Unfiltered Thoughts: Teenagers

So tonight after work I had to go to traffic school to obliterate from my record a speeding ticket. The traffic school was from 6-11 p.m. No joke. My other choice was to go on a Saturday morning, and I’ll be damned if I’m sacrificing half a day of my freedom for the man. But I did get something out of it, which I thought I would share.

Teenagers SUCK. Which makes me Officially Old™. They have this cooler-than-thou attitude, even though they haven’t been around long enough to have developed critical thinking skills enough to distinguish That Which is Cool from That Which is a Fad. They have a totally obnoxious inability to listen and follow instructions. And their oblivious self-absorbed nature fails to recognize that adults might have feelings and thoughts too.

Dude next to me couldn’t have been more than 17, and first thing he says is “How long does this thing last?” I replied, “It’s supposed to go til 11, but from what I hear, if people don’t ask a lot of questions, the instructor might let us out after 10.” So starting at 9:40, he starts packing up all of his shit and sighing loudly and dramatically every 30 seconds in between glancing at his cell phone. By 9:50 when it’s obvious that the instructor still has stuff to say and we haven’t even done our test yet, dude stage whispers, “JESUS! I thought this was supposed to end at 10.” Yeah, buddy. Cuz you’re the only one in this whole room who wishes they were somewhere else and has better things to do. I know I was perfectly happy when the section on school crossings would not end:

Student: “So what you’re saying about school crossings is that we have to slow down?”

Instructor: “Yes because, see, here’s the thing, is that there might be kids,”

Student: “But the sign says stop if Children in crosswalk. What if it’s an adult? I mean, if it’s just the crossing guard, that’s not a child. THEN can we go?”

Student 2: “Yeah, I mean, what if it’s three kids, a teenager, and an adult?”

Student 3: “What if it’s a black kid?”

Instructor: “[Blah blabbity blah]." (Sorry, I couldn’t focus on anything other than how retarded my fellow citizens are.)

Instructor: “Okay. So we answered question number one. Let’s move on to Question Number Two. It’s about the left turn lane.”

Student: “Wait, I have a question. Can we go back to the school crossing for a minute?”

Jesus F-ing Christ, kill me now. But at least I'm not subjecting my neighbors to an obnoxious display of narcissism.