Monthly Archives: October 2004

It seems kids these days are missing out on physical exercise which has the result of turning lots of them into roly-poly, Billy Bunter-esque fatties. A reason that has been given is that schools are afraid of litigation so strenuous physical games have been banned from the playgrounds. Now the kids just slump around sending text messages to each other.

Schools have banned skipping ropes, hula-hoops (the toys not the fattening deep fried snack) and in some cases even running in the schoolyard is not allowed. Add to that the thought-free Findus chicken and oven chip dinners most kids are dished up and it’s no wonder the children of Ireland are turning into little Sumo wrestlers.

When they play now they play with Playstations and computers. Back when I was a kid we used to go out all day to play. In the summer holidays the first game of football would start around 10am, and the games would continue until we couldn’t see any more (either from dog-poo in our eyes blindness or nightfall, whichever came first). When Wimbledon was on we’d play tennis, when there was cricket on we’d play cricket (with our wooden tennis rackets with those bendy blue and white strings as the cricket bat), and if there were girls hanging around sometimes we’d play rounders so they could join in.

When sports got a bit tiresome we’d play games like bulldog. You start with 10 kids, for example, 9 on side of the kerb, 1 in the middle. Then all 9 kids would run at once to the other side of the road with the kid in the middle trying to stop them. If you got caught you joined the kid in the middle. After a while it would be 5-5, then 3-7 until eventually you were left with 1 against 9. Being amongst the last few your chances of injury were heightened considerably. It wasn’t uncommon to see bloody noses, swollen lips and sprained ankles.

I remember one game when there were 2 of us left and about 11 in the middle. Just me and another little lad called Shane. We’re standing on the kerb getting ready. The kids in the middle are telling us how badly we’re going to get hurt and there’s no way we’re going through. Shane was a little bit mad. I once saw him try and kick the shit out of a lamp-post after he’d run into it headfirst playing football. Anyway, he took off at a rate of knots, screaming at the top of his lungs.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRR-urkkkkkkkkkk – he went. Two of guys in the middle had clotheslined him, catching him right in the throat. He lay gasping and choking on the ground so loudly they all forgot about me and went over to check. It was one of my finest victories ever and for about a week afterwards Shane’s voice sounded exactly like Bonnie Tyler’s singing. Everyone thought he was cool though.

We used to show off our injuries like medals. I once slipped off my bike and gashed my thigh, I still sport the scar to this day. Peter used to get nosebleeds all the time. At first he was kind of freaked out by them but in the end when it started bleeding he wouldn’t even hold his head up and pinch. He’d let the blood run down his face and chase after smaller kids or girls.

Then there was Carl. We all used to play up this side road near our houses. Quite often we’d be playing football and there’d be a call of nature meaning you had to go back home to use the toilet (this is when sitting on the toilet was required, the woods beside the football pitch were perfect for taking a whizz), but Carl never wanted to stop playing. So when he badly needed to go for a poo he’d get down on one knee, almost like the way you’d kneel for royalty, and he was convinced this would push the poo back up and let him play on for longer. This worked even when he had a turtle’s tail. One day he did it too often and went home complaining of stomach cramps. We didn’t see him for a few days after that and it turns out he had some kind of poisoned bowel.

Anyway, the point is none of us were fat. That’s because we went outside of our houses. We didn’t have mobile phones for parents to check up on us. We left, we came back, we left again, to no great schedule. It’s a shame that today’s media has turned the world into a place that’s apparently not safe for kids to do anything when in reality it’s probably no more dangerous than when we were growing up.

As for the schools banning running, they should be brought to court for being stupid cunts, a new offence which, I believe if added to the justice system in Ireland, would see prison overcrowding become a massive problem but would make our towns and cities better places to live.