Thinking Out Loud

This story has been on CNN, FOX, Good Morning America, Facebook and YouTube and countless other news sources, thank you Mr Internet.

The setting, Fairfax County Virginia, for those geographically impaired, Fairfax County sits in the Northern Portion of the state, not much more than 10 miles west of Washington DC proper. Fairfax County boasts having one of the nations most modern school systems and is the nations 13th largest school district.

On January 17^th, the area was forecasted to experience a cold rain, instead they received 3 inches of snow, the school system did not close for the day like many other school districts might have, especially in places further south. I am not sure when the snow started to fall on that date, but using weather forecasts and existing weather conditions at 4am that morning, the authority figure in charge of making the decisions on whether or not to open schools deemed it safe to open schools.

I happened to have attended this very school system and graduated from one of its high schools, I remember plenty of times going into school business as usual when we had 3 inches of snow, I also can remember times when we closed with less. If anyone cares, I graduated class of 1982 from George C Marshall HS.

This incident entails a 17 year old teenager, whom attends Lake Braddock HS, he didn’t feel schools should have opened that day, saying the roads were hazardous. Instead of this kid expressing his concern to his parents, he decides to look up the PRIVATE HOME phone number of the county official whom made the decision to keep schools open and express his disagreement. To his credit he made no attempt to remain anonymous and left his name and phone number in the message he left on the officials home answering machine.

The officials wife heard this message and returned the call, using a strong tone and thoroughly dressed down this kid for calling the official at his home and for bellyaching for schools not having been closed.

Unfortunately, she left the message on the kids voice mail, he in turn uploaded it to YouTube and it spread like Wildfire..

Click Here To Listen To Her Message

Listening to the message, its obvious this lady was pissed and a argument can be made that she should not have bothered to respond the way she did, if at all. A better argument can be made that the official should not have had his private home telephone number listed. But hindsight is 20/20 and its too late.

If you click on the link above, it will take you to YouTube, just look at the comments section, you can tell who the teeny boppers are. They all vilify the officials wife and generously call her a b*tch. There is stronger language used, but these teeny boppers learn cuss words, use them thinking that it makes them into instant adults.

I will say this again, the officials wife should not have bothered responding, instead she should have handed it off to her husband whom could have handed it off to this “little boy’s” parents.

Having said that..

This boy is supposedly a A honor roll student, inferring that he is smart, aside from the fact that teeny boppers think they know-it-all, I am amazed that this boy didn’t know:

• The County provides a official means for their officials to be contacted.
• The County provides offices, assistants and aides for their officials to interface with those they serve.
• The officials house, private phone line do not belong to the county or to him or to his parents.
• That as a minor, he had no business addressing concerns that were in the realm of his parents.

Its clear to me that this so called honor student wasn’t prepared for a test and didn’t want to be at school that day.

Its clear to me that this boy does not know how to respect the privacy of others.

I have seen people defend this boy simply because he dialled a listed number, so what, that listed number was not the official listed number that the County provides for people to reach its officials, its that simple.

If I want to address my concerns over something to my County officials, I will look in the blue pages of the phone book, thats what my tax dollars pay for, but I will not invade the privacy of these people in their homes, unless of course they invite that sort of thing.

There is such a thing as proper channels, perhaps if this boy attends school he will learn this?

In my workplace, we use rolling gray ladders to put up and take down stock on steel racking. The ladders have the first step that pivots up and down to lock it in place and a chain across its entrance that also sports a sign that says employee’s only.

Today a co-worker related to me an incident in which he came upon a little boy whom had ducked underneath the chain and climbed halfway up one of our ladders. He said he asked the little boy to come down, at which point, the boys mother a few feet away swung around and glaringly asked him what was wrong with her son being on the ladder?

WELL DUH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well Mrs Stupid Parent, it would be you taking us to court should your child hurt himself!

Another thing that razes my ire is when parents cart their kids around in the part of the shopping cart meant to carry their merchandise. I recall one incident in which a kid was in that part of the buggy while their parent was chatting with a store associate, the kid wanting some attention, reached out of the cart to grab his parents shirt sleeve, kapowee, the cart overturned, on the way down the child hit his head on a steel pillar. The original store associate had warned his customer about the risk, the parent simply assured him that all would be fine. After the fall, the kid wasn’t hurt to seriously, the steel pillar mitigated the carts fall, a small bump on the head and a bruised ego and a scared parent was the result. Fortunately the parent recognised his own negligence and nothing became of that situation, which could have been alot worse.

I have often approached customers whom had kids in the wrong part of the cart, only to be politely told off.

What is wrong with parents these days?