Being a kid just dosen't look fun these days

I think we had it good in the nineties, We came just after the "All I got for Christmas was a jigsaw and an apple" phase and just before the "All I got for Christmas was a smart phone to check in on Facebook wherever I am so Mammy doesn't worry that I've been captured by a sex trafficker" phase.
I remember my days around the age of 10 where my imagination ruled my reality. My week was very straight forward, There was school which was long but the time flew playing tag, sports, bullying the girls and sticking gum underneath tables. The social aspect of my week was Hurling training and games every two or three evenings, a fellow child's birthday party or spotting another kid at mass on a Sunday. The rest of the week was "My Time" to be spent however I pleased.
Time in my room was spent with Lego which today is just not the same. Its all themed like Lego City or Lego Dragons etc. In my day I just had a big box of little bricks and no instructions, you could spend all day trying to make something that resembled absolutely nothing!
TV was so much better too, it wasn't something that made you square eyed and thick as a plank. Star Wars and Pokemon were like Cocaine for your Junkie Imagination, video games were much better too. Who can forget Civilization 2, Age of Empires 2 or Pokemon Red? All Strategy games that could be played over and over again.
Outside there was the woods where I could go hunting in search of a fossil or skeletons (Inspired by Jurassic Park) and collect acorns and chestnuts with my cousin but now the woods are chopped down or there's people parked up in a Corolla Van riding.
Any bit of a hill had to be scaled up and down on bikes, go-karts, Skate Boards until our knees could be seen through our trousers but now you will probably die as every hill has a pothole because our County Council workers seem to all have a rare form of leprosy.
Then there was that friend too who you could hang out with now and then, the one who brought cigarettes to school and whose parents seemed so relaxed. We would play with fire and "Grand Theft Auto San Andreas" but now kids don't have that opportunity because parents no longer see "Sure he's in my class" as a good enough reason to trust another 10 year old. Sure he could introduce their poor little boy to Heroin.
I'm glad to have had my childhood when I did. Life is full of stress for poor kids today compared to just a few years ago, they need to speak about three languages in school, know algebra, understand that there not too be racist, know how to unroll a condom and eat their 5 a day by the time their 10. But the main reason there is no time for climbing trees is because they have to get dolled up for their latest facebook profile picture. If Micheal Jackson's private life tought us one lesson it's that Parents should avoid stressing kids and let them mature in their own time otherwise they end up mad as a bag of cats in heat.

You Can't Deny History

After living in Glasgow for two years I have to wonder are they thought history over there? Every night in any given pub in Glasgow if my accent gets heard then I'm likely to get a lecture on politics from some retired council worker who can speak 5 words of Gaelic but claims to be fluent or some Celtic supporter who puts a drop of lemonade in his larger. Its always the same.


A)"Your like our Celtic Neighbors sure I'm half Irish"

or

B)"Them Basterding English, What they done to Northern Ireland"


Ok lets go with statement A first

"Our Celtic Neighbors sure I'm half Irish"

usually this is followed by "where are you from?"

"Kilkenny"

"Is that North or South?"

Ok well if you have never heard of Ireland's fifth largest city well then sir YOU ARE NOT IRISH


And the Celtic neighbors? Thats a good one. There is no proof that the Celts ever settled in Ireland and why would they come all the way from Central Europe to settle on this Bog? Celtic Ireland was basically just a romantic idea coined in the 20th century for tourism.


Statement B) "Them Basterding English, What they done to Northern Ireland"

While England has a lot to apologies for, this is hilarious. You see when Northern Ireland was planted back in the 17 century there was no Ryanair so do you think that the English went out of their way to sail thousands up North to the most rebellious and barbaric part of Ireland? Use your common sense of geography here guys.....

The Ulster Protestants/Presbyterians/Orange Order/Unionists are from Scotland not England! Thats why they call themselves Ulster Scots for crying out loud. So next time your dancing around with your watered down larger signing "Fuck the UDA" it might occur that if you are a Scottish Protestant or Presbyterian that they are your Scottish cousins and you can take them back whenever you want.