Confidence Is a Preference for the Habitual Voyeur

It's summer. Supposedly.

Not that the weather is especially summery. But that's a good thing.

Why's that?
Because it's the school holidays, that's why.

“What does it matter to you, anyway? You don't have kids,” you might well say.

It matters to me because I live right next to a park. And living right next to the park comes with consequences when the weather is nice.

Bloody kids.

7- or 8-year-olds who play on the swings and slide, my beef is not with you, so stand down.

My problem is the teenagers who see the sunny weather as an excuse to act like gargantuan tit-ends and who try to take ownership of the park.

If they were in there just playing football or sitting on the grass talking like civilised people it wouldn't be a problem.

What this lot do instead is to play loud, tinny, shit music from their phones – probably some chart shite or European techno or whatever the hell the latest talentless dirge is. Even worse they'll sing along with it too.

And while they're doing this they're knocking back half litre cans of pure-sugar energy drinks and crushing the empty cans on their foreheads before leaving them strewn all over the grass. Along with empty Haribo packets and those large bags of artisan crisps. And supermarket sandwiches that probably weren't bought as part of a meal deal, the reckless, spendthrift fuckers. They try to look menacing, but have all the fear-inducing capabilities of a My Chemical Romance tribute act.

That's the daytime crowd though. When night starts to fall it gets worse.

The music appears to be of an even lower quality, if that's actually possible, the shouting, screaming and swearing is ramped up several notches and the cans of Monster are swapped for Carling or some other terrible cooking lager. There's also always at least one of them drinking something from a glass bottle which is then generously smashed all over the path.

The litter bins are seen as ornaments which can be set fire to rather than receptacles for actual rubbish.

The atmosphere becomes inhospitable and walking the dogs in there becomes something of a Damnation Alley-style gauntlet as these arseholes posture and growl in between bouts of vomiting and arson.

And how much money do kids have these days?

From the carpet of empty pizza boxes and discarded fish and chip cartons that more or less cover the grass every morning, far too much is a decent guess.

But the rain is keeping them all away.

Good.

They'll all be at home Snap Chatting each other genital selfies and rubbing cocaine on their eyeballs, or whatever this particular breed of cunt does these days.

Here's hoping it rains until 1^st September, although the sun is out now and I can hear the sound of approaching pricks.