On Radio 5 the other day there was a phone in based around whether the you of today were any more badly behaved than generations past. The general consensus was that teenagers get a pretty raw deal on the whole, and though many go through disruptive periods of varying degrees, so did all the generations before them. I must say that when I am served by students at Sainsburys they are always polite and helpful, though it is the norm for them not be the same at home as parents tend to get the worst of it. I always find that it is old people who are rude to be honest.

Anyway, I had the perfect opportunity to put to test the attitude of teenagers the other day in rather unfortunate circumstances. I was driving along Beggarwood Lane in Basingstoke when I heard a rather annoying noise from behind me that was a bit like a frustrated Bee, it was a sort of continuous eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeh. When I looked in the mirror I noticed that it was in fact, a motorbike tailgating me about a foot from my bumper.

You don’t have to be a genius to work out what happened next, but I’ll tell you anyway. The lady in front of me stopped to turn right, I braked, and the daft twat hurtled in to the back of my car which I bought six days ago. I was furious to start with because I could have predicted that outcome five minutes earlier, but it became apparent that driving into a stationery car causes injury, and I became concerned for his welfare, though he soon became more concerned that his bike was pretty smacked up, and that he had only got third party insurance.

After he had sat down and calmed down, I took his details as his head had dented my boot, and carried on going about my business. As I gave him a quick nod as I drove away, my mind flashed back 25 years or so, and realised this kid was no different to me back then, he was now facing the consequences of having only third party insurance, and a Father who would call him all the names under the Sun. Anyone who knows me from back then, will remember that I used to fall off my motorbike on a weekly basis. I can remember sliding past a bus on Heath End Road, hitting a pot hole at the base of Gutteridge Hill, and cracking my head on a curb whilst falling off doing an impression of Prince after the film Purple Rain in what was a pathetic, misguided and failed attempt to impress the adorable Yvonne Arlott. (though she still let me take her to see Footloose if I paid) I was a 24 carat A1 tit really, just like the kid who had just rammed in to me.

When I got home, I asked everyone for a “what do I do” comment on Facebook, and in a true show of human spirit everyone (except Mark Cunningham who said do the reverse of what he did to you, put your boot in his head) said let him off as he is only young. So I did, I sent him a text message telling him to forget about the damage to my car, and see it as a harsh lesson that bikes are dangerous, which whilst being a bit patronising was, I thought, a very decent gesture, and one that would be appreciated by a lad that had had a testing, and bruising day.

Did he send me a message back thanking me for helping him out? Did he fuck, not a word the ungrateful little shit, I wish I had taken the more basic Mark Cunningham option now. Kids of today…..no bloody respect, thats their problem!!!