Well @backinatracksuit . What did you do?
As @flutehook says McGonagles was on South Anne Street it was demolished and the buildings that were rebuilt and house Hackett and Magee and Monaghan Cashmere replaced it.
Does your wife own the running track?
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He took their ball, dropped it about 30 feet from the jumpers they had down for goal posts and equisitely curled it around the four lads staring at him weirdly and into the corner just past the diving goalie. Then he ran after Karen jumping for joy.
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Sorry, I forgot
First of all I remained very calm throughout, in my line of business it isnât a good look or tactic to lose the head with kids.
I stopped and looked over, âwho said that lads?â, there was 5 of them, 3 looked very embarrassed, âwe didnât say anythingâ says one of the lads, âI heard what you saidâ
Anyway one of the lads gets brave, âwhy donât you chill broâ
So I said, again very calmly, âlads will ye just move the bike off the running pathâ
Whoâs gonna make us,
I might just pick it up and throw it over the wall, says I.
So then all hell breaks loose with one of the lads, another backing him up.
âGet out the phone and record thisâ, none of them took out the phone
So I picked up the bike and moved it, yer man is losing his shit.
So I jog over to meet my wife, when we get back one of them hits the ball in our direction, goes over our heads, and the bike is back on the path, Iâve been explaining to my missus so she picks it up and starts cycling it, so you can guess what happened next,
The two lads going crazy, weâre telling them to just move the bike, and theyâre all âwhat are you gonna do about itâ
And thereâs the nub, what can you do about it? Youâre completely powerless and the young lads knew that, fair play to them.
So I was raging inside for a few minutes, they did leave the bike off the path in fairness.
Afterwards I was wondering did I do the right thing or not, so I posted it here.
Iâm sure sone people will make assumptions and Iâll be hearing about this for years but thatâs what happened, since you asked
We went around the track another few times and each time a ball would miraculously end out being fired on our direction.
If it happened again I donât know how Iâd react, but there you go
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She only asked them to move the bike, itâs muddy, youâd rather not be inconvenienced, elderly people walk around the track, itâs not actually a running track
You were identified as a sap and they went looking for a reaction.
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Did you think you were in the classroom?
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I was on a hurling field
Maybe you have a point and my profession did guide my reaction, but I donât know
Thatâs why I asked, I wasnât sure if my response was typical or not.
I am used to dealing with kids but the sense of powerlessness was unusual, but I was very calm. And I havenât thought about it since, water off a ducks back.
We always give out about society falling apart but then cheerlead lads who would speak to a Middle aged woman like that,
Not sure its right to touch other peoples property like that. Sticks and stones.
For what itâs worth I would have given the bikes and the kids a swerve. Very little to be gained taking on groups of kids of that age. They donât tend to be rational actors and if things escalate youâre the one who will end up in trouble.
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He did the right thing. Heâs a teacher and canât be getting embroiled in something so trivial. Had it been me I would likely have danced the spokes in to the fucking ground. Grrrrr.
Have you anger issues?
I donât think Iâd have said anything to them about the bike. Unlikely a group of teenagers would take kindly to being told what to do.
Itâs a narrow running track and loads of people use it to walk, you are Indeed pushed into muck unless it was the near side which you have footpath to swerve onto⌠In saying that your wife probably should have asked would they mind moving the bike instead of barking at them. Teens need very little to get their back up, which played out here. Thereâs always bravado with groups of lads also. It doesnât mean you tiptoe around them but thereâs a way to approach it.
But since you were gone balls deep into it, you probably should have picked the bike up and fucked it at them and started screaming all sorts of incomprehensible nonsense at them and rightly put them on the back foot as a lunatic not to be messed with. The cunts smell weakness a mile off.
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Itâs hard to put it in words, she didnât bark, her tone was very friendly, she wouldnât be the Barky type,
Thereâs nothing you can do, he was right, what could I do? You canât give him a dig,
When I was a kid youâd get a kick up the hole, and if I told my folks what happened Iâd have got a few more kicks up the hole.
Iâm not sorry or embarrassed by anything, it would have been easy to ignore it but it all happened in an instant,
To you maybe but she might sound that way to others.
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Across the road from Kehoeâs and back a bit on the Dawson Street end.
There was fairly little to do after 11pm or so in Dublin in the mid 1980s â bar the Leeson Street craic, which obviously was not our type of scene for every sort of reason. So McGonagles gigs, as I recall, were great as well for the club/disco afterwards, because there were very few options for post pub fun at the time. âFree Nelson Mandelaâ was usually played at least twice, if memory serves.
Am still extremely envious of someone I knew back then who had seen The Teardrop Explodes in McGonagles. But I at least got to see Fugazi, My Bloody Valentine, Sonic Youth and a big amount of less memorable nights. Fatima Mansions and Inspiral Carpets were okay. I remember a double bill of The Shamen and Spacemen 3, which I was not keen to attend, as awful.
Therapy? in The Baggot Inn â their first gig in 26 Counties â was a great one.
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Look, I was there, and I know her very well, sheâs well able to bark if she needs to, but this wasnât a situation like that, she said it loudly enough for them to hear but the tone was very calm.
Anyway it doesnât even matter, you shouldnât speak to anybody like they did, theyâre not heroes