To think a train is not a playground

[lastqueenofscotland]

Travelling home for Christmas woes!
Booked a train well in advance, two women with 6 children between them get on. Firstly they haven’t reserved seats (long haul train) and are quite shitty when people aren’t willing to give up their seats for them.

Then th kids spend most of the journey running riot with the mums just chatting to each other the whole time.
This is literally running up and down the carriage the whole time, including when the refreshment cart was coming down. Playing a game which involved seeing which one could scream the loudest.
Eventually one of them ran into a man and fell over, cue crying, cue mum having a go at him telling him to look where he was going. Man snapped and said maybe if they had bothered to parent their children it wouldn’t have happened.
Mum stops kids running riot but gives man daggers for the rest of the journey.

Why are people this bloody selfish?!

I think statistically the person most in danger from scooters is the rider

@OhWhatFuckeryIsThisNow Oh I've had the other way round too - people who are just completely intolerant of kids. I was pregnant and travelling alone with DS then 2.5. I deliberately booked into the family carriage of the Eurostar but for some reason so had a middle ages couple. They'd bought a huge picnic from M&S, including wine which they obviously intended to enjoy in a quiet environment on the train. All the other kids on this particular train happened to be peacefully sleeping babies. Fortunately my DS was actually uncharacteristically calm that day - we were just looking out the window and pointing out "interesting" (to a two year old) things in a normal, quiet voice. This couple shot me daggers the entire journey, made theatrical sighing noises every time DS spoke, passive aggressive comments "does he really need to point out every sheep?", "why can't parents control their children any more?". I decided to kill them with kindness shot them lovely smiles, had DS wave to them as we left!

People might not die because of kids on scooters but they are probably annoyed by them, people want to nip into the supermarket and nip out again not have to weave around scooting kids as if it's a playground.

Scooters are a minor inconvenience in the scheme of things

Scooters are not a minor inconvenience when you are carrying a box of wine to refill a shelf, or pulling a heavily laden trolley and a child on a scooter comes towards you at speed and you have to try to get out of their way

I imagine that in any collision I, as the supermarket worker, would be the one apologising/getting the blame.

I used to work in a museum.

Kids hurtling through the museum seems to be the norm now 🙄

So masterandmargarita why don’t you come into the supermarket on your bike? I’m sure you’d get round a lot quicker.

And everything’s a minor inconvenience compared to other more important things, but this is a thread about badly behaved parents (I didn’t write that by mistake by the way) not world politics. Unless you have mobility issues there isn’t a reason to be using wheeled transport in a supermarket.

Mrs f - I just don't understand why people get so riled up about them. And no my kids don't have them.

My mum knew an elderly gentleman... he was walking along a station platform when a young kid hurtled in to him with their scooter, causing him to have a bad fall and was hospitalised. He passed away from complications several weeks later. No, scooters are not a minor inconvenience.

Stick your foot out, works a treat.

a scooter comes towards you at speed and you have to try to get out of their way

Do you? Smashing into a load truck might teach them a lesson.

Bikes kill, cars kill, even recently rollerskaters kill! These are all accidents. It just seems a bit mean spirited to constantly complain about kids on scooters. I fully accept I may think differently when I'm old and infirm, right now I'm nimble and light footed.

This annoys me in supermarkets. We were in Tesco on Thursday and there was a girl about 12 literally dancing about in the aisles. High kicks, pirouttes, with not a care in the world for whether she was in anyone's way or endangering herself or anyone else. She was with a man who seemed either not to notice nor care, either.
lt wasn't just that one occasion, either. l used to go to a big Asda and it was like the Kids from Fame in there. Doesn't it occur to the parents that when people are negotiating heavy trolleys (particularly at this time of year) it's not always easy to stop or swerve if some would be terpsichorist prances right in front of them?
Then who gets the blame if your trolley and said child collide? l once saw two very elderly grandparents failing miserably to control their three very small grandchildren who were running riot. One of the little ones ran round the corner and straight into my trolley, and of course screaming and mayhem ensued. l felt obliged to point out that at the time, the trolley wasn't actually mobile as it was four feet away from me while l was struggling to reach something from a high shelf.
lt's not helped by mums (it's usually mums) glued to their phone screens while the kids treat the supermarket aisles as a kind of ad hoc playground. l've seen (and heard) small children wailing plaintively, wandering up and down the aisles, clearly separated from whichever parent they're meant to be supervised by. Usually the parent is aisles away, blissfully unaware (how, l don't know - don't they care where their small, vulnerable offspring are?) of the banshee like howling?

Those saying scooters are ok, are you saying it's ok to use them indoors in shops etc?! Surely not. As I think everyone agrees, the effort the parents are making is the big thing. I brought almost 3yo ds on a train when heavily pregnant. Books, snacks, stickers etc but the journey back and forth was easy because of two friendly women each time, who talked to us, rolled his cars back and forth etc and were generally kind. In turn he was polite, good humoured and quiet.

@anitagreen

I did a combination of the following:

1. Lots and lots of exercise. Beach, woods, playground. Just tonnes. Like she was an excitable puppy.

1. Counting with consequences, sometimes fairly serious ones. Only to three. Ten was way too many.

1. Working on a really close and loving relationship so she wanted to do what I said.

1. Antecedents. Hungry, thirsty, tired, stressed... don't expect good behaviour if you didn't manage all of those.

1. Reins.

1. Avoiding impossibly difficult situations. I worked out mine couldn't handle things other children could and that expectation was my fault not hers.

1. Very simple instructions. One word is best. "Shoes".

1. Using humour. If I wanted a "please" I would say things like "mummy's arms don't work, aaarrrgggh, they need a please to work". And flop your arms around.

Read 1, 2, 3 Magic and How To Talk So Kids Will Listen.

I’ve just come from tesco’s. Absolutely ram packed

Yet there was a kid around 11-12 with his scooter, scooting around and doing jumps.

Why?!

Isn't 'harridan' a little misogynistic

Synonyms for harridan: shrew, termagant, virago, harpy, vixen, nag, hag, crone, dragon, ogress; fishwife, hellcat, she-devil, gorgon; martinet, tartar; old bag, old bat, battle-ax, witch; scold.

Fuck there are a lot of words for women who don't know their place.

I might get a t-shirt with them all on.

I don't ever see scooters in shops (Ireland), I assume they are prohibited and would expect a staff member to have a word.

was in Tesco and 2 girls were dancing, high kicks, rolling on the floor, Dad beaming at them. Soon stopped when he noticed everyone's scowls.

Also it makes it hard for you to tell your children to sit on their seats or to use quieter voices when they can hear and see others charging about and screaming. Thankfully DS likes books and card games with the Kindle brought out when we get tired of them.

I was returning from hols in August with DH and 2 DCs when the plane about to land and seatbelt sign on couple in front decided to unbuckle child who was around 4 or five and let him lean over to “play with” my two who are tweens DD said I think your supposed to sit down as you might fall.
Woman snapped that DD should mind her own business.
I said that if her child is sent flying when we touch down and lands on us it’s very much our business.
She still didn’t put him in his seat but let him stand between her and partner.
I honestly don’t think some people care how obnoxious there children are.