Baby children, adult dogs and teenage girls - got to love them

There! That's a title that will get someone's attention thinking that I've gone off the deep end. But not so. Well, at least not in that way. I went off the proverbial deep end in other ways years ago; I am the father of four children.

Why should one love this particular trio? What do they have in common?

At this point, I think we'll break out into a Monty Python moment and start singing "he's going to tell, he's going to tell"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2Y7_1dILlQ


"No singing!"

The one thing they have in common is that they will diss you like no-one else. Watch an adult who is "good with children" trying to get the attention of a baby. If they don't offer food or whatever form of entertainment is attractive to the infant in that 20 second slot of their attention span, the baby will dismiss them with a look; a look that conveys all the contempt of ... well an adult dog or a teenage girl.

Baby dogs just want to play. Anyone's a friend if they are happy to wrestle and don't mind bone-deep puncture wounds from hypodermic teeth. Adult dogs are over all that. If you're not offering food, a stick or a humping opportunity, you'll get the a glance, a blink and the head will turn away in search of someone who just has something more to offer the company at this point in its development.

I'm not even going to pretend to know what it takes to avoid the explosive sigh of disgust  (is there a word for that? If not, there should be) and turning of the head from teenage girls; they are beyond mysterious. And I say that with a degree of current competency in the area - my daughter's 15 this year. And, yes, I own a shotgun, a rocking chair and a supply of grass stalks to chew on.

These don't sound like loveable qualities. Can you imagine the nightmare of a job interview conducted by a panel of teenage girls? You wouldn't get past your carefully prepared, corporate-wank-word-rich introductory remarks before you got the explosive sigh, a maliciously directed chew of the gum - in your general direction - and an excellent view of the sides of their heads.

But at least you know where you stand with them. They like you or they don't and you know it. As a grown adult - or at least someone masquerading as one - I'm not allowed to do that. When someone is explaining their moronic opinion to me or presenting me with a train-wreck on paper masquerading as a set of plans for their dream house, I'm not allowed to just blink and turn away. I have to pretend interest. And they have to figure out, from the little hints in my body language and the slightly sarcastic nuance in the way I say "that could work" that there's an implied "if the laws of physics were fundamentally different" and a "please stop talking now!" in my responses.

And, if you're a bit deficient in the people-reading department (in fact, given to confusing one person's face from another a fair bit of the time), this is a nightmare. Apparently it's a skill most people evolve naturally as they grow up - no need to make it another one of those things that teachers have to cram into their precious hours of classroom time - but, if it's something you have to do consciously, then you wind up with your eyes darting all over the place - like a 15 year old boy's at a Free The Nipple parade - trying desperately to find the little hints and tips that tell you to stop talking because, apparently, most people tire of the effects of relativity on GPS satellites after only 15 minutes.

People are so strange!

PS: How about "Hofell (n) The sigh or grunt of disgust emitted by a teenaged girl when the thing or person in her contemplation is just not cool or interesting enough.