Schoolies and toolies

I noticed during the week that a lot of our neighbours were packing up and going away for the weekend.  Now I know why.  It's schoolies time!  The town where I live is the state's premier destination for kids who've just finished high school and want to get away for the week/weekend and write themselves off with booze, drugs and loud music.  It's shit.  Most of the time, my town is the state's premier destination for old people driving Subarus at 80 kph on the highway who feel like a spot of lawn bowls and like to drink really awful coffee.  So as you can imagine, things get shaken up a bit this time of year.

Last night really gave me the pip.  There was loud music, in fact there were loud musics from several different sources, pounding away at 11.  People were roaming the streets shouting and swearing at each other.  Someone threw something onto our roof while we were trying to get to sleep.  This went on until well after 11pm.  This country is stuffed!

I never carried on like that when I was on schoolies.  We used to rise with the sun, do some gentle exercises, picnic in the park, do a spot of horse-riding, then play bridge until 6pm when we would dine in the conservatory and have some poetry readings until the lanterns were turned down by the attendants at 9.

Normally all the to-do wouldn't have bothered me that much, but my Smaller Half has her big face-to-face exam this morning - the dreaded OSCE (Objective Standardized Clinical Examination) - which as my Wise Elder Brother has pointed out is better than a SRTE (Subjective Randomized Theoretical Examination), but only just.  Anyway, she's stressed enough about it as it is, and really didn't need to be kept awake.  I am also stressed about it since it has become apparent to me that although my exam next week should be a bit of a doddle, next year is going to break me unless I change my work habits.

So I lay there trying to get to sleep but also mentally running through an inventory of the house and identifying all of the things that I would like to hit those goddamn schoolies in the throat with.  5-iron, check.  Desk lamp, check.  Umbrella, check.  Philodendron, check.  The list goes on.

The other odd thing about it being schoolies week is that all the toolies turn up too.  That's not really a direct concern to me, but I suddenly became self-conscious about letting people know that I'm not a toolie.  Not that I really look like one, but it's better to be safe than sorry.  For example, I went down to the main street to get my hair cut.  The barber was very laconic so it was a struggle for me to achieve my conversational objectives of letting him know that I live in town and I'm not a toolie, and also that I'm a student so he should give me a discount.  It went a bit like this:

Barber

Hot outside?

PTR

You bet.  Not as hot as last week though.  Here in town I mean.  Because I live here, so I was here last week too.  Now that was hot.

Barber

Yep.

PTR

It's nice and cool in this barbershop.  Much cooler than it would be if I was in my car driving up to university, which I attend on a daily basis in my capacity as a student, which consequently leaves me with only limited discretionary spending power.

Barber

Yep.

PTR

Boy it's crowded in town.  All these out-of-towners coming into town from outside of town.  Not like me.

Barber 

Sigh.  Yep.

I think he got the point in the end.  He only charged me $14, which is the cheapest haircut I've had since 1992.  All the same, sometimes it would be nice to be mistaken for a toolie.  There was a random drug and alcohol screening van on the road into town last night.  When I drove up to it, they looked at me and waved me through.  How insulting - I obviously don't look dangerous enough.  Maybe it was my bumper sticker saying, "I don't know the difference between a direct and indirect inguinal hernia and I'm proud".