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When asked whether children
recognize him from his role as Flik in A Bug’s Life,
Canadian comedian Dave Foley said something along the lines of,
“No. Children are surprisingly stupid.” This quote ran through
my head as I yelled at an oblivious ten year-old girl, who quite
possibly was about to get her teeth knocked out by my wife’s
foot.
This scene occurred in the
southern Okanagan Valley, billed as Canada’s only desert. This
vestigial toe of the Sonora looked like a fraud because of its
abundance of water, but a number of sources confirm that it is
an actual desert. The valley is full of vineyards and a large
lake and during our visit it was humid and rainy. Nonetheless,
amidst the greenery and tourist signs adorned with drawings of
cacti, we did see the stray dry-ish patch, here and there.
We chose a hotel on the
lake that boasted a 250-foot waterslide. It was an impressive
looking corkscrew slide with a warning that read, “Caution!
This ride can cause serious injury. Riders must obey all posted
rules. THIS IS A THRILL RIDE.” Only one of the thirteen
children in the pool was following more than half of the posted
rules, which made my inner lifeguard antsy. I was very
disappointed that their parents didn’t enforce the rules, in
spite of occasional collisions, so I will take this opportunity
to list and analyze the eight posted rules, in the hope that I
can alter future waterslide behavior.
Water Slide Rules
and Analysis
1) This is a thrill
ride. Do not ride the slide if you are pregnant or have a heart
condition. This is sound advice, but the rule is wordy and
therefore should be placed farther down in the list so that
slow, impatient readers have a better chance of reading more
pertinent rules before their minds wander. Also, I think the
rule-makers have damaged their credibility by repeating the
“This is a thrill ride” line. This may cause some clever
children to think that the rules are farcical.
2) Feet first only
down the water slide. The far wall of this particular
water slide is too close to the chute, making it possible for an
efficient, streamlined rider to strike the wall with force.
It’s best, therefore, to avoid head-to-wall collision by riding
feet first down the slide. Even without the danger of the far
wall, I advise against head first sliding. As I told my wife
when she tried to perpetrate this dangerous maneuver, “Come on,
feet first is fun!”
3) Wait until the
previous rider is clear of the slide before riding the slide.
I would make one small adjustment to this rule. By changing
“clear of the slide” to “clear of a two-meter radius from the
slide.” In the US, this could say “two-yard radius.” This new
wording might need to be tested by a marketing research group,
in case some children become confused by the term “radius.”
4) No trains.
The theory behind this rule is sound, but is covered in Rule #3
and therefore repetitive. Also, it presupposes that the reader
knows the slide-riding connotation of the term “train.” On its
own, this rule may make train-loving children sad—the ones that
own conductor hats that cover their ears and $500 Thomas the
Tank Engine sets—so any specific reference should be eliminated.
5) Wait at the bottom
of the stairs until the previous rider exits the slide.
This is a more draconian version of Rule #3. It is a prissy
rule that even I didn’t follow.
6) Do not wear jewelry
or watches. Wearing jewelry or watches on the slide can cause
serious injury. I like the tone of this rule because the
forms of serious injury are left to the imagination,
particularly for shockingly pierced individuals. This gives
slide riders pause to think about their actions.
7) After finishing the
ride, move immediately to the side. This is perhaps the
most important rule. More on this rule in a minute.
8) Riders must be at
least 48 inches tall. There are several problems with this
rule. First of all, savvy, mature children who follow all other
rules can safely ride the water slide, as long as an adult
ensures that subsequent riders follow Rule #3. It is unfair to
rule out slide riders solely based on height (it's downright
heightist, in fact). Also, in the future, Canadians unfamiliar
with the US’s archaic measurement units may become confused by
the reference to inches. Lastly and most importantly, some
riders under 48 inches may not be able to read, although this is
not necessarily a function of their height. If the height issue
is important to the rule-makers, they should create a cute
mascot that does not infringe on any cute mascot owned by Walt
Disney Company. This mascot could serve as a visual reference
to the minimum height requirement. A prickly-pear cactus with a
sly grin and an exaggerated wink would be a good choice to
convey the mixture of fun and peril that results from breaking
this rule.
I was concerned about what
would happen when I rode the THRILL RIDE. My body is massive;
my cobra shoulders, corded thighs and tree-trunk calves could do
serious damage in a watery crash. My concern also arose
because—as my wife is quick to point out—when it comes to thrill
rides, I am a “lame ass scaredy-cat dork.”
When my wife and I climbed
the stairs to the top, I felt the other adults eye us
suspiciously. We’d seen one other adult briefly ride the
slide—a large tattooed man, who was clearly a former hockey
player—but there seemed to be a tacit agreement that the slide
was for children and if there was colliding to be done, it
should occur between bodies below 60 pounds—27 kilos, if you
will. I imagined myself barreling into the former hockey
player’s daughter, prompting him to pummel me in a very Canadian
way. The massive body, cobra shoulders, et. al. are not
accustomed to this.
Accordingly, I had my wife
make sure that there were no children near the bottom of the
ride. I instructed her to exceed the two-meter radius—suggested
in my comments to Rule #3—in order to make certain that I
wouldn’t endanger any children. Assured that all was safe, I
entered the slide.
The slide was dark and
twisting. It took a half-dozen seconds to pass through the 250’
corkscrew before I catapulted out the bottom. During those six
seconds, I envisioned children making last-second mad dashes
into the mouth of the slide and worried that maybe Lynn hadn’t
noticed that the pudgy teenager had decided to climb into the
chute and up the slide. For me, this was a THRILL RIDE. I’m a
little chagrined to say, though, that I broke my momentum with
my elbows, causing me to make a pathetic, slow-motion plop when
I exited the slide.
Lynn’s turn was next: she
wanted to go FAST! After she dutifully waited for me to clear
the two-meter radius, she “whooped” through the corkscrews and
shot out of the slide, knifing through the water to the far
wall. After our first rides, the children seemed to become more
squirrelly, perhaps because we’d infringed on their turf, so I
declined a second run. Lynn was game for more, so I decided to
police the pool for her next trip down.
In line before her was a
pale, milquetoast girl, about six or seven years old. She was a
chronic rule-bender, who was oblivious to both the letter and
spirit of the posted rules. She may have been the daughter of
the ex-hockey player, but if so, she likely was not his favorite
daughter. Anyway, after exiting the slide, this young lady
feigned movement to the side of the pool. Seeing the area
clear, Lynn decided to go. After she disappeared down the gut
of the slide, the girl meandered back to the chute and stared
into the shadows.
“Excuse me. Move please,”
I yelled, waiving my well-apportioned arms at her. This was
wholly ineffective, so I countered with, “Get out of the way.
Watch out.” Her eyes were dull, devoid of any acknowledgement
of my cries or the poor decision-making skills that had led her
to stick her head directly under the chute. There was no
flicker of recognition in her eyes when she abruptly decided to
move, just as Lynn shot out like a torpedo. I know because I
looked carefully. In fact, she didn’t seem to notice at all
that Lynn had almost knocked her silly. She had the case
history of a Rule #7 re-offender.
By the way, if you stay at
a hotel with a water slide, get up early or ride the slide
during lunch or dinner hours. Make the most of your one
advantage over the children: you don’t have to get out when
your mother says so.
Copyright Jeff Lewis, 2004. |
