Debating with James

Most afternoons I head over to Hills Road to see the boys. Part of the ritual is to take them to Coleridge Park, about 1 mile away, with Thomas in the pushchair and James happily scooting alongside. These occasions provide an opportunity for James and me to exercise our shared interest in mad humour. This may include James walking backwards, to the sound of my singing Spike Milligan's classic "I'm walking backwards for Christmas", or "choral screaming" where we both shriek as loud as we can simultaneously, to the alarm of the neighbourhood. Today, we staged a great debate.

It all started when James challenged my description of the rental car, used to ferry Peter Stilbs, and parked overnight in the spare parking spot outside the Callaghan house. "It's not a rental car", said James. "It's a Vauxhall Astra". He triumphantly pointed to the "V" on the bonnet badge. "It's a Vauxhall Astra and I rented it", I replied. "What's renting?" he probed his opponent, seeking my weak spot. "I paid money to borrow it for a couple of days." "How much?" "180 pounds!", I shot back. The debate was well and truly started.

"No, it was 3 pounds", James countered. I stood my ground because grandparents are tough and brook no nonsense from the toddler generation. "Hell, no it was 180 pounds!"

James tried another pitch, upping the ante. "It was one million thousand million pounds." Unfazed, and determined to be resilient, I replied "No it was 180 pounds!" Clearly James needed to move to another gear. He glanced at the Mazda parked on the side of the road and, sensing that he was about to skewer me, said, amidst giggles, "It was three-two-three pounds". Now a granddad really needs to be firm. I was having none of this. "It was 180 pounds."

By this stage Thomas was chortling, sensing no doubt that big brother was just warming up to his game. James, inspired by his source of data on the back of parked cars, was ready for a whole new tack. "It was Peugeot pounds", and then, rising to his new line of wit, "It was Mondeo pounds!". I have to admit, I was temporarily on the back foot, because I had not expected this foray into the use of the whole range of alpha-numerics to describe the cost of renting a car. I decided that keeping the debate simple would be best. "It was 180 pounds." was the feeble best I could do.

James was on a roll now, and his younger brother was almost choking with merriment, gasping for breath between belly laughs. Inspired by his younger sibling's admiration, James was overtaken by moment of transcendental genius. He saw at that instant the means to torment his granddad, a source of alpha-numerics which could not be answered, and one which he knew would once and for all clinch the debate. It was the yellow numberplate on the nearest car, and there were plenty of them in the street whose letters and numbers could be hurled at me. "It was BF34HGX pounds", the obvious absurdity of such a sum of money being so overwhelming that James himself was starting to choke with laughter, though I doubt he could have easily heard himself over the din from the pushchair.

I had only one viable course and that was to press on. "It was 180 pounds." "It was VH26BUW pounds." "It was 180 pounds." "It was JI03TDF pounds." "It was 180 pounds." "It was LP788GUM pounds".......Stretching ahead of me, all the way to Coleridge Park, must have been 100 cars. I was in for a rough ride. I needed a new level of defence. It was taking James about 3 seconds to read the number plates. I reckoned I could read them in 500 milliseconds. "It was not LP788GUM pounds. It was 180 pounds.", and so it went, all 100 cars being thrown into the furious cauldron of debate, me belting out the plates in a slur of syllables, and James getting them read at a faster and faster rate.

I was exhausted and needed a game changer. And so I went for the low blow and started to whistle. James dislikes me whistling and always tells me to stop that. His laughing subsided. He was clearly floored. He looked at me nonplussed. Here was my chance, my moment of truth. Could I ramp up my advantage a notch? The park was by this stage right across the road. There was no pedestrian crossing. I said to James "push the pedestrian crossing button!". He grinned and jabbed at the air beside him,. Immediately I started a "beep...beep...beep.." whistle, imitating the crossing signal. He clasped my right hand and together we crossed the road, me using the left hand to perambulate Thomas. We had made it to the park and James grabbed his ball, ran off across the grass and started kicking.

Had I won the debate? Well, all I can say is that on the return journey James happily scooted in silence, though he insisted on jabbing the air as we stopped beside each road crossing, waiting for me to whistle "beep...beep...beep.." before traversing the road. He seemed to have forgotten the argument. Then his eyes wandered upward to the sign on a lamppost. "Coleridge Road Bus Stop pounds", he said, with a wicked look in his eyes. The pushchair erupted!

I was defeated, well and truly. I had only one decent course of action and that was to honour James accordingly. I swept him up onto my shoulders and carried him home in triumph, warning him that he would need to grip hard if I was to push Thomas as well. His small hands clenched my chin. Losing a debate isn't so bad.

PS: Yes, those are my glasses James is wearing.