I called it the episode of the teenage telegraph.
I was once in line behind a mother and her teenage daughter in a huge warehouse style retail store.
The mother turned to her daughter and said, "Go get your brother and tell him to come up here."
At that, the daughter, about a yard in front of me, turned and yelled at the top of her lungs, "MOM SAID TO GET UP HERE RIGHT NOW!!!" It was like standing in a strong wind... a LOUD, strong wind. I think my hair stood straight back, like in a cartoon... I had more back then, by the way
I guess I was probably like that when I was a teen.
Had my own interpretation of instructions... and proper behavior.
Totally oblivious to others, too... especially grownups.
Can't fault the teenage girl's solution to NOT wanting to bother walking to the back of the store and fetching her "little" brother... having been a little brother to an older sister all my life.
We little brothers CAN be a pain. I was. (Grinning at a couple of memories.)
Anyway, doing the "right" thing, or doing something the "right" way is usually not much harder, and sometimes easier, than, the "wrong" way or thing... as the young lady found out when her mother lit into her, and then sent her to the back of the store anyhoo.
How embarrassing! You could hear her gum snapping all the way to the back, and she STILL yelled at her brother when she found him.
Would have been much easier to do it right the first time. Not as funny a story... no story at all... but easier.
A lot of things are like that.
Donovan Baldwin