for the love of crap, please please please please PLEASE do not send your underage minor children to the pool. Aside from the fact that it’s against the rules (they have to be 16 to be unsupervised in the pool area), I think they put something in the pool water to make preteen boys become idiots the minute it touches their skin. Because I swear preeteen boys+cute girls to show off for+ pool=they’re suddenly stupid.
If one of their stupid stunts (like taking a running start so they can hit the edge of the pool and do a flying twist leap thing) causes them to get injured EVERY SINGLE ADULT in the pool area will probably be held responsible and as one of those adults, I don’t want that responsability. AND they’d probably raise our HOA dues to pay for a lifeguard. All because you couldn’t be arsed to come down and keep at least half an eye on your kids.
Hey at least you don’t have ducks in the pool like we do. Kids, generally speaking, don’t leave piles of black goo on the bottom when they’re done frolicking in the water.
Get a lifeguard or get rid of the pool. But I agree with the sentiment. We also should have a bank where everybody just throws their money in a big box and only takes out what they put in. It would cost a lot less than those other banks we use.
Yeah, when the OP started talking about “the pool,” I automatically pictured a public pool, with lifeguards and stuff. The OP would have been clearer if it had set the scene a little better.
I’ve never in my life seen an apartment complex pool with a lifeguard. Like the OP’s pool, they had a rule requiring kids under 16 or 17 to be supervised by an adult.
And fuck getting rid of the pool. Why should everyone suffer because a few mouth-breathers refuse to keep a leash on their brats?
I would fully endorse a planet wide law that said unless a pool was lined with lead weighted bear traps anybody who drowned in the damn thing (well their relatives anyway) was shit out a luck regarding any lawsuits. Shit, people, its fucking water and you can drown in it. Its what water does! A no lifeguard sign should be enough. Hell, fuck even that, unless you see a tower with a guy in it and it says in on giant flashing neon sign “LIFEGUARD ON DUTY NOW” use your damn brain and go with the assumption there isn’t one and react accordingly.
Sorry–you’re right. I should’ve set the scene better.
We live in a subdivision with an HOA which had a pool long before we moved in. The pool is maintained with HOA dues. No, we don’t have a lifeguard and we have a “security guard” part time in the evenings and on the weekends once school gets out. Not that the security guard does much aside from sit there and text/talk on their phone.
And yes, it is a liability thing. Thankfully, nobody has (at least to my knowledge) ever gotten seriously injured although I have seen all manner of idiotic behavior taking place.
We’ve had issues since we moved in a decade or so ago with the pool (and by We I mean the HOA, not just me specificially)–vandalism, theft, non-residents breaking into the pool, unsupervised kids of all ages, people bringing dogs into the pool area (another no-no), residents using the pool to hold pool parties for non-residents. You name it, it’s probably happened. Last summer, there was a near riot after the pool was closed for nearly 3 weeks because some idiot had started chipping away at the coping (I think it’s called? Mortar? I have NO idea) on one edge of the pool which caused several large stones to come loose and break off. It took the HOA longer than it should have to get the damage assessed and repaired (which is another rant entirely).
If it weren’t for my kiddo, I wouldn’t go down to the pool at all. He insists on going nearly every single day and I honestly can’t think of a good reason (other than I just don’t want to) to keep him from going there.
Because people can and do win lawsuits against homeowner associations when their children drown in swimming pools. You may wish they didn’t, but that won’t change the facts. Take measures to prevent drownings, or suffer levies against owners to pay to settle lawsuits.
I don’t know about HOA pools, but most hotel swimming pools I’ve seen had a sign posted which read “No Lifeguard, Swim At Your Own Risk” (or words to that effect). Would that be sufficient for legal ass-covering?
Clearly we must fill them all in with cement, and then cover them with latex-free cushioned mats lest an unsupervised child with a learning disability bash his or her tiny face on the floor.
We do have several signs that say “NO Lifeguard–No Smoking–No Alcohol” in both English and Spanish. There is a locked windowbox (don’t know what else to call it) with a corkboard that has a copy of the rules right inside the gate so you can’t miss it.
They do, I’m sure. But it doesn’t always appear to stop the little twerps. We took Slim to SeaWorld last summer and every night when we got back, the only thing we wanted to do was swim in the pool before we retired to our room. Both nights of the trip, the experience was made less enjoyable by hooligans running up and down the SLICK tile (I’m surprised nobody fell and got hurt) and the second night, Stickman nearly had to apply his emergency medical training when a 5 year old decided she wanted to do a cannonball into the “hot tub” (the water was barely lukewarm although it was designated as a hot tub by the signage) and bashed her head on the side.
Her mom WAS present..just not paying attention to anything but her margarita until her pweshush baby was injured.
That’s because it’s hard to keep them. I was a lifeguard for an apartment complex when I was a freshman in college. Turns out that I was a actually a babysitter for all of the cheap parents who barely had control over their little turds. They would lock little Mungo out of the apartment at 8 am (the pool didn’t open till 9 but the [del]babysitter[/del] lifeguard showed up at 8:30) and not let the little turd in till 4:30. The pool had no restroom, water fountain, nor food; so the little shits got pretty cranky and were constantly sneaking behind the pump shed to piss and drink from the hose.
Multiply that situation by an average of 5 to 10 kids each day and that was my life. I got a little bit of supervision/help from some of the parents who would accompany their kids but I felt more like a daycare center than an actual lifeguard.
And there was one mega-brat about 13 years old who would ignore, challenge, curse me about everything. Of course I couldn’t hit him. I could ban him from the pool but he would just ignore me, stay there, run, act up, and jump in the pool.
In desperation I finally gave up, jumped in after him, and “saved” him. I “saved” him on top of the pool, on the bottom of the pool and on all sides of the pool. I “saved” him for about five good minutes.
He ran out of there crying and came back with his very large father. The father asked me angrily if I was dunking his son in the water. I said, “No sir, your son acts up all the time and won’t listen to me. I thought he was drowning so I saved him.”
The father growled and said," Don’t you ever dunk my kid again. If he acts up, do this!" And with that he smacked the kid upside his head with an open hand. After that, the kid was an Angel.
:eek: