Coolness is the Stuff of Fire

A pet peeve: Sometimes, people are so busy trying to be cool, they don’t realize how stupid they're being.

A few weeks back, I was at my college welding class. Actually, “welding camp” would be more accurate. It is this three-day program where students from three surrounding high schools come to the college to learn how to better their welding, while the college students can attend too. Anyway, it went pretty well. Until lunch. As some welding buddies and I ate, we were approached by a high-schooler. This story is completed in two cases.

Case 1: Boy pulls out cell phone. My friend notices that it is melted in a couple spots.
My friend- “Dude, what’d you do to your cell phone?”
Boy- “Welding.”
My friend- “Dude, it’s melted in two spots.”
Boy-(with relish, and not the pickled cucumber kind) “Yup, couldn’t be bothered to move it.”
So he not only knew that it was burning, but couldn’t risk upsetting his perceived welding coolness by leaving it in the classroom. And you know the ironic thing? Welders actually look down on that sort of thing. Burning your personal communications device is commonly regarded as idiocy. It always gets a laugh, but no one truly admires you for it. The real thing to be proud of is burning your clothes, welding equipment, and yourself (now I know why you have so many fingers: spares). Nothing is more satisfying than to be able to point to various burned patches on your clothes and skin and drawl(in a suitably hillbilly accent): “Yeeeeessirreee, that ‘un thar wuz when I wuz weldin’ so perfect, when I cawt fire I cuddent stop, it was lookin’ so purty.”

Case two: After Boy finishes talking, I say (in an optimistic tone), “Well, at least you weren’t carrying a plastic BIC lighter, *chuckle*”
My friend latches on to this, telling a story in which his welding caught a lighter in his back pocket on fire, “Shooting out a flame three feet.” At this the Boy, at this point cooler than a sunbather on the arctic tundra, dramatically pulls a lighter from his FRONT POCKET (let me put it this way. If it’s in your front pocket, it’s toast. Literally), and says (and you could almost hear the hillbilly in his voice), “Like this?”

Sigh.......the kid couldn’t have been over 15. Why exactly did he carry the lighter in the first place? In case of U.S.C.s (Urgent S’more Cravings)?