[Up With Grups - The Ascendant Breed of Grown-Ups Who Are Redefining Adulthood -- New York Magazine](http://www.nymag.com/news/features/16529/) > Let’s start with a question. A few questions, actually: When did it become normal for your average 35-year-old New Yorker to (a) walk around with an iPod plugged into his ears at all times, listening to the latest from Bloc Party; (b) regularly buy his clothes at Urban Outfitters; (c) take her toddler to a Mommy’s Happy Hour at a Brooklyn bar; (d) stay out till 4 A.M. because he just can’t miss the latest New Pornographers show, because who knows when Neko Case will decide to stop touring with them, and everyone knows she’s the heart of the band; (e) spend $250 on a pair of jeans that are artfully shredded to look like they just fell through a wheat thresher and are designed, eventually, to artfully fall totally apart; (f) This is a great article. I guess it's about people a little older than me (35-ish versus 27 for me) and being NY Magazine it's about people who are more trendy than I'm familiar with but it's interesting. I'm always amazed when I see or hear about trends that both describe me and point out just how out of it I am. I own an ipod, but have never heard of Bloc Party. I like the New Pornographers but don't know who Neko Case is. I wear jeans and tshirts but I bought the Decepticons Transformers shirt I'm wearing to work today years ago because I actually liked the Transformers, not because it's ironic. I'm wearing jeans and Vans but the only way I would pay $250+ for pants is if they came with a supermodel to put them on me every morning and tell me how good I looked in them.

A lot of the stuff in this article seems pretty lame, actually. I listen to my music around Allison and she knows who Johnny Cash is (for the record she likes Walk The Line the best) and recognizes The Hold Steady but I sure hope she gets her own tastes and we don’t like the same stuff. I think it’s only right if the next generation makes up their own stuff and pushes past their parents. I’ll be very disappointed if I like the same stuff as the kids in 10 years. That’ll mean they haven’t progressed, not that I’m a super cool “alternadad”. I’m glad we got Nirvana, Pearl Jam, and lots of rap that my parents didn’t like. They listen to country for pete’s sake, what do they know. :) I don’t want to be skateboarding with Sam, I want him to be hover-jet-skating around his old man and laughing at me for being old and lame. Parents shouldn’t try to keep up with their kids because it’s cool. Parents should do their own thing and if that means shock! horror! you aren’t hip and don’t know who the hot new group is, that’s okay.