BOUNCERS who card for height and not for age are the Major Irritant of the Week.

One day, I asked my then four-year-old twin cousins, 'who's the oldest?' I really meant 'who was born first?'

"A. is," said S. thoughtfully. "She's wearing big shoes, so today she's older."

Sure enough, A. was wearing shoes that gave her a slight height advantage over her sister. The 'shorter twin', S, was using a childish method of age determination practised by millions of adults around the world. Taller equals older.

THIS morning I read an article in The Royal Gazette about teenagers using more sophisticated fake identification cards to get into bars. My stomach sank. Uh oh, bad times coming for short people. Any type of crack-down on identification cards usually translates into a crack-down on the vertically challenged.

There are two reasons young teenagers, particularly girls, get into bars before they are of legal age to drink. One, bouncers all over the world universally use the preschooler's approach to age determination. The short girls get carded while the tall girls often do not.

Second, the bouncers, unless they think the cops are watching, do not care. At many nightclubs (this is based on the two times in my entire life that I have been to one) girls get in free and there is no identification check at all. The bars use the young girls as bait to attract male patrons.

Any new attention paid to identification cards (assuming there is any new attention) will have little or no consequence for teenagers skirting in under the wire, unless the teenager happens to be short. All it will mean is that short adults will be harassed more than usual.

One of my professors says short people have bad attitudes. Yup, I'm the first to admit it. I have a bad attitude. I'm bitter and cynical, because the whole world was designed without me in mind. The people who design cars, pharmacy counters, clothing, chairs, movie screens and theatre seats, simply do not know that there are millions of adults in the world under 5 ft 5 in tall. As far as they are concerned, me and my short brethren, we do not exist.

In fact, the average height of women in the United States is 5 ft 3 in, according to a USA Today columnist, April Holladayat www.wonderquest.com/size-women-us.htm .

Ms Holladay wrote: "According to the US Department of Health and Human Services, the average US woman is 5 ft 3.7 in (162 centimetres) tall and weighs 152 pounds (69 kilogrammes) ...

"The average American woman is tall enough for an astronaut (minimum height, 4 ft 10.5 in) but falls short of the average Miss America winner (5 ft 6.5 in) and is about the same height as the shortest president (James Madison, 5 ft 4 in)."

One of the reasons I don't drink is that it is too humiliating. I have a patch of gray hair, I'm 27 years old, and I still have to fish out my card to order a glass of wine. If I liked to party, my life would be hell. I'd spend most of my "party" time having my identification card dismantled and fending off rude remarks from other patrons who don't like having to share their drinking space with "kids".

Last Thanksgiving my sister and I went to Portland, Maine with my husband and my sister's boyfriend. We decided to go into this restaurant and get some lunch. Upstairs turned out to be packed. We were directed downstairs to the bar area.

After the four of us ordered a round of coca-colas (very suspicious, I know) the man behind the bar came over and asked us to leave. "You have to be over 21 to sit here," he said.

We fished out our cards. There was much mulling over them. The situation was further complicated by the fact that they were Bermuda drivers licences with the day and month reversed.

LOOKING at it the American way - month, day, year - my sister was still under 21 years old. Luckily, the bartender accepted our explanation and eventually went away.

If the Bermuda Transport Control Department could simply write out the first three letters of the month, instead of using numbers it would make life a million times easier for those of us living abroad. Once, I had my identification refused at a bank in the United States because the lady insisted my licence was expired. She read the expiration date as March 9 instead of September 3.

Recently, I was reading about a medical programme in the United States that gives special hormone shots to kids who may turn out to be short (perish the thought). One girl was projected to be 4 ft 11 in when she grew up. With the growth hormones she turned out to be 5 ft 2 in. In order to gain those extra three inches she had to endure years of painful hormone injections.

She said it was worth it, because people have no idea what it's like to be the kid at school who can't reach the drinking fountain.

After I read the article, I thought about what I would say to this kid if I ever met her. Did her parents do the right thing? I don't know. Being short is a pain in the neck (all that craning to look up at people) but it's not that bad. I don't think being shot up with hormones is worth all the pain. If she'd turned out to be 5 ft 6 in, then I would reconsider. It's society that has to change and acknowledge that the average supermodel does not represent the average woman.

It would be nice to see more marketing toward us for a change. My money is just as good as anyone else's. I buy clothes like other people. If there was a 'short and chunky' store I'd buy shares. Short people exist, world. We're here, we have a bad attitude, and if you don't soon start to show us a little respect we'll be cutting you all off at the knee. (We have our ways, Mr. Saggy Socks.)