Tuesday, 19 February 2008
The Pootling Society
Here is the alleged website for the alleged Pootling Society. There is no point going to this website. It is a dormant website. It is a website in the depths of a profound slumber. Worse, this slumber has befallen it even before it has fully gestated. It's no more than a dozen cells in the great internetian womb, and, like the kangaroo (whom I've heard can arrest the gestation of a fertilised ovum until the rain comes and there's enough kangaroo-food to go round, thus ensuring that her youngker won't be born to starvation), the great internetian womb has sent a hormonally coded message to the website of the Pootling Society and told it to stay barely-more-than-gamete-sized until the pootlers' equivalent of rain. Now is the time of rain, Pootling Society! Develop your website into something worthy of my wasted time! I want to pootle, early and often.
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19 comments:
They probably need to drink more prune juice to aid them in their pootling.
Is there an international association of flâneurs you can join instead? "Pootle" is a very inelegant word for the noblest of all aimless pursuits. Indeed, "pootle" sounds more like flânerie with the intent to distribute leaflets.
(And that's true about the kangaroos. And you can grow kangaroo mammary glands in trays. One of the proudest and strangest moments of my life was attending a presentation by my sister and realising that she had been occupying her time in that fashion).
"Pootle" is not an inelegant word! I must protest! Oh, awright, maybe inelegant, but certainly cute. I imagine a wombat pootling, whereas one cannot flanerise unless one is wearing a waistcoat and moustaches - wherein, I think, I prove your point abour elegance. Flâneurs are elegant, pootlers are rotund with a leg at each corner.
Ta for verifying kangaroo theory.
Hmmm...
'Flâneurs are elegant, pootlers are rotund with a leg at each corner.'
Well, that proves it then. Chesterton was a pootler.
I have a number of volumes of Chesterton, but had not bothered to investigate his physical appearance until this moment. John Betjeman probably "pootled", as part his duties as "teddy bear to the nation". I think "pootling" might also involve a snout. It certainly has that suggestion of shuffling about. Perhaps the distinction is in locale as well. One can "pootle" through a flea market or "pootle" through the dells, but "pootling" may be frowned upon in Paris. Pootling is flânerie's country cousin.
Kangaroo theory only tenuously verified by my memory and comprehension of a quite distant conversation, I'm afraid.
It's a well known fact that Chesterton was a part-time cherub. I suspect Steinitz was a pootler, but the evidence on that is not definite.
PS This picture, showing Chesterton tenderly ministring to his flock, is really quite good. Vive la Pootlers!
I was going to ask what a Pootling was. It sounded like a kind of cross-breed to me - a poodle and a ... what?
A simple google closes in on the mystery further. That cheerful little chap is obviously the standard against which any would-be pootler must be measured.
A very charming photo of Chesteron and you are also bringing me round to seeing the virtues of the word "pootle" itself.
You could try sending them an email to see what they're up to (does the address actually work?)
Thanks, Anon. That's a tip-top idea. I'll commence a correspondece with pootling.org later today. If it's okay with all you pootle-theorists up there, I'll share some of your observations.
G. K. Chesterton was remarkably productive for a pootler, but there you have it. It takes all sorts.
I find this word offensive.
But the blonde looks good.
Offense noted. I'll look into the viability of anticipating all future uses of the word pootling with a warning, e.g., "As I was [NB to RH: I am about to use the word pootling] pootling along, I chanced upon a box of apple Danishes."
I see they like to pootle by the sea. Unlike Mr. Pooter. who stuck to Upper Holloway.
I wait with bated breath for the results of your pootling correspondence. And who could resist pottling beside the seaside, where the brass bands play "tiddly-om-pom-pom" (or however you spell it!)
I don't know what Pootling is, but I think you'd be fascinated by Boontling, a language that was spoken in an area just north of where we live.
That's brillig, that is. Thanks, Cloots. I'd take up Boontling right now, only it might impede my overweening quest for social acceptance in the 'Bourne.
Dear Alexis, further to our email exchange in February/March, and my horror this evening upon realising that fellow pootlers around the globe are feeling left out in the cold by the lack of a living breathing Pootling Society, may I humbly direct you hereto avoid further chills. Yours delightfully, MP.
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