Wednesday 23 April 2008

Zut alors!

The blog and I, we've been spending a bit of time apart lately, seeing other websites, avoiding eye contact. But, y'know, as a great man once said (I think it was my sister), abstinence makes the heart grow fonder, and I am back, on bended knee, offering up sweet nothings in parentheses and a heartfelt pledge to try harder in the future, especially in the mastering of html.

Meanwhile, the Visigoths have mashed Western Civilisation As We Know It into a cultural purée alarmingly suggestive of textured vegetable protein.

Firstly, Connex had the temerity to replace the "Snailway Crossing" sign in my street with something that reads "Railway Crossing". Philistines. Philistines who marginalise nematodes, moreover.

Secondly, I received a letter from a place of higher learning. "Dear Dr Harlot", quoth the letter, "Thank you for your acceptance of our invitation to act as an examiner of the project submitted by –– for the award of –– of ––." Naturally, the receivance of such an invitation signals the high-point of my life thus far. Truly, said I to self, Thou has reached the high-point of thy life thus far. But what, prithee, is the deal with all those nouns? Don't get me wrong, some of my best friends are nouns – piglet, asafoetida, elbow – but your acceptance of our invitation to act as an examiner? "Thank you for accepting our invitation to examine", mayhap? This kinda hypernominalisation will only end in tears, I tells you.

Then the final blow: I received the prize what-I-won in the G--------d story competition, and it included a bottle of Hair Removal Crème (crème, note, with two ees and an acute, not dowdy old unaccented cream). This Hair Removal Crème promises to chemically burn the poor wee hairlets from a person's personal arenas of hirsutitude. Fortunately, I've been in the market for paint-stripper, but still, what excuse for a magazine sends out vials of Crème D'Acide to persons who may or may not be body-hair-conscious fourteen-year-olds with skin allergies? It's a good thing they threw in a tube of watermelon lipgloss, is all I can say.

And that, citoyennes, has been my week. My time has been entirely taken up with witnessing these abominations unto nature, except for the brief juncture wherein I signed myself up as a fan of Sigmund Freud on Facebook (a mistake - my fingers slipped), and the odd moment or two spent marking and/or avoiding marking my pile of essays.

It's good to be back.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Obviously, in your enthusiasm to be an examiner, you have begun the task of examination a little early (which makes me fear for poor ---, who may be subjected to a degree of rigour she had not anticipated). They only need change "acceptance" to "accepting" and it reads more easily to my ear. In any case, it is certainly a milestone and hearty congratulations are due.

As for hair depiliation, this seems to be a perpetual bugbear. I'm always disturbed when I see children who have had their eyebrows professionally plucked- as if a ten or eleven year old doesn't have better things to think about! Because I am getting old, the things which annoy me as of this moment are: young men wearing misogynistic T shirt slogans concerning their alleged sexual prowess, young men urinating in public and the way the Annandale hotel seems to have become a vast billboard for an especially pernicious manufacturer of alcohol.

Alexis, Baron von Harlot said...

I'm sure the eyebrow thing will pass. It can only be a matter of time.

Anonymous said...

When I was getting my hair cut last week, there was a sign advertising eyelash lengthening (!). Can you imagine how neurotic you would have to be to be worried that your eyelashes were too short? It won't pass, it's an ongoing race to the bottom.

Alexis, Baron von Harlot said...

Sorry - I don't mean the disease will pass; I just mean that the particular symptom that is compulsory eyebrow plucking will pass.