● Lady Percy moves me - might she move you? CLICK TO FIND OUT
● Plus my novels, stories, verse, vulgar interests, apologies, and singing.
● Most posts are 300 words. I respond to all comments/re-comments.
● See Tone Deaf in New blogger.


Thursday 25 July 2013

To which I plead guity

From time to time I am able to make VR laugh and that, as much as anything else, has helped promote my acceptability for a half century.

But there are lapses into what VR calls my "public schoolboy sense of humour", frequently to do with body secretions. Her judgement always brings me up short since I am unable to see myself as a true alumnus of a public (ie, private) school. Even though it's partly true.

However the temptation is never entirely suppressed. Having bought Lid-Care wipes online I now receive spam from the supplier. The website is divided into predictable sub-sections: Medicine, Toiletries, Vitamins and - intriguingly - Embarrassing. I could no more resist a click at venture than voluntarily stop breathing.

The label was short for embarrassing symptoms and listed specifics which could be ordered by name rather than description. These include products claiming to reverse hair loss and over-the-counter solutions to impotence. Neither remotely funny, though my grab-bag was moderately enriched by “itchy anus”.

Our local pharmacy has a consulting room. My favourite pharmacist, Frances, a tiny, rather gay woman dressed in black, her accent the quintessence of Welshness, likes to eliminate the solemnity from her offerings. In particular (see pic) toe-spacers ("You could make yourself a fortune," she joked in response to my description.) Would I dare admit jock itch to Frances behind the frosted windows?

I dare say I’d falter. But there's a short story there.

WIP Hand Signals. "Outside, on the moped and within the vault of her crash helmet, Francine had time and privacy to consider a truer account of how she and Martin Ibanez had parted. Below, the 50 cc engine crackled inoffensively and traffic was light; for once she wasn't required to be totally alert ... "

4 comments:

  1. I am intrigued by Francine.

    Is Out of Arizona in print yet?

    ReplyDelete
  2. The Crow: Just dropping snippets about her for the moment. Mainly descriptive; no clues to the plot. This is because something horrific happens to her at about 10,000 words (out of 16,000 written) and her life changes completely.

    Out Of Arizona not published yet because I haven't managed to force myself to look for an agent, I've preferred to write. However you've jogged my arm and I shall start huckstering this very afternoon.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I am intrigued by lid care. Could you work it in to the novel?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Joe: Lid Care is a soothing agent for sufferers of the incurable eye ailment, blepharitis, mentioned in Tone Deaf a few months ago. Blepharitis is a disfiguring plague, oozing a sort of yellow pus out to the periphery of the eyelids where it dries into a crust. When it is in full flow and I am faced with a social occasion (eg, the French lesson) I am compelled to wear shades.

    I love all my main characters far too much to inflict them with anything like that.

    ReplyDelete