Part 5 of something (which is the part that follows the other four parts)

I found a use for the bales (OK - four yards) of lurid georgette. Look at this – it's amazing what one woman can accomplish in the space of one day when she is thoroughly pissed off. 

It's a little quelque chose to drip my make up and nail varnish on.  Actually, I don’t wear nail varnish yet. I expect that’ll be Stella’s next mission – those awful three inch jewel encrusted talons you see on people on American day time TV shows. You know the kind of thing - a bell rings 'Ding dong', and the hostess says 'Who can that be? It’s your wife, Vulvodynia and her sister Syphileesha,' cut to man's horrified face 'who both say you cheated with their best friend Empahzymia. Looks like you got some explaining to do, you dirty dawg!’ But I digress.  

Anyway, back to my rug; I've impressed myself. I have sisters Bernadette and Marie-Claude from the Rheims convent to thank for that; they taught us thrift, inventiveness and self-sufficiency; nowhere better exemplified than in this - two nuns in a shower 'Where's the soap?' says one. 'Yes, it does, doesn't it?' says the other. Who needs a man, right? 

So I sent back the ‘I respect your decision… I’m sorry you feel that way…  Good luck in the future …’ missive, that is to say, same cacola, different day, the reply to which was this:  

Dear Bette,

Thank you for being so understanding. I expect you might consider this a little bit cheeky. You remember we talked about the book I’m writing? The children’s novel? Would you mind reading it for me and telling me what you think? (Did you just hear me gasp at the sheer effrontery, dear followers? I think that you have gone too far, matey! I think that you have you have well and truly pissed on your frigging frites and shat on your poisson, that’s what I think!) I have included it in the attachment.

Well, I had to look at it – I can’t help myself, I read any old crap; I’m the woman who falls down escalators on the tube craning my neck whilst trying to read all the posters that go by. Hell, I even read my train tickets.  It was some cutsie rubbish about a caterpillar which, as many of you no doubt know, is a topic that has been done to death. And it was – well, words cannot describe it really, but they must: shockingly, brain-blisteringly awful. I won’t go into it here; I’ve already divulged the porno content of my previous non-show date, and if I carry on like this, you might think I have no regard for the arts.

But here’s what I discovered about my profile; the section that ought to be removed is where I say a write a bit. Because when the would-be Hemingways see those three little words, they must think I’m being modest, and that really I'm Margaret Atwood and Flannery O’Connor morphed into some kind of literary Mother Theresa. And folks, I know I am gradually (thanks to Stella’s constant interference) becoming a femme fatale extraordinaire, but hello! I write a blog. Duh! I doubt that anyone from here is going to come knocking at my door in the immediate future.  

Still, I just had to have a go at editing his story. I got to the end of page 2 and gave up. Yes, it was that bad. Who (who has got beyond Year 6) gives the chief caterpillar protagonist a nine, you heard me, NINE syllable name and then persists in using it every single time when a personal or possessive pronoun would just as easily do. My creator must be thrashing around in his grave. 

Lessons learned?

• Get excited about nothing.
• Do not plan on wanton sex, especially if frivolous purchases are required. 
•  Don’t assume that the ability to pen more than two sentences in an email is an indication of anything whatsoever in common. (That's the third time for that one now; I must be very, very thick.)  -