Monday 1 March 2010

Retreat and jelly sandwiches.




Rusty telephoned this morning from Cerne Abbas where he is in retreat.

Retreat from what? I asked him.

From the truth. He replied.

He went on to tell me about a pub in Brinkworth that did a great peanut butter and jelly sandwich (he had had one for lunch on his way down there). I never could understand the concept of that particular Americanism. I told him.

That's rich coming from a native of the land of marmite, he said.

'But i'm a Dutchman rusty.'

1 comment:

headsknowbest said...

I am sorry to have missed Rusty’s visit to Cenre Abbas but at the time I was unexpectedly hospitalised with a nasty case of giantism. The consultant, Richard Frenum (a ‘Dick’ to his wife), concerned himself as if a case of Viagra overdose inflicted by Mickey Finn was in the consulting room before him. Thankfully, he concluded that it was a rare example of phallus impudicus brought on by too close a proximity to a rather smelly stinkhorn. It reminded me of a case of a poor fellow in the late 1940s or was it the early 1950s; a chap from a rather good family, who got horribly horny with a single mum, and was despatched to the Franciscan Friary at Cerne Abbas to lick his wounds and repent. There was reputed to be a ‘little bastard’ but no certainty about who the ‘bastard’ actually was, because there was also a ‘big bastard’ to occlude the morality of this tale. Some commentators were inevitably concerned that ‘bastardy’ might be contagious, or at least heritable. There was, initially, a fearful hush. Contrary to expectations this Franciscan repose fired the penitent up no end and he soon found himself a wife and a small population explosion of children, some disgruntled. It has not been possible, despite the best efforts of a team of dedicated sociologists, to ascertain the extent to which ‘you bastard’ refrained a generation.