Pour yourself a drink, put on some lipstick, and pull yourself together.
— Elizabeth Taylor
Author Archives: WSW
Monday Satire: Postcards from Pyongyang
Welcome, friends!
Regent Holidays — For travellers looking for a truly unique experience, our tours to North Korea offer a privileged glimpse into a secret and propaganda-filled world. As the leading UK experts on North Korea we have worked closely with the authorities since 1985 to develop tours which push the boundaries for tourism.
Part of the fun of a tour to North Korea is to expect the unexpected, so go with the flow and you will be rewarded with an intriguing and memorable holiday.…
15th July
Darling Nicola,
After a fascinating week in Beijing, Daddy and I fly to Pyongyang today. So far lots of “exotic” meals and even a karaoke night. Who’d have guessed your father knew all the words to Livin’ on a Prayer!? The other members of the tour group are calling him “Elvis” Bunstable! Bad luck about the timing of our trip. We’re absolutely crushed to have to miss out on this year’s camping holiday with you and the children. Despite the torrential rains, the mosquitoes and the twins’ stomach flu, we had such a lovely two weeks in the camper van with all of you last year.
Love to James and the children,
Mum and Dad
* * *
16 July
Dear Nic, James and kiddies,
Our group took an “escorted” tour of the demilitarized zone this morning. Bit dodgy. Apparently they haven’t accounted for all the land mines as yet, and Mum was a bit put off by the Kalashnakovs and the dogs. Still, good fun. Stopped for lunch – rice and what I hope was either chicken or pork – in an abandoned munitions hanger. (Add a cold bath and a bit of flogging, and I might have been back in the Royal Navy!) Went on to look at some rather hideous monuments, but had a celebrity sighting! Turns out it was that mad American basketball player Dennis Rodman – not likely to miss a seven-foot Black man in a pink cap, feather boa and lipstick round these parts. No traffic at all on the roads, and you would not believe what these people can do with concrete.
Cheers!
Dad
* * *
17th July
Dear Nicola,
Last full day behind the barbed wire curtain. Went to a parade this a.m. Not terribly festive — just tanks and missiles. We never did find out what they were celebrating, though I can’t say being in the middle of a crowd of under fed, identically dressed, flag-waving Kim fans was particularly jolly. Unfortunately one of our little band of travellers, Mrs. Fenster from London, somehow got separated from the group and ended up in the People’s Security Palace. Luckily they found nothing questionable when they searched her, and the authorities let her go in exchange for teaching them something called a Gang-Nam Style dance (?). Our “bon voyage banquet” is tonight. I’m certainly ready to be back in Shropshire. Your father’s been practicing for his karaoke performance all afternoon.
xoxo, Mum
* * *
18th July
Dear Nicola,
Boarding the plane for Beijing shortly, but I have some rather shocking news, so prepare yourself. Daddy has decided to “follow his star” and remain in North Korea for the time being, abandoning not only his family, but 30 years’ service in the Commemorative Stamp Bureau and his government pension as well. After his rendition of Tainted Love at last night’s banquet, he was approached by representatives for that Rodman fellow, who are recruiting performers for something called a Diggin’ the Worm Goodwill East Tour. Given how poor Mrs. Fenster was violated here, I think your father has gone stark raving mad, but once he zipped up that yellow jumpsuit and switched on the rhinestone microphone there was no reasoning with him. Apparently they’re planning an autumn swing through rural China with a stopover in London on the way to Beirut. He can explain himself to you then, since reaching him in Pyongyang will obviously be impossible. He can do as he likes, but I am coming home. This is one Bunstable the secret police will not be using their filthy hoses on.
Love to all, Mum
* * *
4th September
My dearest daughter Nicola,
What up, Kimmie?!
Day twenty-four in the British Embassy compound. Sending this out in the diplomatic pouch as leaving grounds impossible. The station chief hopes Dennis may be able to secure my release. Not sure what you’ve been told, but let’s just say that when the Great Successor requests “Superfreak” it’s best not to refuse on artistic grounds. Pity really. Rehearsals for the tour were going terribly well. If you speak to your mother, please tell her how very sorry I am. Can’t think what was going through my head, but if she feels she must continue with the divorce proceedings, I understand. Seems we’d have been better off camping with you and the kiddies than swanking off to this barmy corner of the world, but no use crying over spilt state secrets as they say in the safe room. On a happier note, I’m told the Stamp Bureau may have a position in the Commemorative Re-Issues division should I make it out. Apparently they have a very competitive karaoke team and view me as something of a ringer!
Chin up and keep a good thought. Love to all,
Daddy
Saturday night is bean night!
Well folks, it’s vacation time, which means that instead of spending most of my time lolling around the portable bar, sipping one concoction or another, I plan on spending all my time in this pursuit, at least for the next few weeks. As such, my output will likely be even thinner than usual. Luckily, like the sturdy ant in the parable about the grasshopper and the violin and some other equally edifying, thoroughly boring stuff, I have squirreled away a large supply of posts over the past couple of years, and since virtually no one but my mother read my blog for the first year or so, they will no doubt seem fresh and new to most of you. If they don’t, I suggest skipping the reread and joining me in a Bloody Mary or three. Remember, it’s the drink that eats like a meal, my friends.
In Maine, back in the Bronze Age when I grew up, it was traditional to have Boston baked beans on Saturday night, and by this I mean every Saturday night. Now, there were families that just heated up a can of B&M, dumped some coleslaw from Shaw’s into a bowl, steamed up the brown bread and called it a night. Not mine. For us, baked beans represent serious tradition. Grammie Sue baked her own, as do my parents, and so do I. In the past, I have even made my own brown bread, but I cannot in good conscience urge you to do so; just buy the can. Making brown bread is a pain in the bean shoot.
Why Saturday night?, I’ll bet you’re wondering. Well, I can only guess, but my hunch is that it has something to do with the Puritan mania for mortification of the flesh. Let…
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Op Ed: The Selfies
Normally I avoid straying into political territory in social situations and my online ramblings. More often than not, the combination of my slightly off-kilter views, propensity for personal mockery and three-cocktail minimum tends to ruffle the feathers of my dinner companions, and has even cost me the occasional friendship. And what’s the point? It isn’t as if my insights, no matter how razor sharp, are going to change anyone’s position or worldview. No, I find it’s best to just smile and nod when politics come up, then steer the conversation in a less contentious direction, such as whether Martha Stewart bathes in her own urine, chews broken glass for breakfast and transforms into something even more terrifying than her TV persona at the full moon.
So that’s my policy. Or it was until the Weiner-Spitzer story picked up steam and I felt compelled to opine on the whole sordid, sorry mess. For what it’s worth here’s my two martinis’ worth.
“One is a genius, the other is insane.”
Do you have to be a narcissistic attention junkie with the scruples of a used car salesman and the professional standards of a carnival barker to run for political office these days? Maybe not, but apparently it helps. Given the steady stream of rehabilitation-flogging, forgiveness-demanding, scandal-tarred politicos seeking second chances from the voters they betrayed, not to mention their beleaguered families, what else makes sense? Not so much shameless as utterly unshameable, Anthony Weiner and Eliot Spitzer want their redemption, and they want it now.
Of course, sex scandals are nothing new in government. There was Grover Cleveland in 1884; Wilbur Mills and the strippers in the mid Seventies; Marion Barry’s 1990 ‘ho and crack fest (“Bitch set me up!” ring any bells?); Bill Clinton and his Oval Office shenanigans; and most recently Mark Sanford’s infamous Appalachian Trail of Tears (and big fat lies).
In the current political climate it seems anyone can come back from almost anything. Except maybe trying to solicit gay sex in a men’s room using sign language. An infringement on the Americans with Disabilities Act, perhaps?
See what I mean?
Owing to a fortuitous special election, Sanford is well ahead of his fellow travelers on Redemption Road, but New Yorkers move fast, and Spitzer and Weiner have a lot more baggage to dump. These two, it seems to me, have more in common than non-standard sexual tastes, over-inflated balloon heads, no principles and wives who are way too good for them. There’s a detectable whiff of narcissism about them both, though clearly Spitzer is the brighter of the two, The Brain to Weiner’s Pinky, if you will.
As you no doubt recall, Spitzer, the former Big Stick of lower Broadway, was chased from the governor’s mansion (presumably with his socks on) in 2008 after being identified as Client #9 in a prostitution sting. The long-married father of three somehow managed to avoid prosecution and hold on to his lovely, if bafflingly-loyal wife, and he is now running for New York City comptroller. He may even win. So let’s break this down: New Yorkers are seriously considering handing the financial reins of the nation’s biggest city and most powerful economic engine to a man with poor judgment, no impulse control and a pattern of aggression and lying. Sounds good to me. In fact, it sounds a lot like Anthony Weiner to me.
The flash of the camera phone in his face, the bleep of the sent selfie, and the illicit thrill of his naughtiness intoxicated his weak brain.
Weiner – the Mr. Toad of sexting – is asking the voters of New York City to make him Mayor Bloomberg’s successor, despite his 2011 disgrace and a newly revealed phone sex relationship with a 22 year-old woman. Kind of puts a new spin on the notion of Bloomie’s nanny state, doesn’t it? See my comments above re: judgment, impulse control and lying. I can’t imagine what’s going on in his wife’s mind, but as Kingsley Amis rightly observed, “Other people’s priorities are endlessly odd.”
By now, the other mayoral hopefuls have issued the standard calls for Weiner’s withdrawal, most notably John Liu, the current city comptroller. He pointed out that Weiner’s “propensity for pornographic selfies is a valid issue for voters.”
Well there you have it. And so, despite his own scandal problems, Mr. Liu just got my vote purely on the basis of that observation. If the public can’t expect accountability and integrity from its elected representatives, maybe we can get by on humor.
Kitchen Slattern 
The Zumba saga continues: “I thought we were dating.”
Aug 15
Posted by WSW
ALFRED, Maine (AP) — The first man to go trial on charges that he patronized a prostitute who worked out of her Zumba dance studio contends he thought he was engaged in a romance.
Alexis Wright, the fitness instructor who pleaded guilty to running a prostitution business, doesn’t have to answer questions from prosecutors at the trial of the alleged client, a judge said Thursday.
Prosecutors had wanted the 30-year-old Wright to testify in next week’s trial of Donald Hill, a former Kennebunk High School hockey coach. Under oath Thursday, Wright declined to answer questions about him, other than to point him out.
“He thought he had a relationship with her,” said his lawyer, Gary Prolman.
Where, oh where, to begin?
Those of you who follow my ramblings may recall a post I wrote in the not-too-distant past concerning the Zumba dance/tax evasion/sex trade/stupidity scandal in my home state. For everyone else, here it is.
So here I am, vacationing my head off in the land of a thousand dances, Downeast Maine, when I encounter the above coda to the original story in the local broadsheet. In it, we learn that one of Miss Wright’s 68 clients is fighting his charge of patronizing a prostitute because he claims he thought they were DATING.
Meet the Missus!
Now, I can see why you might think that some denizens of this little corner of paradise, like residents of similarly far-flung and/or remote locales, would be less sophisticated in the ways of the world than their urban cousins. It’s a fair assumption, though I must point out that naiveté and stupidité are not the same things.
Because really, what kind of moron do you have to be to think that a woman who demands money for having sex with you is your girlfriend? Does that make the waitress who serves you pancakes your wife? Is the nice lady at the dry cleaner who irons your shirts your mommy? Perhaps, if you tend toward the metrosexual, you believe your manicurist is actually your concubine.
Or maybe you’ve just spent one too many Saturday nights on the sofa indulging in heavy petting with a blow-up doll while watching Vision Quest for the three-hundredth time. I don’t fucking know, but I am certain that when the woman you’re doing the horizontal mambo with once a week has a revolving door on her vagina, and you have to take a number for a “date,” it should be apparent to even the meanest intelligence that she’s not doing it because she’s really really into you.
Any more questions?
Honestly.
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Posted in Commentary, The easy way
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Tags: Alexis Wright, Alfred Maine, current-events, Donald Hill, Kennebunk High School, Kitchen Slattern, Maine, Slattern, Vision Quest, Wright, Zumba