Saturday 3 October 2015

Knick-Knack Paddy-Whack


I decided this morning over coffee, that I am at my most content when simply blending in. Conversely, I am most troubled when out on a limb in the company of others.

You must know by now that 90% of my social life consists of talking to people in the pub. Apart from a handful of contemporaries, I often find myself to be the oldest in any particular group, so the others quite often consult me on matters of fact, having had more experience than them, being - on average - about 40 years older.

Last night, a crazy young woman shouted to me from across the bar where she had been discussing the subject with another young woman, "Why is it that you never see white dog-turds any more?"

I was able to inform her that it was - of course - all down to diet, and not the 'fact' that only white poodles produced white turds and that there are not as many white poodles around these days, as she had believed.

Dogs produce, I intoned, white turds when they are fed a large bone every day, and not many people give their dogs a bone now. I also supplemented this snippet with another fact - that in Victorian times, leather-tanners somehow used white dog-shit in the process of curing leather, and you could sell pure white dog-turds to tanners for a reasonable profit. For this reason, poor people made a point of feeding their dogs at least one bone per day, supplementing their meagre incomes.

I added yet another bit of trivia to this - that small boys would commit minor fraud by actually making fake white dog-turds from chalk and other shit to sell to gullible tanners, and there was a little, Dickensian cottage-industry going on in the slums of Victorian London, carried out by boys with conkers and string in their pockets who could not afford a whip and top to keep them amused.

One young woman regarded me with a far-away look in her eyes as she said, "Well I never knew that about the fake shit".

The other stared at me for a couple of seconds, then said, "You knowledgeable cunt, you".

21 comments:

  1. I wonder if you would be out on a limb in the company of me.

    With regard to dog shit ask the Welsh expert, John.

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    1. Regards the expert, I think he is more used to the brown, wet specimens.

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    2. With regard to feeling out on a limb, this is difficult to say. You are not exactly known for your desire to blend in and be content.

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    3. We should make perfect drinking partners then.

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  2. I should have called this post, 'This Old Man', really.

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  3. The only 'coloured' dog turds I've known are ones I painted red white and blue. I made a Union Flag from them when I left school. The Art Work was left outside the headmaster's door.

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    1. I should add that collecting all the turds took quite some while, and I stored them in a cardboard box in my study.... Pheeeeew.

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    2. I remember you presenting a gift-wrapped box containing one to whatshername, and being very confused as to why she didn't appreciate it.

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    3. Me and dog turds go back a long way.

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  4. I am really rather beginning to be pleased that I don't spend my evenings in the pub.

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  5. I just thought they had gone white with age - shows you how much I know.

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    1. I never monitored anything other than mushrooms which go white with age.

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  6. I wonder why she cared to fill this gap in her knowledge.

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    1. I filled it for her, whether or not she wanted it filled. I would like to do the same for all young women, but I wouldn't last long.

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  7. Replies
    1. Talking of piles of shite, I have just seen 'Gladiator' for the first time ever. See next post.

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  8. I'd forgotten all about white turds. I know urine was used to tan leather, but I didn't know they used shit, too.

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