There are four absolute certainties in life: Death; taxes; the occasional dose of pubic crabs; and a visit from the Jehovahs Witnesses at the most inconvenient moment. At 8am, as I lay in bed dreaming of my recent love-making with the entire Under-25s Portuguese Rugby Team, the doorbell rang and rudely interrupted my reverie. "Baaaassssssssiiiiiiilllllllll!" I shouted.
When one appoints and remunerates a maid, one at least expects hand-service.
"I'm doing lady-stuff" my maid, Basil Wiggleswade, bawled back, sounding like a Cockney fishwife. The finality of her tone meant she had no intention of answering the door.
"Lady-stuff?" I bawled back, sounding like a Texan millionairess beauty queen.
"Yes, I'm out on the town tonight, so I'm waxing my lady-purse. Have you seen the third tube of Nair? I could be some time" my maid called back, gaily.
Lady-purse? THREE tubes of Nair?
Fuck me... Basil must be as hairy as a baboon down below if she needs not one, not two, but three tubes of Nair!
As I was pondering this addition to my vocabulary - Lady-Purse - I was forced to get up and don my Chinese silk and duck feather dressing-gown, jam my pudgy feet into my Antarctic penguin feather slippers, and tiptoe down five flights of stairs, telling myself to "keep calm" and open up the front door, only to come face-to-face with two elderly male Jehovahs Witnesses in charity-shop black suits, waving a pamphlet entitled the Resurrection of God and slavering at the gills.
Their presence, on my doorstep, put the wind up me, I can tell you.
Fortunately, my father was a keen game-hunter in the African bush, and I still keep a collection of antique loaded rifles in my downstairs lobby, in expectation of such visits from strange, unsolicited men preaching religion. A bullet in the bum, my father used to say.... and now it's my turn to deal with Basil...
When one appoints and remunerates a maid, one at least expects hand-service.
"I'm doing lady-stuff" my maid, Basil Wiggleswade, bawled back, sounding like a Cockney fishwife. The finality of her tone meant she had no intention of answering the door.
"Lady-stuff?" I bawled back, sounding like a Texan millionairess beauty queen.
"Yes, I'm out on the town tonight, so I'm waxing my lady-purse. Have you seen the third tube of Nair? I could be some time" my maid called back, gaily.
Lady-purse? THREE tubes of Nair?
Fuck me... Basil must be as hairy as a baboon down below if she needs not one, not two, but three tubes of Nair!
As I was pondering this addition to my vocabulary - Lady-Purse - I was forced to get up and don my Chinese silk and duck feather dressing-gown, jam my pudgy feet into my Antarctic penguin feather slippers, and tiptoe down five flights of stairs, telling myself to "keep calm" and open up the front door, only to come face-to-face with two elderly male Jehovahs Witnesses in charity-shop black suits, waving a pamphlet entitled the Resurrection of God and slavering at the gills.
Their presence, on my doorstep, put the wind up me, I can tell you.
Fortunately, my father was a keen game-hunter in the African bush, and I still keep a collection of antique loaded rifles in my downstairs lobby, in expectation of such visits from strange, unsolicited men preaching religion. A bullet in the bum, my father used to say.... and now it's my turn to deal with Basil...
