May 13th, 2010
The main business is to find the most appropriate and most stimulating equilibrium.
Saul Bellow
Classifieds
Why not subscribe to Badger Fancier's Monthly? Only $37.95 per year (9 issues). Write to BFM, Box 908, Fuzzy Thing, Wyoming 09876.
Anyone witnessing an accident on River Road at midnight on Saturday, May 8th in which a burgundy Toyota Corolla hit a deer (the deer was driving a late model Ford Explorer) please contact Box 482.
For Sale: Spanish Fly. Answers to the name of Pedro. More or less housebroken. $14 OBO. Reply directly to Parker Fysche c/o the PERSIFLAGE offices.
Wanted: Any cheese that can be spread easily but that doesn't smell like my college roommate. Reply to Box 2009.
Lonely bachelor of in- determinate age seeks similar woman with a penchant for saddle soap. Object: rousing game of cowboy and school- marm. Reply to Box 228.
Married Woman with extremely boring husband seeks Man or Woman or Higher Primate with a love of Scrabble and Cheez Whiz filled Celery stalks for illicit shenanigans during the day. Contact Box 345. I'm waiting!
The Mystery of the Lost Lenore
Listen to Part Fifty-Six
Click on the picture. (2:35)
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One Girl's Dating Story
There was a girl who had terrible luck with men (boys really, none of them, regardless of age, were mature enough to warrant their being called men). She was intelligent, funny, kind and not unattractive but for some reason the guys she became involved with were all, not to mince words, losers or assholes or some form of hybrid.
She dated a guy, named Lance, who was somewhat less sharp than a bag of wet mice (his name should be a tip-off) but who was so good-looking that she tried for some time (weeks in fact) to overlook his obvious dimwittedness. His propensity for sleeping with every woman who stopped moving for more than a minute (which is about how long it took) she could not, however, overlook.
Dermot, by contrast, was very intelligent and not the kind to cheat but his stamina was expressed only in his ability to expound his own opinions at great length. Conversations with him were monologues. The girl had had her fill of lectures in school and the prospect of spending her free time listening to some self-important grad student (which Dermot was) drone on endlessly proved too much. To make matters worse he wasn't even good-looking.
Jerome was neither as smart as Dermot nor as stupid as Lance. He also fell somewhere in the middle lookswise. He could be a lot of fun to hang out with but his constant use of certain herbal products had made him scattered and unreliable. He never showed up for anything anywhere near on time. He used the expression "Sweet!" (he also called her "Dude") so many times that she finally stopped telling him her number.
In a weak moment she fell for a poet. Christian was kind, sensitive, intelligent, passionate and quite good-looking in a scruffy way but it wasn't long before his downside became evident. He would fall into a deep depression at the slightest provocation - the sight of a dead bird or a dirty child's sock on the sidewalk and become inconsolable. Her taste for hand-holding and general mothering soon faded. And she became tired of paying for everything.
What was she to do? It seemed that no matter what kind of guy she dated he turned out a bad deal. It was then that she met Richard. Richard wasn't as good-looking as Lance, as smart as Dermot, as fun as Jerome or as passionate as Christian but he did have a helluva lot of money and somehow, that made everything all right.
Sally Kind
MAY 15th Declared Be Kind to Napkins Day
Don't just unthinkingly wipe your hands or face on napkins today. Really savour and enjoy the service they self-lessly provide!
Spring Has Sprung
We are well into spring now and as the weather becomes warmer and the sun begins to bear down on us with a little bit more intensity some of us (I won't name names so don't ask me) find that our libidos (libidoes?) have been somewhat roused with the change of seasons.
I suppose this is natural enough. Spring is, of course, well known for this sort of thing, having been at it (so to speak) for as long as there have been multi-celled reproducing organisms oozing about. But the problem remains of what to do with this increased feeling business.
As one ages (which, of course, we all do) this can become a bit of a problem. In An American in Paris Henri Baurel says (or more accurately Alan Jay Lerner makes Henri Baurel say) "Let's just say I am old enough to know what to do with my young feelings." and that's all very nice but knowing what to do with them and being able to do something with them are two different things.
Now I am NOT talking about what YOU think I am talking about. We all get those emails so we know what to do if that problem arises (if that's not too silly a way to describe the onset of that particular problem). What I am talking about is dealing with the increased libidinous pressures that build up when one is ... well, one.
There is no need to turn away and blush. This is not about to become a how-to on the arts of self-love. We here at Persiflage assume an audience sufficiently mature to have worked out the intricacies of those little maneuvers some time ago. What I would like to discuss is how to deal with those terrible overwhelming feelings of lust that rage over one in spring and for which one has no acceptable outlet.
I have heard, for some years now, cold showers recommended as a kind of cure-all for these pressures. This is, in my considerable experience, worse than doing nothing. At least when one does nothing one's circulation remains intact and one does not risk a heart attack from the shock. If you go the cold shower route you will be as hopelessly in lust as before but you will be cold and wet. What kind of a deal is that?
The only semi-sure fire solution for the problem of uncontrolled lust is convince yourself that you have just had sex. Yes, that's right. By fooling yourself into thinking that you have just had fully satisfying consensual sexual relations with the object of your desire you will be able to turn your lurid fantasies into charming memories!
I should probably add a little caveat here. It is best to pretend that your insanely gratifying sexual relationship must remain a secret for some reason (I like National Security but it's really up to you) and so you can give no public sign or signal of it no matter what.
It may be okay to smile or wink at your lust object from time to time. They will just think you a bit weird. And they probably do already or wouldn't they be your non-imaginary partner? Quite possibly it is this sort of creepy behaviour that has left you in this state. Bears some thinking about doesn't it?
Hugh Briss