Prelapsarian

Twenty things that scared me aged seven:


Privet
The spelling of 'privet'
My auntie Lillian's Sunday hat
The deep end
Baked beans
The phrase "Mr Davis you require three snookers"
Jim Bowen
The anti piracy warning at the beginning of my betamax video of Oliver Twist
The telephone
Wispa adverts
The 'woah hokey cokey cokey' part of the hokey cokey
Smelling salts
My Jungle Book knickers with Baloo on the front
The concept of sex
Dandelion and burdock cordial
The nine times table
Paternoster lifts
Dinner ladies
The Juliet Bravo theme music
The facial expression on bottles of Mr Matey


I am still afraid of four of these things.

15 October 2007

Comments

I too harbour a fear of dandelion and burdock. It tastes like evil.

Posted by Matt | 15 October 2007

May I guess?

The deep end
The telephone
The concept of sex
Dinner ladies

Or perhaps I am projecting.

Posted by bohémienne | 15 October 2007

Five, in my case. Not counting your auntie Lillian's Sunday hat. I'm sure it's splendid.

I've never actually seen a paternoster lift. I'll have to take your word for it that such exotic devices actually exist.

Posted by NRT | 15 October 2007

bohémienne - One out of four. The concept of sex isn't scary so much now as faintly but persistently ludicrous.

Posted by Jack | 15 October 2007

Privet, auntie's hat, deep end and lifts.

P.S. Baked beans? Are you sure you are British?

P.P.S. The Jungle Book puts you one generation after me which is just wrong.

Posted by Ani | 15 October 2007

I'm no Freudian - well, okay, maybe I am; in fact, yes, I am - but I think these are all connected with a sheer terror about the concept of sex.

- You can have sex in a privet hedge, albeit it might hurt a bit.
- You'd be unable to spell 'privet' whilst having sex in a privet.
- Your Auntie Lillian probably had sex in her Sunday hat.
- The deep end. Um, no explanation necessary, I'm sure.
- Baked beans. Sex after a plate of baked beans is inadvisable.
- Steve Davis. Snooker. Balls in pockets. Three balls, i.e. snookers. Very oddly deformed sex.
- Jim Bowen. Well, you just wouldn't, would you?
- The anti-piracy warning ... hmm, was that the one with Simon Bates. Obviously, his Our Tune only came into play after atrociously bad sex.
- The telephone. Phone sex. So much more painful in the old days, what with the size of those handsets.
- Wispas melted in the mouth chocolate. With bubbly bits. Oh, come on.
- If 'woah hokey cokey cokey' isn't a euphemism, then I'm Sister Wendy.
- Smelling salts, obviously required to be brought round after atrocious sex with Jim Bowen.
- Jungle Book knickers with ... well, if that isn't an opportunity for an inappropriate "are you feeling a little bear / bare?" pun, then I don't know what is.
- The concept of sex. Ah yes, that.
- Dandelion and burdock cordial results in far less drunken and inappropriate sexual activity than, say, three glasses of absinthe and seventeen Diamond Whites.
- The nine times table, being - of course - the male species favourite delaying technique. I know 1 x 9 = 9, and that's it. Oh dear.
- Sex on a paternoster lift could be extremely dangerous, but wilfully risky in a sort of thrilling fashion.
- Well, come on, which pre-pubescent schoolchild didn't have their first sexual crush on a dinner lady? Eh? Eh?
- The Juliet Bravo theme music was the cue for lots of middle-aged men to enter sexual reveries about policewomen. Just ask my father.
- Mr Matey's facial expression is undoubtedly that of a cheeky "come on, girls" grin, not to mention the phallic shape of the bottle.

I rest my case. Indeed, I have to, because I am quite, quite spent.

Posted by An Unreliable Witness | 15 October 2007

Ani - Also one out of four. Not beans however, although I do still to this day prefer tinned pasta in the shape of Noddy.

UW - I am soaked through to my underwear in stunned, admiring silence. Consider any challenge I may ever have made to the innuendo crown utterly, comprehensively thwarted.

Posted by Jack | 15 October 2007

The 'woah, hokey cokey cokey cokey' bit always scared me as well. I was always terrified I would lose my footing and be dragged in and out in and out by the ruthless hokey-cokiers around me until I was just a limp and lifeless carcass, unable to put anything anywhere,

Of course, now I am scared of all of them after reading UW's comment, although I have never met your Auntie Lilian so I cannot comment on that one.

Posted by Léonie | 19 October 2007

"I am the spirit of dark and lonely water"

Say no more.

Brrrrrrrrrrrr

Posted by RedMolotov | 19 October 2007

Have you done an article for Glamour mag because there's a Jacquelyn in there discussing her sterilisation. Is that you?

Posted by Emma | 19 October 2007

Jack, I think I love you.

I will not require us to have or even consider the concept of sex.

I am happy to admire from a distance.

Posted by Miss T | 22 October 2007

I am frightened of the line "Eden saw play" in "Morning Has Broken" (Cat Stevens version). Did Mrs Matey scare you too?

Posted by NON-WORKINGMONKEY | 24 October 2007

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