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Emily post post

According to Metro today, Good Housekeeping have released a "Noughtiquette guide" to teach people the right way to negotiate the ever-changing world of modern manner.

Now firstly, ‘Noughtiquette’?! What the fuck? As a lover of words, I am appalled. That is easily the weakest neologism I have come across in some time. How lazy are the writers on Good Housekeeping that they were happy to publish this clumsy, ugly construction? It’s worse than the newspapers slapping ‘-gate’ at the end of any word for a scandal (e.g. Blind-Fascist-Bastardgate).

Anyway, lexical snobbery aside, apparently these hints and tips include such wonders as ‘Never be late for yoga class’ and also suggests ‘sharp’ answers for such ‘silly’ questions as ‘when is the baby due?’ Apparently, the Dorothy Parker-esque reply to that one is ‘Fourteen years ago’ (no I didn’t get it either).

So, clearly this guide is bollocks, but the need for advice has been identified, so here is my very own version of a guide to etiquette in the modern world.

1. Don’t be late for yoga. This is achieved by simply never going to yoga, you pretentious Yuppie cow.
   
   
2. When sending a ‘goodbye everyone’ to your work colleagues when you quit, make the effort to address it to individuals rather than sending it to the global address for the whole company. You’re not as popular as you think.
   
   
3. After several lunchtime beers, the smell of alcohol will pervade the office no matter how many Extra Strong Mints you swallow. So avoid disturbing your colleagues and angering your boss by drinking vodka instead. Or just don’t go back to the office.
   
   
4. When parking your giant four-by-four (that’s never so much mounted the pavement, let alone scaled a mountainside) outside the school in the mornings, consider running a hosepipe from the exhaust pipe to the driver’s side window and keep the engine running.
   
   
5. Don’t try to avoid people soliciting for charity in the street. Instead, maintain eye contact, give them a big smile and snarl ‘Just don’t’ before they have a chance to speak.
   
   
6. Try to remember that a novelty ring tone is, like a comedy tie, no substitute for a personality of your own.
   
   
7. The correct response to “cheer up, it may never happen,” is not “It already has.” Instead, you should simply beat the commenter to death with an umbrella.
   
   
8. If you have to talk about how ‘naughty’ you feel by choosing to eat, say, a slice of cake, either don’t eat the cake, or shut up and enjoy it. Killing hitchhikers and dumping the body by the M4 is sinful. Chocolate is not.
   
   
9. When invited to a dinner party, dress appropriately, choose a nice bottle of wine, then ask yourself ‘has my life really come to this? Dinner parties, for fuck’s sake.’.
   
   
10. It is most certainly impolite to drink your meths without offering a swig to the other wino on the bench.

PLUS Some snappy answers to ‘silly’ questions.
Question: "When’s the baby due?" (when you’re not pregnant, obviously)
Answer: "Are you calling me fat? Well you’re no oil painting yourself buddy. Fuck off."

Question: "Do you have a criminal record?"
Answer: "No, and I think you’ll find it’s a violation of data protection law if you look into that."

Question: "Why do you swear so much?"
Answer: "I don’t fucking know."

So, if that can’t get you through the minefield of modern manners, there’s no hope for you.

Incidental note: I had a job interview yesterday which seemed to go quite well, except for the bit where I said "Actually, I don’t really want a job." Oops.

Oddly, that didn’t seem to put him off.

I’ll keep you posted.

posted by Peter The Great @ 9:47 AM