Hi, I’m Apple…
…and I’m Ginger.
And we’ve just been chatting to Anne Archism.
Now, we haven’t mentioned Anne Archism before, have we?
No, we haven’t. So, let’s explain what she’s like.
Well, Anne Archism does a lot of travelling. She likes meeting people and she enjoys going places. Not by car. You can’t see the landscape if you’re too busy looking at the road, can you?
Unless you’ve got someone to hold your wheel for you.
Well, Anne Archism doesn’t have anyone to hold her wheel. She hasn’t had anyone to hold her wheel ever since her husband ran off with the milkman.
Only hears from him occasionally. At least she doesn’t have to say her husband ran off with a younger woman.
So, Anne Archism does a lot of travelling. By rail. By bus or coach. Whatever. Maybe she’s unsettled. Maybe she’s searching for something. She’s happy in herself.
She’s a sensitive soul.
Well, aren’t we all?
Anyway, what she was chatting to us about is that all the advertising and announcements get on her wick.
Yes. Take railway stations for starters. Do they say “welcome and thank you for using this railway station?” Do they, fudge flavoured ice lollies!
No, they say “if you leave your luggage unattended, it might get damaged or destroyed.” How welcoming when you’re on holiday trying to forget all your worries.
I mean, what if you leave your relatives unattended, would they get damaged or destroyed?
Imagine someone saying “where’s Uncle Harry?”
And the reply comes “he was blown up at the railway station because they thought he was a bomb and we only left him for a minute while we spent a penny!”
And they’d say “fancy someone blowing up Uncle Harry.”
It’s little things like having a relative blown up by an over-cautious railway station that can really put the mockers on your holiday.
Then there are posters for domestic violence and VD, next to advertisements for the latest films and a quote from the Bible, such as “I am the way, the truth and the life.” How eclectic!
And what upsets Anne Archism is that many people say goodbye on railway platforms. It’s very emotional. They don’t want posters about domestic violence and VD, do they?
Exactly. When Celia Johnson said goodbye to Trevor Howard in ‘Brief Encounter’ it was very passionate and emotive, but it wouldn’t be very passionate and emotive if they had a whopping great poster about domestic violence or VD in front of them! You don’t want VD in your face, not that you can!
Take buses and coaches. She saw an advertisement that showed a long road with a toilet in the distance, with the line “are you going on a long journey?” Charming!
And the point is that everyone just switches off and doesn’t notice and if all they do is switch off and ignore all this twaddle, why have we got it plastered all over the place? It reminds me of that modern art exhibition.
Oh, yes, we don’t normally bother with modern art, but it was raining.
And right there on the wall was a framed collection of polaroids of a cow in a field from nine different angles in three rows. It was called ‘Perspectives’ and it was for sale and they wanted four hundred for it.
Well, we couldn’t believe anyone would ever want to by nine polaroids of a cow. I mean, if they like cows that much they could’ve taken their own polaroids.
Now, next to this cow was the fire exit instructions and it was framed in an identical frame. So, I stood in front of the fire exit instructions and said “now, that’s brilliant. It looks calm, but it says that somewhere a fire is burning. How symbolic. How deep.”
Then I said “it is what it is and what it is, is brilliant. It counterpoints the surrealism of the underlying metaphor and the underlying metaphor is that beneath the calm a fire is blazing.”
Then we turned round and a group had developed. They were all captivated by our description of the fire exit instructions and some were even trying to find it in the catalogue and wondering how much they wanted for it.
So, we left them to it and walked out with our nose in the air like two art critics discussing its’ merits.
I often wonder if someone bought it.
They could’ve got more for those fire exit instructions than the nine cows or any of the other cobblers. At least the fire exit instructions served a purpose.
The thing is no-one wanted to show their ignorance in case they were wrong. All we were doing was being honest. We don’t understand why people want to fill their homes with pictures of large-breasted women, poorly-endowed men, bums, front-bottoms and so forth. Puts us off our dinner.
The cow was naked!
That’s not the point. Cows are entitled to be naked. If they had trousers on, it would be harder to milk them, but possibly more fun. Anyway, time for us to go now because we need a cuppa tea, a slice of cake and a chocky bickie or two.
O.K., goodnight folks, See you next Tuesday.
themaster1968 