Most spam goes to my bin without passing GO or collecting 200 baht. I opened one today, though, intrigued by the address of the sender: Freida@youareadork.com. It was something of an anti-climax to see that it was just another weight loss product on offer. But imagine my joy when I read, in Freida's breathless testimonial:
"I literally saw 15 pounds melt away within the first few weeks!"
I just hope the manufacturers provide a free drip tray.
15 comments:
Medical factoid - fat is actually liquid at body temperature. It drips on the floor during operations. Hope you are all enjoying your breakfast.
So it can't melt. Vaporise, maybe.
Is that why fat people's bottoms keep moving even when they stop - a bit like waterbeds?
I saw an article about some of those very odd (stupid) people who do bizarre things for fun (whatever juices your Joyce) and they did some liposuction on their friend and then *drank* what came out. Perhaps she could make a living selling it to thirsty people.
I thought you would like that story.
Milkshake anyone?
That Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall was on the tv a few weeks ago meeting a chap who liposucts himself and fries meat in the fat.
Liver and bacon, anyone?
Erm... I'm eating my dinner here.
Doesn't this blog usually have erudite cultural discussions?
Cultural Snow Dumbs Down Shocker! Where can we go to talk about Raymond Williams now?
Actually I missed the R. Williams chat. Bloody dial-up; I'm missing everything.
ne1 wanna chat abt hrbrt marcuse?
Well it wasn't dumbed down when it started. It was meant to be a light-hearted snippet about the sloppy use of the word "literally". When Pashmina does it, everyone says "Ooh, how terribly erudite!". But here, it just turns into a Channel 5 documentary. I blame that realdoc. I don't think she's a real medic - she's like Paul McGann in that film.
As for Raymond Williams, the only thing I can recall is Billy and I having a dead-end conversation about him and Richard Hoggart and what their voices sounded like.
But anyway, I was just reading Williams' thoughts on the word "consumer" and the political overtones of its distinction from "user". Since he was writing in 1976, I think it's a pretty prescient analysis of the privatisation boom of the 80s/90s and the current identity crisis of the blogosphere and the world as a whole. If anyone can find an anecdote about Williams' body fat, I think we can reconcile the two threads of this post, and reach some sort of equilibrium.
And, yes, that should be "Billy and me"
oleaginous.
HA!
epigone?
"There are no masses; there are only ways of seeing people as masses" - Raymond Williams.
The 'mass' of the body is something that we can use to control people. By seeing someone as a 'mass' (I believe that the last great taboo is class prejudice - see my comments on 'chavs' - but here I am talking about 'body' mass as a link) - by not allowing people access to 'consume' the right things...we can then control them through symbolic violence. Take away access to certain things (the only place I can get to is Wal-Mart) we have automatic control. Creating 'literal' masses of people...(have you seen the cost of vegetables in supermarkets?) we can literally stop people in their tracks. And then we can all laugh at their fat butts and sell them diet pills.
We can abhor them more. We can create a bigger division between the haves and have-nots. Some areas of the country cannot get access to anything other than processed food. The price of processed goes down, the scales go up. Pile it high.
Not all places are like this though. Pockets of resistance my friend - the market place...the traditional burlesque. The lushness of it all. Big bowls of fruit and veg for a pound. Don't suck out your fat...get down the market. Don't take a pill...share in the 'voice' of the market. Dip your hand into other cultures - ackee, salt fish, mouli, sweeet potatoes alongside carrots, swede and apples. Small change. Small change. A wonderful place.
It's all about pockets of resistance and bags full of veg.
Take control of your body - take control of the capitalist and push him away. The mass of the mass could be stronger. Roar!
...so the proletariat will keep eating KFC and Curly-Wurlies until they're so fat they can defeat the bourgeoisie by sitting on them, belching contentedly. "Curses!" gasp the grasping, plutocratic bosses of the agribusiness multinationals, "If only we'd invested more heavily in the distribution of broccoli and apples, rather than cheap meat!"
(Marx & Engels, The Communist Manifatso)
Yes, but we the evil skinny ruling bourgeois chattering élite can run faster, run away...far away...to...the Cotswolds, where we will live in tiny honey-coloured stone cottages that are too small for even one obese pitchfork-wielding chav to break into and attack us.
"I blame that realdoc. I don't think she's a real medic - she's like Paul McGann in that film."
Oooh I remember that film - it was excellent and may possibly have scared me shitless.
I like Curly-wurlies but not KFC. Does that make me lower-middle class?
Patroclus: That's an interesting thought - are the rural proletariat "chavs" (sorry Moll - but it is in quotes), or is it a strictly urban phenomenon? And yes, I know the word derives from Romany... Of course, it was the rural poor that sent Marxism arse-over-tit before it had ever got going; Marx would never have believed that countries like Russia and China would adopt Communism, because they weren't sufficiently industrially developed.
Billy: No, it just proves you are a fellow of excellent taste and refinement. Curly-Wurlies are, in fact, one of the major food groups (along with espresso and hummus), although you're probably a bit young to remember the Terry Scott adverts...
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