Expensive chicks for cheap kicks

I was arriving at The Party and saw there was a queue to get in. Never a big believer in waiting and more a believer in the now, I sauntered to the front, flashed a smile at the bouncer, Jack, whom I know from way back and he waved me in.

Then the male spoke up.

“How come girls always get to skip queues and never have to pay cover charge? It’s not fair. And then they get inside and we have to buy them all their drinks or their drinks are free off the bartenders. This is a total joke.”

Silly, silly, silly little male.

You want to know why girls don’t have to queue? You are standing there in your “going out jeans”, sneakers and a t-shirt. We are standing here in sky-high strappy stilettos and a sequined mini dress–freezing our asses off.

You want to know why girls don’t pay cover charge? Shall I work my way from the top down?
Hair: how many ten dollar barbers do you see around? Hundreds! - because most guys get pretty simple haircuts, there isn’t always that much hair to work with. Girls? We have to have involved architecturally sound works of art with shimmering colour tones, products, products and more rare diamond dust, pearl essence, moon oil products. And straightners? The only straightner a girl can use is $300. Haircut? $100-$150. Colour? $200-$250. Let’s face it, our hair probably cost more than your entire outfit.

Then the face? Makeup and mascara and lipgloss and perfume and facials and creams and lotions and potions and eternal youth stupefying mist because if we don’t look like the photo-shopped to oblivion whores in your dirrty girrly mags, we don’t qualify as the version of “hot” with which you are brain-washed into expecting by the conglomerates that control you.
The outfit? While it is completely socially acceptable for you to wear the same jeans out all the time, or the same sneakers and maybe rotate through a few shirts – However,we have to present an entirely new look with each outing. New earrings, new accessories, new clutch, new attire, new shoes.

So by the time a girl is ready to be social accepted out at The Party we are taking in excess of $800 to get there.

And you want to know why we don’t line up and don’t pay to be there?

You are paying to see us gentleman.

You, and your “going out jeans” from the last three weekends are paying for that pleasure.

Breasts, breasts, and the beast.

I was at The Party – a gala awards night for outstanding professional women. And boy, did I see a lot of breasts. There were those down-to-the-navel cowl neck numbers. There were side boobs, under the chin boobs, double boobs, severely separated boobs, severely squashed together boobs. One unfortunate choice of gown even gave one woman I saw back boobs.
There weren't many legs, just breasts. I wondered what it is that drives woman to send their juggernauts out into space like that. Is it the point of difference? Men have legs, but they sure as heck can't make it look like their head is bouncing on a bounty of bosom.
And while breasts truly are a wonderful female feature, they seem to somewhat lose their exclusivity when you realise that, with the right bra, they are also being doubled as a pouch for mobile phone and money.There is something ultimately more feminine about only softly educating our fans about our lady lumps through sheer fabric, or figure hugging ensembles, as opposed to introducing anyone and everyone face first to the girls. We are precious, valuable treasures ladies. No-one likes a present that is already unwrapped.

mouldy rye inside

It was birthday cake time at The Party.

A beautiful, tiered masterpiece created by his Wife. When I say 'created' I mean it in the sense that Caesar 'created' the Roman Empire - it is more an infliction of terror on surrounding subordinates to make things happen as the Emperor(ess) wishes. Regardless, her minions had done her proud.

His Wife wasn’t a silly Empress either. She knew why the Secretary was there.

“You know, I thought about it,” his Wife told me as she watched the monkey dance across the room. “I thought about getting my tits lifted up to my chin and my scalp all kind of tucked back underneath, look a bit more like her. But when it came down to it, it’s all really like cake.

“You can have the most divine cake – amazing texture, succulent taste, perfect and pleasing in every way. But once you ice it – that wonderful-on-the-inside cake becomes a heavenly treat to behold.

“So when I thought about it, the tit and scalp thing, I had to figure out whether it was maybe just the frosting I need to ice my cake and be delectable again.”

Her gaze drifted back to the monkey dance. Cloudiness over her brown eyes. A heavy swallow and a forced smile.

“These girls, with their tans and their bleached hair – they are already mighty fine cake and that icing is perfection. But would you bother icing old, stale, mouldy rye bread? It just seems like such a waste of icing. Iced or not iced. You aren’t going to turn mouldy rye into cake.

“I used to be cake. I used to be the creamiest, richest, most desirable chocolate mud cake. I didn’t even need icing. But now I know it’s going to take more than just icing to disguise the fact that I have become rye.”

It seemed awful. Do we all become rye? And would we always be second best to cake? And the what about the worth of icing? The worth of the illusion?

“Of course this is all hypothetical.” Strength returned to his Wife’s voice. The Empress was back from her reverie. “We have too many shared assets to worry about silly sweets.” She winked and went back to entertaining his guests.

A Tragedy

The tone had mellowed at The Party. The string quartet was still playing under the marquis, but the mellowing was something else. The Professor was rolling pipe smoke around his mouth. He breathed out through nostrils that flared. The combination of the plumes of smoke rushing from his nose as he exhaled and the deeply crinkled, leathery skin that folded around his eyes and jowls led to the obvious connotation of a wise old dragon.
The little ones were asking him questions in awe. "What is another word for laughing?" their words would tumble out across each other.
"Chuckling." More dragon plumes.
The older ones stepped in - trying to test the Professor to see if they could catch him out.
"What is another word for genius?"
"Prodigy."
"What is another word for tragedy?"
Alas! A pause...

The Professor leaned forward. The string quartet were in between songs. Silence thicker than the pipe's purple smoke descended. The folded leathery skin suddenly seemed less papery and more frightening.
"The truth is, no words for 'tragedy' more elaborate than "very sad" have ever worked."
The baldest of the older ones: "That is because no tragedy is the same."
"Aha! This is a false assumption. It is too erroneous to conclude from this that anything we call tragedy have nothing significant in common."
"And what on earth would they have in common?" the baldest continues, though not so baldly.
The Professor sunk back in his chair. "On earth..." The purple plumes rose into the afternoon sky as the string quartet started up again.
The baldest one shrugged his shoulders and turned back to his canapes - but we didn't miss what he had - did we?

A Pair of Red Shoes

I was walking to The Party when a homeless man called out to me.
"Nice shoes," he said.
It was startling.
And genuine.
His sandy blonde beard was nearly down to his shoulders.

A Vampire at The Party

There is a Vampire at The Party. She vamps by in her $3,800 shoes (how do I know how much? Because she told me. Four times.) and sashays in her designer only suits – “Daddy bought it for me”.
It must be said the Vampire’s taste in clothes and shoes is outstandingly fabulous and once I thought we could be friends. I tried several times to with my olive branch, but if you try to open it up with the Vampire it rolls like this:
“I’m having a terrible time. What is there to be happy about? Yeah, I got these $3,800 shoes but I didn’t want them. The ones I wanted weren’t in my size. It’s so depressing. I’m so depressed. I can’t eat anything I have to lose weight (from where?). Are you eating that? Do you know how many calories are in hummus? 102 per serve. That’ like a half hour run just to work off that hummus. I really want a boyfriend, but no-one pays me any attention at all. I’m not having fun. This caviar is too cold to be eaten properly.”

And so on and so forth until the Vampire has sucked all the life out of The Party. And it can happen with such ease and velocity: one minute you are quite enjoying yourself – the next you are struggling to find a reason to keep living. And then she will vamp off to suck the life out of some other unsuspecting victims at The Party.
But when the Suits arrive, the Big-Shots beside, the Vampire engages full sucking power, but this time, instead of sucking the life out, she is sucking up – an intense display of ego stroking, almost sickening to observe. Now the caviar is just right. Now there are so many interesting things happening in the news. Now the Vampire is excited and bright – it must be the energy stores she has sucked out of the rest of The Party.
We have more Manhattans.

The Enemy

I haven’t seen her in years. I haven’t thought about her in months. I hadn’t even thought about the whole saga in weeks. But there she was and here I was and we were walking into the same private function. Exclusive. Limited Numbers. Black Tie Only. Fine Dining and Wine Fine. Private Room. RSVPs ONLY. – All fantastic sounding caveats on a party (I mean, really what is the fun in going to anything if it doesn’t have a guest list? There is simply no sense of achievement or dignity otherwise) but when one finds oneself at The Party with all these caveats and the Enemy walks in – it only spells unavoidable trouble.

I know it’s terribly unladylike, but I do find that childish tantrum throwing is just so, well, satisfying. If only it were more socially acceptable to hurl your champagne glass against a wall, screech and charge at someone with your stiletto. But it’s all about poise these days isn’t it? In the adult world there are so many more rules! I remember being six and being angry at my sister for breaking my crayons, so I snapped the head off her doll. Perfect tantrum throwing. And we all moved on from that quite comfortably.

So when I saw her, the Enemy, at The Party. I did indeed consider bowling a few canapés at her head. But it was Black Tie Only. The quandary: how to throw a Black Tie Only Tantrum...
I started by switching from champagne to red – a well oaked cabernet sauvignon (the most likely contender for causing irremovable and irreparable staining upon spillage). Then I laid the all important ground work for exquisite revenge at The Party – I poured my heart out to the barmen. All five of them. Every detail was embellished and enriched and totally pitiful and by the conclusion of my horridly graphic anecdote demonstrating the true evilness of the Enemy, the barmen were riotous.

A riotous barman is essential to Black Tie Only Tantrums.

My other key secret weapons were:
1. I am great at telling stories to a group;
2. I have an unnecessarily loud voice; and
3. I knew one dirty little secret about her involving two boys, first year end of uni term drinks and the varsity swimming pool.

The Black Tie Only Tantrum proceeded as follows:

Commenced conversation with group at the appalling state of programmed televisions shows ‘these days’, deviated conversation to reflection on popular culture generally, zoomed conversation into celebrity antics particularly (all the while employing said unnecessarily loud voice and drawing many laughs from my audience). Then recounted the documented exploits of Britney Spear that I had recently read online. The exploits here – included two boys, end of year drinks, and a varsity swimming pool.

“And THEN,” I continued, sure the Enemy was within earshot, “She said, look boys, there’s no need to take turns, I’m sure I can accommodate –“
And perfectly, the Enemy spun around, bumping into me. I pulled the ole Italian footballer trick and exceedingly overreacted to the bump, spinning, and tipping my wine all over her and then stumbling into the arms of one of the audience.

The barmen arrived pronto.

“You have had too much to drink!” She tsked at her, and before anyone could say “What did Britney Spears say next” the Enemy was whisked from The Party.

It turns out adults can throw tantrums. You just have to be clever and strategic about the whole thing.