Classified
I didn’t know the London Review of Books had personal ads, and would have gone on not knowing if there hadn’t been an incongruous picture of a bottle of booze in the bottom right corner of the last page, and the announcement:
Each issue, the sender of the most notable ad will receive a bottle of award-winning Plymouth Gin, courtesy of the distillers themselves.
This issue’s gin will be sipped by box no. 01/19, who, nonetheless will not be getting her lips wet (no she won’t, no she won’t).
So of course I had to read them (and sort of wish I hadn’t because, in addition to having no idea what most of them are talking about – so feel very unsuave – I now have images in my head of oiled academics, lounging by the fire in tweed diapers, flipping through Proust for the dirty bits).
Among the least perplexing:
Serious about segregated supermarkets. Gay Cambridge poet, 25, sick of Thursday night salad bar cruises spoilt by dawdling no-tails, WLTM Garcia Lorca down by the watermelons. No blenders, Dales or pak choi boys.
This is the personal ad that just won’t quit. Previously common or garden M once sought adulterous F, thirties, but now much more flexible. Still likes dogs, but the rest can go hang.
Incontinent M glider pilot, 42. Sincere, loving, distant. Loveable like a pigeon.
Collecting Miss Worlds 1985-present. (Come in Miss Moldova 1993 and the puppies are yours.) Also any unnaturally beautiful women in the Dorking area.
One man short of a full crew – that’s where you come in. Scaled-down replica of the Kon-Tikki (2:1) leaves Plymouth Hoe to emulate the journey of Drake battling against the Spanish Armada as it would have been if Captain Cook were in charge with Nelson as his first mate. Failed game show designer (From Winchester Cathedral, it’s Lenny Bennett’s “What’s my boat?), WLTM would-be Wheel of Fortune co-hostess for long nights of weeping inconsolably (‘waaaay, he’s fallen over in the gunge tank – second penalty points there’).
And this week’s winner…
When I go on my summer vacation I go to Juan les Pines. (sic) UCL’s own Marie Claire (but very old), even suntan (on my back and on my legs), and a racehorse from the Aga Khan that I’m keeping just for fun (for a laugh, ha-ha-ha). Would like to meet anyone but Peter Sarstedt look-alikes – don’t you thing there’s enough here already (yes there are, yes there are). Found in St. Moritz when the snow falls, otherwise mostly Raynes Park (South West Trains, South West Trains).
Only sincere searching hearts need reply.
· · • · ·