what a load of arse

I mean literally. it’s all about arses. arses, asses, backsides, behinds, booties, bottoms, bums, buns, buttocks, butts, cheeks, posteriors, rears, rumps, tuchases or tushies, whatever you want to call them. we are a nation obsessed. not content with ‘rear of the year’ contests and daily tabloid front page analysis of the dimensions and terrain of kylie’s versus j-lo’s bum, the obsession has now spread to the upper echelons of the newspaper industry. which means a thoroughly pretentious pseudo-intellectual dissection of the role of the butt in modern culture. whether it be sexual disconnection, gender competition, cultural essentialism or the supremacy of the bum in recent advertising campaigns, it’s fair to say that it’s all an enormous pile of arse. howver, the most obscene thing about all of this is not, IMO, the gratuitous talk of anal sex or even the ‘jackass’ exploits wherein someone with scrambled egg for brains drives a toy car up their ass. it’s the fact that zoe williams’ sub let her get away with ending an article about bums with “but there’s a crack in it”.

exercise and I were never meant to be bedfellows. the misfortune of having had a back condition for the past 8 years gave me a good excuse to avoid the inside of the gym – and on the rare occasion that I did manage to get my lazy arse into a class or gym, well, general disaster area. I’d be waiting for the endorphins to kick in – but nothing doing. zip. nada. endorphins schmendorphins. I just felt knackered. but 2 and a half months of bed rest will give you the urge to get up and do something to vaguely exert yourself, it seems. note the use of vaguely. now that I’m enjoying the fruits of another bout of recovery, where actual progress is made and I start to feel better (as opposed to the last few weeks of ‘recovery’ where very little recovering seems to have happened, other than getting seriously bored), I’m feeling the urge to hurry things along and kick the old body back onto working by regular stints in the gym, on the treadmill, and even some wanky pilates-type toning. anyone who knows me will be gasping incredulously right about now. I kid ye not. however, if you’re starting to worry that this is a worrying sign heralding some newly-health-conscious katy – fret not. my post-workout snack of choice? a kitkat chunky. well, hey – no-one’s perfect…

I’m chatting to tom t’other day, and he’s bemoaning the horrendous state of his flat, the need to do washing, eat good food, floss regularly and so on, when he comes up with the brilliant conclusion that he needs a wife. then this genius suggests that I should get me a wife too. now, I think the boy coates is talking a lot of sense. I mean, we’ve seen the topic of good wives popping up on kitschbitch here and there, and though my feminist sensibilities are screaming obscenities at the mere suggestion, well, how cool would it be to have a 50′s wife?

I mean, obviously I wouldn’t want to be one myself, my needing one is surely evidence of my unsuitability for the role. but how fab would it be to have someone to keep the house clean, cook me food and generally make sure I don’t lapse into the pit of self-neglect and slovenliness that I tend towards when left to my own devices? now that we both know we want to get us each a wife, the only question left to answer is this: where exactly does one procure one such healthy specimen? answers on a postcard…

happy may morning kids! but bank holiday isn’t till the weekend, you say, what on earth are you talking about you mad, crazy idiot-type person, you ask? well, if you know the true significance of may morning, you’ll be collapsed in a drunken stupor right about now (11am) and it’ll be may, er, afternoon by the time you read this. see, as if we didnt get enough opportunities for getting utterly bollocksed at uni, may morning is a traditional occasion for, well, getting utterly bollocksed. the cultural fancy pomp-and-circumstance bit, the 6am singing by magdalen choir on the very top of magdalen tower, is great and all (despite the fact that you can’t actually see the choir and can barely hear them either), but, as we all know, the main point is to stay up drinking the night before and to cane it on through until 6am, at which point you’re completely off your tits, and then go for breakfast, hurrah! the whole of oxford’s turned out to see you making a total prat out of yourself the charming may morning celebrations, so you have to do it big style. though the city of oxford’s been learning from past years that students off their nut like to do daft things (really? you don’t say!) and closes off magdalen bridge to stop said pissheads leaping off the bridge into the river and, er, well, killing or maiming themselves, that’s not to say that others aren’t trying to foil their dastardly plans.

oh yeah, and I should also point out that nearby radcliffe square is hi-jacked by the christian union, who seek to convert everyone to the word of the lord jesus by, er, giving away free coffee and doughnuts. no, I don’t get it either. if it some weird oxford-style holy communion whereby jesus has transubstantiated into a jammy doughnut? it makes a lot more sense when you’re tanked up to the max, let me tell you…

[ photos of may morning madness and info about this strange custom @ the bbc ]

ps: happy 3rd birthday to kitschbitch!