(there's no talk of muffs for at least thirty lines. you might want to use that 'page down' button) ~~~~~~~~~ a quick cautionary note, my dears, before i get on with the bulk of this post.. in recent days you will have heard talk of the 'tilde'. my friends, do not confuse the tilde with the ~ . you may hear the misguided comparing the two, but the tilde is not the ~. it is an aspect of the ~, but it is not the whole. i shall refer to an old religion to make my point. not a false religion, but one in drastic need of an update. a religion from the days before the discovery of ~ : there is a hindu goddess named kali, famed for devouring her own children. she pops 'em out at one end and with her claws scrapes the dead ones into her huge, slavvering jaw. people don't think she's all that nice. but they're wrong. you can see their point, though. she doesn't sound very nice, does she? yet she is only doing what she has to. she has to eat them, so she can produce more. birth and death, one cannot exist without the other.. in a similar way, darkness cannot exist without light. some people will say they're both sides of the same coin... that isn't quite true. they're actually just different points within the same spectrum. yes, the tilde exists. one must be aware of it, and respect it, but those who tell you of the tilde fail to appreciate the glory of the hole. sorry, whole. see... the ~. it is so much more than that. of course it frightens people. terry underwear has clearly been through the dark side and has struggled to return to reality. there are others who will warn you of dangers more sneakily, guarding their own hidden motives. nevertheless, i don't want you to think of stephen hewitt as a deranged madman, spouting filth and obscenity and attempting to lead you into a life of degradation. not unless you already did, anyway. i want you to think of him as a poor soul who has lost his way. a hungry traveller cast out of the little chef of enlightenment. to these, too, one day the ~ will come. one day. but enough of that now. in time, you will learn more of the ~. today, i want to talk of different matters: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ so.. i got up this morning with a mission. and it was an GRATE mission. and i want to tell you about it: men... they talk of many things. religion, politics, life, death, fart-lighting, football and.. a sacred object that many of them seek with endless energy. women...they talk of many things too. although many of them are mysterious to me. they also talk of a sacred object that it is wise to seek to possess. i have never had one. but, today, i decided to get one. a vagina. i know this must be something marvellous. a lot of the men i know, and quite a few of the women, seem to worship this mysterious object. i have heard talk of people bowing down before its luminescence, and, prostrated thus, performing all manner of bizzare acts. i seek the truth. it makes being alive a great deal more interesting. and, although i knew little about my goal, i decided that meant there was even more opportunity to learn. first stop, the corner shop, for provisions. omco superstore, deep in the heart of selly oak. i smiled at the lady handling my coconut macaroons, and i told her i wanted a vagina. i asked if she could help me in this quest. my friends, she had clearly never met someone pursuing this goal before. she looked at me curiously, before disappearing to the back of her counter, and bowing before the (presumably sacred) words: 'embassy.......number one'. when she reappeared, she handed me a green packet and said 'is this what you are looking for?' an ordinary green packet, with some yellow writing on it. it was a little squidy and it cost nearly five pounds. it didn't seem all that impressive. i was about to tell her that i didn't think so, when she informed me that it was a golden vagina. well, that was easy. astounded with my instant success, i turned it over in my hands and wondered what to do with it. a little unconvinced, i decided to check, to be sure. there was another word by which i had heard this revered object called: 'fanny?' another peculiar look: 'there's no need to be rude, dear' 'are you sure this is a fanny?' at this point she told me to give me the money and leave her store, and never come back. she said if i did her 3 big brothers and her alsation, who were all waiting out the back because they were too DANGEROUS to come into the main shop, would attack me simultaneously, and rip me to shreds. i left at this point. omco is an odd place. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ i took my vagina home. i had a cup of tea. i tossed it from hand to hand, then considered i should probably be touching it more reverentially. then considered that perhaps i shouldn't be touching it at all. what, after all, was the procedure for such things? i had no idea. perhaps i could find a book on it. i asked my boss where i could find a book on vaginas. she advised me to go to the medical library and to take a couple of weeks off work, unpaid. clearly she, too, is a non-believer. when i told the lady in the medical library what i wanted she looked at me quizzically. i explained that i had just acquired a new vagina, and didn't really know what to do with it. suddenly, her expression cleared. she asked me why i hadn't told her i was going to do this, and i said it was a spur of the moment decision and i hadn't really had time to tell everybody. she asked if it had hurt. i told her no, not really, although it had cost me nearly a fiver and it seemed to be causing a lot of trouble. she gave me what seemed to be a supportive smile, and handed me a book: 'enjoying your new vagina'. marvellous! i took it home, and, ready for my new, wholesome spiritual experience, i made myself a cup of white spirit with just a spot of milk (no sugar, i'm careful about what i put in my body) and sat down to read: 'you may be anxious to explore yourself, but find that your new acquisition is a little tender. try caressing it gently, at first, getting to grips with its shape, and its texture.' texture? blimey. i stroked my vagina a little. plasticcy... smooth.. i lifted it to my face.. it smelt... plasticcy and smooth. i touched it with my cheek. it felt...plasticcy and smooth. christ, this was tedious. i skipped a few pages: 'enjoy your vagina in stages, slowly at first. you will find that exploring it internally, with a gentle finger, will bring untold pleasure.' really? i put my finger inside. it came out covered in brown stuff. i didn't get much out of it, really. the brown stuff smelt funny. i wondered if my golden vagina was somehow defective. maybe that had been why the woman had been so keen to get me out of omco. maybe that was why she had told me not to come back. even someone as wrongly-directed as her doesn't sell counterfeit sacred goods without SOME hint of remorse. and.....untold pleasure? no. i could feel a little tingle, but i often do when sitting on the washing machine. i skipped a few more pages. when i came to the part about penetration of the vagina (with PENISES and EVERYTHING) i couldn't take it any more. the book went back to the medical library, and i'm NEVER going there again. i only stopped to spit the words 'filthy PERVERT!' at the head librarian on the way out. i put my vagina on the shelf, not knowing what else to do with it. it sits there, between the 'hello kitty' 3-speed vibrator and the signed picture of wincey willis, unobtrusive. in time, i'm sure i shall forget i ever had one. the lesson? i'm not sure there is one love, and ~~~s prophet i ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ p~s~: just a couple of other things: i notice we have a few new people saying hello. i hope you all like it here. a couple of tips: a. everybody should try anal sex at least once in their life b. watch out for people from brighton also, robyn fadden mentioned the new future bible heros cd and it made me think grrrrrr, because i can't find it ANYWHERE. even amazon only has it on import. has it been released in the uk, does anybody know? does anybody have it fancy doing a little tape-swap? i have lots of lovely stuff i could send you in return. mark hester said: *those of you who've heard the new St Etienne offering "Finisterre" will *recognise the line at the top from Michael Jayston's spoken parts, which he *utters with such gravitas that they seem of the utmost import. I had no idea *who Jayston was, so I went a-googling, natch, and discovered that he was a *"character actor" who'd been in loads of stuff without actually being the real *star. i am reliably informed that michael jayston did the voice-over for 'war of the worlds'. reliably informed by someone that tells lies sometimes. but it might be true. does anybody else think that the spoken parts, together with the poor sequencing, spoil finisterre? i mean, its an okay album, but it could have been one of their best. especially the part where he says 'use a bank/ i'd rather die'....so, none of saint etienne have bank accounts then? it must take a big mattress to hide all that money underneath. the end. thank fuck for that. +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ Brought to you by the Sinister mailing list +---+ To send to the list mail sinister@missprint.org. To unsubscribe send "unsubscribe sinister" or "unsubscribe sinister-digest" to majordomo@missprint.org. WWW: http://www.missprint.org/sinister +-+ "sinsietr is a bit freaky" - stuart david, looper +-+ +-+ "legion of bedroom saddo devotees" "peculiarly deranged fanbase" +-+ +-+ "pasty-faced vegan geeks... and we LOST!" - NME April 2000 +-+ +-+ "frighteningly named Sinister List organisation" - NME May 2000 +-+ +-+ "sick posse of f**ked in the head psycho-fans" - NME June 2001 +-+ +-+ Nee, nee mun pish, chan pai dee kwa +-+ +-+ Snipp snapp snut, sa var sagan slut! +-+ +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+