Regency Trousers - A Not Entirely Toilet-Related Post

The main topic of discussion at the Privy Counsel right now is Regency trousers. Specifically, Regency trousers as related to embarrassing erections. (It probably surprises nobody to learn that this discussion was occasioned by an overdose of Austen adaptations.) You may find this hard to believe, but there is no information on the entire internet about what Regency gentlemen did if they accidentally got an unwelcome erection in the drawing room. None at all!

Buckskin breeches - which have been compared to a pair of Levi's - were appropriate morning attire in the country. They were supposed to be skin-tight, but would become baggy with time. However, whether helpfully tight or comfortably loose, you couldn't wear them to the drawing room, and so they would be of no use in hiding RREs (Rampant Regency Erections) except maybe when pottering round the stables or the kennels, and frankly, that's a train of thought we would rather not follow.
Image from janeaustensworld.

As anyone who has ever studied Austen adaptations in way too much detail knows, the distinguishing characteristic of a pair of gentlemen's breeches is that they are very, very tight. Also, the coats are designed to cut away from the front, leaving the crotch area abandoned and forlorn. What happened, one wonders, when one of the ladies accidentally flashed too much ankle and the gentlemen's blood was inflamed by a fiery passion?
Fictional Friend speculated that "I think that's the response Ms Bingley was trying to elicit by insisting upon perambulating the room". Was this, in fact, what the endless cups of tea were for? To place over the front of one's trousers, thus hiding any embarrassing physical response to bewitching beauty? As Tudor Friend mused, "Given the lighting conditions in most houses of the period, unless it's a very bright day, it might well work".

A fascinating close-up of the technical workings of the Regency fly.
How helpful, if at all, would this have been in hiding an RRE (Rampant Regency Erection)?
Image from janeaustensworld.

According to Lucy Worsley, one of our favourite historians, it was socially acceptable to relieve oneself when in company in the Georgian/Regency era, at least among gentlemen. Was it likewise socially acceptable to display an erection left, right and centre? Tudor Friend here argued that "it's post-Puritan England, so I'd be surprised if even the lascivious Regency crowd were THAT down with open sexuality". Fictional Friend added, "True. Just trying to figure out how to read between the lines and find a euphemistic reference to it". There was also a strong suspicion that standards may have differed between social classes; as Fictional Friend argued, "that farmer guy in Emma might have had different standards for this than Mr. Knightley".

A resolution was voiced to "go through every Jane Austen story and wonder which of her heroes suffers from RREs (Rampant Regency Erections)", and it was agreed that there is "nothing like a good smutty-minded paradigm shift"!

A gratuitous image of Alan Rickman wearing trousers in Sense and Sensibility.
Image from thepenofawdur.

The discussion ended with the Regency costume website we were studying being declared to be "PURE CRACK" (i.e. highly addictive). There were then some jokes in very poor taste about the Pump Room, and the whole thing deteriorated into a very unscientific conversation.

Seriously, though, why has there been no scholarly inquiry into this topic? As Tudor Friend ranted, "I'm genuinely surprised no one has written about this. Because there is NO WAY that trousers that skin-tight didn't have SOME sexual overtones intentionally". What are the social historians out there doing?

In order to salvage what is left of our self-proclaimed intellectualism, we feel the need to post some seriously classy toilet pictures. These are from the National Gallery - bog photos can hardly get more respectable than that! So there.

This is a functional and aesthetically pleasing motion-sensor tap,
with a functional soap-dispenser dispensing pleasant soap.

Well, strike us pink with a pair of buckskin trousers if that ain't a revolving towel! Huzzah!

There is only one possible festive video for this post. As we all know, thanks to Bridget Jones, the scene where Elizabeth Bennet walks to Netherfield to check on her sister Jane is one for which Andrew Davies, the director of the 1995 BBC adaptation, wrote in the stage directions that Darcy had a giant erection.

Says Bridget (who is interviewing Colin Firth):

BJ Oh. Do you think Mr Darcy would have slept with Elizabeth Bennet before the wedding?
CF Yes, I do think he might have.
BJ Do you?
CF Yes. I think it's entirely possible. Yes.
BJ (BREATHLESSLY) Really?
CF I think it's possible, yes.
BJ How would it be possible?
CF Don't know if Jane Austen would agree with me on this, but...
BJ We can't know because she's dead.
CF No, we can't... but I think Andrew Davies's Mr Darcy would have done.
BJ Why do you think that, though? Why? Why?
CF Because I think it was very important to Andrew Davies that Mr Darcy had the most enormous sex drive.
BJ (GASPS)
CF And, um...
BJ I think that came across, really, really well with the acting. I really think it did.
CF Thank you. At one point, Andrew even wrote as a stage direction: "Imagine that Darcy has an erection".
(V. LARGE CRASHING NOISE)
BJ Which bit was that?
CF It's when she's been walking across the country and bumps into him in the grounds in the early stages.
BJ The bit where she's all muddy?
CF...and dishevelled
BJ...and sweaty?
CF Exactly.
BJ Was that a difficult bit to act?
CF You mean the erection?
BJ (AWED WHISPER) Yes.
CF Um, well, Andrew also wrote that I don't propose that we should focus on it, and, therefore, no acting required in that department at least.
BJ Mmm.
(LONG PAUSE)
CF Yes.
(MORE PAUSE)
BJ Mmm.

You're welcome.

Festive video - Pride and Prejudice BBC 1995 walking to Netherfield scene

Related Reading

The by now classic post about Lucy Worsley and Regency toilet habits:

Lucy Worsley and Jane Austen: Historical Toilet Etiquette

Another classic post, which shamelessly objectifies Mr Darcy, but which is also surprisingly informative on the subject of Regency hygiene:

Privy Counsel Pin-Up - Colin Firth

Some more objectification of Mr Darcy:

It Is Tolerable, We Suppose: A Privy Counsel Pick-Me-Up

Our festive abridged version of Pride and Prejudice:

Pride and Prejudice and Plumbing

If you wish to read more about tight trousers:

All Mouth and No Trousers - Sichuan Food in Singapore

Here's what happens when you go to Tudor Friend's house with the specific purpose of overdosing on Jane Austen costume dramas:
Failing to Be Disappointed: Tudor Friend's Tudor-Era House

Þórsmörk, Iceland: Some Light Relief

Vroom, vroom! Yes, we have been away! No, you don't want to know what we have been doing! What matters is that we are back - with what we like to think of as a vengeance! Recent traumas have, quite possibly, contributed to some pretty rampant spiritual growth, which should logically result in even more inspirational and intellectually uplifting blog posts henceforth.

Also we made a vow that, if we survived our ordeal, we would go on a champagne bender, the likes of which you have never seen. As regular readers may remember, we have produced some of our best work while hungover (for instance this, and this. This one wasn't bad. Oh, and this was a very satisfying rant), so this resolution may very well work out in your favour.

Audiologist Friend has been adventurous as usual, this time in Iceland! This eminent earwax specialist says (as ever, do take this opportunity of refreshing you colloquial Swedish, but if you happen to be hungover, or otherwise linguistically incapacitated, a translation will follow):

Tro inte att jag glömt din blogg! Här kommer en riktigt fräsch o härlig WC (!!!) nedanför Eyjafjallajökull och Mýrdalsjökull - riktigt lyxigt efter en 26 km gångtur. Inga lampor men tak där väggarna inte når hela vägen upp = ljus lyser igenom, och taket gjord av genomskinlig plast (med vit färg så ljuset kommer in). Stället heter Basar i Þórsmörk.

(Don't think I've forgotten your blog! Here is a really clean and lovely WC (!!!) below Eyafjallajökull and Mýrdalsjökull - properly luxurious after a 26 km hike. No lights, but walls that don't reach all the way to the ceiling = light shining through, and the roof was made of clear plastic (painted white, so the light could get through). The place is called Basar, in Þórsmörk.)

Icelanders know how to do a good bathroom! Even in the wild! Woof!

We note with pleasure that this toilet is both clean and disability-friendly,
and features a covered toilet-roll holder.

In other news, Tudor Friend sent us this article about Japanese toilets, which was interesting, but also a) creepily close to being an advert, and b) totally lacking in anything resembling an environmental angle. Tudor Friend commented:

My theory on the great "why we don't like bidets" discussion is that we feel like we won't get sufficiently dry, and *retaining* moisture on one's posterior or nether bits is something we associate with not having cleaned sufficiently.

On us predictably going on a rant about how any discussion of Japanese super toilets needs not only an environmental element, but also a clear affirmation of the total and utter non-necessity of having a warmed-up toilet seat, Tudor Friend concurred heartily:

I agree! I've sat on one once and it was fucking CREEPY. My ass does NOT need to be toasted to have a functional bathroom experience.

We're off to bang our heads against the wall for a bit. Hopefully next time we write, we will be rampantly hungover!

Because we recently encountered a gym instructor in his fifties with a passion for both hair metal and Lady Gaga, which totally reminded us of Australian Friend, we thought we'd make today's festive video the most bathroom-related of Gaga's videos. (It coincidentally appears to feature somebody being forced to drink water.)

Festive video - Lady Gaga, Bad Romance

Related Reading

A trip down memory lane - memorable posts we've written when hungover:
A Life-Affirming Experience
"Drunken Routs, in Which More Things Were Broken Than Heads and Furniture, Sister!"

Uncle Sean's Very Rude Toilet Graffiti

The Screaming Bloody Horror That Is Unisex Toilets

Whether You Believe in Jebus Or Not: Unbelievably Rampant Linguistic Musings!

View all hungover posts here:

Posts Written When Hungover

And here:

Posts Written When Hungover (Work in Progress)

(No, we don't know why we have two labels for posts written when hungover. Most likely it is a mistake which we have consistently been too lazy to rectify.)

All posts featuring Audiologist Friend

In Anticipation of a Royal Flush

You'd be surprised by how many postcards we receive at the Privy Counsel. When it comes to the more vulgar kinds of material possessions, we don't have much to hang on the Christmas tree, as the Swedes so charmingly put it, but in terms of postcards, we possess a fortune. An actual fortune! Kick-Arse Suffragette Friend sent us one just recently, of the historical-slash-salacious kind; a picture of a rampantly attractive Dakota Sioux by the name of Kicks Iron. We do enjoy our historical heroes and heroines at the Counsel!

Kicks Iron, a Dakota Sioux.
Photograph by Frank B. Fiske, ca 1905.

Then of course there's all the postcards from random weirdoes readers that clog up our postbox to the point where the postman is giving us dirty looks arrive with charming regularity.

This postcard, from a correspondent at Castle Howard, says:

To: The Privy Counsel

The Queen will be visiting the estate next month, and the lady of the house has asked me to contact you for some advice. (The household etiquette books were recently lost in a freak plumbing accident.) 

How is one to lay out the bathroom for a royal visit?  

How is one to offer the facilities to Her Majesty?  

Can one find loo roll that is superior to two-ply?  

And is it considered indiscreet, following the visit, to install a small plaque to state "the Queen peed here" for future generations to admire? 

Your discretion regarding the matter is appreciated.  

From: Private Secretary to Lady [name illegible - these aristos frequently suffer from hereditary syphilis, making their nervous systems unreliable and their pen-wielding limbs prone to tremors]

First of all, let us assure all our readers of our utter and complete discretion.

HEY EVERYONE! THE QUEEN IS COMING TO USE THE BOGS AT CASTLE HOWARD!

When it comes to laying out the loos for a royal visit, our experience is that ordinary cleanliness goes a long way. Scrub the bathroom thoroughly using eco-friendly products (stay clear of  bleach - you don't want the Queen getting her outfit stained then sniffing disapprovingly throughout her visit). Make sure the towels are clean, but don't use fabric softeners (apart from softeners being environmentally hostile, exaggerated softness causes bits of fluff to stick to one's skin which is annoying as hell). Avoid vulgar ornaments.

Googling the words "Which toilet roll does the Queen use" yields a surprisingly rich vein of internet lunacy. The least crazy comment on this subject that we encountered was "I think Andrex holds the royal warrant which would suggest that is the brand of choice for the royal bum". Then again, once the Queen is seated on your throne - belt off, trousers down - she doesn't have much of a choice, does she? We suggest you go for the most ecological alternative you can find. (Read one of our rants about toilet roll and ecological destruction here. Here's another one.) Also, of course, make sure you hang the toilet paper the right way round!

Regarding the royal visit toilet plaque, there are two schools of thought. The first, classic, school goes, "this is an unbearably vulgar and horrid practice and must cease immediately". Was it Josephine Tey who pointed out that if one is to believe all the stories of Tudor houses visited by Queen Elizabeth I, she must have made sleeping in other people's beds quite the hobby? (Then again, Tudor courts did travel more or less constantly. Maybe we should ask Tudor Friend to write us a guest blog post about this?) There is not, as far as we know, an outspoken tradition of putting up plaques commemorating royal toilet visits (though there is a rather festive anecdote about Henry VIII and a toilet in York), and so we suspect that the advice regarding them exists as a kind of sub-genre to the "Queen Bess slept here"-type plaques.
The second, more modern, school goes "take every opportunity of making your toilet a joyous, festive place - fucking go for it, babe!" We're rather inclined towards the more modern school of thought.

This is today's festive video, because it is simply a splendid song. The title does not correlate in any way to our current mental state, long-term memory, or employment prospects.

Festive video - Bruce Springsteen, I'm goin' down

Related Reading
Our last delightful postcard: Sober As a Judge
Our first ever postcard: We Receive a Postcard
This post is not the first, nor is it, we fear, the last, time we have made a cunning pun on the poker term "royal flush". German Friend was the first to make use of this delightful witticism: Royal Flush
How to choose an eco-friendly toilet roll (WWF)
A Thought-Provoking Blog About Cholera in Haiti

A Fatally Fascinating Sequel

In our last post, we went all cryptic about what Dirty Harry might or might not have done in relation to some urinal or other. Uncle Sean explains, in this thrilling sequel, what was actually going on:

My apologies for the vagaries of my recent clippings. We had the great pleasure of visiting Coit Tower, which of course brought to mind the scene with Mrs. Westwood. So the loo pictured, the tower's actual loo, was shared in the spirit of architectural and filmological bog edification.
As for the resolution of the scene, that remark was meant to be ambiguous; let the mind of each individual make of it as they wish.

We don't know about you, but WE UNDERSTAND ALL THE AMUSING CONNOTATIONS NOW.

In other correspondence-related news, Shewee Fiend Friend sent us this festive picture of a cholera babe!

The top painting is a portrait of Kitty Fisher by Joshua Reynolds.
View the full Cholera Babe Parade here.

Look at this cholera babe I just found in the New York Public Library!
Looks like she has cholera anyway
Apologies for shitty phone quality

For those of you who are not familiar with the concept of the Cholera Babe Parade, a cholera babe is, as we so memorably put it in our classic post Woof! Cholera Babe Parade!, "a red-hot Victorian babe in the process of dying from cholera".

In other news, it has come to our attention that there is some competition or other, which is considered important by many people, and determines which restaurant is currently regarded as the best. Apparently, the Danish restaurant Noma was considered the best in the world until very recently. As it happens, we have a very lovely picture from Noma, which Audiologist Friend sent us not too long ago:

We are woefully unqualified to determine restaurant quality (our usual modus operandi when in a food-and-drink-serving establishment is to stumble to the bar and ask for the second cheapest whisky), but we certainly think this Noma toilet looks excellent! It's got a vertical toilet roll, which we decided last year was the ideal bog roll placement, and everything looks very clean, comfortable, and well ventilated. What this picture doesn't tell us is whether the facilities in Noma are afflicted with subjunctive taps - a particularly Danish disorder.
We shall have to continue pondering, no doubt.

We had originally planned a rampant feminazi video for this post, but then we came across this one! It was so festive, and the dudes in it so lovely, that we had to post this instead. Enjoy!

Festive video - Pjammerz Dubai, pjamming to Lloraras Por Mi by Chapa C

Related Reading

Our by now classic post about Dirty Harry: Gunning for Greatness

The original Cholera Babe Parade

A post on toilet roll placement: Rocking, Rolling, Ranting

Other posts about memorable Danish restaurants:
On Ranting, and Wine
Det lille Apotek: Big Beers and Small Toilets in Everyone's Favourite Toilet Country

Rumours, a Teaser, and More Epistolary Action (With Useful Facts about Everyone's Favourite Toilet Country)

Gunning for Greatness

At the risk of boring all our readers to actual, salty tears of desperation, we must inform you that we've had another one of those days that aren't as bad as one expects, despite various gruesome elements like a presentation and - horror of horrors - a group collaboration. (Last time we had an unexpectedly good day of this sort was back in March.) We do realise that a tale of angst, drama and insurmountable difficulties makes for more exciting reading, but really, we've just had quite a nice day. The weather has been pleasant, and we had a really nice lunch.

HOWEVER. We know that our regular readers come to this blog expecting action, wit, and dirty puns, and therefore we shall share with you today our latest missive from Uncle Sean. That stalwart of ironic detachment and really quite perverted thoughts sent a message containing the following multi-media material:

Dedicated to bringing you noteworthy loos from our travels, we must begin with Dirty Harry:

Festive video - Dirty Harry, "Penetration"

Where, oh where could this scene resolve?

We must confess that we're not quite sure what Uncle Sean is driving at. Maybe he's been to the San Francisco area? And perhaps got shitfaced on way too much beer? Like Dirty Harry is about to get in the movie clip? And he's perhaps thinking that Dirty Harry might have ended up using a urinal like this one? And then proceeded to make more phallic puns?

The possibilities are endless.

We visited a random history site recently which had the audacity to call itself a "multi-media" blog simply by virtue of featuring a single crappy embedded video. This miffed us to the core - we've been doing regular festive videos for YEARS! Spurred by pride and conceit to up the ante, we've decided to add, on top of the rampantly festive video above, A FLAGRANTLY JOVIAL GIF. This one comes to us from a rampant feminist friend, who claims that it illustrates a useful way of dealing with mansplainers and misogynists.

http://barfingunicorn.tumblr.com/post/114348618414/do-u-ever-just-wanna-throw-a-motherfucker-at

Uh-huh.


Related Reading
Actually, when we started doing regular embedded videos, it was because we were similarly spurred by pride and conceit, having seen Semi-Intellectual Friend's blog and getting ragingly jealous of the zingy format: Handwashing Extravaganza

All posts featuring Uncle Sean

Clint Eastwood being laudably hygienic:
Privy Counsel Pin-Up: Clint Eastwood, or, Black-and-White Baths, or, Dirty Men with Guns

That other time when things ended up not quite as bad as we had feared:
Southern Comfort: A Joyful and Soothing Italian Toilet

The Bottom Line Is, There's a Copper-Bottomed Approach to Jeans. Bottoms Up!

So it turns out other people actually manage to wear skirts, and even dresses. (If you haven't read it already, see our rant about the impossibility of wearing skirts (and also jeans) here.) We were having a conversation with some rampant feminazi friends of ours the other day about the struggle to allineate feminazism with the real world. It went like this:

Medievalist (With a Side Interest in Roman Archaeology) Friend: I like to keep the scales balanced by listening to rap music but never shaving my armpits. 

The Privy Counsellor: We shave our armpits but take a manly interest in plumbing. 

Friend of Medievalist (With a Side Interest in Roman Archaeology) Friend: I scowl at male babies and drop the word "patriarchy" into casual conversation. But I wear dresses.

Note, here, a) the balancing act that is required to perform gender in a socially acceptable way while staying reasonably sane and maintaining a modicum of comfort, and b) the fact that there are people out there who manage to wear things, perhaps even with tights. However, we find comfort in the fact that Bridget Jones, like us, finds it hard to wear skirts without them riding up:

12.15 p.m. Was bloody Richard Finch yelling: "Bridget. This isn't arseing Care in the Community. It is a television production office meeting. If you must stare out of the window, at least try to do it without sliding that pen in and out of your mouth. So can you do that?"
   "Yes," I said sulkily, putting the pen down on the table.
   "No, not can you take the pen out of your mouth, can you find me a Middle-England, middle-class voter, fifty plus, own home, who is in favour?"
   "Yes, no problem," I breathed airily, thinking I could ask Patchouli in favour of what later.
   "In favour of what?" said Richard Finch.
   I gave him a really quite enigmatic smile. "I think you might find you've answered your own question there," I said. "Male or female?"
   "Both," said Richard sadistically, "one of each."
   "Straight or gay?" I exoceted back.
   "I said Middle England," he snarled witheringly. "Now get on the bloody phone, and try to remember to put a skirt on in future, you're distracting my team."
   Honestly, as if they would take any bloody notice as they are all obsessed with their careers and it is not that short, it had just ridden up.
   Patchouli says it is in favour of the European or single currency, which she thinks means either. Oh fuck, oh fuck. Right. Ah, telephone. That'll be the Shadow Treasury press office.  

(Fielding, Helen. Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason. London: Picador, 1999. Pp. 80-81)

Luckily, there may be hope for womankind after all. After our recent rant, Medievalist (With a Side Interest in Roman Archaeology) Friend sent us a sympathetic message about the secret to wearing jeans. It said:

It's hard, this feminism lark, isn't it? Also, my advice re jeans buying. Buy the pair that comfortably fit your legs and arse, and take those motherfuckers in at the waist.

For all fat-bottomed girls out there, this is the only way. I've not bought a pair of pants in ten years that I haven't performed this quick operation upon. Much less stressful!

We have taken these words to heart. Finally, a sensible approach to wearing jeans while maintaining all of one's vital bodily functions! Hurrah! Bottoms up!

We reckon some hardy toilets from a tough, male environment would come in handy right about now. The following photos are from Carspect, a vehicle safety inspection garage in Svågertorp, Sweden. The photographer is Our Mum, who is very ladylike, but totally has this tyre-changing thing down. She also deals with other traditionally male areas like leaky pipes, Latin grammar, and rodent infestations, with style, pizazz, and even brio.

We enjoy this festive green floor and covered toilet-roll holder. There is also disability-friendliness happening,
and the bin is at a very comfortable distance from the toilet.

A lovely sink with a lovely mixer tap, a lovely empty bin, lovely paper towels,
and a lovely, sturdy coat hook on which you can hygienically hang your handbag. Woof!
(See another toilet we enjoyed, that had a very empty bin, here.)

You knew what the festive video was gonna be, didn't you? YEAH.

Festive video - Queen, Fat-Bottomed Girls

Related Reading

Ten Things That Feminism Has Ruined for Me (Guardian article)

A blog post about all the ways in which tights can gang up on you and ruin your day (from Mytightswontstayup.com)

Our massive rant about jeans: All Mouth and No Trousers - Sichuan Food in Singapore

Our most Bridget Jones-esque post ever: "Drunken Routs, in Which More Things Were Broken Than Heads and Furniture, Sister!"

Another post about shamelessly plagiarising other people's words: Coasting Along: Saving Time and Effort by Plagiarising Our Friends. Also Some Otters.

To be honest, there are quite a few of these. Here's another one: Rampant Titillation - Basically, a Real-Life Epistolary Novel!

All Mouth and No Trousers - Sichuan Food in Singapore

It is a truth universally acknowledged that women's jeans are the tool of the devil.

We have access to excellent advice here at the Privy Counsel, what with being in communication with so many intellectual people, and one piece of advice that has really stayed with us comes from Australian Friend and goes, "When buying jeans, go for the tightest you can squeeze yourself into. They will stretch". This is good, solid advice, and was confirmed by the semi-hot dude who sold us a pair of very nice and very tight jeans once.

There is, however, a problem with this approach. It impedes breathing, blood circulation, and digestion. It became apparent, for instance, that wearing the jeans mentioned above caused us stomach pains and shortness of breath. (Seriously, one might as well be wearing a fucking corset.)

A trifle! you might jeer, derisively, while sipping your fennel twig tea, sitting down carefully, lest your jeans split, on a velvet chaise-longue from which you will not be able to get up due to your poor circulation and propensity to faint. Well, at the Privy Counsel we like to stay not just intellectually, but physically active (within reason). We are rather fond of breathing, and doing stuff, and eating things. So for a while we took to wearing skirts.

This constitutes a change, rather than a break - you still get misery, but at least it’s a different kind of misery. A skirt usually doesn't have pockets, meaning you have nowhere to put the random, crumpled-up post-its that are the basis of survival in this perilous world; it necessitates the wearing of tights, which will leave your crotch sweaty and uncomfortable; and it will worm its way around both horizontally and vertically, requiring you to keep pulling the fabric into place in the manner of a Tourette’s-addled drug addict, scratching and yanking at random parts of your body, lest you abandon your skirt to ride up to just below your arse, leaving all of your thighs bare for pervy old men to leer at. (Try keeping this up while running for the bus.) Also, when teaching, a skirt that keeps riding up is a seriously uncomfortable thing to be wearing, on so many levels. Skirts, like jeans, are not good.

It's not just us. Tight jeans are DANGEROUS.
Image: doctorsrepublic.com

So we bought some less tight jeans. (This was not easy, by the way. Have you tried looking up women's jeans online to see what's available in the shops? There is a plethora of jeans, sure, but they are all modelled by skeletal women with the kind of shape that means you might as well have put the jeans on a pair of stilts, or a baby giraffe, for all the good it will do you in determining how the jeans will look ON YOUR ACTUAL ARSE. Wouldn't it be good if jeans models didn't look like a pair of stilts, or a baby giraffe?)

This worked really well until they - as Australian Friend had warned us, many times - stretched, and started to sag. If there is one thing a toilet blogger does not want while engaging in intellectual pursuits, it's a pair of jeans sliding downwards, and dragging one's underwear with them. Jeans, in our opinion, should stay firmly in place, and not go anywhere.

To make a long story marginally shorter, we found an internet tutorial on how to take in the waist of a pair of jeans. We performed this operation the other night, meaning our new jeans now a) don't sag, and b) don't allow us to breathe, circulate blood, or digest food. We're back to where we started, and are considering joining a religious cult of some kind, in order to be able to wear a tent with impunity.

Caitlin Moran obviously manages to find jeans that are both comfortable and attractive
- certainly in these pictures she appears to be breathing and performing all normal bodily activities 
including intellectual exertion, while looking leg-thumpingly gorgeous.
Where does one buy jeans that allow one to do all of these things?
Image: spillerena.com

Our actual point with this harangue was that we haven't got round to posting Medievalist (With a Side Interest in Roman Archaeology) Friend's fantastic pictures from Singapore yet, due to being preoccupied with breathing, putting the sewing machine back, and picking bits of thread and fluff off the furniture. Let us quickly post the pictures now, before we faint from oxygen deprivation.

Medievalist (With a Side Interest in Roman Archaeology) Friend says:

I've been meaning to send you these for ages! These are from my trip to Singapore last year. The first three photos are the best toilets I have ever seen, from The Jewel Box in Singapore. The toilets have floor to ceiling windows which look out over the whole of Singapore bay (view included). We had to make a pit stop there after a certain relative's bum couldn't handle the delicious Sichuan meal we'd just eaten! 

The second photos are from the loo at Singapore zoo, but many loos in Singapore have that classic open garden thing going on. It's so cool! 

The final set are from the Singapore Night Safari, which is totally awesome, but I had to wait until people had left the dunnies before I took them. In all, Singapore is basically better than the rest of the world at everything, toilets and autocracy included! 

P. S. I only saw one loo in Singapore that didn't have sensors on the sinks. Blended taps ain't got nothing on this!

Isn't this beautiful! And disability-friendly, too - check out the shorter sink!
Does this remind us of something? Well, yes. The Battlestar Galactica bogs!

This is very stylish, but, as we famously complained once in Iceland, a place this posh should be able
to afford doors that go all the way down to the floor. (We have a horror of flimsy cubicle doors.)

Loo with a view!

Same problem with the doors, here.
But look! You can almost see Medievalist (With a Side Interest in Roman Archaeology) Friend in the mirror!
Truly a sight for sore eyes!

Masses of points for the lush greenery and mixer taps!

Doors.

But greenery!

Wasn't that lovely? Do you yearn for a warmer clime, where men are men, women are women, and all taps are mixer taps and most have motion sensors? We sure as hell do!

This post is quite long now and it appears we are expected to do actual work today, so we should probably just fuck off. But there ought to be a festive video. This one seems eminently suitable, being tropical (like Singapore), flamboyant and musical (like Medievalist [With a Side Interest in Roman Archaeology] Friend), and festive (like this bog blog, and also like Medievalist [With a Side Interest in Roman Archaeology] Friend). Also, like us, Elton John appears to reminisce about the jeans of his youth, which somehow allowed one to breathe and didn't rip except perhaps if one slid on one's arse down a massive rock.

Damn it. We just dropped an ibuprofen in our tea, and haven't got a spoon handy to fish it out with. Definitely time to fuck off.

Festive video - Elton John and the Muppets, Crocodile Rock

Related Reading

Our favourite post (so far) featuring Medievalist (With a Side-Interest in Roman Archaeology) Friend:
Hungover Ranting: Festschrift to Medievalist (With a Side-Interest in Roman Archaeology) Friend

An account of all the different ways in which a pair of tights can ruin your day

All posts featuring Medievalist (With a Side-Interest in Roman Archaeology)

All posts featuring Singapore

Another zoo-related post: HTFU - Wipe for Wildlife

Here's a random thing that a friend sent us, that we though was deliciously ironic