An acquaintance of mine who shall remain nameless, a self-confessed Christian who nevertheless often chooses Sunday brunch-going over church-going, has recently returned from vacationing in the Nevada desert with a shameful rash that shall also remain nameless: proof, if any were needed, that what happens in Vegas does not necessarily stay in Vegas, no matter how much expensive ointment you slather over it. He claims that this amusing skin condition is merely the result of an allergic reaction to his hotel's all-you-can-eat buffet: further proving, as I gleefully pointed out, that God does not always help those who help themselves. No doubt, I suggested, such sufferings were sent by the Lord to try him, much as he was sent by the hostess to try the spicy pork dumplings, and both the Lord and the spicy pork dumplings obviously move in mysterious ways.
Requiring a suit for a funeral, size 38-regular and hopefully modern, I wrestled my way through the revolving doors of my local fashionable boutique and toured the designer racks in search of something appropriate.
One well-cut example caught my eye immediately, but unfortunately the acronym "DKNY" was printed down both the right jacket sleeve and left trouser leg in large, bold, white letters. Another was embossed with grinning skulls and another featured scarlet leatherette lapels. There were suits suitable for gypsies and pirates, suits that Liberace would have thought too vulgar, space suits sans helmets, suits with short pants, and suits for stage productions of Guys and Dolls, but nothing sober.
I don't want to pay my last respects looking like the banjo player in an old-time jug band, so I guess I must give up on any suit stitched together in the twenty-first century, and a beat a retreat to time-worn Mr Henri's Gentleman's Outfitters, the bay-rum scented inside-leg emporium of yore.
Predictably, my bravura performance as Hamlet at the Slugford Drama Festival has been heavily criticized by the philistine local media. These provincial idiots accused me of "merely phoning it in," when it should have been quite obvious to anyone with brains that I was playing The Dane as a modern commuter forced to deliver his profound soliloquies via AT&T's cellular network, and consequently experiencing all the communication problems that arise in such a situation.
Any audience familiar with theatrical genius would surely have understood that my slurred speech, nervous pauses, repeated lines and incoherent mumbling were all integral elements of this seminal interpretation of Hamlet's human condition, brilliantly conveying the poor quality of AT&T's service and the frequency of its dropped calls, and in no way offered incontrovertible evidence that in realty I am simply a extremely feeble actor who spends far too long in the bar before the curtain opens.
Honestly, do I really have to swagger on stage with an iPhone stuffed down my codpiece to ram the point home? This is the thanks I get for bringing my considerable talent for challenging, avant-garde theater to the stupid suburbs!