Jun. 25th, 2008

davywavy: (Default)
Virginia Woolf once said that, to be herself, a woman needs a room of her own in which she can be undisturbed.
So how come, right, when Mrs. Rochester in Jane Eyre got precisely that, she did nothing but complain about it?

Eeeh, women. They're never satisfied.
davywavy: (Default)
I've been playing Baron Munchausen with [livejournal.com profile] robinbloke on his LJ. I really ought to be working.

Anyway, my story:


I was in Russia - I forget the year, but I had remained there after the affair of the Batavian Pearl-Necklace (during which, I'm sure you remember, I had been profoundly mislead as to the provenance of the piece of jewellry, much to my launderer's dismay) - and had entered the Trans-Caucus midwinter sleigh race. This remarkable race uses double-decker sleighs pulled only by russian serfs and only regular application of the knout (a type of sturdy russian whip) is enough to ensure victory.
My sleigh had been manufactured on a bespoke basis for me in St Petersburg, and the entire upper deck was a single gigantic bed. You see, although a gentleman does not like to boast and never reveals the name of a lady, my sole companion on this race was the Tsars youngest daughter, Princess Olga.
Alas, I used the whip far more on her (feisty little minx that she was) than my serfs and we fell well behind the main race without my really realising.
Looking up from preparing my breakfast one morning (a special concoction of my own devising involving eggs, oysters and a strong zinc supplement) I realised that we were surrounded by a horde of lusty Cossacks, many of whom had never seen a noblewoman before and were keep to try their arm, as it were. After my immediate thoughts of following the fine example of Lot and his daughters in the book of Genesis (Chapter 19, Verse 8, if you're interested), I realised that it would reflect badly upon myself if I allowed the a future tsarina to be carried off to a fate worse than death.
Unless she had been Catherine the Great, who my grandfather knew well, obviously, but Olga was cut from quite a different cloth so I took it upon myself to step out of my carriage and talk to the Cossacks myself.
I don't know if you are aware, but the Cossacks, from their long history of eating the hearts and drinking the blood of their enemies, consider that a sign of oral health is bright red teeth and gums - apparently they use brick dust as toothpaste when short of enemies - and so upon seeing my gleaming white smile they took me as a god and fell in awe at my feet.
This sort of thing happens to me all the time and so I had no lack of experience of capitalising upon such a situation. I quickly explained to their Shaman that the great sky-god would be angered ("Droskula Glbludnik Gzjuzka Gzjuzka", if you're ever in that situation yourself) if they hampered me in my task of carrying the beautiful woman to her nuptials in the sky.
To cut a long story short, the Cossacks quickly agreed to pull my carriage for me to ensure there was no further delay to my trip, resulting in my winning the sleigh race and delivering the princess to her father (who was warring against Turkey in the Crimea at the time).

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