New slang
Saatchi n. after Saatchi, Charles, wife strangler
and ‘playful tiff’ merchant. To get one’s hands around another’s throat.
For example: “gor blimey that’s better,
he were givin’ me a right saatching before you came along with your truncheon,
officer.” To strangle with your bare hands: “if he’s parked in my space again I’ll saatchi the bugger, so I will.”
Nigella n. after Nigella Lawson, celebrity cook and
battered wife. To have another’s hands around your throat, to be strangled
by someone using their bare hands. For example: “can’t anyone (cough, splutter) help me here? (Cough, splutter, gasp,
gasp) I’m being Nigellaed good ‘n’ proper.”
Tipping
BLISS always gets into a pickle about tipping in
restaurants, so here’s a useful guide, handily categorised on a geographical
basis:
Everywhere else: leave a tip. About 10% should do, 20% in North America .
When not to tip: when the service has been awful.
Don’t say ‘keep the change’ when it’s a piffling amount and
some poor waiter or waitress has sorted out your Alzheimer’s vegan grannie and
your three fussy kids and your pathetic husband who won’t eat onions (how’s he
still in the gene pool?).
Talking of waiters…
…there’s a school of thought that goes against that ‘you are
what you eat’ and ‘you are what you wear’ baloney and, as a rule of thumb,
determines your character by how you treat the staff serving you in
restaurants.
I wasn’t aware of this until today, but I like it. I’ve
frequently cringed at the way people I’ve been with have behaved.
Apart from anything else, I’d refer you to the relevant
scene in ‘Fight Club’.[1]
It must’ve been easier in the past. Fish, chips. Here you
go, mate. Enjoy. Salt and vinegar on the table. Slices of (unidentified,
non-specific) bread with some sort of butter-substitute spread. Now there’s
intolerance not only to staff, but to gluten, to certain oils, to, no doubt,
tartar sauce. I’ve heard a grown man utter the words “sorry, I don’t like fish”
with a straight face and the expectation that he’d not be thought any worse of
for saying such a childish, pathetic thing.
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