I must firstly say that if a reader, or unintentional clicker, happens to be a trick cyclist by profession, then you may be able to relate to the early part of this post and offer help. Not the dark room again, please.
I do, on occasion, wake up with strangeness in my head. Hay, trick cyclist, you paying attention? Today I woke up with a name buzzing round in there. I have no idea why, but there it was. A name. Buzzing. The buzzing name was Willy.
When I say a name ‘buzzing’ well, that’s just an expression. If the name had been literally buzzing it would've sounded more like ‘Buzzzzilly and have meant absolutely nothing to me and I would’ve nodded off to sleep again. Know what I mean?
As it was, it was Willy in the head, and as I dragged myself into full wake-up-fullness, the Willy tale came back to me. The story relating to Willy goes something like this….
Many, and again I do mean many, years ago I remember hearing my mummy talking to the young daughter of lady friend. This young daughter of the lady friend informed my mummy that she was off, that evening, to see her new boyfriend who lived in a village not far from town.
My mummy, being the polite, conversational mummy she was, enquired as to the name of the boy and where he lived. The reply came thusly, and is absolutely, honestly and truly the answer wot mummy got,
“His name’s Willy, Willy Wacket. He’s from Wetwang.”
Willy Wacket from Wetwang became a firm favourite conversation piece during family gatherings for many years there-after.
It’s been so many years but if there are any Wackets still residing in Wetwang, well, how ya’ doin’?
This remembrance process of remembering that reminded me of a wonderful book from days of yore by Mr. Adams and Mr. Lloyd. If you’ve never come across this little work I promise you will enjoy it. Over and over again. And again. Please be warned, although I’m no expert, I would think this is quintessentially British humour. The contents are best explained by the authors;
In Life*, there are many hundreds of common experiences, feelings, situations and even objects which we all know and recognize, but for which no words exist.
On the other hand, the world is littered with thousands of spare words which spend their time doing nothing but loafing about on signposts pointing at places.
Our job, as we see it, is to get these words down off the signposts and into the mouths of babes and suckling's and so on, where they can start earning their keep in everyday conversation and make a more positive contribution to society.
Long story short, obscure place names given new meaning. Yup, Wetwang’s in there…… and is given the ‘meaning’ you’d most likely guess.
Without further adid, arm yourself with your favourite drink and enjoy a pleasant, chucklesom evening; here she be;
{There's also ‘The Deeper Meaning of Liff’ out there.}
Quote; Douglas Adams.
“The fact that we live at the bottom of a deep gravity well, on the surface of a gas covered planet going around a nuclear fireball 90 million miles away and think this to be normal is obviously some indication of how skewed our perspective tends to be.”
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