VAGUENESS
Unquestionably the best way to communicate with your fellow hoi polloi in these hectic times of Congo-Crimean Haemorrhagic Fever and Inspector Collect. As a communicative device, vagueness is deployed in one of the following manners: (1) Murmured Words of Comfort;1 (2) Trailing Off Into the Ether;2 or (3) Speaking Before Congress.
1. “It’s just a correction, not a recession, darling. . . .”
2. “I will spend the rest of my life looking for the real killers. . . .”
VODKA
Like IKEA end tables and The Collected Works of Lenin, vodka goes with everything.1 As if they were playing a kind of grisly chicken with this conventional wisdom, club patrons have been mixing the yummy fermented elixir with vile cough-syrup flavored “energy drinks,”2 thus applying the age-old drinking bylaw “gas and brakes.”3
1. [In fact, these three things might actually go together, as after you’ve finished propping up your dangerously listing end table by answering that pernicious question “What Is to Be Done?” you may be ready for a nice stiff vodka martini or five.—Eds.]
2. See also: “Jelly, Royal” and “Scams, Egregious.”
3. A.k.a. the poor man’s speedball, the ol’ giddyap-whoa.
VULGARITY
As that noted war criminal Henry Kissinger is wont1 to note, nothing makes good diplomacy better like a well-placed string of curse words. Of course, even those with the most proficient and artistic potty-mouth might want to think about investing in alternatives to cursing—just in case you’re called to speak in front of, say, your grandmother or the Pope.2 Barring these unfortunate Valium-compulsory circumstances, one may profitably inject one’s everyday speech with as many fucking curse words as one can stammer out. However, special props are obviously due to those industrious types working overtime to generate new, inventive curses for social consumption.3
1. “Wont,” of course, is one of those terms currently out of vogue that hipsters can use to amuse themselves. See also: “Behoove” and “Coupland, Whatever Happened to Douglas?”
2. For this purpose, consider investing in some cursing homonyms. Instead of “Jesus Christ!” try “Cheese and Rice!” Be creative!
3. Personal favorites of the Encyclop椩a of Evil staff include: “Shitballs!” and the splendid innovation of the local cyclist who yells “Cock!” (at an earsplitting volume) when she encounters hills.
Kate Shuster, Contrib.
