Conversation in a Victorian Tea Room

On 8 August 2012 20:11, Mary Francis <francismef@gmail.com> wrote:

Silvana (73) said she'd never laughed so much since she was at school, and it was Agnes' (75) fault. We three agreed afterwards that it was just as well Margareta, (82) is deaf. If there's ever a conversation you would have wanted to be a fly on the wall for, this was it!

We were at a Victorian Tea Room, and we're delicately drinking tea and forking our way through scones with cream and jam, having an unexpectedly good time.

Agnes is very smart both in dress and appearance, slim petite and blonde, with hilarious tales of her life in the travelling community. Most of them involving Agnes bossing her enormous and devoted husband about, keeping him on his toes by proving time and again that whatever he does to please her, he can't get it right.

It's how she tells them.

During a lull in the conversation I casually mentioned the controversy over Fifty Shades Of Grey. Without batting an eyelid, Agnes tells us she's reading it at the moment. I really hadn't expected this, we are, after all, Catholic Matrons in a Tea Shoppe!

'I'll tell you one thing, 'she said,' It's really badly written. I shan't be reading the other two!'

'What's she talking about?' asks Margareta, so I have to relay a slightly modified but still unmistakably risqué conversation about which parts of a man's body we find most attractive and generally hooting over the assumptions behind this question. Sylvana thought male bums too hairy to be attractive, but that a deep voice really turns her on. She's French, and was free with gestures and facial expressions, such as made my attempt to tone down her remarks for Margareta, redundant.

I would blush to repeat what wiles Sylvana and Agnes employ to cool the ardour of their respective mates: these are the tactics of black belt, medal- winning, wives that have both served terms of well over fifty years. I think it safe to say that Agnes occasionally employs a wincyette nightdress.

I don't expect you know what a wincyette  nightdress is! Hint: It doesn't plunge.

A film crew were filming the occasion for, 'Food Glorious Food' a prog that wias screened early last year. They took footage of me pouring tea, but they were, thankfully, elsewhere in the room for our confessions.

Fr Aidan was seated right behind Agnes, but she didn't care. 'Oh he knows what a wicked soul I have!' she laughed.

'Agnes,' I said, You have an innocent heart! A dirty mind... But an innocent heart... .