Kevin the Butcher's Dangly bits*

Today was warm and beautiful and I thawed out when I got home from work and shed the office gear and got into my jeans/polyester mini dress /skivvy/slippers combo, which was *very* mountains and very comfie and VERY glam in the tree print green, scarlet rouching and leapord print that these various items were decorated in. As opposed to the 'little black dress' plus long grey jacket I had on today. My newly returned from O/S boss said 'you're looking nice, all in black...' as I was making a cuppa. So what did I do? say 'oh this? Thankyou' looking slightly puzzled slightly pleased with myself... or did I laugh and say 'all my washing is wet and the only things I have left are the corporate gear!'. I'll leave you to guess. But lets just say that indeed I fibbed, because the washing is not wet, it's all over my bedroom floor in semi sorted piles waiting for someone to take pity on it and wash it. But no one has, and nor will they (probably) 'til every last sock and knicker has been worn, and every last skivvy has failed the snifff test and I have run out of suit coordinates and tights to pull me through. Goddess knows what I'll be getting my self to life drawing in tomorrow. hey, if I was the model I could legitimately go in a dressing gown and nothing else! (except for the fact that I walk there of course...). That said I am no-where near brave enough to get all my lumps and bumps out for strangers to mimic in ink and charcoal. Oh no thankyou. Especially the couple of older creepy-ish (not actullay creepy mind, just this side of creepy) men who go to class and might get a little too much aesthetic joy out of said lumps and bumps, and worse, who might say to me like they did the model last time 'oh you're looking well, have you been going to the beach, you look more tanned' and 'yes you've lost some weight around the middle.'...like, hello, the girl is baring her curvy bottom for our drawing pleasure, standing still in highly improbably poses for long silent minutes, braving the fact that we could all draw her with hairy hobbit feet and witchy face, and then to top it off they think they can just casually appraise her physical form?? Like where do you draw the line? Would it be ok to say 'hmmm, I see your boobs are looking big this week, are you pre-menstrual?' or 'gee, I see your pubes have really got quite bushy, do you get hairer in winter?'... Anyway, lets just say that mismatched crap clothes will suit me just fine tomorrow and I am not tempted to rip them all off. Just one final debrief (ha ha) about life drawing - putting it to the board here... I asked whether they ever have male models (not because I particularly want one, although a bit of sinewy back and different shaped arms would be a good challenge from a shading perspective) and they were all a bit 'oh, well, you know, in theory...but we never have', a woman said 'they're quite hard to draw you know... the dangly bits' and one guy even had the nerve to say 'I just don't find men very sexy to draw' to which I snorted/scoffed in a way that I like to think said quite clearly 'hello, you are bordering on being dirty old sexist perves here, don't you think you should even up the power balance here and deal with looking at and appraising the male body as well??' with a touch of 'well maybe you're scared you will find it sexy and don't want to grapple with that' and then a post script of 'and anyway, if Michaelangelo could carve a giant marble David, I think you should be able to do a crap sketch of Kevin the butcher with hobbit feet don't you??'.

* Not his real name.