I’ve felt even lazier than usual today because yesterday I drove to the K-Club in Kildare and ran in the BHAA 10K race. Yes, we running scruff were kept well away from the glitterati. They probably didn't want us to suffer from seeing them suffer in their £350-a-night accommodation. What's that? Well yes, I did do a mind-bogglingly good time, but modesty would forbid me to....Oh OK, you’ve forced me, just under 47 minutes. Now can we get on?
Even had I felt fresh today, I would have been weak from laughter after reading my old university classmate Ruth Dudley Edwards’s column in the Sindo. The woman really is God's gift to humour. Today she was on about the French ban on Muslim women wearing the burka in public, and you're probably wondering is she outraged by it. Ha ha ha ha HAAAAAAA! Of COURSE she isn't. In fact she hates any kind of covering of a woman's face. On what grounds? Because it’s not a mandatory part of the Muslim religion! Mind you, there's no religious law that says I have to wear underwear or that the head of the Church of England has to wear godawful hats, but we do. I mean, I wear the underwear and she wears the hats. Although I'm sure she wears underwear too. When I say 'she', I naturally mean the head of the Church of England, not Ruthie. Though of course she wears underwear as well. I think.
Ruthie isn't just a fan of banning the burka in every country IN EUROPE (I told you this woman is funny), she's also as you probably know a big fan of the Orange Order. It fits. The Order always does what the law allows it, like marching through places where there are loads of people for annoying, although if the law stops allowing it to march in some of those places, it gets a bit upset. At least that's how it looked on my TV screen, the time of Drumcree. Upset. Very very upset.
Right now Ruthie's the teeniest bit upset herself because she'd prefer that all the European countries ban burka-wearing in public, not just France. She claims she wants this because if you're a lawyer or a teacher or a civil servant, working with the public, you can't do your job properly in a burka. I don't know if Ruthie's ever taught a class but I have, and if I could stop laughing long enough I'd tell you why I think she's pulling our collective leg. If she weren't, I know she'd have mentioned the wishes of pupils and parents and the school itself, and she hasn't. It's called straight-face humour. Like Woody Allen or Buster Keaton.
I tell you - my bones are aching from my near-death experience in Kildare yesterday, but none of them half as much as my funny-bone, after reading Ruthie’s weekly word-dose. To paraphrase another old classmate of mine, Eamonn McCann, in another context: How would we know what to laugh at if we didn't have her?
Yes it really is Freedom to practice your religion unless you happen to be a Muslim living in France. I sometimes wonder what planet Ruth Dudley Edwards lives on. From apologist for Protestant fundies to Secular Humanist in one giant leap.
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