Thursday, 12 March 2009

The monocled scrutineer

Something exciting happened today. On my way home from work, there was a man on the train wearing a monocle. A monocle! I've never seen one in real life before. It was fatter than I thought it would be, which is the opposite of when you see famous people in the flesh.

He was a late-middle-aged man, but he was not some tweed-strictured* fossil. He was a waterproof-jacket-and-casual-slacks wearer, who was clearly in touch with at least some inventions of the modern age. Gore-Tex, for example. Also, he was reading The Independent. 

I assume he wore the monocle because one of his eyes is much lamer than the other. If I was afflicted in such a way, instead of with tedious old chronic myopia, I might go for a magnifying glass, which I would wear on a chain hanging from my belt.

The monocled eye looked brilliantly googly and looming through the glass, and I found myself hoping he had some young grandchildren or nieces and nephews who would be giddily spooked by it, and grow up to remember its strangeness with an ever-increasing degree of exaggeration.

Today was almost as thrilling as the occasion last year when I saw a businessman wearing an actual bowler hat.

*I may be using this incorrectly.

2 comments:

Robert Hudson said...

Oh, yup, also: big up for this post heading. Been meaning to say for a while.

Miss Jones said...

Thank you. My thought processes afterwards were: 'Does it actually makes sense?' and then 'Do I actually care?'