Louise Rennison_Georgia Nicolson 06 (20 page)

 

Sellotape •
Sellotape is a clear sticky tape. Usually used for sticking bits of paper to other bits of paper but can be used for sticking hair down to make it flat. (Once I used it for sticking Jas's mouth shut when she had hiccups. I thought it might cure them. It didn't, but it was quite funny, anyway.)

 

sidies •
Bits of face hair that men grow down the sides of their ears to their chins. If you are asking me why, try asking yourselves why, as I believe you will find George Washington started it.

 

slag •
Slag is a lovely complimentary word for girls meaning “madam.” (No it's not. It is a word that means “you are a rough, common, tarty girl with very low moral standards.”)

 

spangleferkel •
A kind of German sausage. I know. You couldn't make it up, could you? The German language is full of this kind of thing, like
lederhosen
and so on. And
Goosegot
.

Vair vair good value.

 

squid •
Squid is the plural of quid and I do know why that is. A bloke owed another bloke six pounds or six quid, and he goes up to him with an octopus with one of its tentacles bandaged up, and he says, “Hello mate, here is the sick squid I owe you.” Do you see?? Do you see? Sick squid, six quid??? The marvelous juxtaposition of…look, we just call pounds squids. Leave it at that. Try and get on with it, people.

 

strop •
A “strop” is No. 3 on the famous “losing it” scale. This is as follows.

1. minor tizz
   
2. complete tizz and to do
   
3. strop
   
4. a visit to Strop Central
   
5. F.T. (Funny turn)
   
6. spazattack
   
7. complete ditherspaz
   
8. nervy b. (nervous breakdown)
   
9. complete nervy b.
   
10. ballisiticisimus
    

tannoy •
Loudspeaker system. Intercom.

 

tosser •
A special kind of prat. The other way of putting this is “wanker” or “monkey spanker.”

 

truncheon •
A fat piece of wood for policemen to bop criminals on the head with, or twirl about for a laugh. I have been told (by Jas, so I am not relying on it), that you say “baton.” But why your policemen have the time to conduct orchestras at work, I do not know.

 

Veet •
A cream you use to remove evidence of the orangutan gene. Hair remover. It used to be called Immac.

 

Water Board •
A bunch of blokes who look after the nation's reservoirs and water supply.

 

wet •
A drippy, useless, nerdy idiot. Lindsay.

 

whelk boy •
A whelk is a horrible shellfish thing that only the truly mad eat. Slimy and mucuslike. Whelk boy is a boy who kisses like a whelk, i.e., a slimy mucus kisser. Erlack a pongoes.

Jacket art © 2006 by Howard Huang

Cover design by Sasha Illingworth