District Bulletin: Event & Circumstance

This article is part of the District Bulletin series.

Passer of this post, relieve yourself of stride and savor a moment between yourself and the dispatch that has been tacked to this post! Readership of this bulletin brings the relief of mental fullness and the satisfaction of knowledge. It is also required. If you have passed the post to which this post is posted without reading this post, please report yourself to your superiors for unkind judgment, thrashing, and forced reading of the document which you failed to read, this very document, which readers of this document are now reading and may disregard the last sentence of.

And to continue:

Concealment of the Slattern
November 15th, 01033

Join the festival! As leaves break free of their moorings and crash upon the soil, we burst once again into festival. Autumn brings one of the district’s most beloved celebrations, the annual Concealment of the Slattern. Your superiors strongly encourage you, under threat of much clucking, to attend. This year’s festivities will be held at the outskirts of the Weep of Desperation, where the bracken has grown quite greenly and highly, so suitably. The Effigy of the Slattern, already under construction by the district’s finest sculptors and woodsmiths, shall be pulled into the Weep in a four-man tugbarrow and thrown into the bracken at noon exactly.

A superior will then read a passage from our book, in which the harlot is cursed to a lifetime upon the bracken, covered in leaves, concealed from the eyes of the men whose lust she so arouses. The men of the district, whose rakes are expected to be at the ready, will then speedily rake fallen leaves upon the Effigy of the Slattern until her whorish shame has been entirely covered by the graceful waste of trees. If weather permits, fire will be put to the effigy. When the event has concluded to the satisfaction of all present, the event will conclude.

Day of Despair Has Been Cancelled
November 19th, 01033

With a heavy heave, we pour our regret into word: we are forced to cancel the Day of Despair that was scheduled for November 23rd. The Organ of Despair is currently inoperable, forcause an errant cat walked into the works and spoiled the whole thing, and all of it needs to be cleaned of hair and gums. It will take some time. December’s Day of Despair will, barring rude interjection of further fate, occur unimpeded.

Dedication of Monument
November 23rd, 01033

District Monument 405 has been built. Join your fellow and betters in observing with solemn soul the dedication of this monument. The Monument will be dedicated to them who died in the building of this monument, and in all other monuments, and to all them who would die in the building of all future monuments. Though nobody has died yet in the pursuit of this most noble purpose, the eventuality of the thing cannot be overstated. Please pay your respects.

Monument 405 takes the shape and purpose of a grassy traffic island between Boiled Street and Warding-of-Croisquessein Street.

Conclusion of the Dance Lottery
November 26th, 01033

Reluctantly, your superiors require your attendance at the annual conclusion of the District Dance Lottery. This event shall take place in the large open meadow at the base of the Vale of Sterility, where the winner of this year’s Dance Lottery will be afforded an uninterrupted six-minute dance, unaccompanied by music, before the gathered crowd.

As a cautionary piece of information, they who present this bulletin are displeased to reveal the winner of this year’s Dance Lottery: Dorroile Y______.

Due to Dorroile’s history of indulgent crapulence, criminal malfeasance and moral decrepitude, your superiors would be pleased to apologize in advance for the lewd and artless dance which Dorroile will undoubtedly perform. Be aware that district law requires that all in attendance view the dance to its completion, no matter how scandalous it should become. That Dorroile will choose to thrust and flail like a comical puppet cannot be doubted, but please refrain from allowing Dorroile’s antics to provoke nervous laughter. Dorroile, who revels in his own infamy, will surely interpret your utterances of discomfort as approval for his misdeeds, and will then attempt to impress you with further and more grotesque roguishness.

As a precaution against Dorroile’s dance, ladies in attendance will be fastened to the ground, so that if they should faint and fall at Dorroile’s physical disgraces, they will already be there.

A Social Debut
November 30th, 01033

A true fawn! Newly virtuous sublady Ellen Guirk shall see her formal debut upon this night! Dandies of all stripe and weave are encouraged to mingle and court, for Youngmadame Guirk shall surely be a toastable tribute to the charm of a lady. While the gorgeous fawn has felt the sting of district punishment in the past, her reform is utter. Oncewhile, the fawn did tend to let her springs dispatch a bit: the fireball fawn once spent a week on the Wanted Offenders list for disturbing the natural process of a menstrual asylum! Oh yæ! Not always quite so delicate, she disrupted the masculine proceedings of our finest casino parlors in a tophat and false moustache, playing cards with the boys. Such a stir!

Youngmadame, sentenced to six days tethered, saw the error of her ways and expressed a jolly desire to enter society as a lady befitting of her breeding.

And what breeding it is! Young gentlemen readers of this dispatch will relish the quality of her pedigree; her Dukebarrel Kennel Score is a mesmerazzling 50.3, but her fair skin and dark eyes raise her practical score to nearly 60. Dukebarrel himself would be slain to see it. Slapped and slain! A fireball by deed, but a lady-fawn by numbers.

Postnovember Parade
November 32nd, 01033

The fruits of a long November at last shall be sucked! All districtfolk with a capacity for joy are merrily compelled to attend the Postnovember Parade, which is sure to impress even the haughtiest of old shits. Dress in your finest feathers and face no sneers from your betters! Spangle yourself in baubles and fear no charge of public ostentation! Once a year, when November dwindles to nothing and folds in on itself on the other side, our district can freely caper like the hedons of Novembers so long past.

As held by tradition, attendees may expect to witness the delight of the barrel child, to shriek with glee at the old barrel made new, and to hide their childlike eyes at the explosive clownbarrel. The wonders are not expected to cease! If the wonders should somehow cease, the district’s superiors will humorously humble themselves on the platform of nudity, their wattled bodkins swaying like the underflap of a moose neck! This is the twisted guarantee of the Postnovember festivities.

Feel the whip-crack of gaiety upon your spongy back once more, for you never know which Postnovember may be your last!

This is the conclusion of the District Bulletin. You are free to move from the post now, citizen.

– Dr. David Thorpe (@Arr)