Memoirs of a Lit. Girl III

Earlier parts may be found here:

Introduction

Part I

Part II


First day at Hogwarts part II

Readers of earlier episodes will recall that I had just entered the Bi-Room for the first time………..

Here the pace of the scroll was much slower and there were probably 18 to 20 chatters present. Abandoned by my knight in shining armour, I suddenly felt very much alone after the hurly burly of the lounge.

However, within minutes somebody called IslanderGirl adopted me and explained the ropes, particularly the room politics. As we chatted somebody called Thrusty dominated the scroll with incomprehensible and seemingly infantile banter. I assumed she had been drinking too much fizzy orange laced with the artificial colourant tartrazine. I ran my eye over the serried list of names on the right hand side. They ranged from the anodyne, through work-a-day vulgar, to un-lady-like, to finally the obscene. Presiding over the list, chaperoned by asterisks to ensure she was top of the pile was a chatter who I will call *Nosey*. She was clearly the Head Girl and I recall her monosyllabic interjections had all the panache and charm of a Rottweiler with haemorrhoids forced to endure a dry rectal examination.

Minutes later much to my amazement a chatter with name akin to Cumstainedpanties, exploded with a torrid and venal stream of abuse about men. Apparently she had only been in the room 3 milliseconds and had already received 3859607 unwanted cross-room PMs from men. ‘Men make me fucking sick,’ she squealed. I read her profile and wondered why any man with an IQ in excess of 25 could possibly want to make her acquaintance. Back then I had no idea that this was the opening gambit of what I was soon to learn were called ‘posers’

I read a few more profiles and wondered if I should invest in breast augmentation. It seemed every one else was at least a DD cup!

The next profile drew me up short. It said something along the lines of….. ‘My status says I'm bi but honestly I'm straight... with lesbian tendencies....’ I pondered this for a full five minutes then decided I might well need a course in metaphysics to fully grasp this particular concept.

Shortly, someone whose profile suggested she was an American sophomore entered. She was studying English literature and I decided she might be nice to chat to. Swilling the last of my coffee I began to assemble the bones of my first ever PM. Sadly I was too late. Clearly I had been mistaken. *Nosey* announced they were a ‘fucking poser’ and advised them to ‘fuck off’ to the ‘fucking Family Room’. At that the poor would-be chatter duly fucked off.

*Nosey* then went on to announce to the rest of us now shaking in our boots that she had access to everyone’s IP addresses and inseam measurements as well as hot-line access to Langley. It was my first inclination that traces of DNA and the Y chromosome attached themselves to one’s IP address. Information technology had clearly moved on since I studied it in my second year at uni.

Shortly, another chatter arrived who was clearly one of the senior prefects witnessed by the number of deferential greetings from the junior ranks. After a moment she began to flood the scroll with rambling, prolix accounts of her weekend, which it seems consisted of Church, long walks on the beach and baking shed loads of apple pie. For the sake of anonymity I shall call her Apple Pie Girl.

What I didn’t realise back then was I had already encountered the bi-room’s then top chatters.

Meanwhile, two other chatters were being roundly abused for being ‘posers’ and wails of hate went up relating to every short-coming associated with the male species. While no stranger to misandry, having known a couple of lunatic feminists at uni, I had to admit I had not come across anything quite as rabid as this before.

My first reaction proved astute in hindsight: ‘The lady protests too much, methinks.’ Having said that the place did have the feel of a set for Hamlet. In hindsight that too proved to be prophetic. Little did I know but Lit was also a backdrop where real and feigned madness would be played out leavened, by overwhelming grief, seething rage, treachery, revenge, coupled with lashings of incest and moral corruption.

Unable to resist I tentatively typed my first ever room contribution: ‘Though this be madness - yet there is method in't.’

Somebody sniggered and momentarily I felt a glimmer of hope. Always nice to be in the company of people who had read Hamlet I decided.

Minutes later I had PM. It was IslanderGirl again. She simply wanted to warn me to be careful what I said, as Rottweiler Woman was friends with the Chat Monitors and could get people banned. They explained that not only was she a total fucktard and a bully but was a subbie who ‘liked it rough.’ I tried to digest these gems of information, but for as I much as I grasped what she was saying, she might as well have been talking Serbo-Croat. I wrote down the words ‘subbie’, ‘poser’ ‘chat monitor’ and ‘fucktard’ and made a mental note to get C to explain them to me.

The next PM landed literally with all the aplomb of a burst colostomy bag. ‘Are you into golden showers?’ my PMer enquired.
It seemed a decidedly odd question but I elected to respond truthfully: ‘My shower has the regular chrome fittings but it has a lovely etched glass shower screen…’
There was a long pause. Clearly I had made the wrong response. I decided it would be prudent to Google ‘golden showers’. I blinked, blinked again and my mouthful of coffee hit the screen as the result of a spontaneous unconditioned reflex. ‘You are taking the piss?’ I responded to my PMer, but she was long gone.

Meanwhile somebody else was being harangued by Rottweiler woman for being a ‘fucking poser’, I recalled reading that over use of the Columbian marching powder could induce irrational bouts of paranoia.

I finished my coffee and decided that chatrooms were not really my scene. If somebody had told me I would be back I would have declared them completely bonkers……