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‘making the moment true…’ (what on earth does that even
mean
, Jess? ‘Making the moment true’?).
    If Meredith is – as she claims – such a staunch advocate of the truth (what’s her other favourite catchphrase? ‘Be sincere, be here’ – with a pious little pat on her heart?!) then how on earth can she possibly justify casting Tammy Thorndyke as
St Martha?!
St Martha!
    Tammy Thorndyke’s converted to Buddhism! I swear to God, if I have to hear another
syllable
about that infernal trip she and Baxter took to Tibet last year, and how she got altitude sickness halfway up a mountain and collapsed, and then, when she came to, how she felt ‘an incredible warmth in her throat chakra’ which slowly spread throughout her entire body,making her feel like ‘a glowing bottle of preserved ginger’ I honestly think I shall spontaneously combust!
    As I said to Jill Harpington the other day (while we were picketing Wharfedale Council about those awful, new recycling bins), ‘Isn’t it unfortunate that Tammy’s recent “conversion” doesn’t appear to be offering any kind of formal impediment to her singing lead soprano in the church choir?!’
(Ouch!
Climb back into the knife drawer, Emily!)
    But that awful, piercing vibrato, Jess! It’s more than my shattered nerves can bear! Drew Cullen – on the organ – even turns off his hearing aid, and he’s
deaf as a dodo!
    I actually conducted an informal survey with the help of Gillian Reed last year (Gill’s the blowsy, buck-toothed piano tuner’s wife who polishes the church pews etc.) after she mentioned to me, in passing, that the bats were defecating at almost
twice
their usual volume on the days when the choir either rehearsed or performed.
    With a little casual investigation it became increasingly clear (I can show you the graphs if you like – in fact I’ll dig one out for you, right now) that the more music we sang in a higher register , the more guano the bats produced – often (like when we were rehearsing ‘Jerusalem’, for example) defecating over
three times
as much!
    Then – and this was the
real
eye-opener, Jess – when Tammy was off for a month in August (nursing her youngest daughter through a botched nose-job down in Guildford) the overall quantities produced fell by
almost two-thirds!
OVERNIGHT! Right across the scale!
I SWEAR!
    Utterly fascinating (I know), but I suppose we’re trespassing a little off the subject here, because let’s face it, Jess (as I said earlier this evening), if ‘the truth’ really is Meredith’s main priority, then why does she persist in ignoring what’s so patently true about St Martha, i.e. that it’s not a glamorous role at all!
    Martha’s a work-horse , Jess! She spends virtually
all
of hertime throughout the Gospels JUST DOING THE WASHING-UP !!
    That’s why Jesus gets into a row with her when she tells Mary Magdalen to stop hanging around with the boys all night and give her a quick hand with the kitchen chores! Jesus gets into quite a bate about it. He tells her that Mary is much better off where she is (just sitting on the floor, staring at his ‘Godhead’), and that Martha’s eternal soul would be far better served by doing the same thing herself!
    (Well, that’s all fine and dandy, Jess, but if Martha hadn’t done the chores, what in heaven’s name would The Twelve have eaten for dinner? How could Jesus have hosted The Last Supper? And what would Michelangelo have painted on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, all those years later? A dozen hungry people arguing over a raw turnip?! Hardly an appropriate subject matter for such a prominent art work I’d’ve thought!)
    It’s
ridiculous
, Jess! Pure hokum!
    I mean Tammy Thorndyke has a
dishwasher
, for heaven’s sake! And she has a
char
(if it’s socially acceptable to describe dear Susan Trott in those terms)! And she gets all her dinner parties professionally catered by the sister of that haughty besom who runs Pinenuts (the Swiss