The Many Meanings of Bollocks

With a mere 4 months to go in the UK - I've made it a priority to start accomplishing the remaining things on my on "Fun To Do" list on the weekends. Mainly, the things that are located in England since once I leave, I imagine it will be a long time - if ever - before I return again. So, I have put my English adventures at the top of the list and I had a jolly good weekend!

I spent Friday drinking Pimm's at my friend's birthday party before heading out with her and group of Brit friends for some "dantsing," which is how they pronounce dancing. I got my weekly British-English lesson, learning the meaning(s) and appropriate uses for "knackered," "bollocks," and a new phrase "jog off."

I had always wondered what exactly "bollocks" meant, and after having the various uses explained to me, I find myself almost less informed. Here are some of the correct meanings and uses I found in an urban dictionary....

In general, bollocks is a term of exasperation, often said at having made a mistake.
i.e. If you've sent a saucy text message to your boss instead of your boyfriend... you would relaize it and shout "Bollocks!" 

As a plural noun, the bollocks are the testicles of a human or animal.
i.e. - you might overhear a man here say, "I couldn't be arsed to go home, so I just stood there, scratching me bollocks." Really.

Bollocks can be used in response to what you feel is exaggerated truth or blatant lies....

i.e. "he's talking bollocks"

Or poor or bad effort .
i.e. "He was playing bullocks football"

Bollocks also frequently is used to describe something that was bad, lame, crap. For example,
"the stag-do was bollocks." However - if something is "the dog's bollocks," then it is amazing. So when the bollocks belong to a canine, the inverse meaning comes into play. I do not understand why.

Once can 'drop a bollock,' which is committing a social faux-pas, leading to grave embarrassment and or banishment. (I added the banishment bit.)

A 'bollocking' is a telling off, often by one's boss for an inadequate work or inappropriate behaviour.

To lack bollocks is to be gutless, spineless and generally lack courage.

If a piece of machinery is bollocksed, it is broken or rendered unusable.

 To be 'bollock-naked' it to be completely without clothing, save for a few relatively unimportant items such as socks, watch, rings, necklaces, bracelets, earrings or other body jewellery.

To be 'bollocksed' also means to have imbibed an amount of alcohol which has eliminated a dangerously high number of brain cells causing a lack of social and spatial awareness, incoherent speech and the inability to believe that you're not as drunk as you are.

Finally, as a verb, to 'bollocks' or to be 'bollocksed' is to flummox or be flummoxed; confuse or be confused.  Which I think is the best use for this word, which I have decided is completely bollocksing to me.

After a lovely Friday night - I decided to pop on the train out of London on Saturday and head to one of the sites on the top of my list England List - Hampton Court Palace, home of Henry VIII, for a little culture and history.

I went through a phase about this time last year of being obsessed to an unhealthy degree with HBO's "The Tudors," which dramatizes the fascinating history of King Henry, his 6 wives, children, and the lives of people at court.
During this time I began demanding Josh refer to me as "my lady," we take up jousting, and that we drink only out of goblets. Sadly, The Tudors is only 4 seasons long, so my obsession could not be fed for very long....until I got here!

Hampton Court Palace was Henry's main residence for several years, and the tudor portion of the palace is still in great tact. I got to visit his privy apartments, privy gardens, wine cellar, kitchens, and chapel where he wept over the untimely death of his favorite wife, Jane.

It is also home to acres of privy gardens, a rose garden, and an enormous shubbery maze, which I entered thinking it would be fun and found myself properly lost for a good 30 minutes. Bollocks!

King Henry expanded the kitchen to accommodate feeding his large court.

privy gardens

Possibly the coolest thing about visiting Hampton Court Palace is that there are tudor-style capes in all sizes that you can loan and wear whilst you visit. There are also re-inactments of important events in history by characters in full dress throughout various parts of the palace. While I missed all of these because I was lost in the maze, I got lucky enough to see King Henry wandering around the courtyard...

Clearly, they decided to portray Henry nearer to the end of his life when he got tubby...

He started out as a very handsome, fit, young king and by the end of his life could not get out of bed without assistance because he had grown so obese and suffered from serious injury after a jousting accident. He died at a young 55, and was buried next to Jane.

Sunday I decided to stick around London and attend the Summer Fayre in Marylebone.
After a lovely brunch at my favorite local cafe, Megan's, my friend and I headed up North.

Turns out, it was our lucky day because the Monocle Fair was going on as well. So, we started off there, and could not resist the free face painting station.

I was keen on the idea of having my face painted like Spiderman after seeing a little boy walking around with it, but we decided some lovely flowers on our cheek would be more age appropriate. Unfortunately, because they were pink and round, from far away our flowers looked more like serious acne. Later at church, everyone kept saying, "oh golly, I thought you had huge spots!"

Bollocks. Should have gone with Spiderman....

In addition to free facepainting, there was also this basket of the classic English party favor, leeks. 

As if we didn't look strange enough with our giant "spots" for the rest of the day,  we also had leeks popping out of our handbags.

My second favorite bit of Fayre was the petting zoo - which had baby bunnies, chickens, and goats!

But these cute and cuddly animals came in second to this amazing tween who was going solo on the dancefloor in the street. We stood watching her for a solid 20 minutes. It was too great to peel our eyes away. If you ask me, she was the dog's bollocks.

OH. MY. GOD. indeed

We worked up an appetite watching her, so as the sun went into hiding we sought solace in a cute cafe  nearby and some pre-church drinks, which is a custom in this country. As is post-church drinks. I have to come to realize why so many Brits are actively choosing to convert to Christainity. While there is a lot of drinking going in pre and post, no one ever gets bollocksed. 

But right after church, everyone heads over to the pub - so I ended my night and weekend the same way I started it - drinking Pimms with friends in jolly old England. 

I'll cheers to that!