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Friday, June 02, 2006
For some, the ultimate humiliation...
... is to be "caught on candid camera with buck-naked eyes."
Devangshu Datta has written a brief history of shades, and I pick out just two gems:
DD didn't mention the main use of shades in all ages -- you wear 'em so the chicks don't see where your eyes are going. Sadly, I wore spectacles in my youth, thus obviating the use of shades, and the chicks, such as there perhaps were, were not amused that my eyes were buried in books. "Sicko," they would snarl as me, before getting up from the sofa at the BCL reading room and leaving forever.
I have, in fact, never worn shades in my life. The mind goggles, doesn't it?
Devangshu Datta has written a brief history of shades, and I pick out just two gems:
The Germans almost won the Battle of Jutland (1 June 1916) because they had Zeiss glasses that enabled them to maintain semaphore contact through shellfire (after they learnt that the Kiregsmarine radio ciphers had been broken) and to spot British ships emerging out of the setting sun.And:
The common political thug wears his shades on the streets of Mylapore to show that he is a more evolved being than the average Tambram who wanders about with his eyes exposed. He takes his shades off in front of an MLC, who in turn, displays respect to a senior boss like MK Stalin by whipping off his shades. MGR was cremated in his shades as the mark of ultimate respect.And all these years I thought MGR was blind! Jeez.
DD didn't mention the main use of shades in all ages -- you wear 'em so the chicks don't see where your eyes are going. Sadly, I wore spectacles in my youth, thus obviating the use of shades, and the chicks, such as there perhaps were, were not amused that my eyes were buried in books. "Sicko," they would snarl as me, before getting up from the sofa at the BCL reading room and leaving forever.
I have, in fact, never worn shades in my life. The mind goggles, doesn't it?
