15 March 2020

Teensters and Circles of Unloveliness

The girl and I have been working our way through The Office - we are up to season 9 / episode 11, which means that it's coming to an end.

Last night, we watched "Suit Warehouse", in which some of the folks are out of the office and the remaining Dunder Mifflinites drink ALL THE COFFEE. And start sweating.


Of course, my reaction was "oh, circles of unloveliness!"

The kid was all "huh?"

So I had to explain that this is what you call visibly damp armpits, and that it was a phrase used frequently in my family - like while watching ice skating championships: "OMG she's got circles of unloveliness!"

The kid didn't believe me. So I googled it, as one does.

There was precisely ONE hit for the phrase "circles of unloveliness," ONE.


All hail Archive.org.

In 1948, someone published a pamphlet for teenagers called "The Stork Didn't Bring You [The facts of life for teenagers]".

A chapter called "Oh, Woe Is You" contains this rich paragraph:

Excessive perspiration is another distressing teenster
problem. It ruins clothing and good times with equal fa-
tality. And it crops out in all the worst places the palms
of your hands, making them exempt from holding; the
soles of your feet, making sox smelly; around your hair-
line, undoing curls; and mostly underarms, leaving deep
dark circles of unloveliness.


In 1948, my mother turned 13. Clearly, my mother read said pamphlet, retained said phrase, and passed it along to her children.

Could we PLEASE get "circles of unloveliness" into common parlance?

2 comments:

MARY G said...

Love it. Will try to sell it to the teen grandkid. She is trying her Driver's test today and I bet she has them.

De said...

The whole story is the best. I'm on it!