COLLEAGUE? Friend of a friend? Stranger in the street? Why would they just come out and tell you this shit?
Their oral sex habits
If Janine isn’t into swallowing her boyfriend’s semen, fine with you. If he accidentally jizzed in her eye, that’s unfortunate. Neither is something you mention to a new co-worker you’ve only known for two days, in the canteen, over a yoghurt.
Ailments ripe for juvenile mockery
We’re all theoretically adults. Even so, you personally wouldn’t tell your girlfriend’s best mate’s boyfriend about your constipation by saying in utter seriousness, ‘it’s like trying to shit out a baby rhino’. How can you possibly not take the piss of that behind his back for life?
Their f**ked-up domestic arrangements
Something like: her husband hates sleeping in the same bed as another person, so he’ll stay at his sister’s all week then come over for sex on Saturday, but kip in the conservatory and go back on Sunday. You want to say: ‘That’s really odd, actually, Clare.’ But in one of life’s many injustices then they’d think you were a bastard.
A good porno they’ve seen
Watch it; don’t talk about it. Except for some reasons the watchers of the vilest filth are compelled to unburden themselves by describing it, blow-by-blow, while repairing your guttering. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania has its detractors but given the choice you’d hear about that from a disembodied voice up a ladder.
Sexual adventurism gone wrong
Visited A&E after excessively enthusiastic anal? Boyfriend got a marble stuck up his urethra? These stories are for an audience of one extremely close friend or an arena watching stand-up, and nothing between. But it seems the bloke you’re outside the pub having a fag with disagrees.
Unhinged acts of revenge
Her boyfriend was cheating, so she did what any normal person would do and shat in the glove compartment of his Audi. Wronged or not, this commitment to revenge marks her out as a loony, and the disgusting impracticality of it makes ‘So I popped his kids’ pet rabbit on to boil…’ seem positively well-balanced.
