Let us try to maintain this new tone of levity, by going over to Mr. Answers to see what he has in his bulging postbag. Any interesting enquiries yet, Answers?
“Thank you, BW, Old Fruit. I have had this, from a Mrs. Muriel Dotterill of Market Drayton:
“Dear Mr. Answers,
My family and I have been invited to an A-Z fancy dress party. The idea is that you have to draw a letter of the alphabet from a hat and then go dressed as something beginning with that letter. Just our luck! – we drew the letter Z.
We thought about going as Zebras, but I’m not sure that my sewing skills are up to that. Zombies, we thought, had been done too many times before. Zoroastrians might be a bit obscure, Zionists or Zoophiles too controversial (Market Drayton is quite a conservative place!). My husband suggested that he could go as Zeus and I could go as a Zeppelin – but I soon put him right on that one! Then we thought – what about Zulus? Trouble is, we’re not quite sure how Zulus dress. Do you have any suggestions (making sure, of course, not to offend the dreaded “PC Brigade”)!!!”
Luckily for Mrs. Dotterill, I found that I had already researched this question for one of my contributions to Wkipedia, and had the answer ready for her in a trice, as follows:
“Clothing
Zulus wear a variety of attire. For example, the males may wear a suit and tie with leather shoes for formal occasions, whereas casual attire is more likely to consist of jeans and a T-shirt, possibly with trainers on the feet. In hot weather they may wear shorts. In cold weather they may wear a coat. When it is raining, they may wear a waterproof jacket, or carry an umbrella. Underwear consists of socks for both sexes, together with underpants for males, or knickers and a bra for females. Infants will usually wear nappies.”
So there we are. It doesn’t look as though the Dotterils will have to stray too far outside their “comfort zone” to enjoy their party!!!”
More from Mr. Answers soon.
The Crimson Rambler 