Monday 27 December 2021

My fifty years of daily Mussolini impressions


It has long been a mystery what the hell Mussolini thought he was doing, when he did 'that' pose of tilting up his chin, jutting the lower jaw, and pulling-up his bottom lip? Did he think it was cool, that it impressed the ladies; or what? 

But yesterday I suddenly realized that I myself had been doing the Mussolini face, performing a Mussolini impression; every morning for fifty years... 

I am a wet shaver, foaming the face and scraping it with a razer; and when one tackles the neck, a Musso-phiz is the best possible way to stretch the skin tight and get a close shave

Not being vain; I don't usually look at my face in the mirror - but only the bit I am shaving; however, for some reason, yesterday I caught sight of the infamous fascist Dictator leering back at me. 

Shocked: I then experimented with various other methods of shaving the neck, to see if it was possible to avoid posing as Il Duce while preserving process efficiency... 

But no! Any reduction in the facial intent to March on Rome, led immediately to reduced efficiency at bristle removal. 

Like it or not, the Italian Prime Minister (1822-43) lives on in the morning ritual of innumerable wet-shavers. 


3 comments:

Skarphedin said...

Dr Charlton, to this American it seems like you may have created a new Cockney term for shaving. And probably increased my shaving time by 5min due to all the laughing and absurd posing I'll now have to do. If I do ever invade Rome I will thank you from the podium.

a_probst said...

Maybe he fancied he resembled a Roman emperor's image on a coin.

Evan Pangburn said...

@a_probst - I considered that a possibility for a moment, but I can't really recall seeing any coinage or statues of Roman statesmen looking up with that ridiculous overbite. They typically look rather neutral and are looking straight ahead.