Unpublished Chapter from Caitlin Moran’s ‘How To Be A Woman’ - I Find My Writing Style!

So I’m sitting on the beach, Converse sneakers next to me as I sit here with my legs UNCOMFORTABLY tucked under my 30-something body, and as I’m looking out at the sea I realise - I haven’t written anything about TITS all day.  Yeah, I said it: TITS.  I mean, come on ladies, I spent a whole chapter talking about the bloody things and then mentioning them in every effing chapter, but today I’ve been writing a column for The Times where I seamlessly combine mindless chatter about how AWESOME it is to watch Downton Abbey while eating far too many biscuits because I BLOODY LOVE BISCUITS with liberal lashings of feminist ranting - but not the kind of feminist ranting you’d EXPECT, this is MODERN feminism where we want to be equal but also SCARE MEN by talking about TITS and FURRY CUPS in CAPITAL LETTERS - when I realise that I haven’t mentioned mammaries in any form for the whole article! 

When I was growing up, I read loads of really intense and obscure books because I LOVE reading, especially books about SEX and TITS.  But also really hardcore stuff like the intrinsic transcendental work of writers like Henry David Thoreau, the macroeconomic manifestos of John Maynard Keynes and the original Dungeons and Dragons guide book by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson because this is a diverse selection of titles.  Also, the word ‘titles’ is made up of the words ‘TIT’ and ‘LES’ - so the real meaning of the word should either be ‘sapphic breast appreciation’ or ‘lovely bird (avian, not the slang term for FEMALE which the patriarchy would love us not to use but we CAN because we’re WOMEN/BIRDS) appearing on Family Fortunes’.  I don’t know which I prefer - it’s a real dilemma, if I’m honest.  Here’s why:

1. ‘TIT-LES’ - Sapphic breast appreciation.  As a feminist, this covers two of my favourite things - the freedom of SEXUALITY and my God-given (and God is a woman, and I am a woman, ergo I am God) boobies!
2. ‘TIT-LES’ - Birds appearing on Family Fortunes (mid-90s, not Andy Collins era, obviously).  As a self-appointed expert on EVERYTHING IN THE WORLD EVER, this definition allows me to express my love for learning about things (women = birds, birds = nature, nature = the world, therefore women = the world, and me being the GREATEST WOMAN EVER means me = God), as well as my love for all things retro and cheesy, like Family Fortunes and Les Dennis. 

So what’s a girl to do?  I can say ‘girl’ because I have TITS and a VAGINA but if a man calls me a ‘girl’ then I’m entitled to kick him in the penis and tell him that I am a proud and beautiful woman, before making a joke in one of my columns about running home and crying and eating loads of cake and feeling sad because I think I’m fat, even though that’s what men think women do anyway so even as a joke it’s sort of redundant.  Should I go for option 1, which empowers LESbians and their TITS, or go for option 2, which reminds people that I’m INTERESTING and QUIRKY?  Or should I go back to the original point I was trying to make, which has more or less become lost in one of the seemingly unending rants that has become my trademark?

Speaking of my trademarks (and no, I don’t mean my boobs, although ‘my trademarks’ seems like a brilliant nickname for the twins - non-identical, I should add, I did breastfeed my children I’ll have you know…. with my TITS), I got to thinking about what it was that made my work so damn READABLE.  I mean, how could someone go from prattling on about Sherlock (Benedict Cumberbatch GET IN MY BED), X Factor and Strictly Come Dancing to waxing lyrical about the position of women in society today.  Maybe it’s the smattering of exclamation marks, the grammatical signpost that shows I’m fun-loving and capable of whimsy; or perhaps it’s my chatty, slang-ridden prose that attracts people to my articles - it’s like they’re TALKING TO A FRIEND but also learning things; or perhaps it’s the EYE-CATCHING, EXCITING and often INEXPLICABLY RANDOM way I often lapse into CAPITAL LETTERS to get my point ACROSS?  There’s always the chance that people are drawn to my writing by the fact that there is always a picture of ME doing a QUIRKY face that makes me look AWKWARD but also CUTE and FUN - exactly like Zooey Deschanel except 10 years older and with bigger, (intentionally) silver-streaked hair and TITS that aren’t as PERKY as they used TO be, while wearing SOMETHING that’s blatantly from TOPSHOP even though I can’t shut up about how I used to be pudgy and UNCOOL.

Then I realised; maybe it’s all of those things COMBINED.  Maybe it’s because all of those elements put together make up MY STYLE, and being so IN YOUR FACE ALL THE TIME AAAARGGHHHH CUSTARD CREAMS can be intimidating and excessive, which is why my ARTICLES and COLUMNS (side note: I hate the word ‘column’ because it’s a PHALLIC IMAGE) are easy to digest (like cake, because who doesn’t love cake?  And cats.  I love cats.) because they’re in small portions, and something like an ENTIRE BOOK OF ME SHOUTING needs to be broken down into pieces otherwise someone reading it might go COMPLETELY MENTAL and try to write a parody based on it and find themselves going GENUINELY INSANE AND GETTING ADDICTED TO USING THE SHIFT KEY INSTEAD OF THE CAPS LOCK.

And then I put on my shoes and went to the pub.