Isn’t ‘juices’ a disgusting word? ‘Juice’ is fine, but make
it plural and it becomes the ultimate in unsavoury. It hints at something which shouldn't be let out, something viscous and smelly.
The first stage in the
embalming process was to drain the abdominal juices.
Grossville. I made that up, but they always say something of
similarly disgusting ilk. It’s on a par with:
They sucked the brains
out through the nose.
(And I didn’t make that
one up. I heard it in a documentary once, and Téa Leone said it in a film I watched
recently. She was playing an Egyptologist, so it must be right.)
Sucked!? You mean somebody actually stuck a straw up a dead
man’s nose and sucked his brains out?
I hope those ancient Egyptians were smart enough to have invented some sort of
atmospheric pump, because the alternative is more than enough to put you well
off ancient Egyptians. I expect they did. They seem to have been a pretty smart
bunch.
Tell you what, though. You know the Eskimos have fifty words
for snow? I’ll bet the ancient Egyptians had at least fifty words for juices.
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