SIREN is a great fan of stockings and so she notes with particular sadness the passing of two of the finest, if dramatically diverse, exponents of that most alluring hosiery.
Firstly, the legendary Bettie Page, the woman who put bangs into burlesque and who frequently found herself tied up, as it were, in various stocking-related activities, passed away on Friday at the age of 85.
Known as "The Queen of Curves", Page,
with her naughty-but-nice, girl-next-door exuberance and carefree attitude to erotica, has been credited with encouraging women in the 1950s to embrace their sexuality as both natural and a source of fun.
"Young women say I helped them come out of their shells," is how Page, who would later "find God" and give up posing, once put it.
But while fantasies about Page's stockings may set legions of men aquiver, desire vanishes faster than a stripper's chemise at the thought of the fleshy-toned nylons wrinkled like the skin of a crash-dieting pig around the ankles of the inimitable Nora Batty.
Kathy Staff, who won the hearts of television viewers across the land playing the no-nonsense housewife and love interest of small, scruffy ferret-fancier Compo Simmonite in Last of the Summer Wine, died this weekend at the age of 80.
Siren can only imagine what Nora would have thought of Ms Page's antics, though the Yorkshirewoman would most certainly have benefited from a lesson in the virtues of suspenders.
Siren likes to imagine the two meeting for a chat in the great hosiery department in the sky, where, of course, divine intervention ensures all stockings are straight of seam and permanently wrinkle-free.
Ringtone's bum noteWHILE the late Ms Page was certainly not shy when it came to matters disciplinary, Siren believes even she would have balked at installing on her mobile phone a ringtone produced to promote a new edition of the book The True Confessions of a London Spank Daddy.
The book, penned by an anonymous lawyer in his fifties, purports to expose a secret world of women who pay to be spanked.
The download means you can set your phone to declare "This is your spankdaddy calling" whenever it rings. Siren isn't entirely sure about the intended market for this product, but if you're the kind of person who enjoys being slapped in public by a stranger, then boasting such an annoying ringtone on your mobile phone is probably as good a way to go about achieving your heart's desire as any.
Just didgeridon't do itNICOLE Kidman is, Siren believes, one of the most elegantly poised women in Hollywood. The Oscar-winning actress has maintained an air of unshakeable composure throughout her career – even her recent pregnancy could hardly have been more discreet.
So what on Earth was Kidman thinking when she allowed herself to be filmed on German television this week (on Wetten, dass…?, their version of You Bet!) playing the didgeridoo. Being Australian, you'd think she would have known from childhood that this is something a a woman should not do.
Even if one disregards for a moment the important fact that Aboriginal Australians find the practice sacrilegious, there are some very obvious – if more prosaic reasons – why women and didgeridoos do not make good bedfellows.
As the German television footage revealed, even a little black dress, diamond jewellery and a perfect coiffure won't stop you looking like an extra in a teen sex-com if you have a giant phallic object pressed to your lips.
Siren hesitates to give advice to such an icon of glamour, but in the interests of common decency she suggests that Nicole should bear in mind one unshakeable rule: if you've seen Rolf Harris doing it with enthusiasm, for heaven's sake ladies, avoid it at all costs.
