Wish They Would Make Up Their Minds

Dear Mr. Goodwyn,

I appreciate the earnestness of your advice. I have friends who have been dating on and off for a long time. I can never tell when they are together and when they are separated. It is hard for me to make plans with either of them because I can never tell what state their relationship will be in when it is time for the event. Do you have any advise for me?

Best,
Wish they would just make up their minds


Dear Wish They Would Just Make Up Their Minds,

If there is but one rule that always beeth true, 'tis this: Strumpets be fickle. It soundeth to mine ear as if the slattern of whom you speak be of a particularly shrewish disposition, playing wantonly as she doth with the affections of thy manly and much bewearied friend. For sooth, I have much doubt that a goodly man canst truly befriend any woman, much less a shrew who is young and still doth bleed with each new moon. And there be the crux of the problem: Wenches be much affected by the moon, and will not only become bloody with its waxing and waning, but shall undergoeth such changes of report and personality that they canst be in one instant as a badger and the next as a cooing dove.

In short, thou shouldst not be friends with wenches. They be too inconsistent to offer fellowship or assistance to a right honorable man. They are best employed to taketh care over thy hearth and home and young, and to service thy manly needs whenever thou so wisheth.

However, as this wench hath not yet married and is most evidently liberal in her habits pertaining the bedchamber, it is doubtful that she shall ever be tamed. She is as a wild horse who doth mightily resist the bridle. As thou knowest, however, a wild horse doth give the most exciting and invigorating ride. Tis a safe and goodly wager that she be much skilled in the art of pleasing a man, possessed as she is of much practice.

Therefore, thou shouldst counsel thy manly friend to cast away this strumpet, as she be naught but trouble unto him. Then straight away thou shouldst seek to bed her thyself. 'Tis not treachery on thy part, for 'tis true that she be a most pernicious vexation to thy friend, and he hath not the mettle to make her gallop in a right and goodly manner. Take heed, however. As she be wild, and as I hath imparted, made most variable by the moon, thou must first checketh her temperment before thou attempteth to mount her. When thou dost meet her, simply placeth thy hand within her vestments and squeezeth of her breat. If she do buck, wait ye for the moon to change its face and try again another day. If she find this pleasurable and do whinny, climb upon her and spare not the use of the whip.