Mr Paul Simon, of Simon and Garfunkel, once released a song entitled Fifty Ways To Leave Your Lover. The only flaw being that Mr Rhymin' Simon only actually listed five ways to leave your lover, all directed towards people whose names rhyme with the end of the way in question. The esteemed Mr Simon's five were:

• Slip out the back, Jack
• Make a new plan, Stan
• You don't need to be coy, Roy
• Hop on the bus, Gus
• Just drop off the key, Lee

Now, I was fairly certain that Simon could have got the full fifty if he'd tried, so I set readers of my journal (including myself) the challenge of coming up with the other forty-five ways.

And, within about an hour we had them - thirty of them coming from self-professed 'bored, sick poet' Lucky Star, seven from myself, six from Otto Fisch and one each from sprout and Psycorp603. Which completed the fifty. Suck on that Mr Simon. You could have done it if you'd tried. And now, sorted according to who suggested them, here are the remaining forty-five ways to leave your lover:

Lucky Star

• Say goodbye and you're gone, John
• Chop an axe through her head, Fred
• Get out of there quick, Rick!
• Say 'I wanna divorce!', Boris
• Tell her she's a phoney, Tony
• Say 'I want to remarry!', Harry
• Move your stuff to Glasgow, Joe
• Take the car for a drive, Clive
• Put The Firm on the job, Bob
• Change your name if you like, Mike
• Say you've found someone sweeter, Peter
• Push her out of the plane, Wayne
• Say you'd like the bed higher, Zebediah
• Leave a note on the fridge, Midge
• Slip away in the dark, Mark
• Cut yourself loose, Bruce
• Give her no more chances, Francis
• Make her choke on the talcum, Malcolm
• Down some chianti with her kidney, Sidney
• Admit you're a Tory, Rory
• Say 'It's not me - it's you!', Hugh
• Pretend to be deaf, Jeff
• Wear a boa and mince, Vince
• Catch the next ferry, Terry
• Pack a suitcase and leave, Steve
• Play some dangerous games, James
• Squeeze her tight in a hug, Doug
• Admit your financial ruin, Ewan
• Drown her in a vat of brandy, Andy
• Emigrate to Chile, Willy
• Make her sick of yer rhymin', Simon!

Egon

• Just give her the sack, Mac¹
• Just give him a canary, Mary²
• Shove her out the way, Jay
• Just slip him a pill, Jill
• Stab her with a pen, Len
• Steal her best pearl, Merle
• Let rip a huge fart, Bart

Otto Fisch

• Pretend to be gay, Ray
• Become an Imam, Sam
• Seduce the au pair, Claire
• Elope with his mate, Kate
• Destroy the whole planet, Janet
• Start wearing her smalls, Paul

Psycorp603

• Feed her some quiche, Keith³

Sprout

• Lock her in your shed, Ted

An earlier article along the same lines was written by Terry Teadreg and can be seen on this Post Page

Assembled by Egon

17.06.04 Front Page

Back Issue Page