Check out this wicked-cool juxtaposition I captured after I dropped my handbag on the floor and my foundation rolled under the butcher's block and came to rest amongst the sawdust and gristle. Yes, I do still rub this all over my face on the bus each morning before working at the salad bar. I think it works better now.

I just noticed I haven't put up all the photos from Christmas! And since last posting photos I have learnt how to rotate them so they are easier to look at! Get ready for the BEST BLOG POST EVER!!!

I helped skin this deer! Skinning a deer is highly skilled work and butchers take great pride in getting the skin off all in one piece, without any tears or holes (even though the skins then go in the bin or are given away for free).

See! I wasn't bullshitting about skinning a deer well being a big deal! Pedro has been a butcher for 15 years, and he made me take this picture to send to his family back in Portugal because he was so proud of himself for doing such a good job. There is no question that I was integral to, or at the very least nearby, this wonderful achievement.

This is a pig's bum. He is holding some burnt pork. AYE SEE WHAT I DID THERE?! 

This is Jess, full-time lady butcher, being professional and working hard. In the background, a typical man-butcher can be seen, showing off and trying to be funny.

So the one in the hat is Mr Feller, who started Fellers - which then became Feller and Son, which then became Feller and Son and Daughter. Mitzi is the daughter in the title, usually she looks hot but she's really excited here because she's in a picture with her son, Tommy who she is pretty fond of. Tommy is 11 and already a better butcher than I am. I think one day he'll be in charge.

This is pork mince for the sausages. It looks bad but, weirdly, smells delicious.

Sausage making! This is a really complicated job and only Marc is allowed to do it.

The last few turkeys that were left before Christmas! At the start of December the whole shop is covered with these but I forgot to take a photo so you'll have to close your eyes and imagine.

Wahey! It's Mr Feller! The Big Dog! As I never intend to call him to his face because he would love it too much. He would probably get it stitched onto the back of his coat or something...

...Like he did after someone called him "The Motivator".

Christmas Eve! Or as I fondly remember it, the most exhausting day of my whole entire life. And yours. And everybody's. After two weeks of medium-to-high levels of sleep deprivation butchers are then subjected to a 72 hour period during which you cat nap between 11pm-4am and spend your waking hours confused, holding a knife and running around whilst people shout at you in a secret language. This is 5am on Christmas Eve - we had spent the night packing the orders, which can be seen in the green boxes to the left of the photo and in the brown trays in the background. Each of those brown trays contains about four orders, and an order usually consisted of one large bird - either a turkey, a capon, or a goose, plus a ham, sausages, bacon, stuffing and eggs. There was meat everywhere and we had to match it to the correct customer, most of whom were angry after being made to queue for upwards of ten minutes which was largely because very few of the fuckers brought their order numbers with them EVEN THOUGH WE REPEATEDLY TOLD THEM HOW IMPORTANT THESE NUMBERS WERE so we had to search through every single order until we found their stupid double barrelled name, whilst they stood there rolling their eyes and reminding us it was Christmas Eve and they really did have an awful lot to do. I think the sleep deprivation is a deliberate precaution to ensure all the butchers are too knackered to bother stabbing anybody.

Being a butcher in the summer is much better than being a butcher in the winter.

For starters, working in a large fridge becomes a huge bonus rather than a crushing, chilblain-causing penance. Secondly, I am better at being a butcher in the summer than I am in the winter because people want lamb chops (which are easy to cut), steaks (which are easy to cut) and bits of chicken (also easy to cut) rather than a whole fucking turkey with its insides neatly presented and hanging from a bag around its neck. Thirdly, the sort of questions people ask are questions I know the answer to or can at least look them in the eye and lie about knowing that I will not be solely responsible for destroying their entire Christmas dinner and potentially causing an irreprable rift within the family (as when a flustered middle-aged woman demands to know whether a 4kg capon will feed three adults, one young child and an elderly grandparent who doesn't each much but would be offended by an unreasonably small portion. And will it be enough for leftovers? Because I need leftovers. Well, do you think if I get a bigger one will it still fit in the aga? And how much longer will it take to cook? I still want it moist, of course. Why don't you know? Well can I speak to someone who does know, please? SORRY, MADAM,  BUT NOBODY KNOWS THE ANSWER. Except apparently all the other butchers. I don't know how but they do. They know the answer to that and to all other Christmas meat enquiries and I wish they didn't because it makes it really embarrassing that I have no idea. I didn't even know what a capon was for the first week. FYI it's just a big chicken. It used to refer only to a castrated rooster but now: big chicken). Anyway at summer it's like, "shall I get chicken wings, will chicken wings be nice on the barbecue?" and I'm all yes! yes they fucking will! of course they will. All barbecued meat is good! Throw more questions at me, sir! Yes you should get steak as well! Everyone will be delighted and your wife will love you more! She really will! How long should you cook sausages for? Why, UNTIL THEY'RE DONE MADAM! Next customer please!".

Furthermore, there are lots of scantily clad women wandering around which means that the male butchers can perve on them rather than on me. Thank you, scantily clad women of Oxford for taking that bullet for me. You and your nice summer clothes are making my working day 80% more enjoyable .

BACK SLANG

Back Slang is a secret language which butchers use. I am nervous about writing about Back Slang on the Internet, as butchers are men and women of honour and I'm sure they would consider it notably dishonourable of me to reveal their secret language TO THE WORLD. I am still going to, though, because Back Slang is so much fun!

When speaking Back Slang, one simply reverses the letters of the word one wishes to use and then pronounces the word phonetically. Sometimes it doesn't quite work, for example "cunt" backwards is "tnuc", which is hard to say. In those instances you just chuck a couple of extra vowels in, so tnuc becomes "tunnock". It's really easy once you get going, especially as you don't need to bother with reversing prepositions, pronouns or conjunctions. You pretty much just speak normal English until you get to the rude word in the sentence, and then you reverse that. Back Slang is useful for slagging customers off and for talking about the meat you're trying to flog them. You don't want them to know their sausages are dlo (dee-lo) or that they're a total dratsab, do you?

USEFUL BACK SLANG WORDS

Dab eno/Doog eno - Bad one/good one. Used all the time, to describe people, meat, whatevs.

Lahteeaich - Alright

Eefok - Coffee

Eefink - Knife

Senip - Penis

Whynaff - Fanny

Tunnock - Cunt

Krip - Prick

Teefos - Soft

Gaf - Fag

Evakh - Have

Dlos - Sold

Kool - Look

Eno - One

Owt - Two

Earth -Three

Net - Ten

Enob - Bone

Woc - Cow

Retchtub - Butcher

Sip - Piss

Say - Yes

Yob - Boy

Keenurd - Drunk

Whykess - Sexy

Dlo - Old

Dratsab - Bastard

Isn't it cool? Butchers are cool. With their own language and shit. Like an undiscovered Amazonian tribe, if they had The Sun in the Amazon.

I really miss being a butcher. I think shoving my hands inside dead animals and wrenching out their entrails whilst trying not to explode their poo everywhere might be my calling. I will need to practice on more animals before I know for sure, but, obviously, can't. Not until next Christmas, anyway.