Lady Godiva - Retold!

We are all voyeurs. It has to be true; Reality TV would never have been such a success otherwise! Right from the time Adam and Eve first caught a glimpse of each other, down through the ages with Lady Godiva and the original Peeping Tom, right up to today nothing has changed!

Speaking of which, I've never really understood the whole Lady Godiva story.

Apparently, sometime in the 12th century, Earl Leofric (or was he Count?) of Mercia was levying far too harsh taxes on his subjects (the people of Mercia, of course!). So his beautiful wife, Lady Godiva, steps up to play Superwoman. (i.e. if Superwoman were posing for Playboy!) She chalks out a deal with Hubby whereby she would ride through the town in the nude if he lowered the taxes! (The plan may have been to lower the taxes, but I'm sure it would have raised a few other things, if you know what I mean!) He husband agreed. Why he would want the entire countryside to see his beautiful wife in the buff is beyond me! I would have thought he would have wanted to reserve that sight solely for his bedroom!

But now Lady Godiva (like any good Playboy model) was a conniving vixen! So she played both sides, and decided to have a little meeting with the townsfolk. There she convinced them that if they wanted their taxes reduced they would have to promise to remain indoors with their windows and doors shut while she rode around. (See, that's I call smart! Both sides are happy and she gets to do a little sunbathing in her birthday suit without any prying eyes!) They agreed. I don't know why; I would rather have enjoyed the view and suffered the high tax rates!

So the next day, things all started off according to plan. The townspeople shut themselves indoors. Lady Godiva procured herself a nice young mare. (Somehow it wouldn't have been appropriate to do it on a male horse!) She then placed the saddle on it. Disrobed. Mounted the mare. Climbed back down because the saddle hurt her sensitive regions. Removed the saddle. And then finally remounted the mare bareback. (Well, bareback here refers only to the mare; the Lady obviously was bare-everything!)

A-Ha! That's where the plot started to unravel (like a ball of wool, to use a simile!). For in that town dwelled a tailor who hadn't been delivered his collection of porn for that week! So like any good porn-freak worth two bits, he was upset. And when he saw this golden opportunity, he hatched a devious and complicated plot. He decided he would open his window and take a peek. (Ok! Ok! So maybe it wasn't all that complicated!)

So as the Lady rode by our voyeuristic friend opened his window to catch the show. Legend has it that he was then struck by a flash of bright light that rendered him blind. (My own version though has a much more romantic ending!) Also, as luck would have it, his name was Tom. Thank God for that! What if his name had been Harry? The phrase Peeping Tom would not have made any sense in that case!

So that's how the story ended - Tom became blind (but oh! what a last sight that must have been!), Lady Godiva got numerous offers from the top pornographic directors of the time and a year's contract with Penthouse, and the Earl, thanks to his wife's new earning opportunities, managed to survive with the lowered taxes!



The taxes seem pretty high today too, don't you think? Why doesn't someone step up to the plate? How about it, Aishwarya? This could be a golden opportunity to live up to what you promised in that very touching Miss World speech! (Oh! Wait a minute, those speeches are all baloney, aren't they?)