I can now permanently erase my fanciful notion of LOTHARIO as a silver-maned lounge-lizard in correspondent`s shoes and replace it with that of a gay(sic) young blade with the libido of a rabbit.

I respond, not in order ‘to blow you out of the water’ – heaven forbid! – but because I had a vague memory I wished to check that Lothario is or has been often preceded by the word ‘gay’. This dates of course from earlier usage of that word. This seems to be the case.

Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lothario
notes that there is an old play by Rowe (1703) “Through the Rowe play, the eponym a lothario, came to mean a handsome, seductive ladies’ man. It was often prefixed with “gay”, from Rowe’s line, “haughty gallant gay Lothario”. A “gay lothario” was an amoral seducer”.

As far as I can tell there is no inherent idea that Lothario is ‘old’ in this or other plays.

Uncle Yap – I got the joke (in both senses) immediately I opened your blog, and I was the first.

An Italian, a Scotsman, and a Chinese fellow were hired at a construction site. The foreman pointed out a huge pile of sand and told the Italian guy, “You’re in charge of sweeping.” To the Scotsman he said, “You’re in charge of shoveling.” And to the Chinese guy, “You’re in charge of supplies.”
He then said, “Now, I have to leave for a little while. I expect you guys to make a dent in that there pile.”
The foreman went away for a of couple hours, and, when he returned, the pile of sand was untouched. He asked the Italian, “Why didn’t you sweep any of it?” The Italian replied, “I no hava no broom. You said to the Chinese fella that he a wasa in a charge of supplies, but he hasa disappeared and I no coulda finda him nowhere.” Then the foreman turned to the Scotsman and said, “And you, I thought I told you to shovel this pile.”
The Scotsman replied, “Aye, ye did lad, boot ah couldnay get meself a shoovel! Ye left th’ Chinese gadgie in chairge of supplies, boot ah couldnay fin’ him either.” The foreman was really angry by now and stormed off toward the pile of sand to look for the Chinese guy.

Just then, the Chinese guy jumped out from behind the pile of sand and yelled…

“SUPPLIES!!”

Speaking of old ones, I’d like to assure Carrots @25 that, like all true Grauniad readers, I deplore ageism in all its manifestations. Good luck with the face-lift!

And thanks also to UY for the entertaining blog.

“Humble” foot-soldiers tend to be the ones who survive: lying doggo whilst Generals issuing orders behind them get shot to bits seems, to me, to be an eminently sensible policy.

As for cats: What colour is Monday? (or Thursday/Sunday et. al)….a little teaser I used to use with students who were probably convinced that I was bonkers.

Paul might be categorised in many ways but “ageist”, never. For him “all cats are grey in the dark.”

Thanks, by the way for paying me the immense compliment a while ago of supposing I might be a general rather than a humble foot soldier…

Thanks, UY….your blog was as much fun as Paul`s masterly puzzle. I did share the reservations of Andrew @ 12 and Tupu @ 15 about “scale”, “ratio” “proportions” and “dimensions” nuances, but the clue was so good that to protest too bleatingly would be curmudgeonly.

There was also a question mark in the dim recesses of my burnt-out brain about LOTHARIO. Romeo, in my mind at least, being a young lover, and a Lothario being a generic name for an ageing roue and libertine. I can`t be bothered to research the origins of this perception and can only hope that Tupu will be tempted to blow me out of the water (again).