A Different View with Dave O’Connell
Get a younger looking neck in four weeks’ proclaimed the press release – and you instantly thought … wouldn’t that just be the perfect present for the politician in your life this Christmas?
After all, if they’ve been in the game for a while, their old neck must be due for the knacker’s yard. And even if it still has a little mileage left on the clock, surely a competitor with new neck would hold a distinct advantage with the electorate?
A good hard neck is a prerequisite for a successful political career; indeed some of the most successful politicians could rely on nothing else.
A bit of neck will allow you to blame the problems of the economy on the other fellas; it will allow you to make the most outrageous promises at election time and then deny you’d ever even thought of such a proposal, and it will facilitate a selective memory when it comes to accountability.
Of course a new neck doesn’t just work for politicians – bankers can also use them, although they probably have to come in a much bigger size, given the dinners they enjoyed as Rome burned all around them.
At the very least – and in practical terms – a new unlined neck would allow you to wear open-necked shirts instead of polo necks. So the rejuvenating powers of a new neck should never be underestimated.
But the press release – like many of its genre – doesn’t deliver exactly what it suggests at first glance; this breakthrough product doesn’t give you a new neck at all … it’s a sort of Pollyfilla of the cosmetic industry that might just iron out the creases in your old one.
They’ve called it a triple firming neck cream, whatever that might be when it’s at home.
Still, by reading on, you’ll always learn something – and in this case it was that one’s neck seems to age faster than any other part of the body.
And while there are some definite reasons for this, one of the biggest causes is neglect. Although it’s only fair to point out that neglect of the neck isn’t as yet an acknowledged medical phenomenon.
Apparently the skin on our necks is more prone to sun damage, pigmentation and premature ageing. Which probably explains the origin of the term red neck.
We’re not going to mention the brand name of the new triple firming neck cream – mainly because we wouldn’t want to cause a stampede of people with chicken’s necks or very red ones, fighting over the tubes in their local chemist.
But it’s still worth explaining how this product actually irons out those creases, reduces that redness and leaves you with the sort of neck you last had in the days of wide collared shirts.
The manufacturers have a couple of secret formulae that ‘stimulate a healthy collagen network’, which appear to be mixed with citric acid and some component of skin’s natural filler, all of which are ‘clinically proven to rebuild and strengthen the underlying support structure, plumping and lifting slack, lined skin for a toned, tighter look, and smoothing neck creases from the inside’.
The problem with having a new neck is a bit like painting the ceilings in your house – the ceilings look great and brilliantly white, but then the walls look like they’ve been left to rot since the dark ages.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
