Intro

Some people spend too much time trying not to use one letter. The whole thing seems quite pointless to me. Since twenty-six letters exist for the choosing, why not utilise the full compliment of them? Yes yes, I concede the following: for you, this constitutes "restricted writing"; you invent or explore new styles of writing. Well, sorry to burst the bubble, but... it's pointless, not to mention time-consuming.

Morever, some people actually find this silliness funny. In fact, it's little more than some English students with nothing to do trying to be funny. You failed. I'm sorry.

Think of all the other things you could be doing with your time! In the time it's taken you to write one paragraph without the letter 'e', you could have boiled three eggs or opened any number of envelopes. As the bloke who runs Ikea says, "Divide your day into ten minute slots and waste as few of them as possible doing nothing." You too might make a Swedish furniture one day!

Some people say that, as long as it's not interfering with me, I ought to just let you get on with it. I have two things to say to these people, and one of them is "Fuck".

I am told that an amusing (and slightly sad), thrill is to try to talk to a man (or woman) standing by you on public transport, or on ICQ, without using a particular symbol, and to maintain this for as long as you can. Such talk is usually unduly tough at first, but with much practising it can in fact absorb your thoughts and you will find this occuring without your control. This particular lipogrammatic writing is, according to statistics, a most difficult option, and it is actually now fairly boring. But try it! It's a work-out for your mind!

An occasionally-amusing pursuit is to read a large body written in a "restricted" style and try to discern what rules are being applied. Perhaps some amongst you are wondering just that about this particular exercise. Well, I shan't spoil it for you, but read with care and I'm sure it will become apparent in good time. How many paragraphs are there?