The Grim Reaper will find us all in the end…

Word count: 229 words

Reading time: Less than 1 minute

I read widely, watch movies and listen to the radio. In today’s post you’ll see an interesting piece of figurative language I’ve encountered recently. It’s by Elizabeth Renzetti.

My daily newspaper is the Globe and Mail. In last Saturday’s edition, I read an amusing piece by Elizabeth Renzetti on fad diets dating back to 1913. Most of the diets in those days (which Renzetti terms as “no more bonkers than our own”) seemed to feature trips to places such as Buffalo, with a three-day cure to eliminate the desire for alcohol, or elixirs such as syrup of figs.

But Renzetti reserves her special spleen for the current crop of diet books. And her particular venom is splayed on actress Gwyneth Paltrow. Not that Paltrow doesn’t deserve it. She’s written a cookbook, called It’s All Good, with no dairy, meat, wheat, alcohol, coffee, eggs (or joy, according to Renzetti.) How is that even possible, I wonder.

And here is Renzetti’s best line:

The Grim Reaper will find us all in the end: His Google Map includes both Fat Street and Skinny Alley.

I like the way Renzetti takes a cliche and gives it a quick pinch in the cheeks to make it more current and vibrant. The Grim Reaper is an old man. Who knew he had an iPad for checking Google Maps?

Scroll to Top