Then, it became appalling with girls wearing fascinators instead of hats in the Royal Enclosure.
That means, in particular, making China see that a tinderbox it has long regarded as a strategic asset has become an appalling liability.
On seeing his reaction to this shiny, beige mess I laughed a little hysterically until, unexpectedly, the tears started to flow as I wondered how I had become so appalling at life.
Something problematic, too, because what is tolerable in small doses becomes rather appalling when it goes well beyond that, as it has in Paris.
But, as Turner tellingly points out, their hopes improved when state education became so appalling in the 1970s and 1980s and there was sufficient middle class "flight" to improve standards.
On one level, this incredible performance evokes being trapped in a bar with a twenty -something blowhard of a salesman, whose braggadocio becomes more appalling and preposterous with every rum and Coke.
"What to the Americans was shock and awe designed to force them into capitulation has become shocking and appalling to much of the world that's looking at it," said John W. Dower, a historian of World War II.
You can get appalling things.
On Saturday, the basket case that the London Broncos have become after years of appalling mismanagement launched yet another new era, this time at The Hive in Barnet.
These activities are still crimes, but the authorities now turn a blind eye.On Mr Khatami's watch, Iran's human-rights record has become a bit less appalling.
