The Bluestocking Pub, where we continue to read about gerbils nobly and bravely working undercover in the Fen.

[AsWithGlad]

Welcome to The Bluestocking, the best (perhaps only) online women's pub. Nothing in the food or drink can harm you, everything is served by a very enthusiastic crew of gerbils, who enjoy doing this, and any curious menfolk are welcome at the Staunch Ally down the road.

Previous thread: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5564959-the-bluestocking-womens-pub-in-which-we-wait-excitedly-for-the-next-instalment-of-goseis-adventures

If Winchester, Salisbury, and Wells needs covering, I can check them out while visiting family. My step-dad's partner frequents Wells cathedral and is friends with the organist or someone like that. Dad and step mum live near Salisbury and Winchester, I'm that way that when you live in the middle of nowhere, "near" is anything less than an hour's drive.

Incidentally Winchester has a fantastic Christmas market outside the cathedral but be careful at the mulled wine stalls. Some of them only sell the non alcoholic version!

For those of you not on the Tunnocks thread, may I present this year's selection box for that special Beetle in your life.

Salisbury "is on every Russian spy's bucket list" 😂😂😂

Everywhere is covered. And I love it when everyone chips in, so all suggestions are welcome. It just depends on whether the suggestion is a good one that fits the plot, and how far ahead I am. I currently have episodes 33, 34 and 35 drafted, which takes us to Sunday, so I'm not too far ahead at the moment.

Strictly speaking, the Bluestocking patrons are only looking at the cathedrals that Gosie has already been to, and I haven't listed them all, so if Wells is in that original list, Wells and Salisbury will be visited.

Winchester is not on the list, but I promise you, we will get there. After all, Gemma Glasswing is making a copy of a window from that cathedral.

Winchester Cathedral is unique. I mean, how many other English Anglican cathedrals have been the title of a No. 1 record?

Just caught up.

“Because of the blue.” Gosie set the page down. “It’s a plain bit of modern glass in the middle of all that painting, and it’s the thing the steward wanted to show her. I’ve spent three months learning what old glass does to light. I’d quite like to see what a mistake does to it, 80 years on. And to understand why it shines on the floor, when the rest of the glass doesn’t.”

I would go with Gosie and admire the blue light, given half a chance!

What a fountain of knowledge we are! Ely Cathedral on the cover of Pink Floyd's Division Bell album and now Winchester Cathedral, a number one hit record.

From Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winchester_Cathedral_(song)
Winchester Cathedral is a song by the New Vaudeville Band, a British novelty group established by the song's composer, Geoff Stephens, released in late 1966.

It was recorded entirely by session musicians, when it became an international hit, an actual band had to be assembled, with Fontana trying unsuccessfully to recruit the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band. The recording is one of the few charting songs to feature a bassoon.

It won the 1967 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary (R&R) Recording and Stephens received the 1966 Ivor Novello Award for "Best Song Musically and Lyrically".

In 2016, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the song's release, a new version by Geoff Stephens was released on CD by Signum Classics, sung by members of the Winchester Cathedral Choir. The premier performance of this version was to take place during a gala concert in Winchester Cathedral on March 12, 2016, to help raise funds for the Cathedral's Appeal. You can hear it here

The tune went to number 4 in the UK Record Retailer chart (now recognised as the official UK Singles Chart for that period). It went all the way to the top in the US, displacing "You Keep Me Hangin' On" by the Supremes on December 3, 1966. After one week at No. 1, "Winchester Cathedral" was knocked off the summit by the Beach Boys' "Good Vibrations", only to rebound to the top spot the next week. After a two-week run, it was knocked off the top for good by The Monkees' "I'm a Believer". "Winchester Cathedral" also topped the Billboard Easy Listening chart for four weeks.

What a song, in the middle of THREE classic pop songs!

Gloucester (Leastwise, its cloister) is in a Harry Potter film.

Had my eye test. No change, except the eye pressure was a wee bit lower than last time. They started checking mine once a year because of the increased pressure and a 'change in the macula'

Turns out that the change in the macula improved a couple of years ago - possibly because of improved diet. I've been Googling and now reckon that the increased pressure might have been caused by a reaction to steroid injections - I had a face like a furnace after starting the course and was told that I'd had an allergic reaction.

Of course , there was no communication between the shoulder specialist and the optometrist.

Anyway, I'm happy with the check-up. The optometrist reckons that I'm better using my contacts for running.

Also succeeded in sorting out a package for my phoned and wifi. I currently have two different providers and I'm told that's no longer allowed.

BT have agreed to get the engineer to set up everything. I might have played a bit on being a nervous auld wifie when it comes to tech, but it's pretty much the truth.

The new deal works out less than a half of what I've been paying separately, so that'll cover most of my accordion lessons.

Um ... homoerotic overtones in Brideshead Revisited?? I missed that myself.

Autistic moose here.

Plus, sorry to say I only read Enid Blyton and Just William stories as a child, not terribly influential, but I enjoyed them. I moved on to science fiction, books by John Wyndham, Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, then to Solzhenitsyn and Tolstoy and Kafka, then a few women crept in, Margaret Drabble, Edna O'Brien, later JK Rowling (out of curiosity), and women then became more important, too many male authors and although I liked some of them and read a fair few, I started to select books written by women. I'm not sure when this happened. My reading has fluctuated over the years. I read quite a lot of audiobooks now. When studying, I've read more widely, partly because of the essay writing requirements, but less deeply, skimming over to get the quotes or the sense of style, etc. Toni Morrison is amazing. Fay Weldon, weird, but likeable. Margaret Atwood is frighteningly cerebral. But academia is a strange place filled with pompous notions, dust and mildew, and fashions I can't fathom, or resist, or dislike.

This is my face after not "getting" the main story in a film. Now fillums - sorry Marie! cultural appropriation(!) - I find hugely overstimulating and overwhelming, not every film, but many that I've seen in the past, before knowing anything about autism or me being autistic.

I’ve just been out to look at the blood moon. The photos don’t do it justice but it was worth getting up early for.

I only read Enid Blyton and Just William stories as a child, not terribly influential, but I enjoyed them. I moved on to science fiction, books by John Wyndham

With you up to here @inkymoose but I also added all the a Chalet School books and everything by Judy Blume then so I went off on a different track from you.

Did you pass Forever round the classroom too, @ChristmasStars?

Oh boy I had forgotten Forever!

I was fascinated by these Chagall windows, and the young woman they commemorate
Sarah Goldsmid :: Capelhistory-co-uk
Another person died with her, a third companion survived to tell the tale.
I can't help but wonder if there'd be some questions raised about him in today's suspicious and litigious world...

An unexpected link back to earlier posts this window could serve as an illustration for Hopkin's' Wreck of the Deutschland, couldn't it?

Beauty from such a sad story. I wouldn’t be suspicious of the survivor, Marie, sounds like they were just tragically inexperienced sailors. Running before the wind with the boom right out in a dinghy is asking for an uncontrolled gybe and capsize.

I agree with you Errol - I just think that everything has to be somebody's fault these days.

Weary, the eye test results sound good, that must be a big relief.

Beautiful photos of the moon, Kitty - it was completely clouded over here so your photos are very welcome.

It was not just wet all day yesterday but... a bit nippy in the evening - did we ever think we'd use those words again just a short time ago? could we even grasp the concept of 'nippy'?

I love the 'cathedrals in popular culture' theme😄
To add to the 'bassoons in popular song' list - I submit: the opening bars of Smokey Robinson's 'Tears of a Clown', I suppose because the bassoon sounds clown-y.
Not just any old clown - he mentions Pagliacci in the lyrics..

I suspect the bassoon in popular song' list is going to be a short list😒

Inky - it's interesting what you say about fillums😉- I used to be really into films, when I was in my 20s I went to the local cinema every week to see whatever was on, good or bad, high or low.

At some point films seemed to change - much faster/noisier/really fast editing. Crash bang wallop.
The camera standing still on just one, beautiful shot, or slow pans don't happen much any more.

The cinema as an image-based art seems to be relegated to 'niche'.
I lost interest. Sometimes a film will turn up on TV that I like because it is visually attractive, but otherwise - not attracted any more.

I wonder if you've found that films have got even more overstimulating over the years, Inky?

Am home now, and it's definitely been raining here! Some bits of the garden are already looking greener - the blackbirds and robins will be glad that the ground is softer. 😊

I had a really nice time, but am glad I managed to get an early train. I had forgotten about the Reading Festival! The train was full of loud teenagers (I thought all teenagers were comotose until at least noon), tents, and constant reminders from the conductor to not block the aisles with backpacks. Thank goodness they all got off at Reading!

For those with autism and/or ADHD among us I thought you might enjoy a series of YouTube videos my DD pointed me at when they were staying with us last week. The AuDHD one is https://youtube.com/shorts/Q4gnnU1njKA?is=l8tTYWeyQYLo9Hcy but there is a whole channel run by @diplomaduck.There are other videos explained by cats :-). I like the duck ones because they end with the sentence “still a good duck, always a good duck”. DD had a t shirt made for DGD1, who is autistic and (DD, who is a licensed therapist, believes) also has ADHD, with a picture of the duck ones the front with “still a good duck” under it and “always a good duck” on the back. Both DGDs are currently obsessed with ducks so they love this.

I wish there had been less at the start of each article about who her father was, or parents were. It was 1963, not 1903. The man who also died just has address (Eaton Square) or his occupation given, plus name and age, but it’s understandable that they’d focus on her in her local paper.

Beautiful glass, though and marvellous that, having seen the first window in situ, Chagall says he’ll do all twelve windows in the church.

We had a deluge yesterday evening after several days of half-hearted showers and I could almost hear the garden sighing 'Ah, that's better'. Not a chance of seeing the blood moon though, the cloud cover has only just shifted.

I think I have a little wren living in my large eleagnus. I keep seeing one hopping about and disappearing into the foliage 😁

The bad news is that I found a box wood moth hiding in my garage, which explains why my potted box plant looks very sad. I didn't realise they were found this far north, but apparently, they have moved up-country at pace due to climate change. I need to break the news to my neighbour, who has a whole hedge of the stuff😬

Perhaps we could campaign for a Tunnock’s advent calendar, @RumNotRun! I’d buy one. I used to buy one from John Lewis that was a little gingerbread biscuit each day, but the utter bar-stewards stopped selling it, and I haven’t been able to find it anywhere else. 😢🍪

Ooh yes, I would buy a Tunnock's advent calendar, Woley.😋

There has been a plague of biblical proportion here in Dorset but the vast majority of the hedges have recovered. Have faith in your plants!

All my box was destroyed by those little bastards. Nuff said.

No more rain here, nor very much forecast, though the little we've had has revived the local plants considerably.

The ivy has come into a flower - I walked past an old oak yesterday that is swathed in the stuff, and the whole tree was literally buzzing, there were so many bees.

Yes!!! Maybe one of the doors could contain a mini brioche to try out the brioche/Tunnocks recipe on the other thread.