The Bluestocking Women’s Pub - The Return of Salad and the Lion

[MyrtleLion]

It’s been a while since I last saw everyone!

Welcome to everyone, regulars, lurkers, newly ventured in.

A place for women to discuss whatever takes their fancy, where the bar staff are attentive gerbils, Rosy the Red Panda is available for cuddles and all sweet things have no calories and all alcohol leaves the drinker slightly merry and hangover-free.

Previous thread is here:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5326705-the-bluestocking-womens-pub-where-brains-can-exist-in-a-single-state

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@Shedmistress May I ask why you write in the third person?
Might just be me ( and my tiredness) but I'm finding it hard to read.

Love the pix of Myrtle.

And Magpie, the image of you reclining in exhaustion, with your beak just slightly open, is marvellous - if you feel how you look, then all my sympathies.

I've been doing yet more DIY. I also had a therapeutic moan about SIL to a friend this morning.

And for the naturalists amongst us, my Merlin app informed me yesterday that it had heard a marsh harrier. Quite exciting, but I didn't see it, sadly.

Thanks Farriers, that would make sense. My dad was from inner-city Dublin, and a lot of Dublin slang is actually British Army slang from around the Empire - my da said that something he got for free was 'buckshee' which is from baksheesh, tea was 'cha', taking a look was 'take a dekko', so your explanation of 'the tin lid' fits in.

My dad was in India in WW2 and used quite a few of the above slang terms. He also spoke Urdu.

I've been a-googling about backwards feet ghosts and found this on Wikipedia

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Churel

This bit is sad thinking about it

According to some legends, a woman who dies very cruely will come back as a revenant churel for revenge, particularly targeting the males in her family.

A weak armour that might protect women and girls from male violence. It wouldn't surprise me though if there's a 'counterspell' to stop an abused woman from rising to take her well deserved revenge. Probably involving some desecration of her corpse.

I have long hair and rarely tie it back. It's not unusual for it to be all over my face if I go out and it's windy. If I should ever visit the himalayas I must remember to tie back my hair and never walk backwards towards any of the locals. I might give them heart failure.

My FIL was in India for 20 years, & was looking forward to leaving the army when, with a couple of months to go, war was declared & he was back in! He ended up being evacuated from Dunkirk. DH & I always scan the documentary films when they come up on TV, but we haven't seen him yet.

@EdithStourton I'm a big fan of the Merlin app. The woods where I walk my border collie most mornings are full of bird song at this time of year. The sound of cuckoos ringing through the woodland is very special.

@FarriersGirl I hear the cuckoos across the fields - it's such an evocative sound.

I find with Merlin that sometimes it will give me a millisecond of 'greenfinch' and then say something like 'robin' - as if it's changed its mind. And other times it won't pick up something I've heard clearly, but conversely also identifies a song I didn't even hear...

I love it though - I'm learning so much.

There are definitely still limitations - it completely failed to pick up bitterns booming which must be one of the most distinctive bird calls in existence! We suspect it may not be processing such low tones. And it sometimes won’t detect a cuckoo when we can - I think that’s such a very recognisable call that we can pick it out of the background at very low levels.

I think Merlin is a bit of a work in progress although still really useful. Last autumn I was hearing a new bird making a deep croaking sound. I thought it was a raven and Merlin agrees. The RSPB website reckons they are not in my part of the UK but I have seen and heard them many times this spring.
I have also tried using it on overseas holidays. It has 'packs' that you can download for some parts of the world but these don't seem to work well IME.

I realise I've just clicked on 'agree' to your posts about the Merlin app even though I've never used it - I think clicking on 'agree' is the equivalent of going 'mm hmm' or 'really?' when in a conversation with someone, to indicate interest

Raven can pop up all over the shop. I've seen them flying over my house which is nowhere near stereotypical raven habitat. I've heard of people leaving the app. running overnight to record the birds that use the airspace when it's dark. Lots of birds apparently migrate during the hours of darkness. Previously testified by their collisions with tall buildings and the remains recovered from the nests of urban peregrines.

I want an "ODFOD" react button, because I am a miserable whatsit.

Sometimes I feel like Gary Sinise in Forrest Gump when he talks about his ancestors fighting and dying in every American war.

In tracing my scattered extended family, I've found them popping up not only in both World Wars, but in Korea, Vietnam (US and Australian armies), Sudan, Crimea, American Civil War (both sides), Boer Wars (both sides), various engagements in India...

...and randomly enough, the Franco-Prussian War, because apparently the British Empire wasn't having enough wars, but Otto Bismarck was hiring.

The ones I can't get over are the emigrants in the US who, in 1914, raced up north to join the Canadian Expeditionary Force.

It seems to be in the genes.

I want a shocked emoji 😳😮😲😯

I don’t care which one, though the wide open eyes are amazing. Just because sometimes someone writes something genuinely shocking or as an “are you sure you meant to say that?” and sometimes to be funny.

Do tell us if you start coming over all military @SionnachRuadh, and we'll duck and put you in charge of the bouncers.

I am strictly pacifist except in self-defence.

I stumbled across a film of a caybara attacking a woman, so ours are in the right job.

Apparently they don’t wear trousers or underwear.

That's why we need the 😳 reaction!

I'm not telling them. They're security.

Maybe that’s how they keep order: Calm down or we’ll get the half-naked capybaras!

I'm not going to get Gemini to create the appropriate sign for behind the bar. I fully expect it to refuse!

Same thing happened with Donald Duck. I hear that's why he was kicked out of the navy.