The Bluestocking does a late night flit again

[Magpiecomplex]

New thread, you know the drill!

I used to belong to a musical society whose annual dinner ended with people doing their party pieces. One lovely person recited Albert and the Lion, but she was from a different part of The North and her accent wasn't quite right. Sigh.

The next year she chose the poem which begins "This is the Tale of Sonia Snell" which was fine.

I've just tried an internet search for that poem, and the first three versions I've found are much longer than the one I remember.

Apologies for the triple post. I've often wondered how people manage that, and now I know. 😪

I used to teach a whole Drama lesson based round Jabberwocky , shamelessly copied from one we were given at college.
Fair enough, I think, they were supposed to be teaching us how to teach.

I didn't know that one, Woley. It sounds fun, especially as an audience participation here - Link

MN is not letting me post links again...

Edit - and now it is.

@AsWithGlad did you by any chance used to belong to a musical society?

😉

I can when the occasion demands do the odd Crawford Howard poem. In the correct accent!

St Patrick and the Snakes on The Session

Indeed. Still do.

Indeed. Still do.

Indeed. Still do.

Depending on alcohol levels, my party piece would be either singing Tom’s Diner or Carrickfergus or (into double figures of double gins) Fields of Athenry or reciting The Boy In The Train or A Man’s A Man.

Re the earlier question of toxicity of grapes to chihauhaus, which I don’t think was answered - potentially yes. Vine fruits, including grapes, can be toxic to dogs but it’s Russian roulette, there may be no ill effects at all. Afaik it’s not yet understood why, possibly a fungus or something on some grapes rather than the fruit itself. There’s always a few panicked threads around Xmas when dogs have snaffled a mince pie or some cake, alongside expensive chocolate thefts.

The King's Breakfast is mine. The king and queen are very posh. The cow is laid back Oscar Wilde, and the dairy maid is broad west country.

I learned it when I was 10 and it stuck.

See, I'd need more drink to sing than recite. But in that case you're probably going to get Goldfinger or, in an extreme case, Sosban Fach (I will no doubt mangle the lyrics but will rely on any Welsh speakers present also being sozzled)

Bad punctuation on my part. The recitations come in the pre- or early drinking phase. It’s really only FoA that comes out late in the evening. Or in the second hour of singing a toddler to sleep, who won’t settle unless I’m there singing.

My husband would approve of Sospan Fach though. It’s one of his mum”s faves.

I loved that so much when I was little ❤

Any nocturnal creatures about?

Oh I know this one but only because dp recites it (including the lisp) sometimes. I have to tell him it got a mention at the Bluestocking.
I can't do poetry at all, it goes right over my head and it's not a language thing, I can't do poetry in any of the languages I speak, including my native German.

sorry, I was asleep. Are you ok?

Fine 👌 just nocturnal thanks. Gerbils were snoozing by the fire. Presumably.

As I write I am both nocturnal and insomniac. It's 4am here and I just gave up trying to go to sleep and got up and made a cup of tea. Good morning all.

Good morning! I’m on my second mug so semi human at this point.

Clara seems to have a second job as a model.

There is a version of Cecil the Caterpillar on YouTube - - I know slightly different words - my version goes:

Cecil was a caterpillar,
Cecil was a pig,
When I last saw Cecil, he was this big,
And I said Cecil, what have you done?
And he said, I've eaten all the cabbages in the garden!
And I said Cecil you pig, and you haven't left any for me!

And it goes on through all the different verses in the YouTube version. I do much more of a lithp than she does too.

Well look what quoting from 'Albert' prompted! Great fun, I loved all the recitation posts!
Thinking back, I realise that the tradition of the sing-song at social events has died out in my lifetime, which makes me sad - I noticed it disappearing from birthday parties and family Xmases, quite suddenly in the 1990s.

I'd never stand up and sing on my own, but I used to love joining in sing-songs, and I miss them. I also miss the singing of hymns in echoing churches along with a couple of thousand others- such a powerful experience when I was a child.
When singing was the norm at get-togethers, 'The Recitation' was what you did if you couldn't sing, and was as highly-valued.

That reminds me of what Stephen's father tells him about the friends of his youth in Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man:
One fellow had a good voice, another fellow was a good actor, another could sing a good comic song...That's the kind of fellows I want you to associate with, fellows of the right kidney.
The middle fellow was probably the one who did the recitations

I miss singing hymns in pubs. Hymns, because they were the songs pretty much everyone knew.

(I'm Welsh, as some of you may have gathered.)

Saw this today in my inbox. Thought @SionnachRuadh might fancy it. I have a couple of other things from this seller - they are lovely if ££. Might not quite be right scale for the real life Blue Stucking unfortunately!!!
katielarmour.com/christmas-decorations/sparkly-snowflake-wn89k?ss_source=sscampaigns&ss_campaign_id=68a468ba4010181920c4dbe6&ss_email_id=68a58c43e053182e17926234&ss_campaign_name=Have+you+seen+these%3F+💝&ss_campaign_sent_date=2025-08-20T08%3A50%3A20Z