The Autumn Bluestocking - mist, mellow fruitfulness and hot chocolate!

[SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius]

Welcome one and all - as the nights draw in, pull up a chair to the fire, and the gerbils will be along soon with hot chocolate and Tunnock’s teacakes.

Thank you, @MarieDeGournay . The gerbils are delighted they can bring out that banner again. They do look splendid.

And thank you, Magpie. I'm fascinated that my experience led you to Scrabble of all things. It is a great word, but I don't think I have ever managed to place a word as complex as thorax, let alone pneumo in Scrabble.

But obviously that's because I'm really terrible at Scrabble. Even the gerbils can manage it.

I dream of a Scrabble score like that...

My DH1 used to iron trousers, skirts and flat things, and I used to iron shirts and anything at all fancy - it worked out about 50-50. DH2 and I don't iron anything and I wish I'd learned much earlier in life that most things will be perfectly OK if you just hang them. Although I will say that using a tumble dryer really helps in that (don't hate me - nobody hangs washing on a line here, and it's not only my fault we have a climate crisis though I will cop to a contributing factor).

Oh @MyrtleLion what a dramatic day you've had! I'm glad you are OK and that the human Bessies were able to give you a proper check over.

’human Bessies’ is a great term for the nocturnal medical workers

Human Bessies were a bit like gerbils providing pain relief, but an hour or so after requested, coffee with milk instead of black coffee and they only had salt and vinegar crisps, though they did provide nice biscuits.

The human doctor Bessie wants to be an endocrinologist so we had a chat about that. Adrenals not diabetes, and apparently thyroid is sorted (not until they measure uptake as well as free T4 in my experience). But he was fine and his boss (senior Bessie who I never met) wanted the xray to rule out the pneumothorax.

I did feel like I'd overreacted, but he said it was better to come in because I am at risk of clots, even though I'm on blood thinners.

And my lovely DSIL is coming for lunch tomorrow with her two dogs. We will eat by the river, then sit in the garden.

The Jack Russell is leaning in the other dog who looks as if this is the most awkward thing that's ever happened to him.

Have a lovely and well-deserved lunch with DSIL and the dogs, Myrtle - I love the photo and your interpretation of it

'I beg your pardon! How dare you suggest I'm being cuddled up to by another dog! What do you take me for? I've never seen this other creature before in my entire life. I've no idea how he got there..'😁

That's it exactly! 🤣😂

Though the Jack Russell is female.

'Whaaaat? a female? This is even more outrageous than I thought! Excuse me Madam, we have not been formally introduced, so I must ask you to move to the other side of the car immediately.. '😄

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

Actually I was wrong! Both dogs are male. My SIL's previous Jack Russell was female and her mother's, which she has frequently is also female, so my apologies. 😞

'Whaaat! I'm being cuddled up to by another male?! I beg your pardon, Sir, I am NOT of that persuasion and I'll thank you to move to the other side of the car immediately!'

Sorry, Doggie, I'm sure you're lovely and very tolerant and liberal in real life, I'm just having a bit of fun at your expense. Tell Myrtle and DSIL to give you an extra doggie treat from me by way of apology

They were both in decorous poses even if Big Dog didn’t like Little Dog’s.

But how do the dogs identify?

To make up for making fun of the doggies in the photo, here is a poem about a beloved dog with 'soul in the shining eyes of him':

Tim, An Irish Terrier
by Winifred M Letts

It's wonderful dogs they're breeding now:
Small as a flea or large as a cow;
But my old lad Tim he'll never be bet
By any dog that he ever met,
'Come on' says he 'for I'm not kilt yet!'

No matter the size of the dog he'll meet,
Tim trails his coat the length o'the street.
D'ye mind his scar an' his ragged ear,
The like of a Dublin Fusilier?
He's a massacree dog that knows no fear.

But he'd stick to me till his lastest breath;
An' he'd go with me to the gates of death.
He'd wait a thousand years, maybe,
Scratching the door an' whining for me
If myself were inside in Purgatory.

So I laugh when I hear them make it plain
That dogs and men never meet again.
For all their talk who'd listen to them
With the soul in the shining eyes of him?
Would God be wasting a dog like Tim?

😂

I have three solid days of induction starting tomorrow so I think I need a prophylactic hot chocolate tonight please bar gerbil. Very large, lots of cream and marshmallows, and a shot of mint syrup.

Clarice is thinking of installing some sort of railway to get the hot chocolate bowser from the kitchen to Magpie’s seat (or is it a perch?)

Meanwhile re the dogs - I don’t know what they identify as, but how they identify is by smell. Those noses don’t lie!

Ooooooh a railway project! I'm in!

I like Clarice's thinking! And honestly, what would not be improved by the presence of a steam railway?

Do you have some figures for that, by any chance? 😆

Work in progress, I think sitting over the track isn't a terribly clever idea.

Funny you should mention that......😁

Still true. The intake day for a new commissioning course is called ‘Ironing Board Sunday’ because of all the ironing boards being lugged around.

Strange how they never include the ironing in the recruiting adverts.