The Bluestocking - Raiders of the Lost Sparp

[lcakethereforeIam]

Welcome everyone. Wipe your feet, it's been wet out.

Don't forget to namechange before posting if necessary.

That's a beautiful prayer.

Us slothies are slow and peaceful. I send slow, peaceful thoughts out and offer comforting hugs when you would like one.

The worst thing about the fatigue is not the 40 minute nap at 4.40pm, it's the inability to sleep when I'm actually in bed. Three hours between 0154 and 0500 today. Then a couple of hours around 7am.

I feel like a zombie.

• Being awake in the small hours is horrible, Myrtle, *I'm really sorry to hear you can't sleep - except at the 'wrong 'times😒

I had a period of not sleeping, and I found that listening to factual/historical BBC podcasts occupied my mind like nothing else could, and occasionally I woke up disappointed that I had fallen asleep before finding out some amazing historical fact!

I hope this phase ends soon and you can move forward in your recovery - you'll get there, but poor you, you are being made to take the long road

I use the World Service for nighttime listening. Very soothing.

Poor sleep is miserable, Myrtle. It's a bit like being jet lagged, only jet lag is finite, so you know it will be over in a few days, but a bout of poor sleep has no obvious end point.

It's a real pain having insomniac episodes. It just leaves me permanently tired.

If I'm online I'll often see if I can find a cricket match to listen to. There's bound to be some provincial match in New Zealand or Pakistan.

Or else I'll just read for a bit. A few years ago it was so bad I just went "to hell with this" and spent the night rereading Fight Club... a book about someone who can't sleep.

I struggle with insomnia too, @SionnachRuadh - you and @MyrtleLion bith have my sympathy. I have found a combination that works for me - I use Feather and Down sleep butter, containing lavender and magnesium, take a magnesium supplement, and listen to audiobooks. I listen to history books, and the historian Dan Jones has an especially soporific voice - I love his books, but he can send me to sleep in 20 minutes!

@Swashbuckled - you and Dr Swash are held in my heart.

Aargh the insomnia… I get that too. If I can’t fall asleep within half an hour of settling down I give up and read or play games on my iPad for a while. If I can get four or five hours I’m ok but there have been nights when I haven’t slept at all and that’s like jet lag after an overnight flight. I can’t do the audiobooks thing because it wakes DH up unless I keep my hearing aids in, and that leaves me uncomfortable if I turn on my side (besides which the hearing aids need to charge overnight).

I had an over active thyroid that wiped me out. I could walk, slowly, but standing for any length of time was impossible. Also gave me dreadful insomnia. I got better, I thought I'd be on medication for life, but it was dreadful while it lasted. I thought it was a perimenopause symptom, which was what I told the receptionist when I initially contacted the doctor. So it was a few weeks before I got an appointment. Lesson learned, don't triage yourself. I remember having to wedge myself against the wall in the clinic waiting room to try to steady my hand so I could type my name into the device that let them know you'd arrived. Having to pace back and forth while I was in the queue to speak to the receptionist. Fortunately they had a low bit of counter, probably for wheelchair users, but it meant I could sit on it whilst we were speaking.

I used to get up, go downstairs and read or something. It was so boring just lying in the dark waiting for time to pass. If you honestly can't sleep I think it is sometimes better to admit defeat and do something else. Have a nap when you're tired.

I hope it passes soon @MyrtleLion

Good morning, Stockingers, I hope the Sleep Gerbil has visited those of you in need of her services. She works closely with the Dream Gerbil, but the Dream Gerbil's offer is more of a luxury whereas the Sleep Gerbil is more of a healthcare provider.

She is only now realising the amount of work she has to do with so many Stockingers who are awake during the night and need her services, but she promises to try to get around to as many of you as possible in future to lay a calming little paw on your fevered brows to help you sleep

When I opened the blinds this morning there was a wren hopping around outside. I love that they live in my garden, but I have to be very lucky to catch them in the open - I see their Latin name is Troglodytes troglodytes which would explain why I don't see them often.

I once managed to have binoculars to hand when I spotted one, and up close it looked like a little bundle of fluffy feathers - maybe it was a juvenile. It was very very cute.

This is the cutest picture I could find online,Wren - BirdWatch Ireland but the one I saw was a lot fluffier.
Their feet are interesting, aren't they? not a million miles from opposable thumbs

I love wrens- such jolly little things with big voices. Sady, none in my garden here, but I can dream!

Back when I had a garden, I loved to watch the birds every morning. Wrens were a rare thing. More often it was sparrows or chaffinches or blue tits or even the odd goldfinch. And blackbirds are fun to watch with the way they bounce around the ground.

My sister, being jammy, sometimes has a peregrine in her garden.

Our late cat was very lazy and would watch the birds but rarely even pretend to chase them. The birds were so unafraid that I even spotted a magpie pulling his tail.

The Darlington trib has started up again, but my attention is divided because the freebie Sky Sports Mix channel is showing highlights of the Women's Cricket World Cup final. I know who won, so I can just enjoy the style and strength and athleticism of the players. The Indian players in particular are a delight to watch when batting - stylish and they know it, sometimes they hold the pose at the end of a perfectly-executed stroke, almost as if posing for an instruction manual

I'd be jealous of your sis too, Sionnach - a peregrine visiting is something else!
There's a video online somewhere of a magpie tormenting a cat by playing ha ha you can't catch me, I'll have a look for it..

goes on for 3 minutes. That's one sassy magpie, I don't believe it was feeding because it was hungry, it was just feeding to irritate the cat!

You were very modest, Magpie, you didn't boast of your exploits to us in the Bluestocking, we'd have laid on celebratory drinks for you if we'd known😄

Cake: I used to get up, go downstairs and read or something. It was so boring just lying in the dark waiting for time to pass. If you honestly can't sleep I think it is sometimes better to admit defeat and do something else. Have a nap when you're tired.

Agreed. I've been known to get up in the early hours, make a cup of tea & read or do puzzles, then go back to bed & FINALLY fall asleep. It's OK if you don't have to do anything the next day.

We do occasionally see a wren in the garden, though it's mostly bluetits, robins & blackbirds. We used to get magpies, crows, jays & woodpeckers but not so much recently. Oh, & bliddy pigeons having it off in the trees, noisy buggers. And very occasional chaffinches & bullfinches. The biggest thing I've seen round here was a red kite, when we were driving in the countryside: it dropped out of a distant tree & flew straight towards the car. It was like being strafed.

Aw, our last cat was a tuxie 😻- how lovely to see that one. That was a seriously provoking magpie. Imagine if Magpie was like that in here. She'd be sitting on one table after another, sipping everyone's drinks & nibbling their Tunnocks, then flying off to the next one when someone swatted her away.

Wrens are one of our commonest birds - this becomes obvious if you use Merlin! - but often only glimpsed as a small low level darting flash. I’m fortunate to quite often spot one very close up hunting among the plants on my patio right next to where I sit in the kitchen.

I thought about it and decided it probably wasn't a good idea. Might get in the way of hot chocolate consumption also.

And we all know how important that is to you, Magpie😂
[recycled image]

Thanks, Dean and Fuzzy. You can pray for me anytime 🙂💙

Wrens are really interesting birds. I read an article about them once and they ended up making their way into a poem.

Thank you. I've been listening to Wifedom by Anna Funder. A brilliant feminist excoriating analysis of George Orwell's shocking misogynistic treatment of his wife, Elaine O'Shaughnessy. It also includes a decision she made in the mid 1940s to have a hysterectomy in Newcastle (she lived in London) because it was cheaper, (thank goodness for the NHS) where she died on the table because she hadn't had a blood transfusion.

It's a tough but fascinating listen, as she was basically a joint author of both Animal Farm and 1984. Thank goodness I'm not an Orwell fan. I should probably listen to something lighter while I'm an insomniac.

Arrived today in Outpatients to have my stitches removed. A 90 minute overrun time and 30 minutes to take them out, which is a long time for 5-6 stitches. Now a 30 minute wait for the pharmacy.

But I can be more mobile and restart my physiotherapy. It also means I don't need to elevate my foot at night, so I may sleep better.

I do, and I'll continue to do so.

💙

Just read the previous page. Good luck at the jewellers tomorrow, Swashy. There's no way a clasp should fail so quickly; & a safety chain is a good idea for something so precious.