The Bluestocking: it's the season of mulled wine, conversations about pineapple and, of course, gerbils. Confused? You will be...

[EdithStourton]

Welcome to the anarchic and marvellous women-only on-line pub, the Bluestocking. The booze won't give you a hangover, the cakes won't make you fat, and the conversations are fascinating, covering knitting, health and safety, the Muppets and anything else that comes to mind.

Climb Peak Woo, have a cuddle with Rosie the Red Panda, and watch out for capybaras busy with any necessary building works.

Welcome in (and name change at the door if you need too).

I know It's terrible. Every week it happens. Every week.

I didn't think I'd like caramel wafers when i first tried one, but they are bloody amazing. Still prefer the teacakes though. I never think to buy any when I go shopping and probably shouldn't as I normally avoid eating lots of sugar in front of my son. I'll have to wait for Santa to refill the Bluey cupboard.

She did. There is 96 boxes in the storeroom.

Wahey!
<Flies off to the storeroom immediatelybefore someone else nicks them all >

Thanks Gyroscope!

Did you forget to bring them out to us, Boiley?

Perhaps Maud could allocate Gyroscope to a different role if she's always forgetting.

🤔

Though if I recall correctly, she was considered the most accurate gerbil...
And didn't the previous three gerbils, Gypsy moth, Greetings card and Gaudy night also have accuracy issues...

🤔

Perhaps we could assign Germane to the ordering. She seems to know what she is doing.

Please can a bar gerbil bring me a hot chocolate and then I'm off to bed. Mr Random and MasterRandom have/are getting over flu and i need enough sleep to escape catching it. Good night all and thank you for welcoming me. Lots of good luck to Myrtle for presentation.

G'night Random, sleep well, and good health to Mr and Master R., and I hope they keep the lurgy to themselves

Oh, Myrtle, I am so sorry to hear that you might have yet another complication with your health. Also, what an elaborate recruitment process for the latest potential job.

Fingers crossed still that it all goes well.

Isn't this quintessentially Bluestocking? Tidying, rice crackers, elks, surge protectors, A la recherche du temps perdu, Tunnocks and Rimbaud, to name but a few...
💙

Hopefully santa will deliver.

In the meantime we'll just have to live with an empty space on the shelf where the Tunnock's is supposed to go.

No Tunnock's at all in the pub.

It's such a shame.

When I went French, I think it was something like Jegateaudoncjesuis. I'm not very good at French. It was probably due to the scraping.

...the name change, not the woeful French.

Hello Random. I hope the morning finds you well.

Ditto Myrtle.

Oh I very much like this recruitment process.

Interviews are a terrible way to recruit. The best way to recruit is to see if candidates can do the job. So meeting some senior employees and some stakeholders and presenting on a subject related to the organisation shows if you know your stuff much better than saying I know my stuff in a formal interview setting.

Essentially recruitment asks only four questions:

1. Can you do the job?
2. Do you want the job?
3. Can we afford you?
4. Will you fit in?

4 is always tricky because that's where discrimination occurs.

So this process is very much can I do the job and will I fit in, with a dash of do I want the job. Affordability is for negotiation.

This role is a small step down in salary, but I'm not earning right now and if I do well they can increase it.

I do want it, but there is the possibility of a different role at a larger and very prestigious organisation which would mean a lot more money. But that role won't be advertised and it might not exist and it won't be offered till mid-January. So I'll take this one if I'm offered it and worry about the other one later.

Fuzzy may be a while...

Oh my God you did all your posts in French as well!

I was going to say 'I think I'll follow Random and go to bed' but I'll keep my entendre single and say 'Like Random, I'm going to have an early night'

G'night all, I hope you all have a restful night, and Myrtle - I hope you wake up feeling better.

Yeah! If you're gonna try and beat the scrapers, mangled forrin is the way to do it.

I never got that petit(e) emoji avec le beret.

I think I was just taking a stab at the gender of the nouns.

I am supposed to be sorting the Christmas cards that need posting.

I have an assistant who is currently sitting on the card list, the cards and the stamps. He's also holding the pen so I'm going to leave him to it. I hope he uses his neat handwriting.

The round Robin will be interesting if he's writing it

January she starved me.

February She starved me

March she starved me

April I was not my usual self, probably due to the starvation, however she mentioned the V E T and I miraculously rallied. She did however continue to starve me.

Have been meaning to comment somewhere on the apparent new rule that we cannot advise people to ignore a poster whose opinions are designed to goad.

I did not know that.

There exists another popular website inhabited by relatively few men. I probably ought not to admit here to being part of it, but I have been there for nearly 20 years and although it’s changed over time its main purpose is still the same. Anyway, you can tell if there’s a deliberate derail or goady poster. Nothing is mentioned but people start posting and discussing recipes. Perhaps we need a different code which MNTowers finds harder to zap.

We do go down the food route on occassions. However I'm still smarting about the time MNHQ deleted all the cake recipe posts off a thread because the thread starter complained to mumsnet that we were all derailing her thread. I mean we were but she had no issue derailing just about every thread she appeared on so...

I feel a bit the same about Edith. I've been Edith for quite a long time now (it's a respectful nod in the direction of my late and much lamented godmother)

We'll just have to be elegant ladies together. Which is a very long way from my normal appearance (currently, jeans and chunky jumpers, mostly wellies out of doors and warm slippers within).

Thank you for that thoughtful post about recruitment, Myrtle.

My last job application was over 30 years ago (I retired some years ago) and times have changed. For teaching posts now it seems to be fairly standard to teach a lesson, when you’re given the topic, and age and general ability of the group in advance. Fortunately I’ve never had to do it: it seems very artificial but I suppose it’s better than nothing.

Having hired people, good and bad, it's really hard. Some are amazing - I hired my friend who died on Sunday and he was brilliant. Some are terrible and disruptive.
I regularly couldn't hire anyone decent in one role. It was sort of sales but not just give us money; more give us money for the cause. And the cause was overriding the money but I could only hire obnoxious idiots focused on money.

If I'd used this meeting format I'd have found that out sooner.

Like teaching a lesson shows subject knowledge and classroom control. Which might not be apparent in an interview.

You're a terrible fibber, Boily.

But I am truly impressed at your cable labels.
And I think I might have been on that cake recipe thread, but under an earlier name.

I envy people with proper internet. Half our village has proper internet and half does not. We're in the 'not' half. You can imagine at village get-togethers, how conversations can rapidly cleave between the haves and have-nots, with one lot looking enviously at the other.

But we have mains water and that electric, so should count our blessings.

Anyway, before I turn in...
Good luck and best wishes to Myrtle, and a warm welcome to Random - here's hoping that you avoid the flu.