The Bluestocking: Next stop, Christmas!

[ifIwerenotanandroid]

Join us as we open our slightly wonky advent calendar. 🌲

(copies available behind the bar £12.50 each, no refunds)

Oh bugger, Myrtle! I'm so sorry. You put in so much effort when you were feeling very unwell.

All the wine for you tonight, definitely.
And chocolates, and anything else you fancy...

That may well turn out to be the case, Myrtle, but it doesn't make it any easier not to have been offered the job you put so much work into applying for. We've now got everything crossed for our middle grandson who has a final interview, including the CEO, two days before Christmas.

Anyone seen Giant Wombat recently? I've been invigilating exams, and knowing how good she is at it, I thought I might pick her brains for ways to stave off mind-numbing boredom.

Giant Wombat invigilates exams? And is good at it? Did I miss something?😄

That's pants, Myrtle. Drinks on the house.

The job is there, Myrtle - it just needs some more stalking, like this.

Note the three cheerbils disguised as lion cubs supporting you all the way😄

Gutted Myrtle.

Get 'em lined up.

She does indeed. Recycled image from the summer!

I’m working my way through a bag of midget gems. I stepped out for milk and tonic and thought why not. Not many purple ones so far.

(Thanks everyone for the love and support 💙)

Sorry about the job, Myrtle. You have such tenacity.

I had a look round for Giant Wombat, and gerbils Germaine and her twin Greer told me she was lying on her back in a deep burrow with her paws in the air, resting.

They seem to think this was a good tip for invigilating exams. As far as I know you have to be in the same room as the people taking The exam, so it might not be completely practical.

Hugs and plenty of glasses of mixed alcohol for Myrtle.

Eventually your stalking will bear fruit 🫐🫒🥭🍎

Terrible mixed metaphor! Sorry

😳

Might be a good preparation technique. Although I hope the burrow has central heating.

Oh, very sorry to read your news, @MyrtleLion .

Time for a Glad family saying: they have no taste.

AWG 😢

Very sorry to hear about the job @MyrtleLion, obviously it's their loss. Just concentrate on the job-in-hand, which is getting back to full strength ready to start again in the New Year.

Just as well the drinks in the Bluestocking are alcohol-free. The gerbils would need to carry you home tonight

Well, fruit has stalks, so...

I'm so sorry to hear your news @MyrtleLion. You deserve to all the booze in the world. Please enjoy irresponsibly.

Statistical analysis of student cohort - sex, ethnicity, clothing - cross referenced against the exam subject.

This also has the added advantage that you are closely observing the little darlings while doing percentages in your head.

Sorry to hear about the job, Myrtle, but hopefully it was so you’ll be free to accept the much better job coming to you in the New Year.

That sounds like someone with real world experience, @Anactor! I like it!

'Statistical analysis of student cohort' = numbers of students broken down by age and sex?
Thank you for being my straight man, Anactor, I never thought I'd have the opportunity to crack that joke, or is it 'joke'.😁

😀 🙂😊

Doing percentages in your head can be a good way to pass the time, though.

I can suggest other number ‘games’ to play in your head, but as they are sometimes what I do to fall asleep they might not be a good idea.

Counting the different makes of trainers; the number of students wearing the colour green - that one is expandable, obvs; the shortest haircut/the longest hair...
The good thing about these is that you look very professional and very observant while walking up and down between the rows. It looks like you're rigorously checking for cheating

It’s usually the punchline for ‘old actuaries never die…’

I really read that as 'the one that is expendable'!

You’d have to know all the students pretty well to play a mental ‘balloon game’ with them