The Bluestocking Women’s Pub: definitely full of ludicrous halfwits who refuse to get a grip (with unionised gerbils)

[MyrtleLion]

Welcome to The Bluestocking: convivial by design, opinionated in the best way, generously stocked with excellent food and drink that complies with whatever it’s meant to comply with, and any calories, gluten or alcohol are entirely virtual.

Staffed by impeccably trained, unfailingly polite gerbils who run a tight bar with plenty of enthusiasm and good intentions. Quick with the drinks, but terrible spillers spellers and liable to turn an idle thought on existential existence into a full blown musical with Busby Berkeley routines. You have been warned.

All women welcome, just in case that isn't obvious. Men can go to The Staunch Ally round the corner.

Previous thread here: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5477133-the-bluestocking-your-local-womens-pub-warm-friendly-and-not-at-all-unusual-in-any-way

A few decades ago, when Red Setters had their fashionable moment, familiarity with a few of them led me to theorise that they had a rather good canine brain.

Between them.

And that the larger the number of Red Setters, the smaller the share of that brain available for each dog.Very sweet animals, but not intellectual giants.

‘Nesh’!!

Love that word. My DH uses it as hails from Shrewsbury originally.

I used to say that about Batshit.
I have changed my mind.

Don't worry, she has no idea what misgendering is.

She could help you find a lost pheasant, though. She's very good at finding pheasants. And slippers.

I grew up with the word nesh in Lancashire many years ago.

DH, who has no idea that I'm on MN discussing our dogs, has just shouted through, 'Your dog's a fuckwit!'

Something to do with Batshit's position on the sofa.

His family had a red setter cross at one point. The verdict was 100% delightful, 0% intellect.

(Typo)

I looked up from marking yesterday and found this handsome fella looking back at me!

Wow!

Good evening.

What are you evicting, @Boiledbeetle?

Handsome, but they also have one brain between the lot of them.

we passed a gorgeous setter on our walk (not sure if Red or Irish) and that had reminded me of the one my childhood friend had (daft as a brush, wont to gallop along the beach stealing people’s socks), and the one which used to live in the house opposite when I was even younger, who liked to sun himself lounging in the middle of the road. It was generally a quiet road, except the high school was on it and he didn’t have the nous to figure out hometime.

Yay for @Boiledbeetle 🎉

Am I right in thinking that you have equalled the number of items evicted last year, in just one month? 😮

Anything and everything!

27th December! So I've speeded up a bit.

Well done Boily, 1000 items gone? That's grand😁

Obviously practice makes perfect!

Since we all love Edith's Batshit so very much, I suggest we name her [Batshit, not Edith!] as an Honorary Gerbil.

Would she answer to 'Gatshit', do you think Edith?😁

How about Gormless? it suits her...

100% agree about pheasants and brains. Partridges are much more on the ball - they have a level of alertness that pheasants lack.

NB Red and Irish setters are the same thing. Gordons are black and tan, and English are are liver/black/orange and (mostly) white with a few exceptions.

And Magpie, I thought of you the other day when I saw two Fendts very neatly parked in a farmyard. Mostly John Deere and New Holland around here, apart from the trusty local Valtra. I'm not sure why that farmer bucked the trend. He doesn't strike me as the imaginative type, so I'll have to ask him.

Pissing down here again. 22" annual average in these parts, and we've already had about 4 1/2" - we'd had 3" by mid-month, then it rained on and off, then dropped 28mm on us on Tuesday, and now it's pissing down again. The ponds are full, the reservoirs are recharging, the field drains are pouring into the ditches and the ditches are running like rivers. I went out this evening and over the course of 2 hours the lanes and back roads went from 'fine' to 'massive puddles - proceed with caution'.

1000 in under a month! Congratulations, Boily. 🪻

No wonder I’ve never been able to tell the difference between dogs I’ve been told were Red or Irish setters. 😂You learn something new every day. Having now taken a look at the wiki page I can add sotar rua.

I thought it might be something like that. Rhododendrons do very well in Derbyshire, iirc from my childhood visiting, and their water is very soft. Ours is not.

Rhododendrons are a scourge in parts of Ireland, a damaging invasive species.
Mind you, fuchsia and montbretia are unvetted immigrants too, but they have become completely naturalised
The rhodos form 'an impenetrable understorey' [😏] which changes the soil composition and destroys the growth of native species. There are programmes to clear them out of native woodland, but the rhodos have a headstart...

It’s the same in parts of the U.K. A local nature reserve used to have loads, there has been a massive effort to get rid of most of them. Back when we were postgrads DH did some volunteering with the uni Conservation Soc. and participated in rhododendron clearances. I think they’re one of those species which inhibit growth of other plants under them, and then there’s this…

https://www.kew.org/read-and-watch/hidden-poison-rhododendron-nectar

Honestly I’d take it anywhere but KwikFit. I once had a problem with the handbrake on a car not staying on and went there because I happened to be passing. They took it for a drive and came back with long faces and told me my brakes needed £200 of work (and this was in the 80s). I smelled scam and put on a fluttery little woman act and said I couldn’t possibly spend that much without talking to my husband first and drove away. The car was an old Vauxhall Nova and I was driving home past the Vauxhall dealer so I went in there and asked them about fixing it. The guy said “oh yeah that’s easy,” lifted the handbrake and showed me a little switch thing underneath which needed to be flipped, and lo and behold it was fixed, and they didn’t charge me. Perhaps it’s unfair to judge all KwikFits by that one, but the scam ones plus my dislike of anything that spells quick as kwik has led me to avoid them ever since.