The Bluestocking women's Pub- spring is sprunging and MN's name generator can do one!

[lcakethereforeIam]

Welcome to the Bluestocking women's pub. Men are directed to the Staunch Ally just down the road. Otherwise all are welcome. Pull up a chair, give your order to the Wait Gerbil or the Gerbil behind the bar.

Don't forget to name change if you wish to.

Friends! Bluestocking women and characters! Marvellous creatures from all around the globe and further! Listen -

the sound of silence

... but do not despair. I have ordered an entire caravan of sympathy camels. Take heart, dear women. You are never alone in the Bluestocking.

And there are more! The sympathy camels are still arriving!

Some of us are going outside around the fire. Do come along!

<emerges blinking from darkened room>
gerbils, a nice cup of tea please, I'm recovering from a migraine🙁
I hope I haven't missed much... not too much by the looks of things, just an awful lot of camels!

BTW Carmela is very offended by the suggestion that she smells, she says au contraire, she is wearing Chamel No 5😄

Chamel No. 5 😂😂😂

Sorry you've had a migraine, Marie! Luckily the camels have only just arrived. They bring solace, delicious food and drink for everyone, jewels and gold for magpie, tunnock's and snowballs for Boily and Hedgie, gin for Myrtle, and no they don't smell horrible at all. They are, after all, Bluestocking sympathy camels. The gerbils are having the evening off.

I need two sympathy camels and a large gin.
And, in half an hour, an entire flock of sleep gerbils (they fly, thus, they are a flock).

This made me wonder if there was a collective noun for gerbils… apparently it’s a ‘horde’. And there I was thinking Genghis was just because they were running out of conventional names beginning with G…

however my source also says:

FAQsDo all gerbils always gather in a horde?
Not always—it’s a linguistic tradition, not a biological law.
What general terms describe groups of animals?
Common words include ‘herd,’ ‘flock,’ ‘colony,’ or ‘school,’ depending on the species.
Are gerbils dangerous when grouped?
Like most wildlife, they should be respected, but the collective noun is about language, not threat levels.
Whether you call it a horde, or by another name, a group of gerbils is a reminder of nature’s behavior and the creativity of human language.

Your wish is granted ✨🪄

Send them over to me when they’ve done with Edith please!

Coming over now ...

I could do with a visit from the sleep gerbils myself!

I'm not at all sure it's a good idea to have a burning candle next to a live plug for an electric blanket.

Oh well.

It worked! Went our like a light, woke at a.15, went back to sleep.

I feel like a new woman.

Good! They came my way too.

Wow the Sleep and Dream Gerbils were on fire last night - no not literally, because of the juxtaposition of electric blankets and burning candles😁

I hope as more reports come in [I wish I had saved the image of the gerbils in WWII uniforms pushing symbols around a horizontal map...] it'll be more good news.

Here's something nice to look at
2026 Winners — British Wildlife Photography Awards

I see our own Hedgey is the cover gurl for their book

Yes the sleep gerbils sent me a good night too! They must be exhausted, poor dears - that was a long way to fly.

Thank you - there are some really amazing photos there. Some presumably serendipitous but others requiring enormous patience and skill.

The picture of the sparrowhawk and starling is stunning and tragic. One of the pictures I thought was a long exposure of skeins of wild geese, then I noticed the suspicious rabbit shape. I clicked on it, it's an amazing photo but not the wild geese one of my imagination. I've seen the winning picture already but I thought the photographer had actually got into the pond! The 'Asleep at the Wheel' picture is very good, but I wonder if the clever caption cinched it?

Thanks SO much for posting that link, Marie. I've just spent a happy few minutes browsing through them, as a lovely contrast to yesterday's hard work sorting out the new fridge-freezer.

Speaking of photos... I absolutely have to renew my passport and I've just been into town to the station photo booth. It's blowing a gale and trying to sleet out there and consequently my hair is a mess, also the lighting makes me look as though I'm desperately ill and emphasises all the wrinkles.

Still, it'll make it easier for the border officers to recognise me when I roll up at 4.30a.m. for my budget airline flight.

Wonderful photos Marie, thank you for posting them. I particularly liked the Cairngorm hare. Very little colour and very linear, it took me a while to spot the hare in it's winter coat😀

The Walrus has spent the last 15 days working very hard, which has resulted in him leaving the table immediately after eating, leaving me to watch TV alone while he works late and him actually being away when I needed some emotional support.

But from today he is on leave. Which means when I went downstairs to eat breakfast, drink tea and read the news on my phone, he wanted to talk!

It was actually lovely and he has been a wonderful support since he got back yesterday. But I had become so used to being ignored that his incessant chatter almost became annoying.

Love the wildlife pics.

@MyrtleLion Wait till he retires (ask me how I know 😂).

For Marie

Lovely photos, Marie, thank you.

A building has collapsed in Oldham. The BBC has published an interview, with photo, of one person who heard and saw it happening.
Can you guess anything about that person? Yes, they are wearing pink.