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.

Re time zones and TV - what @PastaAllaNormasaid! In the UK were so used to our own concept of nationhood that it’s hard to wrap your head around the fact that the USA’s states are often quite different in some aspects of their laws, and even in things that seem as if they ought to be national. For example, we really don’t have a national newspaper as such though there are some that are nationally distributed. PBS, which is the nearest thing we have to a broadcaster that shows the kind of programming you might see on the BBC (or at any rate BBC2) with no ads interrupting programmes (except the ones between programmes from their sponsors and the godawful tedious pledge week sessions where they encourage people to donate) makes different shows in each state because each state’s programming is different. Some shows such as Masterpiece Theatre (almost all bought from the BBC) and the PBS News Hour are bought by nearly all PBS affiliates but others vary wildly.

It is a positive thing. I am also living vicariously through Gosie, Maud and Fowley.

And it's lovely that you're enjoying being here, whether you post or not. I'm sure we have plenty of lurkers who followed us from thread to thread and never say a word or react at all. [Waves at the lurkers!]

If we mention someone's absence, it's only because we miss them and hope they're doing well. There is no obligation and if it feels like an obligation then we are probably doing something wrong. I love being here as it's an escape from life. And Gosie has arrived in Nuance...

Sunday lunchtime in Nuance:

• Location: terrace with a view that’s doing at least 60% of the work
• Set-up: notebook open, one line written, pen abandoned mid-thought
• Glass: already poured, not her first
• Posture: leaning back like someone who has ideas, not sentences

Around Gosie:

• Sébastien-André reading his own work slightly too loudly
• Sylvestre Antoine pretending not to listen while absolutely listening
• Genevieve, the facilitator saying “just let it come” to no one in particular

Gosie has written seven excellent words, crossed out three of them and declared the rest “structurally interesting”. She is now observing, absorbing and quietly judging everyone’s metaphors.

I think we are all living vicariously through the gerbils! Beats real life every time!

Hope things improve with your relative.

I'll send some support camels your way!

🐪🐫

I can be of no assistance on where the sleeping bags may be. I don't own any so could not even hazard a guess as to where to store one.

But I do know they'll be in the last place you look.

ETA Grrrr. Where did the quoted post go???

When we were in the US, PBS pledge campaigns typically included people dressed up as Daleks - I think there was a strong Whoovian fanbase. This was pre-reboot before its decline when you knew who was Who.😂

Must have been a long time ago, or Maine PBS doesn’t like Who - I haven’t seen a show since I got here almost 24 years ago.

Hope all is going well. Interactions with the health system hereabouts can be a bit, well, hit and miss IME and it really does help to have someone advocating for the patient. keep up your own strength too!

Around 1990, Pennsylvania. A long time ago indeed now!

Is <gasp> Gosie drinking rosé?
She looks superbly chilled. I wonder what's on the lunch menu?

Tractoring continues, Sunday or no Sunday.

Spring continues. I haven't seen any lambs yet (no sheep in easy range) but I have seen piglets, kids and a young and suicidal squirrel who got off the road just in time.

I'm sorry about your relative, Damson. Anything involving A&E is always very stressful, and the blue lights must have just added to that.

We're all here whenever you need us, and the bargerbils have been alerted to the fact that you've been under stress and would appreciate a little coddling.

Gosie says that the rosé was correct for the place, so ordered it without hesitation. She is treating it with the same respect she gives Margaux

Margaux is structured, intentional, evening. The rosé is situational, ambient, lunchtime. Apparently she’ll go back to Margaux when it’s darker, quieter, worth it.

Personally, I think Sébastien-André's influence is at work...

Lunch menu (loosely structured, firmly extended)
Starter:

• Tomato salad that looks simple but isn’t
• (someone has opinions about the olive oil)

Main:

• Something slow-cooked, or something grilled, or both
• Comes with bread that makes decisions for you

Interruption course:

• Cheese. Not optional. Not hurried.

Dessert:

• “Just a taste” that becomes a plate

Wine:

• The rosé continues
• No one suggests otherwise

Gosie has stopped pretending she’s here for the writing and has repositioned herself slightly to optimise the view. She has not added a single word to the page.

There are lambs around up here, but on yesterday’s short walk (late afternoon after the rain) we came across the prettiest of calves - a local nature reserve has a herd of White Park cattle.

Half a chance, and I'll be joining Gosie on her jolly. Or rather, leaving her in peace and doing a similar jolly.

The CS thread is wild. I am given to understand that I'm a racist, because I had an opinion on the likelihood of encountering bare breasts in many parts of Africa, based on extensive experience.

It's a funny old world.

Gosie seems to be developing epicurean tendencies.

Loving the 'bread that makes decisions for you'. Fougasse is the one that does that for me.

Perhaps Gosie should seek out the little hidden commune of Soupçon.
There's not much there, just a little of this and a little of that, but the village Bistro is where recipes are tested to ensure they remain true to their French roots.

Exactly the kind of place Gosie would “just pass through” and then… not leave.

Soupçon — the detour that isn’t

• barely signposted
• one street that might be two
• shutters half-open, conversations half-finished
• nothing declared, everything implied

The bistro

• no printed menu
• dishes arrive as propositions, not orders
• recipes “tested” means:
• someone older is watching
• someone younger is trying something subtle
• everyone pretends not to notice the change

Gosie’s behaviour on arrival

• does not ask if she can sit
• selects a table that suggests permanence
• observes before speaking
• orders… eventually

What she’s doing:

• tasting carefully
• clocking what’s been altered
• approving or not, silently

What’s happening around her:

• Simon Albert in the corner who may or may not belong there
• Gisele, who definitely does
• a bottle opened without discussion

Gosie is:

• alert
• interested
• not performative about either

How did you make this so perfect? sinks into fantasy world when she really should be knitting squares today

That posters own racist posts got deleted last night. But still they came back to try for more deletions today!

Nowt as strange as folk!

I may have had help from ChatGPT...

Also it is the tragedy* of my life that my favourite type of holiday where I hole up in a gîte in a tiny village in southern France for two weeks, drinking gorgeous wine, eating delicious food and going to see a cement factory or honey museum every three days, is no longer in the cards because the Walrus hates self-catering.

As he does all the cooking, he has a point. We do have lovely all-inclusive holidays in five star hotels where I read at least five paperbacks and we have at least one tasting menu.

*it's not really a tragedy.

Oh, I do love to see calves in the field with their mothers. Looks like a set of twins there.

Nooooo.

I refuse to believe that!

It's all in the prompt, though.

Could you not arrange for an obliging villager to do the catering?

Only if they're gerbils.

I used to leave work on a Friday evening, drive to Dover and get the ferry, stay at a chambre d'hote then drive to the south of France having French lunch on the way. Sometimes I would take two days. Then stay in the gîte and drive back on the final Saturday and Sunday to start work on the Monday.

The Walrus likes to fly and take 10 days so he can "recover" from his holiday before going back to work. I like to squeeze the juice out of every minute.

Obviously I compromise and I do enjoy our holidays, but the difficulty with my version is that the compromise is all on me...