Bluestocking Women's Pub - cheapest bar on the internet.

[EdithStourton]

The thread in which Gosie's mysterious adventures will continue. All women welcome to join us for a virtual tipple, fun, support and arcane knowledge. And tractors.

I haven't yet. Someone else mentioned it to me, so it's been on my mind. Apparently the entry fee is expensive for what you get (she said, anyway). But thinking about it. A friend thought she might go, we might meet up if I can get there. I'm so busy viewing houses right now, and I did see a full Gwen John exhibition many years ago.

Have you seen the exhibition?

And I'm very definitely old. An old woman with short grey hair, glasses and a black cat should be my image. The pointy hat is optional.

Errol, seems I've missed it, but can listen to it again, thanks for flagging this up!

It was a fairly short segment, in relation to an exhibition ‘Making her mark’ which will be shown in Penzance, Worcester and somewhere I didn’t catch in Scotland.

No, I haven't. I think one would have to be a Gwen John fan for it to be worthwhile.

Had a long weekend in Bruges many years ago, just me, DD and DMiL, while DH and DS went on the university milk round. I absolutely loved Bruges - the city, the atmosphere, the art... One evening we went to a concert and as we were walking back to our hotel we came upon a young music student on one of the bridges, playing C16thmusic on a recorder. The combination of beauty of place, time of day and wonderful music was utterly spellbinding and we stood there enchanted until she finished playing. 💕

I'm knitting a two-colour star stitch. 32 stitches. But it's k3 then loop the first stitch over the other two followed by a yarn over.

I swear I have knitted then unpicked one row seven times because I have ended up with 30 (forgot the yarn over) or 36 stitches (forgot to loop the first stitch. Aargh!

GIN!

Yes, bar gerbils, something strong and alcoholic for me, too, please. Surprise me.

Myrtle, I'm very sorry for your frustration. Truly.

But I understood not one word of anything you just said! 😆

That's such a lovely image! It's really making me think I might make some plans for a long weekend in May. I was supposed to be meeting up with my sister, but that's having to be rearranged.

Ooh Penzance...I can get there. Must Google.

This week I went to the Beryl Cook exhibition again. It is sooo good. She really was a very accomplished painter, not just a "comedy cartoonist".

I am feeling wistful about the possibility of going to somewhere like Bruges just for a long weekend - such things are not feasible when there's a transatlantic flight involved. This is one reason why American tourists are so manic about rushing round to see things. So many of them only get two weeks holiday a year anyway.

After Bruges I caught the train back to Brussels-Midi. But I nearly missed it because I was looking for Bruxelles-Midi on the departures board & didn’t realise that it was up as Brussels-Zuid, so that’s the warning thing I always share on Bruges threads.

I got this bag from the shop opposite my hotel as a souvenir. The matching cat turned up a month later.

For someone who learned to knit and crochet so recently, your output is amazing, Myrtle.

Two weeks a year? Really???

Chickadee, this is one of the many reasons that I haven't decided to move back "home" yet. Starting to get to the point of no return now, literally. I would absolutely miss all the museums, but it is also the ease of travel (especially train travel) around different countries that I would miss. Although that's changing with the new border controls.

I hate that I have to get on a plane just to see family, and that it takes so long to get there. Been doing it for more than 40 years now, and it gets harder the older I get!

Still. Two weeks per year. It's... medieval. 😉

It's also why the majority of Americans you meet in Europe are either on a gap year, studying abroad, or retired. No one else has the time.

The US is also so big, that there's so much of it that many Americans haven't even seen. It used to be that most Americans didn't have passports (not sure if it's still the case, but I'd bet so). Why fly to Switzerland to ski, when you can fly to Aspen? Why fly all the way to the Algarve when you can fly, or drive, to Florida?

I've heard it said that Americans who want to know what it's like in Europe, go to Boston. And Bostonians who want to know what Europe is like, go to Montreal! 😆

Angle, Bruges for me is so special you need at least a long weekend. It's so walkable, with so much to see and visit, and then there's the lovely canal trip.

I have a funny story about the canal trip. The three of us were waiting for the trip to start and were the first to arrive. A clutch of male German students pushed past us to the end of the landing stage. After all we were just 3 English females... Their faces when I reprimanded them in fluent German for their bad manners were a sight for sore eyes. 😁They shuffled shamefacedly back to where they should have been all along - behind us in the queue.

really! When I was in the US for a couple of years that was my vacation allowance, but fortunately my company was fine with me taking unpaid time off as they understood I wanted to see a bit of the country (and my salary was significantly more than U.K. so it worked out fine). My US colleagues would eventually accrue more vacation with length of service though.

That was in Boston; after a merger the company was based in California and vacations were more generous there. A few years before I retired they changed to ‘unlimited vacation’ - at their managers discretion. I assume it relied on people not taking the piss.

Oh, Kitty likes your bag!

Not quite medieval, Angle When I first started work in 1972 we got 2 weeks annual leave, which rose to 2 weeks and 3 days once you had completed your first year. It went up to 4 weeks once you had completed 5 years service. I must have been working for around 20 years before the annual leave allowance reached the dizzy heights of 6 weeks.

So within living (if rather old) memory.

😁That's one of those moments, isn't it, when you actually have the right words at the right time, and you are absolutely in the right! Doesn't happen very often.

Angel if you do go in the library could you tell the flying squirrels that it's nearly May and it's high time hibernation was over!

I've never been to Bruge (though I've seen the film) but I went to Cardiff a couple of years ago. My eldest sprog and I went to a museum that was off a pedestrianised shopping area. I forget the name of it. Some it was closed because of staff shortages, but we were encouraged to look at what, iirc, was its original entrance. We'd have missed it otherwise. It was done out in absolutely beautiful tiles. I was so pleased to have seen it.

My degree in German coming in useful at last.

I think it's kept warm enough that they don't hibernate...