The Bluestocking: home of the ice-cold Mojito foot-bath

[MarieDeGournay]

Welcome all to the Bluestocking Women's Pub, where food and drink are free as in gluten free, calorie free, alcohol free - but still delicious. And free free too, of course.
Served by highly professional staff who are gerbils.

The Bluestocking Ice-Cold Mojito Foot-bath kept us deliciously cool through the heatwave. Come and join us, in case there's another one🌞

Oh, and apparently risky not to acknowledge a magpie if you come across one,so I've learned from another thread (doubly so, of course, with Our Own Magpie!)

Apparently robins regard us as weirdly shaped boars, or so I'm told. Naturally they would follow rooting boars around, for the upturned worms.

That makes sense! It must be evolutionary instinct or something. I have never met a robin, however young, who doesn't completely trust me, my tools, its surroundings, and my ability to magically produce food for it, as long as it stays very close and visible. No fear at all!

@EdithStourton wonder if I might PM you?

Weirdly shaped bores? yeah I can understand that, I've met quite a few of them in my time! ...oh, boars..😁

I always greet animals, and yes I have had some strange looks but it just seems like the right thing to do.

I suppose it's A Good Thing that dogs don't ramble around on their own any more, but I used to love seeing doggies doing a little dog-trot walk down a street glancing occasionally from left to right so as not to miss anything, but clearly on their way to something important, and bang on schedule, so no time to stop.
When I said something like 'Hello doggie, you look busy!' I just got a friendly glance, which said
'What ho old thing, hello to you too, can't stop though, sorry, mustn't be late, important appointment, toodle-pip!'

For some reason it most seems to be little short-haired terrier kind of dogs I remember doing that 'boulevardier' walk- little urban, urbane doggies, not collies or German Shepherds.
I also always imagined them to be male and to talk like Bertie Wooster.
I'll stop before I go on to imaginary spat-wearing😄
Anyway, you don't meet business-like little doggies trotting to important meetings any more, spats or no spats.

Well I wish my phase would sort itself out because it's pissing me off. Our 4th was very quiet - we didn't feel like fighting out way through the crowds to see the fireworks, though some inconsiderate patriot thought it was a good idea to let some off somewhere in our neighbourhood around 11pm - at least I hope that's what the bangs were. Unlikely to be guns - this is a very very safe neighbourhood. Until it isn't I guess.

Yes, of course.

I talk to B&B a lot. Brains quite often seems to get the drift ('Come, on let's go and do some gardening... damn, I need the shed key...') whereas Batshit always looks interested but perplexed.

Upon reflection, perplexed is her natural state of being. For example, she and Brains get the leafy ends of strawberries when I eat them straight out of the punnet. Nice bit of strawberry attached, many thanks, down the hatch. Offer Brains a whole strawberry (rejected by me because it's a bit mouldy) and she's thrilled. Give Batshit a whole strawberry, and it's as if she's never had one before. She take it, drop it, pick it up by the stalk, go off with it into the garden well away from Brains, put it down, examine it from various angles, pick it and move it, put it down again, sniff it, press her teeth into it... and go, 'Oh! It's one of those tasty things! It doesn't smell so strongly when it's not bitten into! Yum!'

Brains, meanwhile, has remained right by me as I go through the punnet chucking her all the dodgy ones.

Brains 3: Batshit 1

Thanks, Edith!

@MarieDeGournay- I remember as a child seeing quite a lot of collie type dogs trotting purposefully along country lanes when we were on holiday in places like Cornwall and Devon. They clearly knew exactly what they were doing and were always on the correct side of the road facing oncoming traffic.

A very long time ago when i was young i worked on an arable and rose farm. (Gone to housing estate now)

Anyway the farm dog was a collie.

I would see her strolling down the road to the nearest big village a couple of miles away.

She used to frequent the same pub as me, as if she lived there

Many times on the way home we would pick her up in the car and drop her off at the farm whilst on the way home.

I had an excellent time at the Women’s Rights Network conference today. Their first one, and extremely well done. Plus all the troons were elsewhere.

A big day with stalls, rides, food and drink. But we forgot sun cream. Admittedly it was mostly cloudy, but we are red.

And we were drinking. Though we stopped at about 5pm. It was a lovely day.

Thank you Hedgey and Errol for confirming my anthropomorphic impression that dogs have agendas and social calendars

Good to hear about the WRN conference, Kitty, and that it wasn't targeted.
Are the times changing? Is it going to be possible for women to meet without being under threat?

Your day sounds fun, Myrtle, hope the sunburn doesn't kick in too badly tomorrow

<twiddles thumbs>
Woken by itchy insect bites.
Little six-legged bastards.

I hate mozzies with an abiding passion. They leave DH alone and head straight for me.

Well - I expect a lot of them were hungover from Pride, but the protest was down the road at the CAN-SG (Clinical Advisory Network on Sex & Gender) conference. From the CAN-SG tweets it looks like their conference went well too though.

I have family members who can burn under cloud. I cannot recommend aloe vera enough. We've found Banana Boat the best brand

Everybody can burn under clouds, ~ 80-90% of UV can pass through clouds. That depends a bit on the sort of clouds, thicker clouds obviously block out more but some of them can even increase UV through scattering. Even during an overcast day you get an average ~1000 thymine dimers (they are UV induced and precursors for DNA breakages if not quickly repaired) per exposed skin cell per minute. I worked on repair of UV damage to DNA for a few years. I really wish people would take sun protection a little bit more serious.

About the only thing I seem to have inherited from my Italian relations is not burning.

Did the gerbils all stay up for the football, @MyrtleLion?

Aloe Vera is fantastic but disgustingly snotty in its natural form. I burnt quite badly in Jamaica years ago and the people working in a shop we went to gave me a bottle of freshly harvested aloe Vera. It treated my burn very well but did look like someone very large had sneezed on me 🤢

I promise that Kitty & I will only moult outside (as much as possible anyway) but do the gerbils have any use for large quantities of finest quality cat hair?

Are the dimers what the immune system responds to in UV allergy? I get solar urticaria and it's miserable. I also have dyshidrotic eczema, just for fun, which always gets worse in hot weather.

Bore da everyone! Lots of people up early today!

I'm on my second cup of coffee, sitting out in the garden, among the lavender, which is finally blooming. Not many bees yet, but the lavender isn't in the sun yet. As per usual, the honeybees show up first, during the first week or so, then later the bumblebees will follow. My fav is the Bombus lapidarius, with the red bum!

Also saw a Six-spot Burnet on the lavender yesterday evening. I have planted carpets of lavender to help the pollinators.

Sending soothing, non-itchy, thoughts to all those suffering from bugs and burns! 💜

Off today to view a house. It has a north-facing garden, which would be a new challenge for me. Wish me luck!