The Bluestocking, a unique location for daughters and sisters of earth, frost, feathers, fur, scales and spines

[AsWithGlad]

Welcome to The Bluestocking, the best (perhaps only) online women's pub. Nothing in the food or drink can harm you, everything is served by a very enthusiastic crew of gerbils, who enjoy doing this, and any curious menfolk are welcome at the Staunch Ally down the road.

Previous thread: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/feminism/5568996-the-bluestocking-pub-where-we-continue-to-read-about-gerbils-nobly-and-bravely-working-undercover-in-the-fen?page=1

Rain - steady and quite heavy here since I first looked out this morning.

how I know it's a Spit without looking, but you can't mistake the sound of a Merlin engine.
100% agree, Magpie. I was walking the dogs in a wood once, and heard that engine, and shot to the edge of said wood to look out over the fields, and there one was...

I have many nerd topics. I have been to shout at the TV, and at books. Chairs at table in early Medieval England, when all the lower orders and some of the higher ones sat on benches. The Wrong Sort of Clock. I'm only going to get worse as I get older, and my nerd-knowledge expands.

I'm ok once I've cooked a recipe a few times. It's when I tried to go rogue straight away that things go away, hence needing a good recipe.

In one of my Jamaican cookery magazines there was what sounded like a great recipe but there were no quantities at all, not even splashed or glugs. It was just a list of ingredients and then the method. I tried my best but even my ex, who would eat anything, turned his nose up at it 😂

I will join you in nerdery @EdithStourton. I seem to have chosen nerd-like DH’S too. I remember going to see the film The Battle of Britain with DH1 and he whispered to me at one point that a plane was a Mark 4 Spitfire when it flew into the shot and a Mark 5 when it flew out. DH2 is a train nerd and commented disapprovingly on one movie featuring a train in the late 19th century because it was shown travelling on rails over a ballast that wasn’t used in that period. I get uncomfortable about colour-blind casting when multi-racial people socialising as equals is shown during time periods when it simply wouldn’t have happened, though clearly there’s no problem with that in contemporary drama.

I'm a bit like that with the pronunciation of Irish names - it's KIN-sella from Cinnsealach, not Kin-SELLa, it doesn't make any sense if you pronounce it that way grrrrrr...

And it's chair-at -telly time when I hear CosTELLo instead of COSTello - can I have a word please, Mr Elvis Costello, you've ruined it for all COSTellos😠
and I wouldn't mind only your real name is McManus, why didn't you call yourself Elvis McManOOSE or something, and mess things up for your own clan..😡🙄

And nuns. Nuns in a modern settings wearing habits that went out with the high bike. Or Vatican II, whichever came first

I've heard that the appearance of a collared dove in the background of a period drama, when 'everybody knows' they were only introduced to the UK in 1955, can result in shedloads of complaints.

So We Are Not Alone😁

I have a friend who would feel very much in agreement with your DHs, Chic - he's merciless about things like a specific tank appearing six months too soon and on the wrong battlefront!

Oh Marie, where have you been all my life?! 😍

My pet hate in films is when chemistry labs are shown with lots of brightly coloured liquids bubbling in flasks - particularly ‘fairy liquid green’ when in reality most of them would be colourless or yellowish.

I’m not a plane or trains nerd but this is a lovely display in the Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh. Plus another photo taken purely for the delectation of the BS

Wow that's some display - and nice planes too😂
Seriously though, they've packed a lot of plane into that space, which must have been disappointing for you - no room for Dragons to fly around😞

Thank you for sharing the trip to Edinburgh, it's nice to have all these vicarious visits to new places

Speaking of planes, this is from RAF Cosford. English Electric Lightning, a seriously cool plane. And you can walk right underneath it, which is very freaky.

My version of pillowtalk

Only in the Bluestocking can you find a French philosopher and a corvid jointly fan-girling heavy engineering. 😂

Today has been spectacular & very busy. I’m on the train to Bergen now & will write it up either tonight or tomorrow morning.

You are doing a terrific job of keeping us all fully absorbed and taking all the pressure away from @MyrtleLion so that she can concentrate on her own stuff and not worry about the next episode of the Gosie Chronicles.

Thank you for some fantastic posts.

Ooh, I remember those, Magpie, from the early 1980s when I lived near RAE Farnborough, where the major air shows were held. I was able to watch most of the action from my garden. They were near the end of their service at that time and were being replaced by Harrier jump jets, which could take off vertically. Between the two of them things could get very noisy at times! When I see these planes in museums or at demonstrations these days, I always think they they look very fragile considering how much damage they could do.

Thanks, Rum. I look forward to reading it. Back when I was a public librarian in the !970s-19990s, I knew of Julian Barnes as a prize-winning novelist, but his career has been much wider than that. His Wiki entry is worth reading.

It doesn’t feel different but it is different.

I frequently get distracted by my own thoughts and then I’ve forgotten what I was doing and it takes ages to get back to my original. That has mostly gone, though I can tell when they wear off.

The last ten days have been so busy and intense that I’m really focused but more anxious as if the drugs aren’t working.

But the best effect is that I do not give a single fuck about very much. And that is really liberating.

One big project disposed of today and it won’t be returned to until the end of November. Big drama project has slowed but is now more important. Next couple of weeks will be interesting.

@Chickadeeinme and @AngleofRepose

I do love Robbie and the canal boat diaries because it is more realistic. The calmness of the canals with the challenges of solo travel, the weather, stoppages etc.

his boat engine is a lister a traditional diesel which is a bit loud on starting up but has a wonderful putt putt putt noise once in motion. I love the sound of a lister passing by.

The Walrus and I have a pact that we’re allowed to point out discrepancies if they’re trivial but not numerous, and we are allowed to shout when IT WOULD DEFINITELY NEVER HAPPEN. But if there are lots of mistakes we sometimes have to say, let us agree to get caught up in the magic.

And for really really preposterous things we have to stop watching.

As we both have IT experience, it can be really awful when there’s a live hijacking or cyber hack. We watched something about a rogue computer virus about to infect the world or something and we both just said, “Turn off the fucking router”. Essentially when computers can’t be controlled, you just turn them off.

We were in complete agreement yesterday when we were discussing newspaper reports of AI “escaping” into the “real world” when it wasn’t connected to the internet. We were both shouting in agreement, then it must have been connected to the internet!!!

At various times we have both worked in secure, government environments with computers that are not connected to the internet and we were comparing the security protocols we used. So nerdy.

My plan for when AI starts a war (it won’t, but someone might use AI to do it in the same way that people use computers etc), is simply turn off the national grid while you sort it out.

I once saw a B list sci fi film where the computers stopped the owner switching them off and issued an electric shock at the plug socket.

maybe it could block all of that eeeeek

I just had a brief look at how it could escape … seems like the sandbox wasn’t air gapped, wtf? Isolation for a test system surely means no cables, no possibility of WiFi (just don’t have the hardware on the machine) and ideally its own isolated power source.

More eeeeks

Ok, now I’m warm, dry, fed & in my pyjamas…

This is a long one with lots of photos so I’m doing it in multiple parts. The themes are water in multiple guises, food & transport (an electric bus, a boat, a coach & a train). And Vikings.

The day started with a quick coffee & savoury Danish, grabbed in a hurry before an electric minibus trip up to the Stegastein viewpoint.

Despite the early start, booking the first trip of the day was very much worth it - there were only 3 of us on the bus, so much more scope for taking photos on both sides.

Probably best avoided if you don’t like heights but WOW. The platform stretches out 650 metres above the fjord & although it was cloudy, that made it much more atmospheric. Apparently the white mist that hangs over the fjords is something to do with warm damp air cooling as it moves upwards.

We passed a not-tractor on the way up, and there were also some interesting hairy moments when we met other traffic & had to either reverse to the nearest passing point or carry on as they reserved in front of us, depending. An Australian woman I met later in the day told me she’d driven herself up there - I was deeply impressed.

I understood every single word of the last four posts. I wish that I understood the sentences. Thank Christ that the PPs who posted them did understand.

Back to Flåm & a hearty & sustaining bowl of chickpea & bean stew with rice later, I was ready for the next adventure. I’d seen the fjords from above & now I was going to ride on them.

The cruise was… peaceful. It seems like an odd choice of words but it’s the one that keeps coming back to me. Also fun, friendly, windy & cold. Ok, I could have done the whole thing from inside the cabin instead of being out on the top deck but where would the fun be in that?

I did go in to get coffee at one point, & we encountered a giant waterfall while I was queuing. I could see it rearing up in front of us from where I was, but the temptation to go & take a photo wasn’t as strong as the temptation of hot caffeine.

The statue of the woman was at Flåm, I rather liked her.

Last one for tonight.

The cruise took us to Gudvangen, an old Viking village featuring the Viking Valley. Highlights included seeing their version of our Crafting Nook & some useful tips on axe use. You use the hooked axe to remove someone’s shield (as demonstrated) & the long-handled one gives extra leverage when attacking. I also saw a postcard with a Serious Scandinavian on it & totems to Freya & Skadi. I hadn’t heard of Skadi but she’s the Norse goddess of hunting & the mountains.

After visiting the Valley & having a general look round, I still had over an hour to spend there & my feet were tired so I settled down in the cafe with a cup of tea, a delicious piece of ostekake (cheesecake) & 84 Charing Cross Road. There is a limit to how many fjords you can admire in one day.

The coach to Voss arrived, & I managed to get a window seat next to a broken seat, which was an excellent excuse for not having to sit next to anyone. I half-read, half-dozed on the journey, changed at Voss for the train to Bergen & arrived to torrents of rain. My hotel was only 10 minutes walk from the station but I had to paddle a lot of it & arrived thoroughly drenched.

The very lovely receptionist welcomed me with sympathy, fresh coffee & chocolate brownies, then I came up to my room, hung everything up to dry (including my pullalong) & finding a hair dryer in the bathroom, attached my trainers with it.

Luckily the weather is meant to improve tomorrow. If not, I’m buying wellies.