Well, well, well….for those of you who HAVE watched Gentleman Jack (bonus points to you), you’ll recognise those 3 words or maybe even the welcoming How Do? I now live in a time machine, travelling from 1800 to the current day. I will continue this talk later in the blog cause it’s interesting and worthy of a good cup of tea. It certainly has been way too long between blog posts and I’m sorry for that. So, the last time you heard from me (hmm, shit, nearly 2 months ago) I was celebrating the Nats world series baseball win and I’d just had several cortisone needles in my neck and finger to help heal this disc problem in my neck. Let’s continue…
The Neck and Hands. Good news is that it’s all improving. The 'trigger' finger is not sticking anymore. My hands are still stiff at night but improving. And my neck has only just started to release the sore back/shoulder muscles this week – must be my Xmas present. I hope I’m not imagining it but it has felt a little better these past few days. I’m having another round of cortisone needles in the neck next week and hopefully that will kick it along even further.
Chef’y Tongs Stuff. I finished the year at TAFE school and looked around some temp work during the holidays. I did some temp work before Xmas with an agency which was good experience and kept me off the streets for a while. But now we have the little foster puppy, I’ve not done any further work and will not likely do any more as we are off to New Zealand in Jan and then I’m back to TAFE school and (wait for it), I am starting a new job. I haven’t officially signed anything but will be starting part time work in a small local French restaurant. It’s a family business with a French chef. I met them a few weeks ago and they were super friendly and keen to have me on board around Feb. I will be able to finish my TAFE school work in June and working with the chef is quite a great opportunity. I will save more on this tongs adventure for when the time comes but suffice to say, I’m quite excited for this next adventure.
Flying Props Stuff. After a long wait this year, I will be starting my lessons again next week at Goulburn. Canberra airport is busy and I will be working towards my solo which means lots of flying in the circuit doing takeoffs and landings. Canberra airport is busy and restricted making solo practice difficult. So I’m off to quiet Goulburn to hopefully, work my way to the finish. Stay tuned more for that continuing adventure in 2020.
Harper the Foster Puppy. Deb has always wanted to foster dogs and after a recent encounter with Jack and Ryan, two cute Kelpie puppies, at a local café, we met with a local foster group and well, here we are. The group we work with is called ARF (ACT Rescue and Foster) and we’ve decided to foster puppies as they are easier than adult dogs. We got our first puppy quicker than planned but that’s how this business works. There was an urgent need and we just cracked on with it getting ourselves ready like any family expecting a toddler. We named him HARPER after my good friend because it was his special milestone birthday the day the puppy came to us. He’s 12 weeks old and was 1 of 6 that were surrendered to ARF. Harper is a Mastiff x mix so he’s going to be a big boy.
It’s been a hectic week to say the least. He’s toileting outside but he still needs to learn to tell us he wants to go out. That said, only a few accidents in the house. He gets on well with Macey and Cricket however they both are a bit put out with the new fella. We try hard to remind them that they are our special dogs and not let them miss out on attention. They are a positive influence on him that’s for sure. I’ve been taking him on social excursions to the shops, the vet and Bunnings to get him exposed to lots of things in the outside world. Talk about a magnet – of course, people can’t resist a puppy. He gets up around 6am which is just rude, but, I’ve worked out we can feed then play for a hour and then he goes back for another hour – so we can all sleep a bit more. Overall he’s a good boy, makes me laugh and is learning fast. He taught himself to use the doggie door today. I saw him sniffing the door, poke his nose through and yep, then all I saw was him bum going out the door. He’s very pleased with himself. He loves the hose water and chasing it or gulping it.
This week I’m focussed on separation training which is bloody hard. He’s ok in his crate but it’s the being left alone bit that he hates. I sit outside the front like I’m locked out, listening to him howl and bark. But, after day 1, our mentor said put a sheet over the crate and I also changed the music to a Nashville Country music station (thanks to Sonos) and voila, he settled quicker than ever. Let's hope we continue this with success today. His dating profile will be up today hopefully as ‘coming soon’ and then the task is to find him the best forever home possible. It will be hard to let go but knowing he’s got a good home will make it a bit easier. The link to the ARF website is here so check out his dating profile and show it someone who needs a loyal, cuddly buddy in their life. ARF Foster Dogs
Anne Lister and Gentleman Jack I mentioned last time that I watched this fantastic BBC/HBO period drama called Gentleman Jack. It stars the amazing Suranne Jones (famous for UK hits Dr Foster and Scott and Bailey) who expertly plays Anne Lister (AL). This woman, AL, has captured me in more ways than I ever imagined. And it’s not just me, there’s a whole fandom out there who are obsessed with learning, studying and lusting after her. She is a real life lesbian who kept incredibly detailed diaries of her life from 1791 to 1840. She was from Halifax, UK and she did not conform to anything that ladies were expected to do back then. She travelled, she was a landowner, she climbed the Pyrenees and a mountain is named after her, she was very intelligent, read lots, was super curious and had a very long list of female lovers.
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| The church plaque |
Her diaries total nearly 8000 pages and are now a UNESCO heritage listing. In her diaries, she wrote about everything in absolute detail – her everyday life, what time she got up, the temperature, the time, where she went, who she met, what she did, the route she walked, how long it took, books she read and explicit details of her lesbian affairs. Now, of more amazement is that she wrote her most personal stuff (always included sex) in secret code that she invented so no one would know what she was doing – remember this is early 1800s. One of the most shocking things is that she, after years of affairs and seeking a woman to ‘settle down with’, she finally found one who didn’t run off and get married – which was the thing in that day as women needed men to financially support them. She finally married Ann Walker who lived, believe it or, on a neighbouring property. She was a wealthy heiress who after years of not understanding her attraction to women, finally realises when AL comes into her life. The TV show focusses on their courtship and ultimate marriage. Yes, they got married albeit not legally. They exchanged rings and took the sacrament together in church – the Trinity Church in York where a rainbow plaque now commemorates their union. They were around 41 (AL) and 30 (AW) when they met for their courtship.
Sadly, AL died at 49 while travelling through Russia. Her whole story, the achievements of a determined women in a very male world in 1800s, the discovery of the secret diaries by a future relative and bringing her to life now – is well worth a quick google and the show Gentleman Jack is a must see – funny, entertaining, love story, brilliant acting. It’s written by Sally Wainwright who wrote the UK's Last Tango in Halifax and Scott and Bailey. Gentleman Jack is on Foxtel and Apple TV I think in Australia, or we got it on our Fetch box. Season 2 will come in 2021 which is a lifetime away.
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| She even writes on the sides to fit as many words in as possible. |
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| Batman the AL codebreaker |
Now her diaries. Two dedicated women started reading the diaries over 20 years ago as part of their post graduate research - they are now highly respected and the real experts on AL. They wrote a few books and it was just hard to get traction and funding on the AL story back 20 years ago. But now the world has progressed a step or two and Anne Lister’s story can finally be told. I’ve read (like inhaled) some of the books – fascinating. But the diaries are something else again. The main research/book writer lady who is now 88, kept her own extensive notes (fair enough) but the Yorkshire Archives in the UK have started a project to fully transcribe all the pages of her diaries, starting from when AL was 15 in boarding school where she met her first lover. A fair bit of the diaries have actually been read by only a few researches, but hardly any of the diary pages have been fully and properly transcribed. So, I joined a UK project to volunteer transcribing the diaries.
Here is what a double page looks like.
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| A full double page |
There are currently about 100 code breakers all around the world. We transcribe the plain text and decode her crypt hand. I’ve included a picture of a diary page extract to show how hard her plain handwriting can be to read – she also uses shorthand, and it can be messy and her mind is so busy. The crypt code is actually easy to decode as it’s just symbol substitution like a puzzle. I know it off by heart now. So far I’ve decoded 3 double pages in August 1819 and it takes about 3 -5 hours to transcribe each double page but can be longer to understand books, foreign travel, languages or anything that takes her interest that she talks about. We do it in a special format and send it back to the archives. This will mean that eventually, all the AL diaries will be available to read easily at any time. They are all currently accessible but difficult to read. At this stage, about 25% of the diaries are out for transcribing with the volunteers so there is still some work to go. I am in a facebook group with code breakers where we help each other with tricky words and we share so much information about what we learn from reading her pages. I cannot say enough just how remarkable this woman was – everything fascinates her – anatomy, science, travel, maths, languages, religion, politics - she loves and only loves the fairer sex. Anyway, I encourage anyone to google her and read about this woman – she was trailblazing the way for women 200 years ago in a way that no one ever imagined, until her diaries were found and read.
Here is the link to the Yorkshire Archives which gives some good info on AL and her diaries. West Yorkshire Archives Anne Lister Transcription Project
Mentally Dating Anne Lister. I’ve also made a stack of friends, around the world and here in Australia, on a Gentleman Jack fandom facebook group. It’s been a bunch of fun and laughs for months which I doubt will ever end as we continue to keep GJ and AL alive until S2 gives us new things to talk about. It was set up by two American girls who started a GJ podcast and it just went ballistic – so popular because so many women were looking for an outlet to talk about Miss Anne Lister and Gentleman Jack. So, I’ll wrap up GJ here but I think you can see my ob-session is in full swing. Nothing has captivated me as much as Batman, except Anne Lister. So much so, Deb bought me some stickers which now sit on my computer. And if you watch the show, you'll totally get my t-shirts !!
In Other News. Macey got shaved and is loving the cooler look. We found a local swimming hole that is probably the safest to go in summer given either snakes or water algae restrict their play area options at the moment. Cricket remains a cool character and has been running with me to help keep him active. The last 3 weeks have been spent inside because of the horrendous tragic bushfires that are burning all over the country and creating the heavy smoke fog. The smokey air has blanketed Canberra for 3 weeks now and other parts of the country are choking also. Just terrible. It’s the worst season on record I think and Australia is starting to push hard on our Govt for serious action on climate change. Our Prime Minister is useless, pathetic and so arrogant. His dealing with this crisis has only deepened my dislike for him and the Govt. As far as I’m concerned, if you don’t believe in climate change, you have to at least admit that the climate IS changing, for whatever reason, something's going on. So we HAVE to do something – it’s not an option to do nothing. I don't want to be like the dinosaur just sitting here waiting for the meteorites to take me out !! I also really need to look at volunteering to the volunteer bushfire service because it’s heartbreaking to watch and do nothing.
Time to wrap up this blog post and if you made it past Anne Lister to here, than well done to you. Here's a few final random pics to finish off with. Stay safe until next time and I'll see you in 2020 !!
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| Pie for lunch |
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| from Mount Ainslie down Anzac Parade |
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| look closely, white cockatoo on the branch |
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| Ooops, milkshake fail ! |
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