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Lady Lydia: still trapped in her well of pink sadness


danvillebelle

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Ruth Goodman is awesome.  She really throws herself into the role of the era which they are re-creating.

 

And then I laugh at people like Lori who don't understand how much physical labour performed by not only the lower classes but the middle and professional classes of those times. Lady Lori wouldn't have had the time to sit around inscribing her words of "wisdom" had she been born in those eras. Not even if she had been educated to any equivalent standard to the education she was exposed to in her youth.

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9 hours ago, CelticGoddess said:

Those who have watched Manor house and other have you seen Tudor Monastery Farm and the others in the same theme?  If you haven't, they are available on YouTube.  Not exactly the same as Manor house (et al) because the participants are an archaeologist and a historian but still very neat to watch.

I have not, but this thread has given me a list of things to watch! Lady Lydia needs to take our advice on what to watch so she can learn a bit more about the time periods she is obsessed with. 

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Another vote for anything Ruth Goodman is involved in.

My husband and I recently watched her series on trains. Trains are not an interest of either of us but her take along with the other hosts Peter and Alex are fascinating. They weave historical details and the everyday life of ordinary people together. There is also a series on the building of a replica of a medieval castle in France that I highly recommend.

 I do find it hilarious that we are discussing Ruth on a Lydia thread. The two women could not be more different.

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Thanks @Palimpsest for the link.

<re-emerging after binge-watching Frontier House>

I've never before watched living history shows. I think I found my new addiction.

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1 hour ago, livinginthelight said:

Thanks @Palimpsest for the link.

<re-emerging after binge-watching Frontier House>

I've never before watched living history shows. I think I found my new addiction.

One of Us, One of Us

 

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I've met Ruth Goodman in 'real life' and been instructed by her! I attended a day-course on Tudor Christmas cookery she taught a few years ago at the Weald and Downland Living Museum (in an original Tudor kitchen, part of a building that had been moved there). What can I say except that it was one of the best days of my life?! It was AMAZING and Ruth was every bit as warm, down-to-earth, knowledgeable and enthusiastic as she is on TV. In the morning we had a decent chunk of time where she talked to us about the subject and related subjects, and we asked her questions - and I can tell you, the other participants and I hung on to her every word! I wrote pages of notes, and that evening I wrote detailed emails to my parents and sisters talking about what I'd learned and experienced that day. I was already interested in all the subjects Ruth talked to us about, but she made every bit of it all absolutely fascinating. The practical side of the day was great, too.

Random interesting fact I learned from Ruth: it's not true that in the medieval period people used spices to cover up the taste of bad meat. This myth has its origins in 19th c. racist assumptions about food in India, and didn't become attached to the medieval period until the 1960s or so.

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6 hours ago, Triplet3 said:

snippage

Random interesting fact I learned from Ruth: it's not true that in the medieval period people used spices to cover up the taste of bad meat. This myth has its origins in 19th c. racist assumptions about food in India, and didn't become attached to the medieval period until the 1960s or so.

I am insanely jealous. I would love to something like that.

Mr Wrangler  was once involved in a club which tried to re-create 18th and 19th century beers from the original recipes. I used to enjoy helping with the brewing process.

For some reason I've known that factoid for many years, it wasn't until Ruth and other historians  started to debunk the myth recently that people have started to believe it.

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6 hours ago, Triplet3 said:

 

Random interesting fact I learned from Ruth: it's not true that in the medieval period people used spices to cover up the taste of bad meat. This myth has its origins in 19th c. racist assumptions about food in India, and didn't become attached to the medieval period until the 1960s or so.

I'd never given that story much thought but it makes sense that it's a myth. No matter how much you season a piece of rotten meat, you're still going to be just as sick after you eat it. Because bacteria.

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5 hours ago, Seahorse Wrangler said:

I am insanely jealous. I would love to something like that.

Mr Wrangler  was once involved in a club which tried to re-create 18th and 19th century beers from the original recipes. I used to enjoy helping with the brewing process.

For some reason I've known that factoid for many years, it wasn't until Ruth and other historians  started to debunk the myth recently that people have started to believe it.

I hadn't given it much thought previously, despite studying medieval history at uni and reading around social/cultural history purely for fun! I still hear/see the myth being repeated here and there, but I don't think it's as common as it used to be, thanks to the debunkers.

Were any of the historic beer recreations a success?

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6 hours ago, Black Aliss said:

I'd never given that story much thought but it makes sense that it's a myth. No matter how much you season a piece of rotten meat, you're still going to be just as sick after you eat it. Because bacteria.

Yes, I hadn't given that specific thing much thought previously (I knew that spices were expensive in medieval times but hadn't put 2+2 together) but it makes perfect sense that the story's a myth. Medieval people didn't know about bacteria, but they weren't stupid and and could see basic cause and effect that if you eat bad meat then it makes you ill. Yes, maybe in times of absolute famine some people might have eaten gone-off meat as an alternative to literally starving to death...but people who reached that level of desperation wouldn't have been able to afford spices, which were expensive.

As spices were expensive, they wouldn't have been thrown away by being used on bad meat, and in any case, the occasions when the largest number of people stretched their finances to acquire spices were occasions like Christmas when the emphasis was very much on providing the best, most high-quality food that could be afforded. People took pride in serving good food and drink, and this carried on into the Tudor period (hence why the whole subject came up).

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13 hours ago, Triplet3 said:

I've met Ruth Goodman in 'real life' and been instructed by her! I attended a day-course on Tudor Christmas cookery she taught a few years ago at the Weald and Downland Living Museum (in an original Tudor kitchen, part of a building that had been moved there). What can I say except that it was one of the best days of my life?! It was AMAZING and Ruth was every bit as warm, down-to-earth, knowledgeable and enthusiastic as she is on TV. In the morning we had a decent chunk of time where she talked to us about the subject and related subjects, and we asked her questions - and I can tell you, the other participants and I hung on to her every word! I wrote pages of notes, and that evening I wrote detailed emails to my parents and sisters talking about what I'd learned and experienced that day. I was already interested in all the subjects Ruth talked to us about, but she made every bit of it all absolutely fascinating. The practical side of the day was great, too.

Random interesting fact I learned from Ruth: it's not true that in the medieval period people used spices to cover up the taste of bad meat. This myth has its origins in 19th c. racist assumptions about food in India, and didn't become attached to the medieval period until the 1960s or so.

That sounds incredible! I grew up in that part of the world - on the West Sussex coast, not far from the Weald and Downland museum. It’s a remarkable place, and I love the whole concept of a living museum. Getting Ruth Goodman to teach that sort of course in that sort of environment fits beautifully with the ethos of the museum and must have been pretty special for you too.

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On 01/04/2018 at 3:58 AM, Seahorse Wrangler said:

(snip)

And then I laugh at people like Lori who don't understand how much physical labour performed by not only the lower classes but the middle and professional classes of those times. Lady Lori wouldn't have had the time to sit around inscribing her words of "wisdom" had she been born in those eras. Not even if she had been educated to any equivalent standard to the education she was exposed to in her youth.

Ain't that the truth? Virginia Woolf eloquently makes the same point in "A Room of One's Own". Her thoughts about Shakespeare's sister have always stayed with me, and the thought that there are brilliant women out there, but perhaps they're busy doing the dishes and putting children to bed, so don't have the time to scribble.

 

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3 hours ago, Triplet3 said:

I hadn't given it much thought previously, despite studying medieval history at uni and reading around social/cultural history purely for fun! I still hear/see the myth being repeated here and there, but I don't think it's as common as it used to be, thanks to the debunkers.

Were any of the historic beer recreations a success?

Some were. The men who had been brewing for 30/40 years made some good beer. Though it's hard to tell just how authentic the recreations were when the notes were written in code. And you generally didn't have a sample to test against.

 

Another myth I saw Ruth propagate was "alcohol levels in beer/wine stop it from spoiling". 

 

Nope..it's very easy to contaminate your wort in the domestic brewing setting. A lack of proper aseptic technique leaves the liquor vulnerable to microbes wanting to chomp down on the highly caloric sugars and alcohol produced.  Even though we'd been brewing for 10 years, we still lost one in ten batches. The people we knew form Durden Park had better success, one in twenty was their average loss.

Even large scale breweries lose production through spoilage during fermentation. While some breweries encourage the use of wild yeasts( mainly Belgium lambic beers), it's mainly through airborne contamination of open vats that cause the losses.

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9 hours ago, Seahorse Wrangler said:

I am insanely jealous. I would love to something like that.

Mr Wrangler  was once involved in a club which tried to re-create 18th and 19th century beers from the original recipes. I used to enjoy helping with the brewing process.

For some reason I've known that factoid for many years, it wasn't until Ruth and other historians  started to debunk the myth recently that people have started to believe it.

Are you familiar with "The British History Podcast" (https://www.thebritishhistorypodcast.com/)?  It's my total addiction and in one of their members only episodes they recounted their experiment with brewing 7th century (may have the exact century wrong but it was definitely during the Heptarchy) ale.  It was awesome.

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Lady Lydia is happy that the Target near her doesn't play background music. She is upset that Walmart does. She feels like shopping during the Victorian Era might have been noisy, but not annoyingly noisy like it is today. She thinks hearing loss might be caused by the background music played in stores. 

I'm greatly amused that in the comments she says that places that have televisions are archaic and behind the times! Lady Lydia who pretends she lives during the Victorian Era is calling something behind the times. :laughing-jumpingpurple:

 

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On 3 April 2018 at 1:57 PM, Seahorse Wrangler said:

 

Another myth I saw Ruth propagate was "alcohol levels in beer/wine stop it from spoiling". 

 

Wait, do you mean "propogate" (spread) or debunk?

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  • 3 weeks later...

I actually find myself agreeing with Lady Lydia about something. 

Quote

Mr. S. preaches very short sermons, 20 minutes or a little more, 

Quote

Someone recently told us the "trend" today in churches is for someone to speak for an hour and a half.  I listened to such a person not long ago and it still seems like he could have got his point across in twenty minutes if he had left out the fluff, the jokes, silly remarks, long illustrations, rambling away from the subject, and stuck to the scriptures and simple explanations.

I don't know if that is a real trend, but I have sat through way too many long sermons. IME after about 20 minutes half the people have tuned the pastor out and are daydreaming. There is nothing quite like the despair of hearing a pastor say "And my final point is..." but then instead of going on with the final point they ramble on about 15 different subjects and it takes 30 minutes just to finish the final point. By that point everyone is hungry, bored and tired of sitting still. 

20 minute sermons! @Lydia, you and I agree about this. Say what you have to say and be done.

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@formergothardite, the pastor of First Presbyterian in my hometown was "famous" for his long-winded closing prayers.  The congregation just grew to expect them.  You knew you were not getting out of church before 12;30 or so.

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The last SBC I attended had a pastor who preached forever and then had altar calls that seemed never ending. I learned the key was to sit in the balcony because the steps took you right down to the side door in the foyer so no one could see you leave. By 12:00 the balcony people started slowly slipping out. :laughing-jumpingpurple: 

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On 4/5/2018 at 7:31 AM, Petronella said:

Wait, do you mean "propogate" (spread) or debunk?

That word is correctly spelled "propagate" but I have the same request for clarification for @Seahorse Wrangler.  Is it a myth that the alcohol stops wine and beer from spoiling and what did Ruth say?  Thanks in advance. :)

@formergothardite, Lydia should go and listen to Shrader preach.  Apparently a 2 hour sermon is on the short side for him.

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