All the Frills: Office Style

My job has been crazy busy and demanding over the last few months – which I don’t really mind but it has meant a lot of late nights at the office (as in I’ve been there until after 10 pm on more than one occasion).

But when I first started I spent a little time sprucing up my work space with things that put a smile on my face.

Things that make me smile are, apparently, portraits of Elizabeth I, Anna of Denmark, and several other Elizabethan and Jacobean ladies and what is perhaps the most ridiculous calendar ever created. It’s called Plutocats and it’s insane. For example, the name of March’s cat is Max von Bucks. February’s cat was a train baron. Seriously. I am both highly intelligent and easily amused by idiotic things. It’s a potent combination.

And now for some link love:

• Woman who claims to be famous steals 22 pairs of high-end leggings. The headline really says it all.
• Speaking of leggings, one school (in a veritable orgy of short-sighted, misogynistic (yeah, I’m going to boldly term it that) reasoning, has banned them. You can read about that here and here.
• And here’s someone weighing in on the awesomeness of leggings.
• This story of high society, forced servitude, and the former residents of mental institutions is fascinating, chilling, and horrifying.
• Watching an academic’s life work get confirmed and validated (not to mention being proved scientifically correct) is amazing.
• What’s missing from this is my favourite New Haven tombstone, “Phyllis Sandine, What a Woman!”
• This past week was a big one in terms of the anniversaries of death dates of characters in early modern British history. Topping that list is Queen Elizabeth I, who died on March 24, 1603. March 25 marks the anniversary of the death of the Catholic martyr Margaret Clitherow. When arrested for recusancy and suspected Catholicism she actually refused to enter a plea and was killed for that – the legal penalty in early modern England for refusing to plea being pressing to death. Yup, she was pancaked to death. I did some work on Margaret last year for the website Executed Today and they’re reposted it this week to mark the occasion. You can read it here.
• I love working for the Graduate Students’ Association – especially when our President does awesome things like speak out about sexism and misogyny.