This post is by Nancy Jardine
From 1975 till last Monday, I was the proud possessor of 3 (and a half) vacuum cleaners. Number 1 was simple to use (old fashioned technology), the hose and nozzle easy to worry into tiny nooks and crannies. Number 2 was a wet /dry cleaner (newer technology of the time) which was brilliant for an all-encompassing ‘hoover-up’. Cleaner number 3 was meant to directly replace number 2 which I’d ruined by sucking up just too much fine cement dust from my cellar – not a great idea for a motor of any kind- but number 3 proved to be a very heavy laborious ‘tank’ to lug around the house. Last Monday, I bought number 4 which is the opposite, chosen because its weight is only 3 lbs compared to number 3 which was 10lbs.
My new cleaner number 4 is a pleasure to use with its up-to-date cyclonic technology. Well, it’s almost a pleasure, since I’m not OCD about vacuuming. Actually, I’m really more interested in training the next ‘hoover-upper’ seen in the photo. *smiley face here *
But the vacuum story doesn’t quite end there- I’ll explain the ‘half’. Last Christmas (Dec 2014) I got a present of a fantastic revolutionary cleaning device (technologically speaking) which was intended to take vacuum cleaning totally out of my list of household time-sucks.
‘Robby Robot’ became the newest family member. He’s very lightweight and comes with interchangeable brushes for different surfaces. He’s by far the most entertaining vacuum cleaner I’ve ever seen and attracts not only the dust around the house but that in-training assistant in the photograph, followed by his excitedly squealing 3 year old sister. Robby is quite effective as a cleaner but unfortunately takes hours and hours, randomly spinning his way around the floors. Some folks might be saying that I shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth and they’d be right, but by the time poor wee Robby cleans one room and moves on to the next (battery charging every 2 hours or so) the whole process has to start over again because the kids have made their new mark. I’m not sure that this innovative technology will ever meet my energy-saving criteria!
Domestic trivia? Yes, but what’s that got to do with my writing?
There’s a slight parallel with the research for my Celtic Fervour Series writing. There was a nice light foray into research as I amassed the historical facts used in Book 1. For Books 2 & 3, I was lugging around a heavy weight Vax cleaner, sucking up as much as I could about the invasion of the Ancient Roman Governor of Britannia, Gnaeus Julius Agricola, into what is now called north England and Scotland- since all of that research was new to me. The laborious, though still enjoyable, task was finding sufficient details to use from texts translated from their original Latin or Greek. My tendency to sidetrack during research mirrored my last inefficient vacuum cleaner as I poured over and over the same texts to suck up the tiniest debris.
Currently I’m now in a lightweight vacuum phase since there’s virtually nothing at all written of the period following the withdrawal of Agricola from ‘Aberdeenshire, Scotland’ back in AD 84. In the absence of written evidence, it gives me the opportunity to give my imagination free rein. Yet, that new freedom is tempered by an enjoyable frustration. New archaeological evidence is now being found on a fairly regular basis in north-east Scotland. Keeping abreast of this new interpretative evidence is another time-suck, yet very exciting when a new coin hoard is uncovered, or some other evidence of ancient Roman occupation found.
Back in the 1970s, there was little attention paid to pre-history by ‘John Doe’ in the UK. Researching was mainly done by the ‘fully trained’ archaeologists who tended to search only when funding became available. However, I’m totally delighted to say that the surge of interest from the early 1990s onwards in ‘finding ancient artefacts’, made popular on TV by celebrity archaeologists and historians, has considerably increased the amount of historical finds in my homeland. Innovative Technology has a huge bearing on this, equipment being much more user friendly and affordable by the amateur historian. It’s not unusual now to find an amateur ‘vacuuming’ a field area with his hi-tec metal detector (please excuse my generic use of the word) or other imaging equipment.
There’s now a booming market out there of possible equipment to help with surveying the land – the technologies honed for specific uses and too extensive to mention here. (I confess I don’t know much about some of these)
(Image from: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:62_H_Frox6.jpg)
This site, only one of many found on the internet, has equipment for sale for searching on land or under water. http://www.joanallen.co.uk/Metal-Detectors-s/50.htm?searching=Y&sort=2&cat=50&show=100&page=1&gclid=CPGxmPTshMQCFeHLtAod3yoAFw
Of course, there is no ‘Finders Keepers’ law in Scotland. Anything ancient requires to be declared to appropriate authorities – who, I’m glad to say, act on informtion much more quickly than ever before and rapidly send out experienced personnel to do the full excavation. Many more artefacts are finding their way through the proper channels and are being added to collections of similar items in museums, both locally and globally. It’s now easy for the amateur to make an initial enquiry online about anything they think might be of import. http://www.archaeologyscotland.org.uk/our-projects/discovery-and-excavation-scotland
I’m a member of a lot of Facebook History Groups which are a fantastic source though the downside is that these information posts are also wonderful time sucks!
Have a great weekend- cleaning, or whatever you intend to do!
Nancy Jardine’s contemporary mystery and historical romantic adventure writing can be found HERE
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Writing Wranglers and Warriors 
Very enjoyable post, Nancy. Loved the way you meshed vacuum cleaners and “vacuum writing”. I had one of those robot vacuum cleaners a couple of years ago. It was more entertaining than anything else. It did a good job of cleaning (if you had the whole day) and we finally took it to Goodwill for some more patient person to use. I also enjoyed the bit about finding artifacts. It’s so good that finds are acted upon right away, otherwise history might be lost forever.
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I so agree, Linda, about the risk of history vanishing into a vacuum. I was really pleased to see the official Scottish arachaeology site set up for helping people like me- wanabee enthusiasts who just might find something important and need to know who to contact.
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I really miss those days in the ’70s when I had my first apartment and bought my first comparatively cheap vacuum cleaner. It didn’t have to clean much floor space, the apartment was very small — living room, hallway and bedroom had carpeting. I used broom technology for kitchen and bathroom. I too love to keep up with historical/archeological discoveries and new interpretations.
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I’m sharing new archaeological discoveries almost daily on my Facebook page, Mike. These are mainly world-wide discoveries that need to be globally documented in case something dire happens to the artetfacts. My broom is used every day to gobble up the debris under th ebaby’s high chair. 😉
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Oh yes! I love that people are gettting involved with their history. It may be a time suck, but boy the information we writers have to ‘play’ with. Loved this post. It’s history, it’s writing and it’s fun.
As for the other ‘cleaning’, well, all I can say is, someday. Doris
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It is fantastic, Doris. I can recall as a student in the late 1960s thinking it was so hard to find out information about Celtic Scotland. The fact was that it wasn’t popular then but so great that it is now. 🙂
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Oops. I had to fix a wrong link and forgot to sign myself back in. That above reply was me. 😉
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I hate vacuuming with a passion so you can bet I won’t be doing that this weekend. Good luck with your projects.
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I wonder who really loves vacuuming, Abbie. You have a great weekend, too. 🙂
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Hi Abbie- above answer was from me. (I don’t usually forget to sing in and out) 😉
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Loved your analogy. And certainly could identify with “time sucks” it seems when researching. How fascinating for you though in learning so much history, and I am amazed your are able to go back to such an early time. Must really fuel the imagination. Good post.
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Thank you, Neva. I’m not sure I’ll ever find out enough about the era.
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Oops. Looks like I forgot to sign back in as Nancy! That was Nancy answering.
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I laughed at all your sweepers. I like my Kirby. I had a Compact years ago and loved it. The bullet shaped steel body also served as a riding toy for my son. They certainly do a lot more Digs now than ever before. Thanks Cher’ley
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Cher’ley- My mum had a bullet shaped Electrolux cleaner but I don’t remember riding it. 🙂
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Fun post, Nancy! You have a great way of using analogies and I am very impressed with this one — I prefer the writing over the cleaning myself. I hope your little guy turns out to be a “whirlwind” in many ways, including following his grandma’s passion for writing!
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I think he’ll have plenty of escapades to write about- already being a little bit accident prone as in ‘Here’s a bump – there’s a bump’.
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Nice comparison of vacuuming to researching, Nancy! And, again, I’m just amazed at all you manage to do. I’m been doing far too much cleaning and far too little writing (almost none) for my taste lately. But it’s necessary to get myself moved and all.
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Thanks for sharing I can picture the children squealing as the vacuum nears them. It is good to know that someone interested in history can go exploring and possibly make an important find.
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