I finished knitting the mitered jacket yesterday. Ends still to be dealt with, and of course blocking, and then the decision about a front fastening, if any. But, progress.

In a brief burst of energy, I have ordered the Fair Isle book from the Shetland Times – “The Known Work of Robert Williamson”, mentioned here the other day – on the strength of the excellence of “A Legacy of Shetland Lace”.

In the latter, before I leave the subject, I am greatly drawn to the “Laureya Cardigan”, named for the designer’s granddaughters. Lace-weight yarn, straightforward all-over lace pattern, v-neck, 12-stitch elegant moss stitch border up the front, round the back of the neck, back down again. It looks like the sort of thing which, faultlessly knit in pale grey or beige, one could wear every day for the rest of one’s life. There is something similar in Madeline Weston’s “Traditional Sweater Book” of 1986.

While the burst of energy lasted, I also ordered the yarn for Ed’s gardening sweater from Jimmy Bean – madelinetosh sport weight “Firewood”. I won’t actually be able to start until I have measured a favourite sweater of his, and that won’t happen until next month. Plenty to do in the meantime.

My husband has decided, wisely, not to attempt London. Rachel will come here to hold the fort while I go down for my classes with Franklin on November 18. I’m scared, now it has come to the point. I think Alexander and Ketki will come over for the day on  Saturday the 17th, too.  

No doubt you’ll hear a lot more about this before it happens. And after.

eBay

Skeindalous, I think it’s a perfectly fair tactic to bid at the last moment. I’ve done it more or less myself, in my pursuit of Vogue Knitting Books, although I have never used a sniping program such as you mention, Gretchen, and I’m too scard-y to leave the bidding to the utter end. The point is not to give the opposition time to re-group and bid higher. My opponent in the Expensive Postcard Contest this week had the opposite difficulty – he hadn’t left himself time to raise his bid.

He beat us a couple of times recently for cards which showed the hotel, and I wondered if he could actually be my cyber-friend Angie who owns it. The village owes her a lot: the hotel had stood empty for five years or so. Dereliction threatened, and it would have ripped the heart out of the place, visually, if the hotel had gone. She converted it into self-catering apartments which are, wonderfully, available by the day. We use them a lot for overflow family.

There is an internal balcony on the first floor, looking down to the lobby, and she has enlarged some old postcards and displayed them there. I asked her recently – when nothing was happening on eBay – whether she was buying postcards. She said no – the ones she has, came with the hotel when she bought it.

So I sent her the link to the one I have just acquired, and told her yesterday that I had won. She promises to keep her ears open in search of the identity of the Mystery Buyer. She’s probably much better placed to find him out than I am.