Tuesday, November 19, 2013

Today is my husband's 88th birthday. That's old. Celebrations, such as they will be, are to be postponed until we get to Loch Fyne at the weekend. He wants a cupcake.


I bought a new computer. Archie and I fell into the hands of a talkative salesman who persuaded me to spend a lot less money than I was prepared to part with. John Lewis has a small Sale table for machines which -- as the salesman put it -- people have brought back because they didn't like the colour. If there's anything there that suits, you get it for a substantial reduction and you get everything except the box, including the normal two-year guarantee.


So I gave up my idea of a new desktop with terabytes of memory (the salesman and Archie agreed that I didn't need them), and bought a Toshiba portable, with a touchscreen and all. I'm getting on fine, so far. Open Office and Google Chrome and Feedly have been re-established. Dropbox will be next. I bought an external hard drive, which I will eventually pass on to Archie. The salesman said I didn't need to pay a man from John Lewis to come and do the transferring. So soon -- maybe today -- I will have to try to use it to move actual programs over -- Quicken and Microsoft Office and Lotus Organizer (where I record my weigh-in every morning), to begin with.


I didn't buy a monitor. I will first try plugging in my old one. I find I don't like composing on this one. And I badly need a mouse. Archie says my old one won't do.


So that's exciting.


Knitting


We had a nice time with Thomas and Lucy, although I didn't take the promised picture of her with the Princess veil. We found a moth hole in it, so that's a job for soon. Wretched creatures. They admired the Silly Christmas Project, which is lying about on the coffee table waiting for surgery on its stuffing. Thomas seems magically older and graver under his new responsibilities, Lucy funnier and happier now that she is a member of the family.


My other two projects continue well.


Craftsy had a blog entry about gauge the other day. Try this, try that, it said. It made me think, yet again, what a good thing Herzog may have invented with CustomFit. You knit your swatch, of course, and then the pattern comes to meet you instead of the other way around. She's doing a knit-along at the moment. I'm not knitting, but am following the progress of swatching and design with great interest. It's one of my ambitions for 2014.


Now that I've got a computer that can hack it, I must get back to Craftsy.

9 comments:

  1. Regardless of whether Lucy takes up the offer of the Princess Shawl, the fact of being offered it will have boosted her confidence and made her feel accepted by this family she will be joining. That kindness is bound to make her happier.

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  2. Anonymous12:54 PM

    Many happy returns to your husband! 88 must be very auspicious in Chinese culture with double-8s.
    (Severe boo to the moth which ate the Princess shawl.)
    LisaRR

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  3. I am also 8 years younger than my husband. Happy Birthday to him. I hope the festivities go well. How nice you found a good salesman. I am starting a sweater using custom fit. I am really taken with Herzog's gauge concept. I love that a computer/math professional has turned her ideas into a tech start up for the befit of the rest of us.

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  4. Happy Birthday to your husband, hope it's as sunny in Edinburgh as it is here. Good luck with the new computer.
    Also my parents' 37th wedding anniversary today

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  5. happy happy birthday to a fellow scorpio! mine was sat.

    here's hoping he has a wonderful day and enjoys the cupcake and of course the festivities anon.

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  6. Happy birthday to Mister Miles! May he have a lovely day and scrumptious cupcake.

    And a major boo to the moth! How dare it snack on the Princess!

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  7. Happy birthday to your husband! It's nice you will be celebrating on the weekend with your son and his family at Loch Fyne.

    You didn't mention how large the moth hole was. Hopefully the nasty things have only taken a small bite out of it.

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  8. Anonymous5:57 PM

    Happy 88th Birthday wishes from Texas to your husband! He's not old; my brother-in-law's mother just celebrated her 104th birthday last month, and she's as alert and spry as ever. She's going to outlive us all!

    I'm impressed that the John Lewis salesman pointed out the lower-cost computers available to save you money. That man deserves a raise! May you and your new computer spend many happy hours together.

    Mary G. in Texas

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  9. Anonymous4:20 AM

    Happy Birthday from NY! Wishing you a peaceful and joyful year to come.

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