Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Oh, Jean, that's good: the plain Jack Russell's are “without benefit of clergy”!

Pedro wasn't along on yesterday's outing. We will have to arrange a sitting. His owner says he is relatively low on markings – just around the head, whereas the one in the pattern book has spots on the body. That will simplify things. Free-form intarsia is an interesting idea, but I wouldn't welcome too much of it.

Not much real knitting got done yesterday. When we got to our appt in Restorative Dentistry we found the little waiting room full of dispirited oldies and my heart was in my boots – but they called us while I was still filling out a form about my husband's medical history, and not a stitch was knit.

Some more sleeve in the evening, but not much. I will certainly be glad when there are no longer two balls of yarn attached, winding themselves around each other as I constantly turn the work. I am still using a short circular, and will manage one or two more decreases with it. And, last night, a miracle – there on the coffee table at my knees was an unopened pack of Cubics, 7” or thereabouts, in the necessary gauge. How did that happen? Very gratefully received.

Non-knit

Here's one for you: we often find New Yorker cartoons somewhat beyond our ken these days but the one on page 58 of the current issue, January 19, beats them all – ranks of glum men with cheese on their heads. Please explain.

Janet (comment Monday), I come from a sturdy line of high-achieving women, and went to Oberlin which disputes with Mount Holyoke the honour of being the first institution in the world to give degrees to women – and which certainly introduced co-educational college education. I don't think I was ever made to feel that there was anything I couldn't do, or shouldn't bother to try to do, just because I was a woman.

But there was certainly a powerful Ladies-Home-Journal miasma about in the 50's, requiring marriage of all women as the basic test of success in life. It was my own choice to step off the merry-go-round. And I needed to get away from home, like Roz Chast ("Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant?"). And, unlike her, wasn't a genius.

I doubt if life is easier for today's young women – life doesn't get easier. But at least they know they have to provide a career for themselves.


Life: yesterday was seriously stressful, hard to say why. Partly because the appt was at 1:45, our lunchtime. All went well, see above, and we got home in time for a very late lunch with no hypoglycaemia. But oh, dear, the worry. We are undoubtedly both in steep decline. Nothing is scheduled for today – bliss. And tomorrow Greek Helen will be here – double bliss.

7 comments:

  1. The fans of the Wisconsin Green Bay Packers are referred to by the charming sobriquet of 'cheeseheads' and can be seen in the stands wearing hats shaped like giant wedged of cheddar. Part the second of the joke is the 'cheese snob' cheese head, wearing a wheel of brie.

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  2. Are you still going to Greece for a holiday? You have that to look forward to.

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  3. Ashley beat me to the explanation. When my husband goes back to Wisconsin, he says he is going 'behind the cheddar curtain."

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  4. Anonymous1:18 PM

    Perhaps I should mention for Jean and her readers that Wisconsin's fame as a state is its dairy production. Thus, the cheese heads.

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  5. And the Packers just had a heartbreaking loss to the Seattle Seahawks, so they will not be attending the Super Bowl. Here on the radio in Minnesota, they are saying "If there was ever a time to hug a Packer, this is it. I still wouldn't, of course ... but you could." Vikings fans are apparently not very sympathetic ...

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  6. The Seattle Seahawks are on their way to another Super Bowl. They won last year. My husbands nephew, Steve Hauschka is the kicker for the team. The Hawks had a terrible first half -the Packers are a very good team- but they rallied in the last three minutes to tie the game and won in the first possession of overtime to win the game and head (again) to the Super Bowl on Feb 1.
    It was an emotional roller coaster.

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  7. Anonymous3:50 PM

    In the news today is Scotland's oldest living person - a 109 year-old lady who eats porridge every morning, recommends keeping away from men and advises doing plenty of what you enjoy - she has always done a lot of knitting.

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