Today's problem is that the iPad has frozen again. I thought I knew what to do; indeed, I did it once, after John Lewis unfroze me the first time. But I can't get a peep out of it now. We have a very clever friend who seems eager to shoulder as much as she can of the distresses of old age – and who says that she walks her dog Pedro past our front door daily. Perhaps she can help. Pedro is the dog I am going to knit when things calm down. A Jack Russell without significant spots – which will make things easier.

Otherwise, it's all go. Webs has shipped the new order. I might even be able to knit a sample pocket square in Athens. Portable, light-weight.

The Tokyo has advanced to the fourth band, with another skein of yarn wound. There are 29 bands in all, I think.

I decided last night, as I knit happily on, that the thing to do was face the Sous Sous in the morning when the synapses are firing (or whatever synapses do). I've done that. It starts by casting on a great many stitches, proceeds to purl one row and then knit two, and then launches into the lovely cable panel set in double moss stitch. The pattern is really pretty simple, given the striking effect. All the fancy shaping, if fancy it prove to be, is in the front.

The new iPad won't sort mail for me – or maybe it's just that I haven't figured out how to ask it to do so. Here on the laptop, Googlemail has a category called Promotions which I rarely even look at, but on the iPad I must run briskly through them all. It's probably a good thing – I delete a lot of clutter that way.

I've been hearing a lot from Craftsy lately, indeed would like to get back to them. And Knitting Daily is sometimes interesting. They were haranguing me last week about the value of swatching, attempting to demolish each of my imagined protests in turn. (“I always get gauge”, “I don't want to waste expensive yarn”, etc.) However, they didn't think of my actual excuse – I've got so many daughters and daughters-in-law and granddaughters that it'll fit somebody.

Indeed, one of my real successes in recent years was my first Relax. That time, I think, I did swatch, and based the size on a beloved rugby-shirt-type-thing of my own. It came out exactly as intended. What I had failed to grasp is that the design required a good deal more positive ease than the rugby shirt allowed. It looked awful on me.

So I gave it to the slightest-built of the granddaughters, Hellie, now the prospective bride. It looks brilliant on her. And I persevered to knit myself another, the right size, which I love. So much for swatching.

But I must acknowledge that I knit a substantial swatch for Archie's recently-completed sweater and I admit it may be reflected in the successful result.

I think Meg says somewhere that she never swatches, but will start with a sleeve if she's in doubt. And, of course, as I keep saying, if you're a humble traditional knitter, knitting the same thing over and over – Fair Isle, Norwegian, whatever – you soon learn the characteristics of the fabric and are free to experiment with design.

To return to the Sous Sous – somewhere in all my books there must be a trick for estimating the amount of yarn you are going to need for a long long-tail cast-on. The Sous Sous wants something like 170 stitches. Nothing is worse than getting to the last five stitches and finding that you don't have enough yarn to finish. Been there, done that. But the opposite mistake – winding up with a yard and a half hanging down – makes one feel like a novice and an idiot.

Non-knit

We had another good session with the computer man yesterday. My husband has taken to his mouse with more alacrity than I would have expected. The man has recommended a wireless printer which sounds like a brilliant idea. At the moment, the printer is connected to the old, slow desktop computer which therefore has to be laboriously fired up whenever I want to print anything. The wireless one might even mean that my husband could do his own printing again, from the dining room where he operates.

The man is going to come back next week with such a machine – he recommends a brand, I've forgotten which, whose ink cartridges don't cast £75 each.