My husband is so much better that we suspect the A&E dr was right, and antibiotics to zap an infection were the right course of action. It’s a good thing (for us) that the Infirmary was pressed for bed-space (all those old ladies toppling over on the ice last week) or they might have kept him in to be on the safe side. He’s much better off here.

Taking knitting along didn’t involve much thought, and I had had plenty of time for thought, anyway, during that long, uncomfortable night. The bag is always ready. During the last years of my mother’s life, when she was too frail to travel, I tried to visit her twice a year in the US. I found I could knit six or seven pairs of socks in a year without cutting in to real knitting-time at all. And cured my fear of flying by knitting in the air, to boot.

Now it’s many fewer socks-per-year, unless I dedicate knitting time to them. But still the bag is there. We have a hospital appt on Monday to see a breathing consultant (by happy coincidence) – that should see me well down the foot of the current sock.

Lisa, I’ve lost hold of the names of my KF sock yarns. This one may well be “Easter”. It’s the first time I’ve used one of the newer issue, where some of the stripes have wavy edges. If anything could be more fun than one of the original KF sock yarns, it’s this. I have started an actual, written list of yarns I might want to buy when the fast is over. KF sock yarns are at the very top.

Another thing on the list is a sweater’s-worth of monochrome yarn of a subdued shade. My stash has nothing like that. My husband wants a basic sweater, but draws the lines at stripes. I don’t think there’s anything there that will do. It would be absurd to break the fast to buy yarn for this purpose, when he can buy such a sweater relatively easily. It would be a great stash-buster, though – if only I had the yarn in the stash.

The other thing that inspires this thought is “A Fine Fleece”, which abounds in attractive patterns with interesting surface patterns to be knit in sober yarns. And I find myself greatly drawn to her collars. “October Frost”, “espresso”, and Donice’s “fylingdales” all have enticing collars.

Since so many seem to have the book already – the androgynous model is actually male, do you think? Or do we have a subtle hymn to Lesbianism? There is a line in Ovid, describing I think Atalanta at the Caledonian Boar Hunt, although I’m not going to look it up just now, saying that her face was of the sort that appeared on a girl, boyish, and on a boy, girlish. It is very striking sort of face when you see it, and there it is.