I have never had an outage – is that a word? is it the word I want? – that lasted as long as yesterday’s. It was a disconcerting experience, like one of those dreams in which you need to say something and can’t speak. I don’t even have Free Cell on this computer to keep myself occupied – I deleted it, some years ago, in a burst of Lenten virtue. I found myself slightly surprised during the course of the day that knitting doesn’t need an internet connection.

During a previous period of glitches, minor by comparison with yesterday, I had made a note of some telephone numbers, so I was able to phone Customer Services. “We are aware…engineers are investigating…” It was a comfort. In the afternoon, the message was upgraded to “engineers are still investigating…” The first person who answers when you phone Demon Customer Services is a Scotsman who sounds slightly surprised at being pressed into service to make such a recording. He’s very reassuring, as no doubt he is intended to be.

(I phoned Virgin Money once, about an ISA. While waiting to speak to a human being, I heard the familiar voice of Richard Branson – “thank you for phoning Virgin,” sort of thing. How long did it take him to make that recording? Ten minutes, at most. It was an absolutely brilliant piece of marketing.)

I am well launched into Stripe Three (of six) of the Chevron Scarf. In repose, completely cast-off, it measured 48”. We’re aiming at 58”. It’s not an impossible gulf, given, especially, the open nature of the pattern.

And, Lisa, I think I would say it requires only a fair amount of patience. I did use the long-tail to cast on the third stripe. It was a bit complicated, keeping the two balls of yarn separate when I had to abandon one of them, every so often, to connect to the previous stripe. And also having two ends of the circular needle, plus my left thumb, to knit with. I was getting into a rhythm towards the end, and will persevere with the method, because it certainly makes the succeeding row easier.

Meg, thank you for your kind words (Comment, Friday) about the colours. My first thot had been to use different Koigu reds for each stripe, drawing on my extensive collection. But then I found I had enough of this colour-way for the whole thing. It’s quite like the illustration in VK, and I’m very happy with it, too.

And, Susan, thank you for the nudge – I will write up the jabot. (And congratulations on the weight loss. I love the pic of the scales and the stone. I have maintained my own loss, two-stone-plus-very-slightly-more. It’s tedious, sometimes, keeping up the discipline with no reward of additional loss, but on the other hand I often think of how heavy two stones are, and how nice it is not to be carrying them about. I can feel the difference.)