The big news today is that my grandson Mungo now has his own blog, “Harry in Athens”. “Mungo” doesn’t work as a name in Greek, so he’s “Harry” when he’s there, which is, of course, most of the time.

I found an email from him late yesterday afternoon, asking how to set up a blog. I sent him off to the Blogger home page, and in the twinkling of an eye, it seemed, he had done all that. It is delightful.

He’d love comments, and it’s not entirely easy, because clever Blogger has put all the apparatus of the blog in Greek. My education was classical, and it included occasional references to dimly-understood characters called scholiasts, who wrote commentaries on the ancient authors. Their comments are called “scholia”, hence their name. It is a rare word in English, if not actually obsolete, but it was with one of those little tingles down the spine that I discovered last night that the word for “comments” on a Greek blog is ΣχOλIA. (I did it! I wrote it in Greek!)

Ancient Greek and medieval Greek and modern Greek (what Mungo enchantingly calls “normal Greek”) are all the same language, much altered through the years. Whereas Italian, although clearly derived from Latin, has evolved into a different language. But what are my criteria for those statements? It’s a very interesting question.

Knitting

Today is my osteoporosis pill day – that dread early half-hour in which I can’t even have a cup of coffee, and am not allowed to go back to bed. I regard the time as mine to dispose of, though, and today I spent it watching the beginning of Meg’s Bavarian Travelling Stitch DVD. It’s chock-a-block with good things, including a large circular swatch which is simply taken for granted.

Interestingly, I thought, she stumbled as anyone might in trying to pronounce "Uberlieferte Strickmuster". But her father was German. He must have turned his back on his native language altogether.

She says there was a Woolgathering with a Travelling Stitch cap. I must try to find it.

And thank you for the comment about Rowan Extra Fine Merino, Vivienne. I regard the matter as settled, although I didn’t get in to John Lewis yesterday to fondle it. Congratulations on that wonderful baby.

Jenny, no, the Games programme doesn’t say anything about the dimensions for a preemie sweater. About 12”-14”, I should guess. The real tinies are presumably kept naked in incubators in conditions as womb-like as possible.

I’ve got fewer than 20 rounds of ribbing left to do on the second sock, and will push hard to finish today so that I won’t have to come back to it, post-Strathardle.

Non-knit

The radio said this morning that last night and this morning were the coldest temperatures recorded for May in 15 years. Those beans have a tough future ahead of them.