I did it. I got my MAC – Migrating Access Code, or something like that – from my current ISP and relayed it to BT and the changeover will happen next Monday and I will probably never be heard from again. I had better print out what I can, while I can, about Knit Camp. I still don’t know what I’m going to do, but it’s as well to have the options open.

We talked about this Big Change while my sister was here. She thought I could run both accounts in parallel for a while. Can you in America? I think maybe it was possible here back in the simple days of dial-up, before the need for MACs.

A good day on the Green Granite Block front, too. The sixth rank is established. I’ll attempt a photograph tomorrow, when I should be far enough forward to let the fifth rank be seen in all its glory.

Greek Helen phoned yesterday, still in Athens. They’re coming to England later this week (as you should know by now from reading Mungo’s latest blog-entry) but going first to David’s family and only next week to us. So one of the things I must do is look out lace yarns and patterns for her to choose from.

I stumbled across the Emily Dickinson shawl (Ravelry link) yesterday – I like it a lot. My mother was a Dickinson scholar of some distinction, and Helen was very fond of her. So it would make some nice connections.

It involves, however, beads, which are against my religion. On the other hand, again, several knitters whose work I admire and respect are devoted to them. Maybe it is time to move forward. Perhaps I should at least buy the pattern and have it ready for Helen’s views. I’m not sure I have any suitably Dickinsian lace yarn, though. Mine tends towards garish.

Summer pudding (& vegetable-growing)

I use Delia Smith’s recipe for summer pudding, except, as I said, that I use only red currants. And take the crusts off the bread -- I don't think DS says that specifically. My husband says, oddly, that there should be a transverse slice of bread in the middle. That’s pretty well impossible, unless you’re using a bowl the size of a mixing bowl. Maybe he retains a vague war-time memory of days when red currants and sugar had to be made to go further? He’s right that the fruit-soaked bread is the whole point.

Mary Lou, I am worried about the removal of “walking onions” from your garden. They sound fun, and I thought I might go on to them when I had mastered bunching ones. I am trying to encourage every sort of vegetable that has the slightest capacity to look after itself. I constantly buy “spring onions” and I thought having something in the garden that would do as a substitute would be a real blessing.

By the way – I set out five salsola soda plants in the end, and they seemed, in the week we were there, to be taking hold very happily. I even tasted one. Yes! It’s not so much the flavour as the delicious and unexpected crunch.