Not my favourite day in the calendar, and this November 30 promises to be difficult.

Our niece phoned last night to advise against our scheduled hospital visit today, because of the weather. Her account of her day made Edinburgh sound worse than I had grasped, although I knew we had had no rubbish collection

no post and no traffic wardens, down here in Drummond Place. The amount of snow, as you can see, is not all that terrific. It wouldn’t slow us down much in K*rkmichael or CT. I’ll go have a look at the car soon and see how much work would be involved in digging it out.

But the parallel problem is that I now know my new credit card is here in Edinburgh. The courier didn’t deliver it yesterday because of “adverse weather conditions”. Conditions are even more adverse today: some snow fell in the night, and more is forecast. So maybe we are pinned down to the house, waiting for it? or maybe not? There are things that need doing at bank, post office and chemist. I’ll see if I can glean any information from UPS by telephone.

Our niece said there is still no news about C.’s tests. Somehow the impression has been gathered that these matters are discussed by the drs on Thursdays, before dissemination. The majority of people, I think, would come in on foot and receive the news in an outpatient appointment. C. has been in hospital a remarkable length of time, by modern standards – nearly four weeks now. Release is at least being discussed.

Meanwhile she is feeling nauseous again – the symptom that got her into this mess in the first place. She is aware of not being able to consume the food needed to recover strength. She had lost a lot of weight before being diagnosed (not having had all that much to start with), and more, presumably, during the ten days on either side of the operation.

And the stoma is sore.

Knitting

The scarf is about seven feet long, and I will probably stop soon. I don't like the way the edges pull it in and narrow it, due to weight. What does happen with Big Wool and a 10-foot scarf?


The big news is that VKB #4 – apparently a very nice copy – sold for £260 on eBay yesterday. I am flabbergasted. I don’t seem to have a note of what I paid for mine, but I can tell you that three years ago No.’s 1, 2 and 3 came up together as one lot – I already had them, and wasn’t involved – and went for £112 for all three. (Something of a bargain, I thought at the time.)

My technique when I recently bought #7, you’ll remember, was to wait until the last 45 seconds and then put in a bid which was far more, I thought, than anyone would pay for a Vogue Knitting Book. It worked fine – the price I paid was stiff, but it was less than £100 and far less than I had bid. However, my supposed killer bid was also a lot less than £260. If yesterday’s crazy bidders had been lurking, I would have failed. Fortunately it is difficult to worry in retrospect.