I enjoyed my Monday, just as hoped. I did a Sudoku and shopped and cooked and washed and ironed and cleaned a bit and knitted a lot and went to bed feeling that the edges of the chaos which surround me had been pushed back just a little bit.

The first outré sock is within hailing distance of the heel flap. I hope to reach it today. I love what's happening.

I think the Jimmy Bean package is somehow trackable, and I may try that if it doesn’t declare itself today or tomorrow.

Miscellaneous

I learn from the Historic Knitting Group this morning that Laurie Kynaston (good Greek name) is spending a year knitting her way through “Weldon’s Practical Needlework” as re-published by Interweave. She must be young, to have a year to spare!

Victorian knitting patterns seem suddenly to be everywhere. Perhaps Franklin started it with his articles in Knitty. Sharon Miller’s “Love Darg” book is a brilliant example. Donna Druchunas is at it in the current issue of Piecework. I’m not seriously tempted, but it’s interesting reading. Interesting, too, to think about the other women knitting serious sweaters for fishermen and farmers at the same time, unknown to Weldon.

Don’t worry about me and Knit Now, Roobeedoo. I had a look at the website, but they didn’t seem to offer a single copy, or a digital version for my dear iPad. I don’t think Waitrose, where I shop, is on their distribution list, either, although I’ll look when I go today. I’m often in Tesco – eventually I’ll track it down.

Your day in Edinburgh sounds enormously jolly!

Politics

I’d be inclined to bet that the president will be re-elected, and I’ll be glad when it happens. But things are grimmer than they were four years ago. His presidency has been a disappointment in a lot of ways, although I think his critics underestimate the effect of the world’s economic problems and of the extraordinary polarisation of American politics. As you say, Woollybits.

And the money they spend on getting elected is terrifying, as you say, Catdownunder. I think both of these factors (polarisation and spending) have become exponentially worse since I was young and lived there and experienced presidential elections first-hand.

No, all I meant was that if Romney is the candidate I can sit back and watch the goings-on without undue anxiety. President Gingrich might be paralysed at home, but what would he do to the world?

The Shouts and Murmers page in (I believe) the last New Yorker but one imagined President Romney working a meeting of the G8 in the style he apparently applies at political rallies. It’s very funny.