Ok. This is it. I am in a mild anxiety-attack state, but at least should have Greek Helen here tomorrow morning to steady me – if Greece is functioning well enough to send her on her way today. That doesn’t sound at all certain, from this morning’s news. Tomorrow she will be shooting out for her early appt with Archie’s delectable housemaster, but I hope to be able to see her and confer for a steadying half-hour before that.

The House of Bruar emailed yesterday to say that they have dispatched my skirt – the one I ordered recently and had hoped to wear tomorrow. So, do I sit behind the front door all day? What about my bath? Going to get the newspapers? A necessary shopping trip, for  food and insulin?

I’ve decided just to forget it, and carry on. I’ve got skirts. I’ve got a tracking number for this one – yesterday evening, it produced the news that the skirt was in Edinburgh, being processed. This morning it says that it is in Tunbridge Wells, ready to be delivered. (I tried again, typing the tracking number with particular care – same result.) It’s not worth worrying.

Rachel phoned last night, which was slightly steadying. I won’t see her, except for a brief howdy-do if all goes well on Tuesday. Her daughter Hellie, a literary agent, has made a big sale to Penguin. They didn’t email, they didn’t phone – a man came and knocked on Hellie’s door.

Yesterday wasn’t much use. My husband got the bit between his teeth on the subject of a particular box of papers, whose absence is indeed odd. The search was heavy work, paper being what it is, and unproductive. Not much else got done. I did wash my hair, and that may have been a mistake. Dirt was fairly subdued and tidy. I now look like the Witch of Endor.

On the knitting front,  I abandoned the Stephen West shawl, despite your kind and helpful comment, Liz. I’ve frogged it. I feel right about the decision, for what that’s worth. I’ll be back one day, perhaps for something smaller, and in zing-ier colours.

I cast on Milano. That’s not saying how far I’ll get. 366 stitches. I’ve done a couple of rows of k1p1.

I don’t think today’s stress will allow for button-choosing for the BSJ at John Lewis. Nor will I try to write tomorrow. Kristie will keep you posted. My photographs can never match hers, but I will attempt to take a picture of Fair Isle from the window of the airplane as we come in to land.

(The BBC program about the Golden Age of Knitting was a bit of a damp squib, last night. There was a gloriously jerky newsreel, at least, of the Prince of Wales teeing-off in the early 20’s, in which you could just see the Fair Isle jersey peeping out in the v-neck of  his jacket. And the Golden Age of TV Presenters in Ridiculous Sweaters, which we somehow missed out on in real life, was interesting. Kaffe was there, immortal.)