All went well, yesterday. And today should be relatively calm – the nice men from the garage will come and take the car away, and I've got to establish with the insurance company that the Great Computer in the Sky knows that we're insured. That's all, except for breakfast, lunch, tea and supper and blessed Wimbledon.

I watched a bit of it yesterday. I thought it might be consonant with lacy garter stitch, but it's not. The older and slower and clumsier – both mentally and physically – one becomes, the more wonderful is the youth and speed and mental and physical agility of top tennis players. And their white clothes against the background of that green, green grass are truly beautiful. The New Yorker had an article once long ago about the man responsible for the grass. Consider how you and I feel about moths, and then wonder what he must think of a mole.

The big news from the hospital yesterday is that I at last finished the ribbing on the second Pakokku sock. One would think with all the appts we've had this year, my own as well as my husband's, that I could have knocked out half a dozen socks. This one was slightly delayed when I got the ribbing wrong early on, and found it easier to start again than to correct it. Both of those sessions – the getting-wrong and the starting-again – were connected with my malaise.

I had only done a few stitches yesterday when we were called to see the Great Man, but after that session my husband had to have bloods taken, and an xray of his hand, and during that time I finished the ribbing and made a good start on the smooth bit. Things will go faster from here. Indeed, sock-knitting and Wimbledon should combine well enough. My husband says there was a prisoner handcuffed to a policeman in the xray waiting room, a pleasant-looking youth. That was exciting.

The Great Man suggested that my husband take paracetemol for his hand, quite a bit of it. He seemed surprised that that hadn't been tried already. My husband wants a cure, not palliation, but I don't think he entirely understands.

Comments

Roobeedoo, I am glad to hear that they still maintain a Department for Stupid Car Owners where one can go and confess one's delinquency to a human being. Cam, I once drove for a week or so without a license, including a trip from Birmingham to Strathardle. I discovered the fact the night before we left. In the dock, my defence was going to be that I had momentarily confused the British and American ways of writing dates – I thought, when the license expired on 8/7, that that meant the 7^th of August when of course (light laugh, here) it was really the 8^th of July. My husband drove the first shift, that day. I can still feel my tingle of horror and adventure as I drove down the slip road to the motorway after breakfast, without a driving license.

Hilde,  in Britain after the first two or three years of a car's life – I can't remember which, three, I think -- you have to prove that it is road-worthy before you can pay the tax and get the vital disk to display on your windscreen. That's the MOT test our car is going off for today. It's not just brakes and headlights. It's serous stuff. MOT = Ministry of Transport, and I think in fact it is called something else now. And you also have to prove you're insured.

Shandy, thank you for your comforting words. I don't fear dementia for myself – yet. I do think I am becoming overwhelmed by paperwork. It didn't help, feeling ill in the first months of this year. Now, the more I try to catch up the further behind I seem to fall. Peggy, persevere in your wait for “Elizabeth is Missing”. It's worth reading. The author is – what else could she do? – drawing on her own mental experience to guess what dementia could be like for the sufferer, and it's a very interesting experiment.

I am about to start Stephen King's new, non-supernatural, “Mr. Mercedes”, and am also tempted by the new J.K. Rowling, writing as Robert Galbraith.

I got ahead of myself, reporting on the shawl yesterday. I am currently in the home stretch of the 4^th of six garter stitch rounds to finish off the Unst Bridal Shawl. Two more evenings? Depends on Wimbledon, a bit.