Well, the big news is, I got my iPadAir2. Goodness, it's wonderful. I should be doing more adventurous things with it – watching movies, or making them. Would iPad for Dummies help?

Even with the Post Office gone, and staying out of Poundland, I had a lot of errands to do up the hill yesterday. John Lewis was part of the circuit, and there were the iPads, and I trust their service, so I just bought it there. The man at the till offered to set it up for me for £20 – there were notices up about that option– but I declined so he offered to set it up for me for free. I am pleased to say that I didn't disgrace myself by forgetting my identity or either of the necessary passwords.

The set-up included registering it so it ought to be findable now with the Find-My-iPad app.

So I still haven't seen the Apple Shop.

I've reinstalled Zite, after a bit of password fuss, and it remembers my “magazine”. I've got Kindle-for-iPad, too. The cloud is full of my old books, sure enough, but I think the ones I had on the Device aren't there any more, understandably. I bought a book, just to see whether Amazon would deliver it to the missing iPad, but no, Amazon has automatically named the new one “Jean's 2^nd iPad” and the book came there.

(It is “This House of Grief”, a real-life account of an Australian murder trial, very well reviewed lately and with lots of stars on Amazon. It starts with a disconcerting jauntiness but may settle down.)

As for knitting, I went on with the sock. There are about 20 rounds to go before the toe shaping.

I was right – I have two more skeins of Pakokku “Into the Whirled”, Brandywine and Gwydir. And also a skein of Rowan Fine Art. I thought that one was all natural, and therefore perhaps not tough enough for socks, but it has 25% polyamide like everybody else, and should do fine. On the other hand, is it sightly finer than other sock yarns?

I now need to put my husband's socks and shoes on for him which has given me a new and interesting viewpoint on socks. I remember trying some variations of fit for him, but my notes, alas! don't make it clear which variation applies to which pair of socks. Some are distinctly better than others.

I like the way the Oliver shaping fits, although I now can't remember how it's done. It should be easy enough to recover. For at least one pair, I used 72 stitches insead of 64 for the leg, and then narrowed down for the foot in the course of the gusset shaping. I think that's too floppy. Perhaps I could try counting stitches the next time he's wearing a sock that really seems to fit smartly.

Non-knit, weather

I'm sorry to hear America is still having so much winter – my sister says the same of CT.

Groundhog Day used to puzzle me as a child. Of course there are six more weeks of winter on February 2. I have since learned that it originates as a belief in the north of England, rather like the one about St Swithin's day later on in the year, no mention of groundhogs but the same idea – a dull day means spring, a bright one, more winter. It makes much more sense, here. Either might happen.

February 2^nd is the Feast of the Purification. The groundhog effectively removes any religious connotation which might offend American sensibilities.