I woke up to Test Match Special. I was cheering for Bangladesh, but, alas! just like Scotland and the Calcutta Cup, it was not to be. (Bangladesh has never beaten England in a test match. Today, they got within 22 runs or so. Which sounds comical to a baseball fan.)

I am constantly amused by the passionate love for cricket – and it’s a very odd game, believe me – which the British Empire left behind in the sub-continent and the West Indies. And Australia and New Zealand, of course, but that's different because no blood was shed in throwing off the yoke.

Anyway…

I knocked off one of the biggies on my to-do list yesterday, namely packaging the Hansel Hap for the post. I thought I could at least finish the Whiskey Barrel socks in the evening, and do the same for them – smaller, easier – but I felt ill after my afternoon meal and achieved nothing. I think I’m better this morning, but am not quite sure.

I also got two more rows of Uncia done, as Shandy speeds ahead. I’ve done 378 rows, of 400. If I keep at it, I’ll get there. I wrapped myself in the Tokyo shawl as I knit, and it’s wonderful. I think perhaps its bias construction lets it adhere to the shoulders in a particularly successful way.

And the second Mosaic sock is a few rows short of the toe shaping.

I’ve also got the half-brioche sweater on the go, but what with not feeling well and Queen Victoria having gone away and left me, there hasn’t been much in the way of evenings. (The Queen has survived her first childbirth – a princess.) James and Cathy recommend Poldark.

Dr Who

The original, mimeographed instructions that the BBC used to send to enquirers about the Dr Who scarf have re-surfaced on the internet. The scarf also has its own website, with recommendations for modern yarns to reproduce the original colours. The legend is that the producer bought an armload of yarns and gave them to a knitter (her name is preserved, but I’m not going to look it up just now) and asked her to knit a garter stitch scarf. She assumed that she was meant to knit all the yarn, and the rest is history.

My original copy of EZ's Baby Surprise is a similar mimeographed hand-out that I got by sending off an s.a.e. to the Sunday Times.

The colours of the original Who scarf are particularly good, better than any Who-type scarf I can remember. It’s soothing winter knitting. I’m just saying.