Last night’s problems were resolved shortly before midnight, by two nurses who replaced my husband’s catheter, leaving me weary today (Perdita seems fine) but otherwise OK. The standard of care we receive continues to be astonishing.

An old friend and one-time next-door neighbour from Birmingham came to call today. She said that when her 90+-year-old mother was in hospital towards the end of her life, the social worker called the family in and said that Mrs Molnar would have to be out in a week (i.e., you’ve got to organise care and pay for it). I don’t entirely see why Scotland doesn’t sink beneath the waves, providing us with so much.

Not much knitting today, what with Nina’s visit and general exhaustion. But I am well embarked on the second half of the tenth repeat of the centre pattern of Mrs Hunter’s shawl. Each repeat consists of two rows of roundels, the second one offset.

I learn, a bit too late, that the EYF organisers were here (=around the corner) at Kathy’s Knits today, with a trunk show of patterns from Wool Tribe, the EYF magazine. I doubt if I could have fitted it in, even had I known, and it would have increased the stress of the day to try. I'm sort of sorry, anyway, to have missed it.

What I did do yesterday was to email Franklin urging him to book a gig at next year’s EYF. (I did that last year, too, with no result.) He’s all we lack. I’m sure they’re right in claiming to be “the UK’s premier urban hand-knitting show”. Presumably “urban” is included so that they don’t seem to be pushing ahead of Shetland Wool Week – otherwise, I can’t think of any rival claimants. Having all classes and all free-range market tickets sold out six weeks in advance would make Vogue Knitting Live itself feel a bit envious.

Presumably they are looking for bigger premises for next year. Both the vendors and the knitters must be intensely frustrated at the thought of all those people, keen to buy yarn, being kept outside the doors.

I also went to the Baa Ram Ewe website to look at their Dovestone DK, recommended for the shorter Ancasta. It looks pretty wonderful, both in terms of colour and of composition – none of your poncy merino, it is a blend of the wool of three breeds of British sheep. (I gather the British climate is too cold and damp for the delicate chests of merinos.) I haven’t emailed them yet, but will soon. It is sufficiently expensive that I would be glad for guidance on how much to buy – which Laine doesn’t provide. And sufficiently glorious, that I hope they will say they’re bringing truckloads to the EYF and I don’t have to choose a colour now.