“Ordinary Love” isn’t all that good – we both emerged dry-eyed – and I was prostrate. Hence yesterday’s silence. It’s well-acted, well-directed, and well-photographed, but the script lets it down. It’s about a middle-aged couple – nearer 60 than 40 – and the wife’s breast cancer. The idea presumably is to show ordinary people in an ordinarily-good marriage dealing with an ordinary disaster. What it mainly lacked was other people – the absence of grown-up children was somewhat explained. But no friends? No family? No jobs? They did have a goldfish. It was a somewhat low-budget number. That may have had something to do with the difficulty.

I’m doing fine with the centre square of Gudrun’s hap – 81 stitches so far, of the 144 I need. It’s seductively just-one-more-row-ish. I’ve gone back and started re-watching the Craftsy class from which it derives.

What will I do when I get to the borders? What did I do last time? My plan is to purl at least one round, as instructed, to see if it’s bearable. If not, I think I’ll try wrapping and turning. I’ve done that successfully long ago – it makes a noticeably stronger line in one of the four corners. The other possibility is to leave one corner open (and therefore knit back and forth). Sew it up afterwards.

The big excitement today is that I have acquired a “Box of Light” from the String Theory Yarn Company. Bliss! It’s a sort of Advent calendar for knitters – 31 envelopes with treats. Some of them are yarn. A cowl pattern is provided. I decided to begin with 18, that being today’s date. That has produced an unbelievably beautiful bit of a Malabrigo yarn – linen and silk and merino. You’re meant to knit each day’s bit into the cowl and then go back to your real project. Maybe I will….

We had a new Andrew and Andrea yesterday. I was too prostrate even to start watching, nor have I done so today. Archie came, and we got some things done, including wrapping the few Christmas presents I am giving. James must be on his way here at this very moment (see Sunday). Tomorrow threatens to be another day of prostration.

A columnist in the Times said the other day that she had been visiting her mother – in her 90’s, in a care home, sleeps most of the time, rarely recognises her daughter when awake. This time she said, “I am so worried about Christmas. I haven’t done anything…”

Terrifying.