Sunday, December 13, 2020

 

Another day. The second sleeve of the Evendoon has been somewhat advanced. Moorecat, you’re absolutely right that I need a bowl on my lap. I mean to use my wooden salad bowl, which is right there beside my chair. It is full of little bits of things – twists of yarn from former projects which I must now harden my heart and throw away. Meg says somewhere that she never throws anything away (any yarn, she means) – that’s a line it’s hard to forget. But completely irrelevant here. I'll get that done tomorrow.

 

I still haven’t taken a picture for you. The light goes so early.

 

Helen came, with her dog Farouk, and we got around the garden in a gentle rain. He’s a nice dog.

 

Language: we lived in Glasgow in Early Married Life – all four children were born there, in fact. In those days, workmen used to set forth in the morning with cans containing tea leaves and sugar. At lunch time they would knock on somebody’s door and ask for hot water. (We spent the academic year 1960-61 at Smith College in Massachusetts, and were interested to learn that workmen brought along their own electric percolators.) This happened once when my mother was staying with us, and I happened to be out. She told me about it afterwards. She had had to send the man away because she couldn’t understand what he wanted. I explained. She said, I thought maybe that was it.

 

Brexit is getting exciting, in these final few days. Helen is anti-EU, after all her years in Greece.

 

And Covid is fairly exciting, too. I have no idea when I might expect to get vaccinated. The website of my GP’s practice is no help.

9 comments:

  1. My uncle, in the South, is having his vaccination on Friday!

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  2. =Tamar2:02 AM

    I'm told I have about 800,000 people ahead of me. I can wait.

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  3. Anonymous2:03 AM

    Jean, an excellent BBC podcast is "How to vaccinate the world" - an offshoot of "More or less", the statistics podcast that I think you or another commenter first directed me to. Monday's instalment of the vaccination podcast was all about the serious complexity of actually rolling out the vaccine at a population level - including good comments from a GP about how complicated it's going to be - making all the appointments, making sure people's questions are answered, and rolling people through at a quick pace and with COVID-required protecting and distancing. I wish people here in Canada would all listen as we anticipate our first delivery, with a much more thinly spread population than the UK's and with all the issues of separate provincial jurisdictions. Thanks so much, whoever directed me to More or Less - my former boss, a more senior epidemiologist than I, also listens, with her epidemiologist husband (they met at grad school in Edinburgh in the 60s).

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    1. Thanks Beth, I’m always looking for new podcasts and this one sounds great.

      Anna usually in Toronto

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  4. Anonymous6:36 AM

    Yes, so much going on in the world, knitting is a wonderful anchor.

    re covid vaccinations, my 80+ parents in London get their first jabs this Thursday, 17th.They have to go to a big, designated "centre" rather than to the GP or hospital.
    JennyS

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  5. Anonymous12:54 PM

    Does anyone remember how the polio vaccine was first administered? Chloe

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    1. I remember getting the polio vaccine on a lump of sugar... between 1960 and 1964. I don't remember hearing about the sickness before that. In high school in Argentina we had a classmate who used crutches because of polio... after that I became pro any kind of vaccination I can get.

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  6. I think the first vaccine was an injection - in the UK - but afterwards it was the pink drip on a sugar cube. I was so glad to get it - my Pa was a bit dubious, but Mum won that one. I had seen all those stories about brave little children in iron lungs, and at that young age had decided I would honestly rather be dead.

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  7. Ha! Reading on my phone in bed while the wind howls outside - I tried using Chrome and it let me comment! Jean thank you for always writing, and I can’t imagine keeping every scrap of yarn. My parents should get the vaccine fairly soon being in their eighties, but not just yet.
    Anna usually in Toronto

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