“A degree in applianceship” – Chloe, I love it! (Comment yesterday.) I have been afraid of the washing machine all day – and by now, it’s almost too late. I’ll spend some time with the book tonight, and then Daniela and I can tackle it together tomorrow. She’s very bright, although lacking English. I want to be sure she can be trusted not to overload it, so perhaps it’s just as well to face up to it together.

 

The weather was much subdued today. Archie came again, and we got once around the garden. 2318 steps – back in the saddle.

 

I finished off the Evendoon (I hope). I won’t sign it off on the sidebar, however, until Helen has given it a nod of approval tomorrow. It’s looking good. And I cast on the Polliwog!

 

The yarn I am using is meant to be a sock yarn, chosen for washability. It seems finer than the sock yarns I’m used to. But that could be because I haven’t knit socks for a while, and the Evendoon employs Kate Davies’ Schiehallion yarn, which is substantially heavier. (I have to look up the spelling of “Schiehallion” every time I use it.) The Polliwog is written for a heavier-then-sock yarn (as I’ve said before), I'll try to repeat what I did last time, fairly successfully: namely to use the number of stitches required for the largest size, but, guided by the schematic, keep the measurements as near as possible to the smallest. We shall soon see.

 

My Mindful Chef lunch today – a healthy dal – was really very tasty, going some way to make up for last week’s disaster. No reading to report. I need to get stuck in to something weighty, but meanwhile have an essay on “Fontamara” to write in Italian.

 

There was no international rugby last weekend, in case anyone was wondering about its absence here. This weekend, Scotland goes to France. That’s usually a good match.