A dull, grey day. I didn’t go out – couldn’t, really, because the man was coming to fix the telephone. He came, he fixed it – but he said that my falls alarm was causing the problem. So we (=he and I) rang up the falls alarm people and they came, this afternoon, and took the old alarm away and replaced it with a digital one. It operates by magic, like a mobile telephone, and isn’t connected to the land line at all. So that should be that. Alexander is coming to see me tomorrow, and with luck we’ll walk.

 

I am well advanced with the first sleeve of the Aroon jacket, and prepared to shorten it if I see fit. Babies – children in general – are better without too much sleeve.

 

And Cully’s book came, days sooner than expected. It’s going to be useful. I don’t think I’ve ever knit a plain-vanilla BSJ. I first heard of EZ in an article in one of our Sunday papers. We were invited to send a sae (remember them?) to receive in return a copy of the pattern. I sent the envelope and I got the pattern, mimeographed – that, too, should help date this episode. I knit it many times, and the pregnancy-code names of many of its recipients are inscribed on the pattern. But now I’m not sure where it is, and don’t want to waste time looking. That pattern was a slight variation on the original – it was double-breasted, which meant that the sides weren’t quite on the square. This time I’ll do it EZ’s way, with the help of Cully’s annotations. It will also be possible, at last, to plan it somewhat: he has useful diagrams to show where stripes will end up, depending on when you introduce them.

 

Wordle: yesterday I got RU__E in three. I guessed RUBLE, and it wasn’t for many hours that I realised that that isn’t how you spell “rouble”. Is it an acceptable American spelling? Wordle accepted it, and you’re not allowed to enter nonsense. But it was, of course, wrong. Then I thought of RUCHE and was desperately proud of myself and typed it in with every confidence of being right, but I wasn’t. I couldn’t think of any more words so my sixth guess was one that couldn’t be right, just to see the answer. That guess gave me a brown “P”: if I’d done that earlier, I might have got RUPEE. Today I got three greens with my starter word, and added a fourth with the second guess. But alas! it was one of those Wordle specials where several letters were possible for the empty spot, and no way to choose except by guesswork. I got it in 5.

C spends a lot of time looking after wee Hamish. Today he was allowed to choose what clothes he wanted to put on:

I am flattered, of course, but I also think he has shewn a commendable sense of colour harmony.