No walk today. It was colder, although still open and dry – but I didn’t feel well. I’m coming around now.

 

Three more days until the solstice.

 

However, the main excitement of the day is not any of that, but the arrival of Helen’s youngest son Fergus from Bristol University yesterday evening. She stopped off here with some eggs for me, on the way to the station to meet him. He tested positive for Covid last night – presumably at her instigation – and again this morning, so they are all self-isolating. Her husband David is going to come back from Thessaloniki anyway, as planned, and isolate with them. I think he’s due on Thursday. I don’t know what their middle son Mungo is going to do – he was due home from London one day soon. Meanwhile Fergus feels fine. We think he had Covid last year, when he first went to university.

 

But all this means that I’ll be on my own again, like last year, on Christmas Day. Dear friends from Birmingham had planned to come – they stay with me while visiting their son who lives nearby in a small house. But they have just begged off, too – not a surprise.

 

I do hope I live long enough to look back on all this.

 

No knitting. I spent the potentially active part of the day feeling ill.

 

Language

 

I am increasingly irritated these days by the phrase “mitigate against”, meaning “mitigate”. It is presumably derived by false analogy from “militate against”. I heard it first (on television) from Arlene Foster, then the Northern Ireland supremo, and put it down to ignorance. But it is getting more and more common, and I have heard it recently from a BBC announcer.

 

I’m feeling a bit braver this evening, although it is equally dark. A smidgen darker, in fact. Daniella and I got around the garden. That’s three days in a row. The weather has been very pleasant and open. And the little green noses of the 2022 daffodils and crocuses are appearing – and even of the 2022 wild garlic, I think.

 

Today’s crisis was that I couldn’t charge my iPad last night. That iPad is the umbilical cord connecting me to the world. It was at that point about 20% charged, which is not nearly enough to get me through a day. Frist thing this morning I ordered a new charger from Amazon, and they promised to deliver it by 10 p.m. When Daniela got here she found my spare in a trice (I thot I had another) so the crisis was over – but now I am faced with sitting up until ten. We have a good-sized letter box, but a charger could well be packed in plastic and then in a cardboard box. Amazon would leave it amongst my pots, but the doorbell would blast me from sleep. It’s all my own fault, too.

 

Perhaps I will have to sit up and knit.

 

A dear neighbour died last week – a well-loved local eccentric who will be much missed. This time of year, already grim, is often freighted with such news.

 

The Covid numbers are scary.

 

My grandson Joe in London has it, or so his mother Rachel says. He is in bed with total feebleness (sounds like me). He’s done a home test, and it’s positive. Otherwise he has had no contact with drs, I gather: which presumably means he doesn’t show up on the statistics. I wonder how many other sufferers are in that category?

 

It was grand having James here. He went off on the train this morning. Apart from anything else, it was a comfort in the ever-encroaching darkness not to have to worry quite so much about falling. For three nights, I could shout for James. He and I got all the way around the garden yesterday; Daniela and I did so again this morning. Maybe I’m a teeny bit stronger?

 

Almost no knitting, but I did a bit this morning, listening to the new Americast.

 

YouTube sends me lots of messages about my “friends” these days, half a dozen a day. But nothing from Franklin. Until recently, his were the only messages that came through to my in-box.

 

The weather has turned milder. Helen came this morning, and we walked all the way around the garden. The secret is just to keep on going. I think I feel less prostrate than I did a week ago when we last did it,

 

And I’ve knit on. A measurement this morning suggests about 11”. I’m aiming for 12, or 12 ½. Progress. This morning I watched the Andrew Marr show, which was a bit of a disappointment, Newspapers suggest that Johnson’s days as Prime Minister are numbered. Marr made it sound less serious. I wonder what Prime Minister says to Monarch, and she to him, in situations like this. They confer every week.

 

I am reading, although I blush to admit it, Stephen King’s “Salem’s Lot”. Inspired by last week’s conversation with Archie. He’s keen on horror, and very knowledgeable on the subject. He has long since left King behind in favour of Lovecraft and Ligotti. I don’t think I had ever heard of either.

 

I was slightly surprised to find Salem’s Lot on my Kindle, therefore free to read. But have I read it before? It doesn’t feel familiar. It’s really rather good. He blends traditional Gothic horror with small-town Maine to telling effect. I find it so scary that I don’t read it after sunset, and am interleaving it with “Pride and Prejudice”. Even there, I find myself a bit uneasy: Lydia has eloped with Wickham. But could he be one of the un-dead?...Or could she?... And they’re coming to Longbourne next week…

 

James is coming here tomorrow. I don’t know the details. I’ve got to go to the GP at midday to have some “bloods” taken. The NHS has a lot to catch up on. Why can’t they leave me alone? And (see preceding paragraph) what’s all this about blood?

 

But anyway, if I’m silent in the next few days, it will be because James is here. I’ll let you know about the ramen in due course.

 

 

 

Nothing to report. Daniela couldn’t come – she’ll be here tomorrow. Helen popped in this morning with the weekend Financial Times. Otherwise I’ve seen no one. There must be lots of oldies who live alone for whom every day is like this. I’m very lucky. I couldn’t sustain it.

 

C., who usually comes at the weekend, is having sinus problems. She and I haven’t been to Mass for months, but we still get the parish newsletter. It includes the Sunday gospel for the week. The one received today begins, “The multitudes asked him, ‘What then shall we do?’ And he answered them, ‘He who has two coats, let him share with him who has none.’”

 

Which pretty well answers the question about Daniela’s root canal work.

 

Colder today. I didn’t feel up to exercise when Daniela came, but later on we walked to the corner and back. Better than nothing.

 

I’ve listened to “Americast”. I think they were getting a bit silly and Christmas-y but it was nevertheless interesting. The most interesting part was about guns in America, and that remarkable Christmas card. And I got some knitting done. I think it’s time for another measurement, wherein I will discover that I’ve achieved another quarter of an inch. Tomorrow.

 

Comments

 

Thank you for them, as always. Mary Lou, I’m not at all sure that I know what a helical stripe is, but I trust you will go public with the pattern, and I look forward to seeing it.

 

Kirsten, I made that mistake once, on a border-inwards Gladys Amedro shawl. You start with the entire edging, then join it into a circle, pick up stitches for the four borders, and knit inwards. When the fatal mistake happened, it wasn’t by any means on the first shawl I had knit that way, and I was always (I thought) fanatically careful not to twist the edging. When I discovered the mistake past any doubt, I took scissors to the offending corner. You could scarcely do that with a jumper. Sympathy.

 

Crochet66, Yes, I think I might bring home a doggy bag and add it to my Boxing Day ramen. I like the idea of your Christmas Dinner Soup. I’m sure it’s delicious.

 

Thank you for your remarks about Daniela’s root canal. Helen has got one of her own in the next few days, and will press the dentist about cost. Even if it is theoretically possible on the NHS, we are reluctant to toss Daniela back to the dentist who has achieved so little and made her so unhappy in the last few months.

 

A good day. The sun shone, the wind held off. Archie came, and we got a bit further around the garden than Daniela and I managed yesterday. I knit a bit. A new “Americast” is up – maybe I’ll even knit a bit more and listen to it this evening.

 

Although just for the moment, British politics are more interesting than American. And Boris Johnson has crowned a busy week (it’s not even over) by having a baby.

 

I think maybe ramen will be the answer to my question, what-to-eat-on-Boxing-Day-without-leftovers. The making of it is just complicated enough to keep one busy, and the eating of it is blissfully soothing.

 

Dentistry: I don’t know what a “dam” is, and I suspect I’m glad I don’t. I am worried about Daniela’s root canal. Is it even possible on the NHS, or will they just yank the tooth? The cost, however appalling, is less than a week of residential care, which is what she is saving me from.

 Not a bad day. Daniela had a good night’s sleep, and feels much better. I remain concerned about what happens next – what our expensive dentist did yesterday was only meant to be temporary. The next step -- a permanent crown -- is too expensive for philanthropy.

 

Alexander came over, in good form. I talked to him about ramen. He is enthusiastic, as in Helen, from completely different starting-points, confirming my suspicion that I could go on tweaking it forever. James is meant to be coming next week, Covid and weather permitting. I’ll make some for him.

 

Yesterday we had the edge of the second winter storm, but the weather today was positively benevolent. Daniela and I went walking, and got to the garden. I think it may be a week since I’ve been out. Tomorrow I will be pinned to the spot by an expected delivery (some frozen meals to feed James with, when he’s not having ramen). We shall see. It may work out, or the weather may have turned.

 

And I got some knitting done, I’m sure without affecting the measurement in the slightest. I watched Prime Minister’s Questions on my newly-restored television, without learning much (we're having a crisis), but it provided a good background for knitting.

 

Joni, thank you (comment yesterday). I’ve been to Facebook and caught up with Franklin a bit. It used to be – up until last week – that I would be notified of each of his posts in my email account, almost always between 8 and 9 in the morning. When that stopped, I assumed he had stopped, but I was wrong. I continue to be notified of boring contributions from other people I follow. Logging on to Facebook and tracking him down is too much like work, except for occasionally. I will have to let him drift away.

 

 

 Pearl Harbor Day

It’s been a fairly exciting day – no knitting. I did get back into the sitting room yesterday evening and did a (very little) bit while watching a Panorama program about the private equity firms which own and profit from care homes. Maybe I can profit from that experience to get back in there this evening.

Today’s excitement stemmed from (a) a toothache which Daniela has been suffering from, badly, for a couple of months; and (b) an accountant who has been engaged to straighten out my income tax.

We (=Helen and I)  packed Daniela off to our expensive local dentist, who thinks the problem is due to a root canal job begun but not completed when she was in Rumania in the summer. But even he was a bit uncertain. Helen went along to translate. Both are fluent in Greek, although that is not (obviously) the first language of either.

The accountant came in the afternoon and seemed very competent and efficient. It’s going to cost a lot – in her fees, and perhaps in unpaid income tax. But I will feel at peace with the world. Which I do anyway, by dint of not thinking about income tax.

 

We haven’t heard from Franklin in the last few days.

 

 

 

It turns out that the blasted rowan tree is the one down the commonty – the one by the house which protects us from witches, is fine.

 

Cookery

 

I have become greatly enamoured of ramen. I made some for my lunch the other day, using the recipe from “Nigella Express”. She has also done a YouTube video of the same recipe. It’s not quite as express as she would have it, but not bad, and very soothing. It contains everything the human frame requires – protein, carbohydrate, abundant veggies, all almost infinitely variable. Read the Wikipedia entry and then Google a bit, if you’re at all interested. I shall go on at least for a bit, tweaking the original recipe in one way or another.

I used a dried wild mushroom mix, instead of the dried shitake specified. I was surprised to find "honey fungus" among the ingredients. James has got some of that, killing a favourite tree. Should he have it for lunch?

 

Knitting

 

Not much, but at least I’m knitting. The body of the Machu Picchu sweater is now 10 ¼” long. I don’t dare look back to see what it measured last time. Slowly as it’s progressing, the ball of yarn seems to be diminishing nicely.

 

I signed up for Kate Davies’ new club, not without difficulty.

 

Thank you (comments yesterday), Eileen and Gemma. What I don’t need is another project (or more yarn), with a new great-grandchild looming and the Calcutta Cup to be remembered. But it’s a very tempting thought. It might be just the thing to get me going again. And I do love twisted stitch.

 

It’s dark, again. I’ll be glad when I know that Helen is safely back from Kirkmichael.

 

She wrote last night: “The only damage is to the rowan tree – it’s split at the base”. Many Scottish and Irish houses have a Rowan tree, as Google will tell you – they’re to ward off witches. Will ours grow from the roots? Will witches be impressed by a secondary growth? I trust Helen will have a photograph. I deplore superstition, but it seems nevertheless an ill omen with which to face 2022. Maybe it would be better to plant another one. Mr Cochrane the gardener would have to build a little house for it, to ward off deer.

 

It has been a quiet day – in fact I haven’t seen anyone, which is unusual. I did a fair amount of knitting, interleaved with reading Le Carre – goodness, he’s good – and trying with little success to do some more on-line Christmas shopping.

 

Kate Davies’ new club, “Argyll’s Secret Coast”, opens tomorrow. I will be there in the early-morning queue. Her clubs are a wonderful way to navigate the dark months, and the Argyll coast is close to home, in a sense: Loch Fyne, where Alexander and Ketki live, is a sea loch opening off it.

 

(I’ve just had a message from Helen – she’s safely back.)

 

Comment

 

Beverly, you’ve said it. The “Carp-Beth” pattern is in grey only. KD’s one fault is that she doesn’t offer yarn options, as (for instance) Brooklyn Tweed and Carol Sunday do. She even offers some kits which don’t specify what yarn is supplied. I’m sure one could look up the patterns in Ravelry and find out – it might even be possible by that means to see whether the Carp-Beth could be knit in Schiehallion, my fave of her coloured yarns. But that’s too much work for my dulled solstice brain.

 

 

 

Goodness, its’s dark. Less than three weeks to go, now, until the solstice. Helen has gone up to Kirkmichael to see how everything is, since the storm. We know from the wonderful man who tends the garden that there are no trees down on or near the house. That’s a start. And since he has electricity, we probably do too. A neighbour has reported that there is a dead deer in the garden. The gardener will deal with it. Helen checked in advance that there is no serious snow – but today has been so very dark that I fear some may be about to fall tonight. Our house is six feet or so below the level of the road – getting up the driveway can be difficult (=impossible) in wet or snowy weather.

 

I’m rather glad to be excused by age from doing battle with the dark midwinter in Strathardle.

 

Otherwise, there is little to report. I did some knitting this morning while watching Part Two of the much-discussed BBC “The Princes and the Press”. I thought it was boring. I long to be knitting bright colour, such as Machu Picchu will provide – but not until the summer solstice, at the rate I’m going. I stlll mean to persevere until the armhole before switching to more urgent projects.

 

I like Kate Davies’ new “Carp-beth” pattern, a twisted stitch variation on her previous “Carbeth”. It’s cropped, which I don’t like, but could be easily lengthened. It’s not bright, fortunately, or I might be tempted to order it – the very last thing I need.

 

Comments

 

You’re right, Tamar – there are few things so sweet as the self-solving problem.

 

Mary Lou (and anyone else interested) – I presume “Americast” is available in the US. I find it very entertaining. Alas, one of the pivotal characters, the BBC American editor Jon Sopel, is about to come back to London. I am sure his replacement will be excellent as far as reporting America is concerned, but will she fit into the little group with anything like the same chemistry?

 

Other

 

My grandson Thomas, son of Alexander and Ketki, went to a St Andrew’s Night dinner at his school last week. The significance of the picture is that Thomas’ bow tie was the only one (I am told) which was self-tied. Even the headmaster and deputy head were wearing snap-ons. My husband would have been very proud. What agony that was, the few times we went anywhere that it was required.

 

Crochet66 and Between Me and You (comments yesterday): You were right, although that website didn’t sound at all like the problems I was suffering from. The television was fine this morning: pictures, sound. I switched it off and listened to my favourite podcast, the BBC’s “Americast”. There was a new one up.

 

And did a bit of knitting. 10” have been accomplished, of the 12” I want for the body. I really must get on faster than this.

 

 

Shandy, I was speaking partly in irony, when I suggested that Alexander could solve my television problem because he was a man. Sure enough, things are now much worse than they were yesterday. He switched the Virgin cable box off and on again – always worth trying – and now the screen says “Starting up…” but never gets past that point. I fear I may have to ring up Virgin. Archie is coming tomorrow. He won’t be able to help, I don’t think – despite being a young man -- but might be willing to do the phoning. Which will, of course, take hours.

 

I don’t watch much television, as I’ve said, and I’ve got my beloved iPad on which a certain amount can be viewed. And I don’t have my husband here being cross – he did like to watch television in the evenings, and would expect me to be able to switch it on for him.

 

I got up feeling very shaky this morning, and have accomplished nothing but have at least not fallen down and perhaps feel slightly better.

 

I’ve done a bit of on-line theoretical Christmas shopping (no expenditure yet), but so far – this has happened in other years – have found nothing except presents I would like for myself.

 

The newspapers and magazines are stuffed to the gills with Christmas Dinner in one form or another. Someone should write an article about how to manage if you live alone and can count on being asked out on The Day (=me). What do you eat for the next four days, while everyone else is feasting on leftovers?

Still no cheetahs.

 

 

Here we are in December, and I always feel that’s not quite so bad. Or so bad it’s funny. Much as when, at the other end of the calendar, May segues into June and you know that the glorious spring is over, or nearly.

 

I haven’t done any walking. Not good. We had a whole day of mild weather, but it’s now bitter cold again.

 

I’ve been knitting, and listening to podcasts. I’ll measure again tomorrow, and be glad if I’ve added half an inch. It’s a long way around. My television – which I don’t watch very often – has lost its sound, although it otherwise seems to be in good health and spirits. Alexander is coming tomorrow. He’s a man, and therefore ought to be able to fix it.  I’m sure it’s just a matter of figuring out which button to press on one of the two zappers, but they have all defeated me. I’ve probably made the problem worse by trying.

 

No cheetahs.

 

It's bitter cold. I didn’t try walking. I feel very feeble. But otherwise it’s been a good day.

 

I got a fair amount of knitting done while watching Fruity Knitting’s interview with Kaffe this morning. Highly recommended. Andrea prepares brilliantly for an interview, and I think Kaffe appreciated it. I have been a fan of his for years and years, have many books, have heard him talk in person twice, once here in Edinburgh, once in Birmingham. But I learned a lot. Do I want to buy his new book, “Kaffe Fassett in the Studio”? Or “Dreaming in Colour”?  the autobiography on which, I think, Andrea relied.

 

 I think my Fassett-knitting days are behind me. I’ve done quite a few. Back in some decade or other, Rowan used to put them out as kits. They didn’t sell desperately well, and there were bargains to be had in the January sales. Alas, no longer.

 

Kirsten (comment yesterday), I don’t entirely understand why I can’t watch rubbish television and knit after supper, as I did for many years. It ought to be easier now. My husband always wanted his tea, at teatime, and its consumption meant that supper was often very late. Freed of that constraint, I eat early, if at all – but then just slide off to bed. Very feeble. We’ve got more of The Princes and the Press tonight, but I fear I will postpone it until tomorrow.

 

I’m sorry to have let you down yesterday. Helen and I got all the way around the garden, and it pretty well did for me. In the early evening, it seemed more prudent to get along the passage to bed – it’s quite a long way – than to attempt blog-writing.

 

You can deduce from that. that Helen is safely home. She seems in very good shape. She got to Greece by taking a train to London and then flying to Thessaloniki. There are no direct flights from Edinburgh. I didn’t know how she was planning to return. During Friday’s storm -- it happened all right, after I wrote to you -- the Edinburgh Airport website showed flights landing one after another; no trains were running north of Newcastle. Indeed they still aren’t. Fortunately, she did that lap by air. She says the landing was more than a bit scary.

 

C. came this morning, and the sun was shining. We got no further than the doorstep, however. There was a sprinkling of snow and the possibility of invisible frost, and I am pretty paranoid about falling.

 

No cheetahs to be seen, today or yesterday.

 

Knitting

 

None has been done. I hope to polish off a few stitches at least this evening, watching the Fruity Knitting interview with Kaffe. Tamar, comment Friday, you’re absolutely right that there’s no use worrying about knitting, That’s why I never knit for Christmas – although if I happen to have something ready for someone, they might find it under the tree. I’ve got myself into a bit of a mess, but so what? I wouldn't wish away either the 2021 Calcutta Cup or the new great-grandbaby.

 

 

 

We’re supposed to be having a storm tonight, but it doesn’t seem to have started yet. There’s some wind. Helen is due in from Greece this evening, and I should see her tomorrow, once she has collected her dog.

 

I haven’t done much, except to look knitting in the face and get scared. The Calcutta Cup is in early February next year – in the Good Old Days it was always the last match of the Five Nations series, whether here or in London. (That would have been sometime in March.) The new great-grandchild is due in April, I don’t know whether early or late. And here I sit knitting something else entirely (when I knit at all) – Carol Sunday’s Machu Picchu sweater. I want to get it up to the underarm before I abandon it. It needs another three or three and a half inches, and the yarn is fairly fine.

 

It doesn’t sound so bad, when I set it down in black and white like that. But I must step up production. General feebleness is no excuse for not knitting.

 

No cheetahs, again today. I trust that means, no storms in DC. My sister has sent pictures of their outdoors Thanksgiving, and it looks very jolly.

The storm seems to be picking up speed. Should I worry about Helen's airplane?

 

 

 

Not much has happened on my non-Thanksgiving. Archie came, but not until the end of the morning, and I didn’t manage much mileage on our walk. Still, we tried. He gives the impression that his nursing course is going well – it's a combination of classroom and hands-on which seems to be keeping him engaged. In the new year he will have “placements” in old folks’ homes, followed in due course by other placements. He is particularly looking forward to working in a prison.

 

I’ve done some knitting and some podcast-listening. It’s time for more measuring. The cheetahs aren’t at home. I hope that means that the weather is DC is fairly clement – my sister and her husband are going to have an outdoors Thanksgiving with their son and his family. Their daughter-in-law seriously scared of Covid. 

 

Since there is nothing else to say, I will tell you a story. I hope you haven’t had this before. It is prompted by a series on the radio about Thinking. The first episode was devoted to the proposition that algorithms can produce better results than hunches or gut-instinct, even when based on experience.

 

In the late weeks of 1957 I went to see a dr because I was pregnant with Rachel. I got plugged into the ante-natal system. I told him I was feeling terrible. He tossed a packet of pills across the desk – something he had been sent by a drug company in the hopes he would take it up and prescribe it. It was recommended for morning sickness. “You could try this”, he said.

 

I took one, that day or the next, and threw the rest away. The text suggested that it was a tranquilliser, and I resented the imputation that my sufferings were other than completely physiological.

 

Was it thalidomide? We’ll never know. The date fits, and thalidomide was recommended for morning sickness.

 

If so, it was the single most important decision I have ever made. Pure hunch – we didn’t have algorithms in 1957.  And if not, no harm was done.

 

Happy Thanksgiving tomorrow, everybody. 

It’s not a holiday of which I have any fond memory. We must have celebrated it in 1960, when my husband was working at Smith College; and I think my sister and mother were both there, but I have no memory of the actual event. Although I think I remember that it took some of the pressure off Christmas. Here, the meal is the star event on Christmas Day. In my years at Oberlin, I tended to stay on campus while everybody else went away to eat their turkeys.

 

The odd thing is that Black Friday has become a big thing here in the last few years. It feels a bit odd and empty with nothing to precede it. Back in my day, there was no such thing: just a general feeling that it was time to think about Christmas shopping.

 

Not much news here – little knitting, little strength. I've been re-reading Alan Bennett's "Untold Stories" which I find rather gloomy. Alexander came this morning. We got to the garden, and sat for a damp while on the nearest bench. When did I last walk all the way around? Archie is coming tomorrow. Maybe we can get a bit further. Helen is still in Thessaloniki. Not much in the way of cheetahs, either, although I did spot a couple of kittens at one point, just on their way out.

 

Comments

 

Thank you for them. Shandy, I did look at embroidery at the Bodleian and it’s rather wonderful, as you say.

 

I really mustn’t abandon the subject of ladder-back knitting/invisible stranding until I have at least an idea of what we’re talking about. I watched the video about the hat pattern, and I’ve got part of the idea, but thinking back I don’t see why there aren’t vertical stripes where you don’t want them. I must go back to it.

 

And I will certainly make an effort to find “The Big Night”. All I’ve got is Netflix. And a CD-player, but that’s more than a bit old fashioned.