Well, here I am. Many, many, many thanks for all your kind messages.

Leaving the hospital after last Friday's visit, I suddenly felt terribly weak and breathless. I got to the car, not without difficulty, drove home all right, felt no better on Saturday and decided not to visit, and to see our GP on Monday. Family and friends intervened. It was Ketki who actually phoned NHS24. An out-of-hours GP appt was arranged for the afternoon – she sent me to the good old Western General where my poor husband has been all these weeks. They did a blood test which suggested clots, and kept me.

A scan on Sunday apparently confirmed pulmonary embolism.

I was – and somewhat remain – convinced that the symptoms were entirely stress-related, as I kept telling dr after dr. They are, however, devoted to their science and the result is that I have to eschew cider and consume rat poison for six months.

I thought of a problem in the night. At the moment, I must go in every day for a blood test and an injection. Then I visit my husband, go home, watch Wimbledon, and wait for them to ring up and say how much rat poison to take that evening. This regime will more or less continue for the six months, but the injections will end and the monitoring will transfer to the GP and no longer have to be daily.

However, that's not the problem. The leaflet says that I mustn't go on a diet – weight loss will increase the effect of the Warfarin, presumably to undesirable levels. I always lose 7 or 8 pounds during lent, not drinking cider. I would expect 6 months of abstinence to trim me down by a stone or so. I'll put the problem to them this morning. I certainly don't want to resume sugar-eating.

I feel much better, although not altogether. Once I knew that Alexander had Perdita, the hospital experience was not entirely unpleasant. A neighbour was delegated to feed her, but she doesn't like cat or kitten food, and she doesn't like being alone, and I worried a lot those first two nights. It sounds as if she is having a grand time on Loch Fyne, and eating delicacies. She will come back tomorrow, when James will be here. It seemed best to wait, so that the brothers could see each other at least briefly.

James' wife Cathy came up on Monday evening – this week doesn't have enough days in it for all the events – and stayed through Tuesday night when I was suddenly released. She was a great help and comfort. She even wheeled my husband across to the ward where I was, before we knew that I was about to be set free.

Knitting

Pocket squares are ideal hospital knitting, and I have now finished the seven for the groomsmen. Matt himself has emailed to say he'd like his to be white, so yesterday, during a rain interval at Wimbledon, I ordered a skein of Baah Aspen (which I'm using) in “laPerle” from Webs. I think it will be a bit less stark than dead white. It's coming Priority Mail and should be here soon. Meanwhile there are ends to tidy and blocking to be done.

I did a little test square while in hospital with a double row of eyelets around the edge for the bridegroom and that went well.

Fantoosh and the Ladies' Semi-Finals today. Last night the television stopped working -- "No Signal" it said. But I solved that problem during the night -- switch off the electricity altogether for a moment. It worked.

Daisy, I did have my iPad in hospital – but no wi-fi. Goodness, how I missed it, next after the cat. But the great thing about electronic reading is that, instead of untidy piles of unread paperbacks here and there about the house, one has them all compactly together and I ripped through quite a few – A Passage to India, an old Ruth Rendell which I'd already read but I finished it anyway, and “Nora Webster” by Colm Toibin. Then on to "Nothing but Grass" by Will Cohu which starts well but is sagging somewhat in the middle. And I made some progress will Gillian Tett's "Fool's Gold", about the recent financial crisis.

Update

Jean was taken into hospital on Saturday with clots in her lungs. Ketki and I have just returned from Edinburgh where we found her in good spirits and expecting to be discharged some time later this week.  We brought Perdita back to Loch Fyne with us.

Alexander

Greece

After I launched yesterday's post upon the world, I read the Telegraph and discovered, to my chagrin, that Ambrose Evans-Pritchard was writing about Ochi Day in the business section. This from Helen, still on Mt Pelion:

Yes, I am glad you and Ambrose Pritchard made the Oxi day point. It's a very important one which I have been feeling frustrated that none of the commentators had made until now. We had a really interesting conversation with the village carpenter yesterday who is voting yes and says most of the village is too but the reason, according to him, is that they have been getting handouts from the EU and playing the system - claiming ten acres of spoilt apples in frost, for example, when they only have one. He was very vociferous on the subject saying that all the fields down by the sea used to be cultivated but now they're left fallow and the young people don't want to farm any more. They'd rather sit in the cafes on their phones, taking money from their parents and grand parents pensions. It was an interesting perspective. Meanwhile, most businesses including tavernas have shut down for the week and the roads are empty.

She also sent these pictures, Life in Greece:

Archie on the right, one of his brothers on the left. Mungo?

This is her husband David, talking to a lawyer friend in London about the crisis:

I'm not going to look this up, but yes, Mary Lou, “yes” in Greek is “nai”. There's the “n” sound, which is lacking in the negative. I don't know whether that's an ancient word or not. But that negative upward movement of the head, accompanied by a little tsk sound, so easily confused with a nod of assent, goes right back to the beginning – “anavuo” in Homer, to nod upwards, is said, I believe, of Zeus himself, refusing permission for something.

Becky, I think I'm right – but again, I'm not going to look it up – in saying that Finnish isn't an Indo-European language. Like Turkish. Are they related to each other, or is it just that both fall outside the Indo-European family?

Tennis

Yesterday was brilliant. Brown-Nadal was undoubtedly the match of the first week, maybe of the tournament. I got to see every moment of it, and rejoiced in the result, never having been a Nadal fan. Perdita slept through the whole thing.

And the lozenges are finished. Do I have enough yarn for ten more rows, plus a bind-off, over 423 stitches, increasing to 443? I'll take Kate Davies' word for the totals. I know I'm right, counting lozenge by lozenge.

Watch this space.

Not much of a day, yesterday.

My husband is now back into full-scale get-me-out-of-here mode. I came home from the visit shattered, unable even to knit. I dread today's session.

I don't know as much as I should about home care. I suspect I'm about to learn a fair amount. I know it was provided promptly and wonderfully for my husband's sister when she was dying. She was able to live at home, with a daughter's assistance, until the last fortnight, and the carers came to the funeral.

I sort of feel that the fact that it's free is part of Sturgeon's Socialist Paradise. It will be provided by City of Edinburgh social services, I think, rather than actual NHS nurses. All advice, backed up by common sense, recommends waiting until they're ready to start. A private care company is, however, coming tomorrow to case the joint.

I wonder whether I'm going to be capable of running with the ball when it is passed to me.

Knitting

I've read on a bit in “The Ravell'd Sleeve”, marvelling at a realm of knitting I could never aspire to. Ten-inch square swatches, washed and blocked. I've now moved on to reading about selvedge stitches. It occurs to me that this is essentially Mary Thomas' (of “Knitting Book” fame) style of things – in perfect harmony with the patterns in the Vogue Knitting Books, especially the early ones, of which I have now completed my collection.

And it was from this “couture” view that EZ rescued us, taking knitting back to its peasant roots – circular knitting – and “unventing” from there.

Lots of exciting tennis today – and knitting, I hope.

Greece

No more news from Helen, but I've had a thot. 

The Greeks annually celebrate "ohi day", when they said "no" to an ultimatum from Mussolini. We've been there for Ohi Day, much parading of school children. By framing Sunday's referendum so that a "no" vote is mud-in-the-eye to the Europeans in suits, Mr Tsipras is surely hoping to draw on reserves of popular patriotism. Has Mrs Merkel even heard of Ohi Day?

("ohi" or "ochi" is Greek for "no". It is the ancient word. Is it the only Indo-European language not to have an "n" sound in the negative word?)

Still 2 ½ rows of lozenges to go – the tennis was sufficiently exciting yesterday that I didn't get much done. I am determined to finish today.

Now you can knit your own Wimbledon – not just Andy Murray.

What else? The NHS is offering a lot of free home care for my husband, that's the good news; it will take a few weeks to get it in place, that's the bad. He had been told this by the time I got there yesterday, and was pretty cross about it. We are arranging a home assessment visit from a private care company. I am a bit anxious about starting private care for fear the NHS will just wave goodbye to us. We're talking big bucks, apart from anything else.

That's about it, I'm afraid. Back in what now seem like the Good Old Days, I used to potter gently through my day thinking about what I was going to write tomorrow. Now such tranquillity is impossible.

The cat continues to delight.

Various tidbits from Zite:

Arne and Carlos sock yarn from Regia: what fun it must be to knit!

A free knit-your-own Andy Murray pattern. It's the one from Holt & Bailey's “Knit Your Own Scotland”. I must have told you about the time I saw a much more substantial knitted Andy Murray in a shop window in Alyth – 18” high, as I remember. Alas, I didn't have a camera with me, and when I next was there, it was gone.

An article about Shetland knitting, mostly about Hazel Tindall. I doubt if you'll learn much, but it's worth following the link for the sight of Andy Ross' sweater. He is trying to get Shetland hand weaving going again, from a workshop on Yell.

Wimbledon wasn't very interesting yesterday. The people who were expected to win, won – easily. The Fantoosh moved forward somewhat anyway. Four more rows of lozenge-knitting remain, then 10 of the final edging. A slight unease about yarn. Perhaps the edging could be truncated.

I wrote that much, then some OT's came to assess our way of life, then I visited the hospital...

I'll just post it as is.

Greece

Helen and her family are safely ensconced on Mt Pelion. “We drove past long lines of people waiting at the cash machines in Volos but that was before capital controls were imposed an hour or so ago.” Volos, as I remember, is the substantial town at the foot of the mountain. That message yesterday evening was the first I had heard about currency controls.

However, it turns out they're not all on Pelion: “Fergus is off on a permanently staffed sail boat owned by friends for a trip around the Cyclades for a week oblivious to Greece's financial woes.” Fergus is her youngest son, who recently left his Athenian school for the last time

and will join Archie at Merchiston next term.

I don't know whether a “permanently staffed sail boat” qualifies one as an oligarch. Whether or no, I feel pretty sure that its owner has bank deposits well outside of Greece. Helen drove me and C. through the part of Athens inhabited by oligarchs on our way to Marathon that happy day (amongst other happy days). Not manicured lawns and Palladian mansions, but high walls and guard posts.

Perdita

She didn't join me in bed last night. I felt rather hurt. It turned out that she had somehow managed to get herself shut into the outer hall. We had a rapturous reunion this morning, and I won't to to bed again without knowing exactly where she is. This is a picture taken from the outer hall – she knows that people who go out there, often go on out the front door and don't come back to their cat for hours.

I have also learned, from her original owner, that she is 10 days younger than we had previously thought. It won't make much difference through life, but it does now. She was 7 ½ weeks old when I brought her home, not 9 weeks. That conforms with my own impression of her then.

Medical

My husband has resumed pressing for immediate release. His tone is less desperate than it was in the urology ward, but still sufficiently urgent that I must try to find a programme of action to present to him today. He is much better than he was, but serious problems remain. I have every confidence in the NHS to get him out of this wonderful facility as soon as possible. It wouldn't work, otherwise. Should I point out to him that every day he endures there saves us – what? – a couple of hundred pounds?

Knitting

I'm halfway through the final rank of lozenges on the Fantoosh shawl, at least row-wise. Every right-side row adds four stitches, but by now they are so small a proportion of the whole that it scarcely matters. The yarn still looks all right, but there won't be much to spare. And Wimbledon starts today.

You would think that my present regime, two hours or so of hospital visiting daily and otherwise my “time is my own”, would result in much productive activity. Virtually no cooking or washing-up. It doesn't seem to work out like that.

This is going to be an interesting week in Greece. Helen said that by the end of yesterday, there were queues at the petrol stations as well as the cash dispensers. I trust Archie has successfully rejoined his family – the airport was hideously crowded and his flights, after a change at Heathrow, inconvenient. He was due in Athens in the small hours.

They are all planning to spend the week on Pelion (near Ossa) which might prove even more interesting than Athens, but means we'll be out of email contact.

l.;9 v[pgggggggghh c

That from Perdita, while I was fetching my coffee. She also managed to open a second document, where she continued in the same vein.

Knitting

A couple more rows of the Fantoosh.

And I got Catherine Lowe's “The Ravell'd Sleeve” which I had learned about in that blog piece of Tom of Holland's about “Sequence Knitting”. Self-published, again – this time printed on demand, not very elegantly.

I spent a day or so, after ordering it, wondering where I had heard of Catherine Lowe. It finally clicked – an ad in the current Twist Collective. I had pursued it for a while, but not long enough to find the pattern advertised.

The book is about couture knitting. Her standards are very demanding. I'll continue at least to speed-read it.

A quick log-in to let you know that all's (more or less) well. Archie is here – he will fly off to Athens later today. His mother reports that people are now queuing around the corner to withdraw money from cash machines. He is delighted with the kitten.

I have reached the 4^th row of the final rank of lozenges on the Fantoosh. Wimbledon next week – I think it's sufficiently easy knitting that I can polish it off. If not, there are always pocket squares. It looks to me as if there's going to be enough yarn.

An anxious topic, especially as my friend Kristie – the woman to whom I owe that happy, happy weekend in Shetland – is knitting the smaller Fantoosh, with a yarn other than Old Maiden Aunt's, and she is running short although that shouldn't be happening according to the yardages specified on the respective ballbands. Judging from the point at which I joined in my second skein of yarn, one skein of proper OMA yarn would be adequate for the smaller shawl, just as Kate Davies says.

In some haste – I had a dentist's appt this morning, and it's now nearly time for hospital visiting.

A friend took this yesterday:

Knitting went well – so far, it is the only activity in which I engage which the kitten doesn't interfere with. I have another 3 ½ long rows to do, to finish off the 22-lozenge rank of the Fantoosh, and am determined to get them done this evening.

Lindsay sent me this link to an interesting article by Tom of Holland about Sequence Knitting and its author. I am toying with the idea of knitting the bridegroom's pocket square in an interesting fabric from the book (the other squares are garter stitch) as well as surrounding it with a double row of eyelets. We shall see.

I am grateful to Karen and Randi for starting me off on Lucy Neatby's Double Knitting course in Craftsy. She looks much younger than the Neatby who instructed me in Fearless Knitting the other day – but it can't have been that long ago. I can't really believe that this is a technique I am going to embrace, but I will persevere with the class.

Ta, I'm sure you're right that Perdita is really a dilute calico cat. I am grateful for your endorsement. She shows every sign of being intelligent and affectionate – and I think she's a bit bigger than she was a week ago.

Somewhere there's a range of sock yarn based on breeds of cat -- but I think the closest they get to Perdita is undilute calico.

Now I'd better head off.

qgfv454

The initial remark is from Perdita, who is being a Very Great Help again this morning. 

Yesterday was another good day. My husband really is a bit better – and the catheter is out. Maybe we can pull this off after all.

I knitted another three and a half rows of Fantoosh – I'm sort of halfway through the penultimate, 22-lozenge rank. So far, this hyperactive kitten has combined surprisingly well with knitting. Yesterday, she slept on my husband's chair while I watched Pointless and the news, and knitted. On other days, she has actually slept on my lap.

“Sequence Knitting” turned up, a fortnight before I would have thought it possible. AND the man delivering it – it's large, and it required a signature – rang the doorbell only moments after I got back from the hospital. It's usually the other way around.

It's interesting, although I haven't got very far yet. The idea is simple – “sequence knitting” is any repeated stitch pattern. K2P2, for instance, over a multiple of four stitches, produces a result with which we are all familiar. Then try it over a multiple of five. Then try starting each new row where you left off, rather than beginning the stitch sequence anew. And so forth. I look forward to reading on.

It is another self-published book, like Kate Davies' ones and Lucy Hague's “Celtic Cable Shawls”. Is this the future?

On that topic (Celtic cables) – I'm currently doing Melissa Leapman's Craftsy class on “Infinate Cables”. I must face up to Alasdair Post-Quinn on double knitting. I've got his book, and I signed up for the class ages ago. It sounds so difficult. All the more reason at least to lie in bed watching the lessons, with Perdita trying to catch the yarn on the screen.

Perdita

I thought for a moment this morning, in my bath, that I had developed a really interesting dermatological condition on my lower legs, ankle to knee. Then I realised I was seeing the pinpricks where the kitten had been climbing me. Her original owner warned me that she was a climber. Floor to ceiling curtains are of no interest – it's people she climbs.

I shall have to get a pair of loose-fitting heavy corduroy trousers – or a new cat.

Today is Rachel's birthday. I'm sure I've told you before that they came around the ward with newspapers, the morning she was born, and I bought an Express and looked up the horoscope for my new little person -- "Not a day you will remember." Fully up to the standard of the Delphic Oracle. I've still got it.

I've had a good start to the day. I have paid an electricity bill on-line (I find on-line banking very useful, but rather stressful) and have taxed the car for another year.

And yesterday was another reasonably good day on the knitting front – three long rows done on the Fantoosh, establishing the twisted rib for the 22 lozenges. I won't call those rows the hardest of the pattern – nothing is hard; it's fun. But they're the slowest, and now they're finished.

My husband continues to improve, and is beginning to press for a release date. The Great Man makes his rounds on Monday, and told my husband yesterday that they were as keen to get rid of him as he was to leave. He then named a few goals, sine die. I remain anxious about how we are ever going to manage again, but I have great faith in this place – especially the energetic O.T. woman – to break the problem down into its component parts and address them one by one.

Perdita continues to delight. Here she is just now, helping me write the blog.

I told my husband about her supper of sausages and ketchup and I am afraid he seized on the salient point – you must never feed cats on the table.

Last night at bedtime I read “The Tale of Miss Moppet” to her which I think she enjoyed.

We had a good hospital visit yesterday, before James and Cathy headed south. They admired Perdita.

I finished the 20-lozenge rank of the Fantoosh, and even knitted the first row of the 22's – the penultimate rank. As you can see from the sidebar, adding 20 has boosted the percentage nicely.

And I finished Lucy Neatby's “Fearless Knitting” course in Craftsy. The lesson on seaming made me want to cast all else aside and knit a four- or five-piece sweater just to practice what I have learned. The Sous Sous will at least have short side seams. I am embarrassed to have to tell you that I have always just used back-stitch. Now it will be mattress stitch for side-to-side and some very neat footwork for other conjunctions, such as setting in a fitted sleeve, where you create a row of knitting using a darning needle, like grafting only more so.

Perdita

All continues well. She is very affectionate, preferring always to be in the room where I am even while pursuing her own mad ideas. Last night when I was eating my simple supper of Crombie's Special Pork sausages, she got on the table and asked for some. I cut off a little piece. She ate it with relish. I gave her some more. She even lapped up a bit of ketchup. When she had had enough, she washed her pretty face with the air of a cat who has had a decent meal at last.

So the difficulty is not solid food, it's Waitrose Total Nutrition Kitten pellets. I don't fancy them myself.

 I won't go on feeding her sausage and ketchup, of course, but might try a little bit of fresh minced beef today.

Little to report.

Here we are at the longest day – the fun is over for another year. I feel I've lost the best weeks of the 52, in all this business with illness and hospitals.

James and Cathy are going back to London this afternoon, after today's hospital visit. My husband is much as before (I didn't go in yesterday). James is concerned about some signs of confusion. He was mightily impressed with the Royal Victoria building – “It makes one want to pay even more taxes”.

I did no knitting yesterday – in fact, seem to have achieved virtually nothing. But only three rows remain of the 20-lozenge rank of the Fantoosh. I may be able to finish them off this evening when there will be no one here except me and the cat.

Lucy Neatby's Craftsy Class “Fearless Knitting” continues good. She's got some fiendishly clever grafting techniques.

Perdita is getting on fine – very friendly, very lively. Still no luck with solid food. I have got her some kitten pellets and softened them in her kitten milk, but she will do no more than sniff at them with polite interest. She likes people, and will make a fine family cat one day. We went out to supper last night (Bonsai, at the top of Broughton Street; very nice); she met us at the door when we got back, and said she had been worried about us.

Sorry about yesterday. I was bonding with my cat.

I think we're going to call her Perdita, pronounced Purrdita. My husband has seen pictures, and a little iPad video, and seems to approve. She's not terribly well-marked, if one were being really fussy – grey where she should be black, beige where she should be orange. But she has a pretty face (that's essential) and her human family reminded me of the one in Leicester which her dear predecessor Poussin came from, i.e., seriously cat-orientated.

Cats in my husband's family always have names beginning with P.

Yes, Hilde, the cost of cats is ridiculous. In My Day owners were grateful to one for taking a kitten. The change is partly, at least, because the Cat Protection people have been so successful at getting everybody castrated. We hope Perdita can have at least one litter before being spayed, but it's hard to see how that can be arranged if she has to stay indoors and never meet any boys. Maybe we'll be lucky and can be in Strathardle with her at the right moment.

Knitting

All well. I'm half-way through the 20-lozenge rank of the Fantoosh.

And I've signed up for Lucy Neatby's new Craftsy class called Fearless Knitting. It's good – provisional cast-on's and grafting and duplicate stitch and how to tell which direction something was knitted in, so far. It goes rather well with Zilboorg's “Knitting for Anarchists” and comes back again to EZ's maxim, Look at your knitting.

No, Knit Potion, I hadn't heard of Brenda Dayne either. What a find! Has anyone looked at her book?

Non-knit

Our car went away for its MOT yesterday and hasn't come back yet. I need to get to a supermarket to study the shelves of kitten food. My little cat is drinking milk – we have special lactose-low cat milk these days, did you know? – but so far disdaining solids.

James and Cathy will be here this evening.  

I finished the 18-lozenge rank of the Fantoosh and have embarked on 20 lozenges. The final rank is the 24-lozenge one. Put that way, the end seems nigh.

I don't have a cat. The seller – cats are unbelievably expensive these days – put us off because her son was suddenly taken to hospital with stomach pains. I've captured the picture – here it is:

and will take it to my husband when I go in to visit this morning. We insist on tortoiseshell-and-white. As well as being expensive, they aren't entirely easy to find.

Yesterday's hospital visit went well. We saw the diabetic nurse, and the energetic OT woman, and a nice Registrar (=junior hospital dr) who sat with us and heard the whole story and I think at least grasps that, although my husband has suffered from rheumatics in his hands for some time now, something new may have happened to the right hand recently.

I am interested in the book called “Sequence Knitting” which turned up as I web-browsed this morning. The Schoolhouse is selling it, so it must not be entirely lacking in interest. Amazon.co.uk doesn't seem to have it, though.

What the hell -- I've just ordered it from the Schoolhouse.

Progress with the Fantoosh. I finished the first skein of yarn, and wound the second. Since the shawl has a right and a wrong side, there didn't seem to be any reason not to knit the first skein down to the last inch and eventually weave in the ends on the wrong side. So I did that. I'm now four rows short of finishing the 18-lozenge rank: maybe even this evening.

(Except that they are very long rows, and this afternoon I'm going to see a potential kitten. Here in Edinburgh, mercifully.)

When that's done, I'll be 58% done with lozenge-knitting. I think I'm going to be all right for yarn. I knit it on to the longer needle so that I could take a picture for you. I'm rather pleased with it.

Comments

You're right about those pocket squares, Meezermeowmy.

I think essentially I am happiest with one project at a time. My current plan is to finish the Fantoosh and then finish the pocket squares and then go back to one of the other two projects. But if my husband comes home before the Fantoosh is done – quite likely, really – I'll switch to pocket squares at once. They are the project that can be polished off most quickly – maybe I really ought to go there at once.

Mary Lou, my husband was fine when he was my age. It was the year of our Golden Wedding. I made a calendar of pictures taken in Strathardle. He appears several times doing active and energetic things. Decline has come since.

There was no change yesterday. I met his new consultant. I think he has an unhealthy interest in memory loss which is not high on our list of problems, if indeed it appears there at all.

Bless you, Beth. I had nearly forgotten how knitting faster gets the project done before you run out of yarn. In prosperous old age, I just buy too much.

I put your timely reminder into practice yesterday, and it seems to be working! I have finished the 16-lozenge rank of the Fantoosh and embarked on the following 18 lozenges: have done five of the sixteen rows of that one, and have enough yarn for two more rows at least (I think). The mathematical middle of the shawl must be around here somewhere.

Maybe I'll just stop worrying and trust Kate Davies.

Yes, Zite can be irritating, Birgit. I probably shouldn't rely on it as much as I do for knitterly web-browsing. It's not just Anna Mo at the moment – it's that man who has been knitting frames of a movie into scarves. I've never clicked through to a story about him, so can't tell you any more. Could we improve it by expressing approval from time to time? I often wonder how much the Zites each of us reads differ from each other.

Medical

No news, really.

Helen sent this picture of me giving my husband a wee hurl around the hospital garden on Saturday. You can clearly see that his right hand is swollen.

When we went back in, we found ourselves in a day room where the Trooping of the Colour (or whatever it's called) was on television. We watched that for a while – most impressive. The Queen is six months younger than my husband, the Duke of Edinburgh several years older. They both appeared to be in good form, and there was lots of standing up involved.

Helen is on her way back to Athens, much missed already. I'll take Archie back to school this morning, before the hospital visit – although he hopes to get permission to stay a few days longer, commuting to school for some necessary conferences. Lessons and exams are over.

On Friday Helen spent a long time at the hospital, and I didn't go in at all. Life has sort of gone to pieces around here, and things are Not Getting Done. On that free Friday I applied for a new driving license, as we Oldies are required to do every few years, and caught up with a package DHL was obstinately refusing to deliver except during the hours I spend in hospital visiting.

And this morning – that's something – I spent half an hour or so opening mail. There was more of it lying about even than I had feared. Needless to say, much shreddible paper and four or five things I've Got To Do. It never ends.

My husband is slightly improved, we think, still calm and relatively cheerful. There are a few minor problems, overlooked in the general misery, which now need to be addressed – his right hand is virtually useless, perhaps because he banged it when he fell at the beginning of all this? And he seems unwilling to wear his dentures – which, attentive readers will remember, have been an ongoing problem in recent months. I worry about whether it is going to be possible to struggle on here on our own, even with much help.

Knitting

Not even much of that, but I have nearly finished the 16-lozenge rank of the Fantoosh, and am enjoying myself, so to speak, worrying about whether I am going to have quite enough yarn to finish the whole. (The old Chinese remedy for toothache, I read somewhere, is to shoot off one of your toes. Same principle here.)

When the 16 lozenges are done, I will still be six lozenges short of the halfway number –and there is a 10-row edging at the end, over a great many stitches, which has not been included in the “halfway” count. The first skein of yarn will finish the 16-lozenge rank, but it won't get much further. I must give some thought to the question of whether simply to omit the final rank of lozenges, or whether it would be acceptable to break it in the middle.

Lucy Hague's beautiful “Celtic Cable Shawls” has turned up. Oh, wonderful! All the more so because some have been inspired by the Meigle Stones, very near us in Strathardle.

Still, first I've got to finish some, at least, of the current FO's. Then I've got a dog to knit.

Zite is full of the work of Anna Mo at the moment. I love it!

Onwards!

I pressed on with the 16-lozenge rank of the Fantoosh yesterday, and have successfully navigated the least-fun rows of the pattern, where the twisted-rib is established which draws together at the top of each lozenge. I mean, ribbing is bad enough, but twisted... But every right-side row thereafter reduces the amount of ribbing and increases the st st.

I read some more Zilboorg yesterday, too, not always understanding what I was reading. I'll have to go back over some of it. It made me re-appreciate the utter lucidity of EZ's prose.

Medical

All continues well. I think my husband is improving somewhat. Visits are certainly less painful than they were. I think I might take along a pocket square today.

He said he had a long interview with social worker yesterday about our Way of Life and that she will eventually be in touch to check on my version.

Greek Helen should be here this afternoon, insh'Allah. She plans to make some soup and take along a book to read aloud tomorrow and stay at the hospital for quite a while. I think I'll stay home and get my driving license application in. I haven't even figured out yet whether I need a new photograph. Blogging not guaranteed for the next two days.

Life

Archie had another good day yesterday. He went to the press launch of the Edinburgh Book Festival. The journalists, including Archie, all got goodie bags including some whiskey. Perfectly legal – he's 18. He was rather pleased, but left it behind at the office.

I seem to have set Blogger to moderate-all-comments. I didn't mean to do that and will try to change it now.

CKP, that Persian stew sounds terrific. I think I can even get pomegranate juice, as well as seeds, at the supermarket. But tonight will be a simpler Ken Hom involving tofu.

Hilde, I think I would start with Nigella's book “How To Eat”. “Kitchen” is also very good. Archie and I have been living out of “Nigella Express” this week. Last night's chilli was a success – not blindingly hot, but blindingly hot wasn't wanted.