The post mark is 21.12.2016.
The card comes from a gentleman who used to have piano lessons with me, who always heads his cards with the year... "Christmas 2016"
What a pleasant surprise! I wonder where it has been all this time.
Thursday, 10 August 2017
Thursday 10th August - Post
This arrived in the post the other day;
The post mark is 21.12.2016.
The card comes from a gentleman who used to have piano lessons with me, who always heads his cards with the year... "Christmas 2016"
What a pleasant surprise! I wonder where it has been all this time.
The post mark is 21.12.2016.
The card comes from a gentleman who used to have piano lessons with me, who always heads his cards with the year... "Christmas 2016"
What a pleasant surprise! I wonder where it has been all this time.
Wednesday, 9 August 2017
Wednesday 9th August - Isaiah 40v10
Found this in one of the churches we visited last week.
It's a sort of "Thought for the Day"
Isaiah 41:10
SUNDAY Do not fear
MONDAY I am with you
TUESDAY Do not be dismayed
WEDNESDAY I will strengthen you
THURSDAY I will help you
FRIDAY I will uphold you
SATURDAY I am your God
originally
KJV
Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness.
Lolcat
Lookz! Celing Cat comes wif strong pawz, da rule for him; lookz! his cheezburgerz for da peeps r wif him and his catnipz 2!
I've been enjoying reading the lolcat Bible (it is on wikipedia). It certainly livens up Paul's Epistles.
It's a sort of "Thought for the Day"
Isaiah 41:10
SUNDAY Do not fear
MONDAY I am with you
TUESDAY Do not be dismayed
WEDNESDAY I will strengthen you
THURSDAY I will help you
FRIDAY I will uphold you
SATURDAY I am your God
originally
KJV
Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness.
Lolcat
Lookz! Celing Cat comes wif strong pawz, da rule for him; lookz! his cheezburgerz for da peeps r wif him and his catnipz 2!
I've been enjoying reading the lolcat Bible (it is on wikipedia). It certainly livens up Paul's Epistles.
Saturday, 5 August 2017
Friday 4th August - oh, and another thing
If you send someone a postcard, it is a good idea to use waterproof ink.
I sent a card to my godmother. When I phoned her some time later, she thanked me for the card, said she enjoyed the picture, but couldn't read the message as it had been raining on the day it was delivered.
Sigh
I sent a card to my godmother. When I phoned her some time later, she thanked me for the card, said she enjoyed the picture, but couldn't read the message as it had been raining on the day it was delivered.
Sigh
Friday, 4 August 2017
Thursday 4th August - This'n'that
We've been out and about today and made a few discoveries.
The ghurkas made a suspension bridge to link North Stoke and South Stoke.
If you are wearing polarized sunglasses while you are operating you digital camera, you can only use the camera in landscape orientation if you want to see the image of what you re taking.
Playing hymns on a harmonium is hard work. Physically (those pedals were stiff) and mentally (remembering the tune and guessing the harmony)
My phone doesn't record step counts properly when it is in my handbag. We walked side by side, and he did 10,000+ steps and only did about 4,000+
I saw a weasel today. I've never seen one before. It was on a path through a woodland; it emerged, ran a few steps towards up, and then disappeared into the undergrowth. We couldn't take a picture (not because of the polarized sunglasses, I hasten to add.)
He saw it too, albeit too briefly. "It's a weasel if it moves in a snake-like fashion".
There was a rhyme in my Enid Blyton diary (back in the 1960's) that taught the difference between a stoat and a weasel. I've tried to track it down, and I'm pretty sure that wasn't it;
Weasels are weasily recognised, but stoats are stoatally different.
The ghurkas made a suspension bridge to link North Stoke and South Stoke.
 |
| http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/2490217 |
Playing hymns on a harmonium is hard work. Physically (those pedals were stiff) and mentally (remembering the tune and guessing the harmony)
My phone doesn't record step counts properly when it is in my handbag. We walked side by side, and he did 10,000+ steps and only did about 4,000+
I saw a weasel today. I've never seen one before. It was on a path through a woodland; it emerged, ran a few steps towards up, and then disappeared into the undergrowth. We couldn't take a picture (not because of the polarized sunglasses, I hasten to add.)
 |
| Picture of the "Least Weasel" from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weasel |
He saw it too, albeit too briefly. "It's a weasel if it moves in a snake-like fashion".
There was a rhyme in my Enid Blyton diary (back in the 1960's) that taught the difference between a stoat and a weasel. I've tried to track it down, and I'm pretty sure that wasn't it;
Weasels are weasily recognised, but stoats are stoatally different.
Wednesday, 2 August 2017
Wednesday 2nd August -
He that has a little tiny wit,
With hey, ho, the wind and the rain,
Must make content with his fortunes fit,
Though the rain it raineth every day.
And it is.
Raining. And will be, today and tomorrow, according to the forecast.
That's because I went out and watered my brussel sprout plants this morning. Wonder of wonders, there are tiny little sprouts growing all up the stems!
The french beans and the peas are finished, and I shall chuck them in the compost bin, caterpillars and all, once the rain stops.
I am wondering if I can summon the determination to start doing walks, a couple of times a week. I have set himself the challenge of gathering together a portfolio of Interesting Walks, of around 2-3 miles, mostly on level-ish terrain, preferably including a coffee shop, and not too far from here - say up to 45 mins drive.
No, not there.
And not today, unless we weatherproof and boot up.
(King Lear, Act 3, Scene 2)
With hey, ho, the wind and the rain,
Must make content with his fortunes fit,
Though the rain it raineth every day.
And it is.
Raining. And will be, today and tomorrow, according to the forecast.
That's because I went out and watered my brussel sprout plants this morning. Wonder of wonders, there are tiny little sprouts growing all up the stems!
The french beans and the peas are finished, and I shall chuck them in the compost bin, caterpillars and all, once the rain stops.
I am wondering if I can summon the determination to start doing walks, a couple of times a week. I have set himself the challenge of gathering together a portfolio of Interesting Walks, of around 2-3 miles, mostly on level-ish terrain, preferably including a coffee shop, and not too far from here - say up to 45 mins drive.
 |
| www.thebmc.co.uk |
And not today, unless we weatherproof and boot up.
(King Lear, Act 3, Scene 2)
Tuesday, 1 August 2017
Tuesday 1st August - Knitting Tangles
There is nothing like knitting for learning patience, perseverance, and all sorts of goodly and desirable virtues.
And also for increasing one's vocabulary of unfortunate and inappropriate words and phrases.
I've two main projects on the go.
This yarn is called Bamboozle
It comes in hanks, which have to be carefully laid out and rolled into a ball before you can knit with them. Notice - FIVE little balls of wool beside an the hank. That's because they came from a hank which had four joins in it. Unimpressed.
Here is the front - the yarn has random changes of colour and also of thickness - one moment you are knitting with slippery, silky-soft thin yarn, the next moment it has turned into something more like cotton wool. It is surprisingly easy to manage, though, and I love the finished texture. However, it is extremely difficult to measure how long or wide the piece is, which is why I haven't ended it off, but left balls of yarn attached at the top in case I need to add some more.
Which means I have to knit the sleeves next, in order to lay the pieces together to see if the armholes will be the same size for the front and the sleeves.
I could have shown you a finished sleeve. At the weekend I had almost completed it, but then I discovered a mistake right down at the cuff. And then another mistake right at the start, when casting on the stitches to begin knitting. I went through the usual process;
step 1; stop and consider whether it mattered
step 2; surely no-one would notice
step 3; actually it would show
step 4 rip out the knitting and gather up the mental strength to start again.
No matter. I have another WIP to turn to; a blue medium-weight jumper I started in the Spring. It is knitted using a method called "top-down". You use "circular" needles
which means that you can knit round and round in circles. So, for a "top-down" jumper, you cast on for the neck, knit down as far as the shoulders, leave stitches on a holder to add sleeves in later, and continue down to the waist. Then you get some needles joined by a wire, go back to the hole you left for the sleeve and put those stitches on the needle and knit the sleeve down to the cuff. Are you with me so far?
The other way of knitting round and round and round is to use a set of four identical needles, with a point at each end;
you spread your tube of knitting around three (sometimes four) needles, and use another one to knit with. So you knit the stitches off a needles onto the spare needle, releasing a needles to knit the next lot with. I thought I'd try this technique with the second sleeve. Big mistake - I was well down the second sleeve when I discovered that my knitting was now much looser, so this sleeve was about an inch wider than the other one.
Deep breath, and rip out the sleeve. So, my blue jumper looks like this at the moment;
Because of the way the jumper is constructed, you can try it on before it is finished, which I did. I'm relieved to discover that it is a good fit, and I like it very much indeed. Which is just as well, as on Monday morning, after several inches of knitting, I found that I was doing the pattern incorrectly. Sigh. Still, I'm getting good at ripping back the stitches, and then carefully picking them all up again (the secret is to use a finer needle to pick them up). Last night I discovered one incorrect stitch about ten rows back. Sigh. Yes, it will matter. Half-an-hour's delicate work with a crochet hook, dropping the stitch down and working it back up again and all is well.
The advantage of this form of construction is that there will be no seams to sew up - once I have knitted the last stitch and darned in the loose ends, it will be finished. The disadvantage, is that as I knit round and round the sleeve, I have to keep turning the whole garment to untwizzle the knitting. It is also quite a warm thing to have bundled on your lap, which is why I took a break from knitting it during the spell of baking hot weather back in July. I'm hoping I finish it fairly quickly before I forget what I am doing and have to start over again...
And also for increasing one's vocabulary of unfortunate and inappropriate words and phrases.
I've two main projects on the go.
This yarn is called Bamboozle
It comes in hanks, which have to be carefully laid out and rolled into a ball before you can knit with them. Notice - FIVE little balls of wool beside an the hank. That's because they came from a hank which had four joins in it. Unimpressed.
Here is the front - the yarn has random changes of colour and also of thickness - one moment you are knitting with slippery, silky-soft thin yarn, the next moment it has turned into something more like cotton wool. It is surprisingly easy to manage, though, and I love the finished texture. However, it is extremely difficult to measure how long or wide the piece is, which is why I haven't ended it off, but left balls of yarn attached at the top in case I need to add some more.
Which means I have to knit the sleeves next, in order to lay the pieces together to see if the armholes will be the same size for the front and the sleeves.
I could have shown you a finished sleeve. At the weekend I had almost completed it, but then I discovered a mistake right down at the cuff. And then another mistake right at the start, when casting on the stitches to begin knitting. I went through the usual process;
step 1; stop and consider whether it mattered
step 2; surely no-one would notice
step 3; actually it would show
step 4 rip out the knitting and gather up the mental strength to start again.
No matter. I have another WIP to turn to; a blue medium-weight jumper I started in the Spring. It is knitted using a method called "top-down". You use "circular" needles
which means that you can knit round and round in circles. So, for a "top-down" jumper, you cast on for the neck, knit down as far as the shoulders, leave stitches on a holder to add sleeves in later, and continue down to the waist. Then you get some needles joined by a wire, go back to the hole you left for the sleeve and put those stitches on the needle and knit the sleeve down to the cuff. Are you with me so far?
The other way of knitting round and round and round is to use a set of four identical needles, with a point at each end;
you spread your tube of knitting around three (sometimes four) needles, and use another one to knit with. So you knit the stitches off a needles onto the spare needle, releasing a needles to knit the next lot with. I thought I'd try this technique with the second sleeve. Big mistake - I was well down the second sleeve when I discovered that my knitting was now much looser, so this sleeve was about an inch wider than the other one.
Deep breath, and rip out the sleeve. So, my blue jumper looks like this at the moment;
Because of the way the jumper is constructed, you can try it on before it is finished, which I did. I'm relieved to discover that it is a good fit, and I like it very much indeed. Which is just as well, as on Monday morning, after several inches of knitting, I found that I was doing the pattern incorrectly. Sigh. Still, I'm getting good at ripping back the stitches, and then carefully picking them all up again (the secret is to use a finer needle to pick them up). Last night I discovered one incorrect stitch about ten rows back. Sigh. Yes, it will matter. Half-an-hour's delicate work with a crochet hook, dropping the stitch down and working it back up again and all is well.
The advantage of this form of construction is that there will be no seams to sew up - once I have knitted the last stitch and darned in the loose ends, it will be finished. The disadvantage, is that as I knit round and round the sleeve, I have to keep turning the whole garment to untwizzle the knitting. It is also quite a warm thing to have bundled on your lap, which is why I took a break from knitting it during the spell of baking hot weather back in July. I'm hoping I finish it fairly quickly before I forget what I am doing and have to start over again...
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