Contemplazione
Ok, today is set to be warm again, but, thankfully, not as hot as Wednesday. Shall I bake a cake for our wedding anniversary? Cos if I'm going to better to get it done earlier in the day.
Entirely unrelated - maybe you know the old nursery rhyme Yankee Doodle Dandy. In case your pre-school education (in the widest possible sense) omitted this, here are the words of the first verse. Yes, there are others. No, I don't know what they are.
Yankee Doodle went to town
Riding on a pony;
He stuck a feather in his hat,
And called it macaroni.
I think it dates from the time of the American Revolution and is supposed to suggest that then new Americans were unsophisticated and thought that wearing a feather made them fashionable. What you also need to know, Dear Reader, is that the aforementioned 'Macaroni' was a member of a society of eighteenth century men who wore very fancy/smart clothes. It is believed that said young men, and it would be young (or wishing to appear young) men were well travelled. They had been on the Grand Tour, hence they knew about macaroni and other then foreign foods. Further information may be found here.
Which reminds me, when I was a girl, and it doesn't bear thinking about how long ago that was*, we knew about macaroni. It was served as a milk pudding, an alternative to rice pudding. Then one day Dad had charge of the cooking and made us macaroni cheese. Spaghetti came in tins, in tomato sauce. It was said to grow on trees, in Switzerland, by Richard Dimbleby, on Panorama, on the BBC**!
Of course these days we all know about pasta and can name at least five different varieties, even if we can't quite spell them (neither can the SpellChecker!) What is more, we know that they are for savoury dishes, and are often our favourite 'go to' when hungry and wanting a meal in a hurry.
Entirely unrelated - I just happened to be reading this, on pencil sharpeners and it reminded me, I must sharpen my pencil in the front room. It's been pointless, literally, for what seems like forever. I do knitting pattern planning and row counting with a biro, that at least works. We have pencil sharpeners. We have had pencil sharpeners since the children left home, so I can't be blaming them for not being able to find such an appliance. You know how it is when you have children, Dear Reader. Things have a tendency to 'walk', or even run. You know that things have their places - after all, you decided where they were***. You put them back in their places. You tell the children (Little Dears, Bigger Dears, Teenage Deers) You keep telling the children where the places for various things are. You occasionally happen across things out of place and return them. You sometimes have to go on raids of their bedrooms to regain things, something not to be undertaken lightly with teenagers.
The children left home around ten years ago. They visit occasionally, but not for long enough for things like pencil sharpeners to go walkabout. Which still doesn't explain why the pink pencil sharpener which came with the desk tidy (note that, TIDY) we keep by the computer isn't in it. Hmmm, where did I keep other pencil sharpeners? Maybe I should wait until H comes home and borrow his?
BTW - do you remember those 'turn the handle' pencil sharpeners? The teachers at our Primary school had them on their desks. If we wanted to sharpen our school pencils we could ask to use them. The temptation was to carry on turning the handle. I think some of us had very short pencils! I gather you can get electric versions of the same thing. Imagine how many pencils-worth of inadvisably monitored sharpening you could get through with one of them!
And Finally - I've been knitting a front for the Petal cardigan all week. Mainly because it has been shrinking one side and growing the other! OK so the 'shrinking' side was the side where I was decreasing at twelve row intervals, but the pattern was decreasing at a much faster rate. I'm not sure how it happens, it didn't happen on the back, which had the same rate of decrease at both sides. I've frogged a couple of times at least, once back to where the widening on the front edge occurred, once back further when I noticed I'd gotten the pattern wrong****. Maybe I should give up and knit the other front. At least I'd have a straight edge to be working the knit rows from, that might help. Whatever happens Petal is not going into hiatus, I have Grace, the cotton cardigan; Curry, a sock with a different heel; and my Eclipse socks there already.
Right, off to keep the minute silence for the victims of the Tunisian shooting last Friday. Y'all have a good day now!
*It wasn't as long ago as the Macaronis, nor the American Revolution, in case you were wondering, Dear Reader. Though I do remember the bi-centenary of said Revolution.
**No, I don't remember watching the original. We didn't have a TV at home until after Sis was born. She is younger than me.
***For years we kept the peg bag in the larder. H thought this odd, I thought it was somewhere to keep the pegbag out of the way when we weren't using it. Now the peg bag tends to 'live' in the basket we use for taking the washing to and from the line. That, the basket, 'lives' either on top of the washing machine or, when the machine is in use, on top of the grill of the gas cooker. The number of holes which got melted in baskets temporarily put there when D wanted to make toast! I don't know, I suppose it might have been cos she was shorter so didn't notice them there. Query - how do you not notice a large, fairly brightly coloured, plastic washing basket when it's on top of the grill. At least, how do you not notice it until the smell of melting plastic pervades your consciousness? Teenagers! You gotta love 'em!
****The yarn is still turning my fingers blue!
Entirely unrelated - maybe you know the old nursery rhyme Yankee Doodle Dandy. In case your pre-school education (in the widest possible sense) omitted this, here are the words of the first verse. Yes, there are others. No, I don't know what they are.
Yankee Doodle went to town
Riding on a pony;
He stuck a feather in his hat,
And called it macaroni.
I think it dates from the time of the American Revolution and is supposed to suggest that then new Americans were unsophisticated and thought that wearing a feather made them fashionable. What you also need to know, Dear Reader, is that the aforementioned 'Macaroni' was a member of a society of eighteenth century men who wore very fancy/smart clothes. It is believed that said young men, and it would be young (or wishing to appear young) men were well travelled. They had been on the Grand Tour, hence they knew about macaroni and other then foreign foods. Further information may be found here.
Which reminds me, when I was a girl, and it doesn't bear thinking about how long ago that was*, we knew about macaroni. It was served as a milk pudding, an alternative to rice pudding. Then one day Dad had charge of the cooking and made us macaroni cheese. Spaghetti came in tins, in tomato sauce. It was said to grow on trees, in Switzerland, by Richard Dimbleby, on Panorama, on the BBC**!
Of course these days we all know about pasta and can name at least five different varieties, even if we can't quite spell them (neither can the SpellChecker!) What is more, we know that they are for savoury dishes, and are often our favourite 'go to' when hungry and wanting a meal in a hurry.
Entirely unrelated - I just happened to be reading this, on pencil sharpeners and it reminded me, I must sharpen my pencil in the front room. It's been pointless, literally, for what seems like forever. I do knitting pattern planning and row counting with a biro, that at least works. We have pencil sharpeners. We have had pencil sharpeners since the children left home, so I can't be blaming them for not being able to find such an appliance. You know how it is when you have children, Dear Reader. Things have a tendency to 'walk', or even run. You know that things have their places - after all, you decided where they were***. You put them back in their places. You tell the children (Little Dears, Bigger Dears, Teenage Deers) You keep telling the children where the places for various things are. You occasionally happen across things out of place and return them. You sometimes have to go on raids of their bedrooms to regain things, something not to be undertaken lightly with teenagers.
The children left home around ten years ago. They visit occasionally, but not for long enough for things like pencil sharpeners to go walkabout. Which still doesn't explain why the pink pencil sharpener which came with the desk tidy (note that, TIDY) we keep by the computer isn't in it. Hmmm, where did I keep other pencil sharpeners? Maybe I should wait until H comes home and borrow his?
BTW - do you remember those 'turn the handle' pencil sharpeners? The teachers at our Primary school had them on their desks. If we wanted to sharpen our school pencils we could ask to use them. The temptation was to carry on turning the handle. I think some of us had very short pencils! I gather you can get electric versions of the same thing. Imagine how many pencils-worth of inadvisably monitored sharpening you could get through with one of them!
And Finally - I've been knitting a front for the Petal cardigan all week. Mainly because it has been shrinking one side and growing the other! OK so the 'shrinking' side was the side where I was decreasing at twelve row intervals, but the pattern was decreasing at a much faster rate. I'm not sure how it happens, it didn't happen on the back, which had the same rate of decrease at both sides. I've frogged a couple of times at least, once back to where the widening on the front edge occurred, once back further when I noticed I'd gotten the pattern wrong****. Maybe I should give up and knit the other front. At least I'd have a straight edge to be working the knit rows from, that might help. Whatever happens Petal is not going into hiatus, I have Grace, the cotton cardigan; Curry, a sock with a different heel; and my Eclipse socks there already.
Right, off to keep the minute silence for the victims of the Tunisian shooting last Friday. Y'all have a good day now!
*It wasn't as long ago as the Macaronis, nor the American Revolution, in case you were wondering, Dear Reader. Though I do remember the bi-centenary of said Revolution.
**No, I don't remember watching the original. We didn't have a TV at home until after Sis was born. She is younger than me.
***For years we kept the peg bag in the larder. H thought this odd, I thought it was somewhere to keep the pegbag out of the way when we weren't using it. Now the peg bag tends to 'live' in the basket we use for taking the washing to and from the line. That, the basket, 'lives' either on top of the washing machine or, when the machine is in use, on top of the grill of the gas cooker. The number of holes which got melted in baskets temporarily put there when D wanted to make toast! I don't know, I suppose it might have been cos she was shorter so didn't notice them there. Query - how do you not notice a large, fairly brightly coloured, plastic washing basket when it's on top of the grill. At least, how do you not notice it until the smell of melting plastic pervades your consciousness? Teenagers! You gotta love 'em!
****The yarn is still turning my fingers blue!