I mentioned that it rained yesterday.  Hard.  In places they got a whole month's worth of rain in six hours, in a few places they got it in two.  Naturally these places flooded.  Yes, we have drains, we even have storm drains, but either they were put in back before Climate Change kicked in, or more modern buildings were erected with insufficient ( Read more... )

That's reading as in what you do with written or printed words to get their meaning, not Reading, the town in Berkshire.  I learned to read at my mother's knee.  I had pneumonia shortly before my fifth birthday so didn't get to school til much later that term.  Mum had been a primary school teacher before she had me, so she got out the old primers ( Read more... )

I frogged the left front of Petal back almost back to the cast on edge, then started to knit it as the Right front, which was going fine until I noticed a possible mistake at one point four or so rows back.  Trouble is it involves a couple of ssk's and k2togs, so I don't think a quick run down and pick up again with the ol' crochet hook is going to ( Read more... )

So how will you be celebrating National Book Day, Dear Reader?  Or maybe it's World Book Day.  Do you have Primary school-age children?  Have they gone into class today dressed as their favourite character or as their favourite book?  Are you any good at making costumes?  I should think Where's Wally might be the easiest, or maybe Just William  It' ( Read more... )

Ooh look!  The new Paddington Bear film is out at the end of the month.  Lovers of the bear from Darkest Peru will, probably, be enchanted, though they seem to have rather gone overboard on the Effects, and seem to have put a fairly major Diversion (Nicole Kidman as a Baddie) into the story. I dunno, see what you think, Dear Reader.  I think it's ( Read more... )

Today the sun is again shining, having had its face well washed yesterday.  This is nice and maybe I shan't have to pull the curtains before 5pm, as I did last night.  Heigh ho, less than two months now to Solstice.  Wonder what time it will be necessary to pull the curtains that day ( Read more... )

I Shall Wear Midnight arrived Saturday.  w00t!  So I spent the day reading it, even with chapters it is very moreish.  Ostensibly about witches and unthinking prejudice, with side orders of domestic violence, very basic witchcraft, hares and time travel.  Apparently the Discworld books have been translated into thirty-seven languages, which lead us ( Read more... )

I've said it before, Dear Reader, but it bears repeating.  READING IS IMPORTANT.  A study apparently found that the likelihood of someone ending up in prison was directly linked to their literacy, or lack of it.  Which is not to say that those who are fluent readers and writers won't commit crimes and be committed, but it is significant.  Perhaps ( Read more... )

Forty Years On

Forty years ago I was still at Junior school - a little village school within a couple of miles of the new housing estate to which we'd moved a few years earlier.   Maybe you're too young, maybe it didn't make the News where you live.   That day, and subsequent days, the News media were full of what had happened at another little ( Read more... )