Oops! How did that happen ....

 

How did what happen Anne?  I hear you cry as you look at the photo and think , she's bought some sock yarn. Hardly needs much explanation. 

And yes it is sock yarn and yes I did buy it and yes it's the first instalment of a monthly sock club. That's the bit you didn't see coming and how did it happen? 

Well Madrigal Yarns put up a Facebook post about their new self striping sock club. Self striping is relatively difficult to get hold of because it's a pain to dye and a lot of dyers seem to have decided  that it's more bother than it's worth. The OH of course, loves bright socks and what he most likes is bright stripey socks so this, despite the fact that it means at least 100g of yarn incomnig every month, was a bit of a no brainer. 

The colours will be inspired by the month the yarn is produced and this one, for April, is called Colours of Spring. While I love the main skein, and indeed the mini that came with it, I don't think they pair very well together so I've looked out a green that I had 'in stock'  to pair with it when I get around to knitting it up into socks. 

That won't be for a wee while because at the moment all my knitting time is taken up with my So Faded  sweater, which is the pattern I'm using for my Beehive advent yarn . I am so very nervous about whether or not this will fit that I have taken a tremendous amount of trouble with it; swatching (in the round, no less!), measuring myself, measuring two slightly differently fitting jumpers, comparing measurements to pattern schematic etc.  etc. If the universe tends to the benevolent  then it will fit and fit nicely. I'm a lot further on with it than I thought I would be after only five days but not quite at a place where I can yet try it on to see how it's looking. Fingers crossed. And then the self striping is second in the queue once it's done. 

 

Reading Round Up for March

 

So it appears that I read10 books in March and did a DNF on an eleventh. I kept hearing DNF on people's You Tube reading blogs and it took me longer than it should have done done to work out that meant Did Not Finish. 

So we might as well start with the DNF which was The Sanatorium by Sarah Pearse. The blurb sounded promising - an old sanatorium in the Swiss Alps (possibly the French Alps actually, but definitely the Alps anyway) has been turned into a luxury wellness retreat type thing by an award winning architect and people gather for the grand opening only for them to disappear one by one, and then turn up dead. Sort of And then There Were None, but abroad. I borrowed this from my library's borrow box program and I did really reallly try but honestly it was about as interesting as watching paint dry. I couldn't keep in my mind who half the people were, and most of the ones that made an impression made a bad one by being either unpleasant ( the men) or feeble ( the women). Possibly it's better if you read it rather than having it read to you; at least that way you can go back and check who all  people are - if you find yourself caring enough. Pearse has since written two follow ups featuring the same detective so obviously someone out there likes them. That someone is not me. 

At the same time as I downloaded The Sanatorium I also got The Silent House of Sleep by Allan Gaw. This sounded very promising as it was the first one in a series, so if I liked it, lots more to read, It features a young forensic pathologist at  almost  the start of the development of the discipline and that could be a really interesting way to approach the detective genre but  oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. The method of murder was just ridiculous and the motivation for it non-existent. What a let down. Also to be honest the main protagonist is a total misery guts and the police he works for/with are unsympathetic in the extreme. A C+ for the ideas and an E for execution. I won't be reading any more. 

With attempts to find new authors so unsuccessful, is it any wonder that I fell back on some old favourites. My falling asleep to book was The Thirteen Problems by Agatha Christie, a set of short stories which feature the first appearance of one Miss Jane Marple. When you've been reading Christie as long as I have there aren't many surprises to be had, but the plots are competent, the writing is fine without being fancy and the motivations for murder are all credible. 'nuff said. 

I listened to Karin Slaughter's Indelible and in a way this was disappointing because I thought it was the book in which she killed off a recurring character who I dislike very much. Imagine my disappointment at the end of the book when it turned out they had survived. (Spoiler, they don't survive the next one ...) Meanwhile I enjoyed this one, and certainly didn't see how it would end or how the past and the present would all tie in together. One of her best I think. 

I knocked off a couple of J D Kirks; One for the Ages and City of Scars. I must surely be running out of the library stocks of this man, but as long as I keep finding ones on the shelves that I haven't read, I'll keep reading them. 

Staying with the detective novels I also read a couple by J M Dalglish who tends to turn up on line attached to messages like 'If you liked J D Kirk, you might also like J M Dalglish'. On the grounds that I do like J D Kirk I followed up last month's not entirely successful experience of reading one of JMD's  books set on Skye with several of his Hidden Norfolk series. When I say several, this was courtesy of them being bundled together in sets of three on Audible which sounds like a bargain and I'm a great one for trying to get the best value possible for my Audible subscription. So in March I listened to One Lost Soul and Bury Your Past. I'm not sure if its the writing or the reading but Gordon Bennett these books are pedestrian. This they then did, squared. Great if you like your books to have chapters that usually open with a weather report though. And the lead detective to be half heartedly dating the most passive aggressive girlfriend ever. 

In search of some light relief I got Jodi Taylor's Lights, Camera, Mayhem which didn't supply many laughs to be honest.  I think I've got a bit tired of these characters and their recurring behavioural and conversational tics. It all gets a bit monotonous. 

Next up was a fantasy novel called Immortal by Sue Linn Tan. Can't remember now why I bought it, possibly I was looking for something to read that wasn't a detective novel and picked this up at Waterstones from a Book of the Month table? I knew it had been well reviewed, and initially I enjoyed it. The setting is oriental-ish and there were some interesting concepts. However it went on a bit too long and there was a not very well revealed 'reveal' about 5/6ths of the way through, for winch nothing had prepared the reader ( unless possibly an acquaintance with Chinese mythology that I don't have? ) I did at least finish it, but I was bored with the characters long before the end. I would say 'at least they weren't riding dragons', somethign for which I no longer have any patience at all, but at one point the heroine does ride something else, possibly a thing called  a 'quilip', which, while it isn't a dragon, does fly and have hissy fits if the wrong person wants to get on its back. 

And so finally to Enchanted Glass by Diana Wynne Jones.  It's not her best, but it's a long way from being her worst and it's a personal favourite. It's not particularly deep or subtle,  since it is after all a children's book, but it has charm, real danger, and a satisfying denouement. It also features one of her signature hapless academic males, who are great fun  on the page but who would be really really annoying in real life. And there's an understated message about the importance of tolerance and how a life full of love is  infinitely  preferable to a life full of money or power. 

No judgement  if you DNF-ed this post as it's rather long. Suspect April's will be longer, unless I content myself with just a list! 

I had Some Sad News

 It's a week now since I received the sad news that  my last surviving uncle had just died. 

To be honest it wasn't a total surprise. We had seen him at my aunt's 90th  (she was his sister, not his wife. His wife died some years ago and I wrote about that and how deeply it affected me  here ) and he looked very frail then. He had been slowly losing his sight over many years and two years ago was registered as blind. He coped with that with his usual determination to make the best of things, greatly helped by his love of music, but over the last couple of years his hearing had started to go too, so that even that consolation was gradually being closed to him. 

He was 92, which people generally refer to as a good innings; his side of my family certainly seem to have a gene for long life. And it had been a largely happy life; a strong marriage, three sons and a multitude of interests. always curious about new things and ready to try them. I remember he was the first person I ever knew, when I was quite young, to have a cine camera. One of my favourite photographs of him is at my sisters first wedding, where he is standing in the grounds of the church holding the latest one and looking about.   In my photo album this this is captioned 'Now is there anyone here that I haven't got on my film' and the reason I called it that was  because , although he had the rest of the family there, he had somehow missed the OH and me. He and his wife were mortified, and very apologetic. One of those things that seem dreadful at the time but which, after years, are just either not important or funny. In fact  as far as I recall I found it funny at the time.He also had an a mazing sense of humour and a gift for telling stories; I can remember evenings in my teens  when we would all get together and the time was just full of hysterical laughter. As a  a huge music fan;he was also  one of the few members of the family with whom the OH and I could share our love of listening to singing. 

I am heartbroken that he has gone, while at the same time realising that his life had become so narrow that his passing may have been a blessing, although to be honest  I am very far from actually believing that.

As always English funerals take an age to sort so his is not until 12th May. It's going to be very sad and I'm dreading it. 

I made some cards

 This week was supposed to be all about paper crafting but somehow the week got away from me a bit and I didn't get as much done as I would have liked. That said, I did make some cards on Wednesday and here they are

For something so simple they took a remarkably long time to do, but then it's not the actual doing it's deciding what to use that takes the time. 

I'm reasonably pleased with them all, but the front two are my favourites.

The (Not So) Magic Flute

 

Another month, another ROH filmcast, this time The Magic Flute. 

Regular readers will be aware that I am not a huge fan of the plot of this opera, perverted and bonkers being about the best things I have to say about it. However I can often be reconciled to it because of the beauty of the music. It's also a huge favourite of the OH's, so when he pointed out there was an ROH filmcast at the Arts Centre at the University, given that he has recently gone to two operas on his own (Wagner, need I say more?) I felt sort of obliged to go with him. After all I reasoned, the music IS fantastic and it's Covent Garden so the cast and the playing will be great. 

Alas for such confidence. The cast was not great,and nor was the orchestra. The playing was mechanical and, bar the Queen of the Night who was excellent, the rest of the cast were either competent, uninspiring or underpowered. It was a revival of David McVicar's 2017 production and I can sort of see why people think it's wonderful; puppets, people with animal heads, a 12 section snake ( rather than a dragon!) to open. I wasn't charmed myself. They had also put in a lot of the spoken dialogue which is usually heavily cut ( and rightly so),  so it was l-o-n-g. 

No production I have ever seen has beaten Bergman's film, although the performance at Savonlinna a few years ago came close. We would have done better to stay at home and watch that instead. 

Never mind, it was a night out. Next month it's the Met's production of Evgeny Onegin and I'm hoping that will be really good. I was going to write 'hoping that will be better' but I can't see that it could be less enjoyable to be honest. 

Day 3 - Florence Reprise

 The day after Siena we were taken to Florence, a welcome return for the OH and me and a bit of an endurance task for some of the others if you listened to them afterwards. We started off with a guided walking tour of the centre and despite having done a lot of reading before we went last autumn we still learned a lot on this tour. It ended by the the Uffizi and the general plan was people had lunch nearby and then came back to visit the Gallery at the time on their pre-booked tickets. We'd already said we didn't want to go to the  Uffizi; it's not as though it isn't only six months since  we were last there, so we went off to do our own thing. 

Above - Dante's house, so they day. 

This was basically to have lunch; the OH had decided it would be nice to revisit the place we had eaten on our first night in Florence, so we did that. It's not that we like ruts or anything 😄 but he had exactly the same meal as he had on our previous visit and I only varied mine by choosing  a different dessert, because, as I recalled it, their pannacotta had been just a tad on the rubbery side on our previous visit.

 

After that we went back to San Lorenzo to visit the Medici Chapel.Previously we'd only been to the Library and the Cloisters and we thought we might get into the church proper this time as well, but it turns out you buy a different ticket for that somewhere else, so we saved it for another time. The Medici Chapel is - well, shall I say overwhelming again? Jaw dropping but not what I would call tasteful. There again my taste doesn't run to green marble, but then I'm not an uber-wealthy Renaissance Duke. 

After we left he chapel I said to the OH he should see if he could find any wool shops in the vicinity and I honestly thought he was joking when he said; There's one a two minute walk away'. Despite being so close it was difficult to find, as Google directions can be a bit iffy when you get down to small distances. It was very nice but I didn't buy anything in there. Still it was fun to visit. And then we trooped back to the  group meeting point for the long walk back to the the coach park. 

I have to say that I thought Florence was crowded in September, but that was as nothing - as nothing I tell you!- to how it was in April. A thoroughly enjoyable day nonetheless ( for us. Some of the rest of the groups were less than enchanted by Florence.) Can't think why not

Tuscany Part 1 - Arrival and Siena

 We flew to London on Easter Sunday so we could catch our mid-morning flight to Rome on Monday. The hotel at terminal 5 obviously still had notes about our unfortunate previous  experience there and had upgraded us to a suite as a result, which was nice, but you know, for one night ....still it was a gesture. We had a room service meal and all I'm going to say about that is that I wouldn't do it again. 

There were a few hiccups at Heathrow, the procedure for checking in when you're on a group ticket is different to normal and no-one could be bothered to explain what was happening but you know; water, bridge. We arrived safely, our little group was gathered up, the person in charge of our coach transfer to Arezzo where we were staying for four nights admired my pink hair, so that was all good. 

The hotel in Arezzo was very nice and the staff were lovely. The restaurant, where we ate the first night was over priced and overhyped although my dessert was nice

Day 2 (since arrival day is Day 1 ) we had a trip to Siena. I have wanted to go to Siena for many years and I have to say that of all the places in Italy I have longed to visit and finally arrived at, Siena was the only one (so far) to disappoint. There's  nothing wrong with it, it's a small Tuscan city with a huge shell shaped square in the middle where they run the famous Palio, but it just didn't live up to my expectation. Possibly the main problem was that the free time we had there was ill judged. It gave us too long to see the Cathedral and have something to eat but not long enough to do anything else. Still that's not Siena's fault. It was rammed with people, but that was a recurring theme all holiday really.

Our guided walking tour took us first to the basilica of  San Bernadino. Since this holds the mummified head and an equally desiccated thumb reputed to belong to St Catherine  it was perhaps a shame that photography is forbidden. Who doesn't want to come back from holiday with a picture of a saint's mummified  thumb?

Our guide told us a a lot about the contrada, the city factions which run  The Palio and also, as far as we could tell, the lives of the people who belong to them. I expect they do a lot of good although her description made them sound like a cross between the mafia and the masons. It's obviously something everyone takes very seriously; you can even have a civil 'baptism' into a contrada if you're not a member by birth ( strict controls apply). 

The areas of the city controlled by each contrada are marked by small plaques like this on building walls, especially prevalent near borders between one contrada's territory and the next.

Next up was the square where the Palio is run -

difficult to take a good photograph - and then we went on to the site of the Duomo where our tour ended. We chose to go into it. I think overwhelming is the word

Once we came out we searched out some ice cream which did instead of lunch and wandered round some of the places our tour hadn't taken us to. 

So that was Siena; glad I've been, wouldn't rush back.