Put Out More Flags: The Library is Open

Well sort of. You can borrow actual physical library books again anyway. This is how it works, You let them know which books you want, they pull them off the shelves and get in touch with a pick up slot, you go at the prearranged time and pick them up. Sounds simple, doesn't it? Which it is, in theory. In practice it turned out a little bit more complicated. 

I ordered four. The library rang me up. One of them I couldn't have because it was just on order and hadn't actually arrived yet. Why then did it feature in the catalogue I ask myself?, but I didn't ask them,  because they're trying to be helpful and give us a library service and they don't deserve people like me getting snotty and querying their cataloguing practices. There was another one I couldn't have because it was out on loan and items out on loan aren't covered by the new service. I did feel they might have mentioned this when they put out details of the new way to borrow, because who would have assumed things were this way? If they are using the reservation service for you to put in requests and quarantining books for 72 hours when they come back, there seems no difference to me to reserving a very popular book, with a long waiting list, in normal conditions and reserving it now and going on a list. I'm sure they have a good reason, I just can't figure out what it is.

This left me with two and I picked them up with great joy and anticipation and since then the joy and anticipation have turned to ashes in my mouth. If I had been able to see these books on the library shelves and browse them  I would never have borrowed them because I would have seen they weren't really my sort of thing, so to that extent the new system is a bit  pot luck. But it is better than nothing and I've requested a few more which I go to pick up on Monday. 

Of the two I got one was James Meek's To Calais in Ordinary Time. It has been lauded and nominated for lots of prizes and I am sticking with it to see if I can find out what all the fuss is about. It has however irritated the hell out of me already because of the weird archaisms, some of which I suspect he invented, despite acknowledging the usefulness of the OED. Whenever authors do this sort of thing I wonder whether they are clever or just pretentious and I usually end up convicting them of pretentiousness. I hesitate to do that with Meek since better men than me Gunga Din think this is a brilliant book, but he is hovering close to the pretentious side of the divide and I'm not yet convinced he won't be firmly  planted there in due course. 

The other was The Girl with all the Gifts by M R Carey.which was mentioned in a Guardian review and spoken of very warmly. So warmly that I was a bit surprised the library actually had it to be honest, but there you go. I began to have my doubts when I saw the sentence 'Kazuo Ishiguro meets The Walking Dead' in the plaudits on the book jacket. It wasn't a concept that I could quite get my head around, and as Knightley says to Emma 'for reason good', which is that this novel and Ishiguro have about as much in common as a plastic snowflake and the real thing. I read Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go years ago, long before anyone thought of making a film of it, and it has haunted me ever since. I wouldn't go so far as to say I wish I had never read it, because it is heart breaking and lyrical and thought provoking and beautifully written and very much worth reading. But I wouldn't read it again and I wouldn't give it to an impressionable teenager either. Carey is not a writer who can do lyrical or heartbreaking or beautifully written. He has cardboard characters ( and that doesn't include his vampires), a rip off plot and a crash bang wallop style. I got to page 200 and then gave up, which isn't something I often do with a book, but even in lock down life is too short. 

Better luck with the next lot, eh? 

Been there, Not done that!

Here's a photo of the latest completed jigsaw puzzle; Sydney Harbour. I bought this some time ago and this is the first time I've tackled it. I put it off because I felt obliged to buy it* and then wasn't convinced I could do it. 

*I had gone into a jigsaw shop in the Meadowhall Centre in Sheffield not realising that it was just about to close. The girl kept the shop open for me and looked this out when I asked if they had any puzzles of Sydney. So when she found it I didn't feel I could say I didn't want it. 

Anyway I have done it now. In fact it was much easier than anticipated, except for the sky. The sky was just a whole bunch of protracted trouble, but I finished it nevertheless. 

This one is naturally a keeper, partly because it's a nice picture and a good quality puzzle but mainly for the memories it brings back of trips to Sydney. Who knows how long it will be before we get to go again, if indeed we ever do? 

The thing I haven't done is the bridge climb. I feel I should, because of facing your fears, and good views from the top and a feeling of achievement etc etc. The sad truth is that my vertigo is probably too severe  for me to even think about it. 

But there again, one day, who knows? 

Not a haircut but

a little bit of now-allowable self care

Grey base coat with a sparkly top. They are fabulous. They were done locally and the girl who did them even gave me a lift home afterwards since the weather was so foul.

It's been foul for days and we're really missing our walks. I've also had to give up my Scottish Ballet live stream dance classes as one of my knees suddenly decided that it didn't want to bend unless I was willing to put up with some fairly eye-watering  pain. I hope this isn't permanent. I'm holding off for a week, then I'll do some of the less strenuous ones and see how I go. I do hope I don't have to give it up altogether and can go back to the ones which feature work at the barre as I really really enjoy it. Now of course I'm stressing about not getting exercise despite the fact that before lowdown we led fairly sedentary lives which we've basically been forced back to but only while the weather is bad. I'm trying to convince myself that there won't be gales and lashing rain here for the rest of my life. 

There is some good news on the haircut front though. My hairdresser re-opened as soon as she was allowed. Sadly I didn't catch up with her announcement and the opportunity to book an appointment for 24 hours, so when I rang up on Monday last week, the earliest she could fit me in was 11th August! So still a shaggy pony for my birthday then, but sleek 1920s bob for going away at the end of the month. 

Knitting - More Small Things.

Small things continue to drop off my needles as I really can't  face anything big just now, (except for the blanket which is anyway just a series of small projects that will get lashed together in November.) So for the record, since the last catch up I have done

lots of socks

these were stashbusters and a 'lovely to see you again' present for son no 2, delivered the other weekend when we got off to Glasgow

These were for me. Several years ago my sister and I both purchased a skein of Debbie Bliss Rialto sock yarn in a shop in York. She recently used hers up which proddedme into using mine too. I am very annoyed by the hard line which features on the foot of the lower sock, caused by the manufacturer knotting new yarn onto the skein in a completely different colour and making a definite change rather than the gradual progression which features on the rest. But you know, it's hardly the end of the world. 

I bought this wool when I saw someone selling it on Ravelry as the colour is called The Tardis and these are destined to be a Christmas present for a Dr Who fan. 

And these are mine and I l-u-r-v them. In fact I l-u-r-v them so much I have yet to soil them by bringing them into contact with my feet! 

A few years ago I went through a period when every pattern I picked up had an error in it. I'd bought this wool to make a lovely thick heavily cabled cowl but the pattern for that was one of the main offenders and so the wool languished in a plastic bag until I found it when looking for something else. I pulled it out, looked for  pattern for it and came up with this baby jacket. 

I'm trying to clear out magazines that I have kept because they had patterns I wanted to try in them as well as using up wool in my stash. These two hats came about because of that. The magazine has now been passed on to a friend. Of the two hats, both were destined for charity but the green one is a) very nice and b) took so much effort to knit that I am keeping it for myself. 

And then for Bonnie Babies I managed another blanket ....

 .... and used up the bits of left over wool on hats

did several more hats with other bits ....

and also a matching hat and cardigan set in this rather startling wool. I got this in a job lot of sock wool and this was my least favourite ball of the set. Having done the hat and cardigan I decided that I couldn't  bear to knit anything more with it, as I find it hideous, and so, given that there was slightly more than half a 100g ball left and I couldn't throw it away, I labelled it and set it aside for the charty shop. Where someone might see it,  love it and buy it. 

I have to say it doesn't look like all that much when I put it up on the blog. But the blanket squares take time and I've been working on an, as yet unfinished cardigan, for myself too. So maybe I am being as productive as I thought I was. 

Baking subscription - July.

No, no-one blinked and missed the report on June's; it's sweet pretzels and I haven't been able to face making them yet. Although report says they are very nice. We're just not pretzel people. But I don't feel too bad about not having done them because let's face it, last August's box, which called for me to make custard creams, is still sitting on the kitchen work top. 

I won't say that I did this one so promptly (it arrived on Monday) so that I had something to blog about but I am aware that with very little happening the blog is in danger of becoming a book review/ show and tell knitting site. And that could became quite - well, I hesitate to use the word tedious, so I'll say repetitive. But tedious is probably what I mean. 

Anyway this month's bake was Raspberry Ripple Cake and here it is

and I'm not going to moan about the finishing off as there wasn't too much of it. It's a basic sponge with a raspberry jam and sweetened marscapone filling, and after you'd splattered some of that on the top all that was left to do was scatter a few freeze dried raspberries over it. And I was pleased with my jam, made from home grown raspberries.  

It stayed whole for about as long as it took me to take the photograph, after which it was coffee and cake time.

And if you're wondering; yes, it's delicious.

100 Books to Read Poster No. 13

I read this one sort of by accident!

I have a friend here who occasionally brings me bags of books that she's finished with. It's very kind of her and I read the ones I want and then pass them on again. Generally they're thrillers but this time, right on top was F Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. Which I have never read. And which features on my poster. A happy coincidence. So I read it. 

It's quite short. Which was a mercy. It's also very of-its-time, which wasn't. 

I am quite willing to believe, from my position of ignorance, that this is  at least a contender for the title of the Great American Novel. However I've never been a fan of reading books which are full of horrible characters with nary  a redeeming feature between them, and although son no 2, who studied this at Higher tells me that's sort of the point, and I get that, it doesn't mean I have to like it. 

Everyone in  this book is selfish, idle and stupid, except for Gatsby who is stupidly delusional (and also, let's not forget a criminal.) It's also misogynist, and anti-Semitic. The only thing in its favour is the elliptical narrative style which means that the reader is never on a sure footing about the past lives of these people. It's cleverly sustained, a bit of a tour-de-force of narrative technique in fact. The problem is of course that I don't care about their pasts any more than I care about their present, so for me it's just so much wasted effort. 

It was a book that left me feeling ever so slightly slimy after I'd read it. As such it is a resounding Miss for me. 

Here is the picture that was behind the silver screen for the book. Forty eight hours after revealing it I still have no idea about a) what it's supposed to be and b) how it relates to the book. Suggestions in the comments are welcome! Ignore the scrape above the lenses/car headlights/whatever. That was just me being over enthusiastic with the coin I was using for the reveal. 

I'm not one for houseplants, but

I do love a geranium as I think I've mentioned before. And I don't mind having them inside because they put me in mind of the pictures of Carl Larsson. His interiors generally feature a geranium or two on a windowsill. 

We got this the day we went to the Garden Centre the first time they were allowed to reopen, and I'm glad to say it's flourishing. It's not red but it's still cheerful, in a slightly more restrained way than its scarlet sisters. (Also they did not have any red ones on sale at the time!!) 

Hooray! We've Been Away!

With the easing of many restrictions on travel here in Scotland, including the buying of ferry tickets, the OH and I were at last able to get off-island, for the first time since January. 

Bits of it were weird. Wearing masks on the ferry. Looking around and seeing other people wearing masks on the ferry. Seeing how few people there were on the ferry. But that meant nothing when compared to the sheer joy of just being on the ferry and going somewhere else. 

The somewhere else was only Glasgow. I had told Son no 2 that the moment we were allowed to we'd be down there to see him properly, and give him a big hug, and that's exactly what we did. Down on Friday, back yesterday (Sunday). 

I can't say I wasn't a bit apprehensive but we soon relaxed - enough to order takeaway pizza on Friday night. I'd planned to go to The Yarn Cake on Saturday, which re-opened, just for wool sales, on 1st July, and pick up a skein of wool I need to finish a sweater, but having checked with them, they were out of stock so there was no point. The OH was a bit miffed that we had jumped the gun because if we had waited until next weekend the shopping centres would have been re-opened and he could have gone to the Lego shop. So that was bad timing, but the Lego shop will still be there next time we go. 

Given that the Yarn Cake was a no-no, we took ourselves off to see the Falkirk Wheel. It wasn't going so we couldn't spend a small fortune taking a boat ride on it, but I'd never actually seen it before and we had a nice walk along the canal bank, although rather discombobulated by the number of cyclists who whizzed past. I'm all for cycle paths and walker paths but I'm not so keen on the two combined, because the advantage is all with the people on wheels. Possibly I'd feel differently were I cycling. 

Anyway here's the Falkirk wheel (just to be clear, it's a boat lift )

We drove back to the ferry a different way, going up the left side of the country and then across the Great Glen. It was beautiful and it was also a lovely sunny day so we enjoyed it. We'd go that way more often if we thought we could do it in a timely fashion for catching the ferry. But it includes various tourist hot spots that in a normal July would be packed with traffic. Even with C-19 Glencoe was very busy. As a result of most of the lay-bys in scenic spots being crammed full of cars we didn't get to take too many photos, but we stopped for a scratch picnic lunch by Loch Lochy - far from the most beautiful place we passed - and managed to snap a couple of pictures. 

We might do this again but it will have to be in either spring or autumn, between the high tourist  season and the bad weather; also remembering always to check the status of the A82, because like Junction Road in Kirkwall it is closed almost as often as it is open. 

Book Buying Two Ways

I get a lot of stick from people I know on social media (not all of them obvs) for using Amazon. I can explain until I am blue in the face the gaps in the local shopping landscape that Amazon plugs, how difficult some things are to source when you live on an island, how depressing it is to be faced with an almost total lack of choice for some sorts of merchandise, yet still I am held to account for generally selling out to the Evil Empire and helping Jeff Bezos take over the world. 

And I know that Amazon is not a leading light in the field of workers rights and I deplore that as much as the next person, but there are very few high street retailers, of the sort I am apparently helping to put out of business, even though  they do not, and never would have, a branch here (thereby creating my problem) and from whom I therefore could not buy even if I wanted to, who would stand up to much scrutiny in the field of human/workers rights.  Which is why we have tragedies like the Bangladesh garment factory fire in 2012. 

I'm not looking for an argument here. The world is a bad place for most of those who live here, I do what I can to mitigate that and that helps me not have sleepless nights over swelling the coffers of Mr Bezos. Whether I think he should enjoy a good night's sleep is another matter. I'm sure he does. Sadly. 

But during lockdown when I had real fears for the local economy here I decided that from now on  I would not buy any more books from Amazon, but would buy them from our local bookshops. We have two independent bookshops; one in Kirkwall and one in Stromness. And while it would be more expensive to buy from them and not from Amazon, and many would need to be ordered rather than be found on the shelves, it was a small step I could take to help local business. I'm never in urgent need of a book and I don't buy so many physical books these days, so that neither my pocket nor my comfort was going to be greatly inconvenienced,  and it was therefore, although only a Small Thing,  a Small Thing that I could do.

We went into town last Monday when non-essential shops were allowed to open again in Scotland and I duly presented myself to the bookshop with details of the two books I wanted to order. The first was quite new, had just been reviewed in The Guardian and sounded like an excellent choice for a birthday present for our elder grandson. It was also, as it transpired, out of stock at the wholesaler and  would have to be ordered especially by them and this would take about two weeks. Well his birthday isn't until November so that's not a problem. The other one was a little more obscure; a poetry collection from 2015 but I had checked and it was still in print. The person serving me could not find it to start with. She went and talked to a colleague. The colleague pointed her elsewhere, where she did find it. She then had to ring up the suppliers to ask if it could be ordered since it was on their 'extended catalogue'. It could, but they needed my name before they would take the order from her (why? what possible difference could it make to them, I wasn't buying it from them directly!). And naturally it would take 'about two weeks'. 

So here's the thing. I was in that shop trying to order two books for about 20 minutes. There was uncertainty about whether one of them could be sourced for me and I am having to wait two weeks to get my hot sweaty mitts on them. What I could have done was buy them both from Amazon, where both were in stock, with three clicks of a mouse, which would have taken about a minute  and by now I would have had them for several days. 

Is it any wonder that Amazon is successful?