Finishing up the Advents

I thought I should probably just post pictures of the last few days of the advent calendars, before we're into the New Year and it all seems a bit late. 

The Arran Aromatics one 

I was very pleased with my AA advent which contained not only a bottle each of eau de toilette and an eau de parfum, but no fewer than three candles, as well as a selection of shower gel, shampoo, body lotion and conditioner in six different fragrances. It was a delight.

The final days of the yarn advent looked like this 

and as you can see the OH had added in the optional full skein and mini for Christmas Eve, both of which I intend to incorporate into the advent project. I was really pleased with this too; Beth at Beehive Yarns does some wonderful colours. I was rather shocked to receive e-mails/hear on podcasts  from at least two dyers I follow that their 2023 Advents are either on sale, or going on sale in the next week. Various phrases came to mind, of which 'jumping the gun' was the most polite. 

I will see you on the other side of the New Year divide.

Holiday Reading

 

Here's my pile of books for holiday reading. Since I don't work, holiday reading is a bit of a misnomer, but basically it's stuff to read between Christmas and the time when normal life resumes after New Year. Since several of the books above came from the library I'm taking that as the day the library re-opens, which is January 9th. Not that I'm going to punish myself if they're not all finished by then. 

So, from the bottom to the top we have 

Two art books from the library - one about Egon Schiele and the other about  The Glasgow Girls

Two books I asked for for Christmas - Natalie Haynes' new novel about Medusa called Stone Blind and the Alan Rickman diaries.

Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell recommended to me over and over again by lots of people, so time to read it. 

The Hare with Amber Eyes by Edmund de Waal A couple of friends said I might enjoy this in view of our recent visit to Vienna so I'm going to give it a try. 

Three Hercule Poirot novels written at the request of the Christie Estate by Sophie Hannah.I won these as a prize in my Ravelry swap group - I was only expecting one, so was a little overwhelmed to receive all three. 

I have managed two and a half of these since Christmas Eve, and I shall be reporting back on them all in due course. 

Vienna - The Art

And I can say with 100% enthusiasm and hand on heart that the art in Vienna was fabulous. We went to the Kunstshitorisches Museum for the old masters and the Belvedere for the more modern stuff (and then discovered that they also had a medieval gallery which was totally my happy place) and if I ever did go back to Vienna I think I'd spend all my time in the art galleries and the cafes.

Sadly he Kunsthstorisches Museum does not allow you to take photographs of their pictures, but you can take photographs of  the building.

Here's the outside - very imperial ....

...as is the inside, and the staircase proved to be vertigo inducing, but very grand 

The things that most caught my eye here were the C15 and C16 portraits by German artists. They didn't have quite the skill of the Flemish artists for painting cloth, but my word they could do faces and jewellery. I think portraits are my favourite form of art really. Obviously I couldn't take pictures of them, but I have some postcards that I might try to photograph and put up here another day. 

Many years ago when we visited Madrid we went to The Prado, and I developed a catchphrase that went 'Came for the Goya, stayed for the Velasquez' and a similar thing happened in The Belvedere, went for the Klimt, stayed for the Schiele. That's a bit reductive as the Klimts were of course gorgeous and there were some other fabulous pictures. There's a Finnish artist I admire greatly and they had one of the nicest picture of his I've ever seen which you can find an image of here , linked to avoid any copyright issues, although it doesn't do the colours justice. A lovey little Monet, some Munchs and a not very exciting Van Gogh. Since you could take pictures at The Belvedere here are a couple of the Klimts that they have 

had to take this one at an angle as you couldn't get near it for tourists taking pictures (Ha!)

on the other hand nobody was taking a picture of this one which I loved. I particularly liked the thing she has in her hair as it was such an obvious reference  to the hairstyles of the Spanish Royal Family portraits that Velasquez did, one of which we had seen the day before at the KHM.  

There were a couple of rooms of Expressionist pictures which I found really confrontational in some ways but at the same time they were mostly so beautiful that you couldn't help but just stand and gaze at them in awe. There was what I currently think of as an uncharacteristic Klimt 

and this one by Egon Schiele

There were several pictures by Schiele and I said to the OH  at the time 'This was one very disturbed individual'. But of that, more anon. ...

The Fourth Advent

 I made reference to this earlier, but didn't post much about it as it was a bit different to my others.  I'm in a swap group in Ravelry which concentrates largely on recycling and making, rather than buying stuff for swapping, and there's a very small budget for their monthly swaps. I have found it challenging, but fun in the few months since I  joined. 

For Advent this year they ran a Secret Santa type swap where we all sent our giftee 4 parcels, one to be opened on each Saturday in Advent within an overall budget or the four of £20. When mine came they looked like this when they came out of the box 

So that was four new project bags right there, before I opened anything! 

And as  opened them I found the following 

week 1 

week 2

week 3 

and week 4 

It was a really lovely and quite exciting experience and I'm hoping they do it again next year.  

Happy Christmas!

 

My Christmas post images are normally snaffled from somewhere on the web, but this years is a photo of my own from a few days ago.

I'm signing off from the blog now until 'The Other Side'  of Christmas, when I'll be back with tying up the advents, displaying some Christmas kitting I did which couldn't feature on here beforehand because - surprises, trying to finish the story of our visit to Vienna, perhaps some ranting (or who knows? raving) about Christmas telly - in other words, the usual mix. 

Meanwhile to everyone who visits me here, I wish you a very happy Christmas. 

Advents week 3

 

Arran Aromatics. I'm impressed that there's yet another candle.

 

 Beehive Yarns advent. Just three more to go and I have to say I have loved this. Although I have some skeins that I prefer to others there hasn't been one I haven't loved and I'm really looking forward to knitting it up. I have recently changed my mind about what I'm going to use it for and I'm excited about starting it, when various other bits and pieces are off the needles. 

Son No 2 came safely home yesterday so I'm off now to rope him into some baking and wrapping. There may be photos of the baking in due course. 

Vienna The Operas 2 - Andrea Chenier.

So I was looking forward to this one very much, mainly because I had never seen it before. There was an additional draw, which we hadn't known about when we booked the holiday, that Jonas Kaufmann had been cast in the title role. I wouldn't have booked on the strength of that alone, but it was a bit of a bonus. 

It was performed on our third evening in Vienna, and I had started to wonder why people had been constantly checking somewhere to 'see if Kaufmann was still supposed to be singing' practically since we arrived. I found out in the late morning of the day of the performance when someone told me in doleful accents that 'Kaufmann has cancelled after all'. I gather he is notorious for cancelling performances at the last minute which I think is not a good look, but obviously as long as he can  get away with it he will continue to do it.

Some people in the group were very downcast at the news but we weren't because  as I say his appearance would have been a bonus, but wasn't  our reason for being there. Good tenors may be rare, but when you've heard some of the best live, ticking off another, and extremely temperamental one, doesn't really loom large on the priority list. So we were prepared for the pre-performance announcement that Kauffman would not be appearing. What we were not prepared for was learning that, not only had Kauffman cancelled, but the cover was ill as well, and the only reason they were able to put on a performance at all was by getting the tenor from the previous evening's Tosca to sing the role from the side of the stage while some poor sap from the stage management team walked through it on stage. 

Since  had not take to the tenor on the previous evening this prospect did not fill me with unadulterated joy. nor was the stage management person a good actor, or indeed a good fit for the costume. There were some very very odd moments. 

But - but but but - all was not lost. The tenor was much better as Andrea Chenier than he was as Cavaradossi. The women were all really good, the production was a bit OTT but fine, the plot was bonkers but you know ... it's opera, and the music was lovely. I really enjoyed it. I'd have enjoyed it more if they had managed to persuade the tenor to actually act the part, but at three hours notice I suspect he felt he was giving his all agreeing to sing it, especially after Tosca the previous evening. Cavaradossi is, after all, a big sing. And at the end of the day, Herr Kaufman  was not missed. Well, not by me. 

Advents Week 2 and Christmas Socks

 Arran Aromatics

and the Beehive Yarns yarn

complete with a little extra of a pair of scissors. Which was very welcome as scissors have a tendency to disappear around here, and when they turn up sometimes they're not as sharp as they might be. 

And this week I finished the third and final pair of the Christmas socks, in good time for us all to wear on Christmas day. Basic vanilla sock pattern although mine have a twisted rib cuff and a stocking stitch heel, in the WYS Christmas colourway for 2022, Gingerbread. 

Oh no, you didn't? Oh yes, we did!

We bought some Christmas/winter bedlinen. I think every year when it's too late, that it would be nice to have some special bedlinen for Christmas and this year when we got back from Vienna I got a bit obsessed trying to source some with a Nutcracker theme. True to form I  had  left it too late and even the multifarious versions on Amazon wouldn't arrive until after Christmas. So I resigned myself.

Then came word that M & Co had gone into administration and were having a sell everything off sale. Since we were in town the day afterwards and since  have bought bedlinen from them in the past we decided to go and see what they had and lo and behold we came out with this.

It's not Nutcracker themed but it is nice and wintry/Christmassy and we got a lot of money off it and the accompanying sheet and pillowcases. 

I would have felt a bit like a vulture going in and buying up their stuff cheap, but  when the Arcadia Group went into administration a couple of years ago we lost our business so I know what it's like from the other side. And the sad truth is that a) what it can't sell at reduced prices to bona fide customers M & Co will end up offloading to wholesalers for next to nothing and b) they will need every penny they can get to meet their liabilities, and that might well include redundancy pay for its employees. In which case we've made a small contribution to someone else's welfare. And got some Christmassy bedlinen. 

Think I will try and remember to look for some with a Nutcracker theme a bit earlier next year though!

Shining Lights

Here as promised is  a photograph of the tealight holder we purchased in Vienna

isn't it lovely?

And here's the one I purchased earlier in the year in Prague

which is just as lovely  in a different style.

And now I'm off to decorate some shortbread I made yesterday (I know! who does that?) If it's a success pictures another day!

Vienna - Christmas Markets

The Christmas Markets were a bit of a draw for the visit to Vienna, along with the opera. It's about six years I think since we went to Stockholm for the Christmas markets there and we had really enjoyed that so we thought it would be good to have a look at some elsewhere. 

There are lots of them in central Vienna, and wherever we went basically we could see one; they are strategically placed by almost every tourist site in the city so the first one we visited was the one by the Kunsthistorisches Museum. By the time we'd 'done' the bits of the museum we wanted to see the day was getting on an the market was filling up. Given the propensity of the Viennese to elbow people out of the way as we went round we found ourselves further and further away from the actual stalls which was a bit sad as it meant we had to do a bit of pushing ourselves to get into a position where we could see anything. 

It was fine. We didn't want any gluhwein, although plenty of people wee getting tipsy on it, and we didn't want to buy cheese or bread or cold meats so that meant we didn't need to look at a lot of the stalls. I did manage to by, in my best pidgin German a stick with chocolate covered pineapple pieces on it which was nice; both the thing itself and the fact that the woman on the stall understood what I was asking for. I was very very taken with a modern style wooden nativity scene, but closer inspection revealed that just the Mary Joseph and baby in the manger cost 93 euros. I did a quick conversion in my head and decided that, however taken I was with it, that was actually daylight robbery - and anyway when would I ever have a chance (not to mention the funds!) to buy the associated shepherds and wise men? So we passed on that and settled for a tealight holder with trees ad a reindeer. It's very nice. Picture later maybe? 

What I had hoped to buy to bring back was some stollen and some lebkuchen both of which were conspicuous by their absence which was a shame. 

A couple of days later when visiting The Belvedere Palace to look at Secession Art we had a quick gallop arond the Christmas market there and were disappointed to discover that many of the stalls were exactly the same. I suspect that many of them are actually outlets for shops in the city and we didn't buy anything at that one, alhugh as it was earlier in the day we were able to get closer to the stalls than on the previous occasion. 

Here's a picture 

Quite Christmassy. Overall though we preferred the Swedish ones; partly because the stalls were more varied and had people selling things that they had actually made themselves, and partly because there was more gong on; carol singing, traditional dancing etc. I think we are probably over the excitement of Christmas markets now. 

Tree is Up!

 

It's a bit earlier than we normally do it, but I was feeling in the need for some Christmas cheer when we got back from Vienna. We didn't do it all at once; tree assembled and the lights on one day, and decorated and the rest of the stuff put out the next one. For a white tree it is starting to look quite cream coloured; it may be time to star thinking abut buying another one for next year. 

I took a few close ups of some decorations, totally at random, not necessarily my favourites or the best or anything

This one features a 'pohutakawa' fairy, sent to me many years ago from a friend in New Zealand

This is one of my favourites and relatively recent; Maisie mouse sent by my sister a few years ago. So cute!

Bottom left, if you click on the photo to enlarge it, you'll see the new bauble we bought at the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. Not that we needed more baubles, but ....

On a related note I can report that Museum hops  in Vienna are just as good at prising open your wallet as Museum Shops in Britain. I could have spent a fortune - but I didn't. 

Anyway I'm edging towards being ready. I have two parcels for the post office, one letter to write and then apart from local stuff, I'm done. Yea for that! 

Let's Talk About Advents.

Just typing the title reminds me that I have yet to open the window on my Jacqui Lawson advent calendar for today - well I'll do it after this post.

I have four advents this year, all different. I had an Arran Aromatics one from the OH a few years ago, as you'll recall if you've been reading the blog for that long, and this year I treated myself to another one. They are a lot cheaper than they used to be; I think the one I had before was the first year they had them and I remember seeing them on the website half price by 2nd December, so possibly they learned the price point had been set a bit high. Anyway here's week one of that

I'm still playing catch up with this and the next one as I missed the first six days through being away and I thought opening 6 all at once would spoil the pleasure so I'm doing two a day until I catch up.

The next one is a yarn one and is my Christmas present from the OH. It's tricky with yarn advents because you want one where you like the theme so in theory you hang on until all the dyers you follow have announced theirs and then pick. However as they all produce limited numbers, which is sensible in view of the amount of work that goes into them, the early ones can often be sold out before you know what other people are doing. I was lucky this year as not long after I decided this was what I'd like for Christmas a dyer who is relatively new to me, Beth from Beehive Knits, announced that her advent this year would be themed around the Laura Ingalls Wilder book The Little House on the Prairie. No brainer, and the OH ordered it immediately. 

Here are the first seven minis and the two extras I've opened so far

From bottom to top the colours are: Spring Woods Awaken, Sapling, Buds and Berries, Grassflower, Wildflower Posy, Nine Patch Quilt and Rosehip Jelly. They're seasonally themed so all of the above are spring apart from Rosehip Jelly which takes us into Summer.   The extras are a packet of wildflower seeds and some honey scented tealights. I do have a pattern to use these on but as I'm desperately trying to finish some Christmas gift knitting I don't know how far I'll get with it before Christmas. Probably nowhere, but we live in hope. 

We burn a lot of tealights at Christmas which is why I allowed myself to get the Yankee Candle Advent tea light advent wreath. 

For some reason this contains only 18, rather than 24, tealights but that works for me because, as noted above we missed the first six days of  December here. So we have one a day until Christmas. I have to say they are good value as they burn for ages and have a good strong scent, quite often you can only smell tealights when you stand up! 

And the fourth one I think I'll leave describing for another day nearer Christmas. For now, after a heroic struggle with the UK cards this morning I  have an afternoon appointment with my ironing board. 

Vienna The Operas 1 Tosca

You can't go wrong with Tosca, can you? I've heard that said many times and I think the performance at the Staatsoper proves that actually you can go wrong with Tosca, and using a production that is over  one hunded years old is definitely one of the many ways this can be done. I kid you not, the production was first put together in the early 1900s; the woman who did it left Austria in 1938 fleeing from the Nazis and never went back, and yet despite its age they roll it out quite proudly. You know, there's traditional and then there's stupidly hidebound. 

After the performance the tour manager asked what I would give it out of 10 and I said 4. She thought that was quite harsh but I thought it was fair. One point for the music, one point for the scenery, one for the baritone who was excellent, and one for Tosca's costume in Act 2. 

To my shame I had never heard of the baritone, who is apparently very well known and who was presented with the honour of being named a Kammersänger after the performance. This is huge. I suspect I don't really understand how huge it is, but he got a certificate from the President of Austria on the stage so quite a big deal obviously. 

The Staatsoper is a huge renaissance style building; the Emperor or Empress who commissioned it didn't like it, thereby ruining the careers of the two architects who designed it, one of whom was so distressed that he killed himself. Well done, your majesty ....

It is much less posh inside than you might expect, with the exception of the foyer, and of course the  auditorium, which is splendid  if you like that sort of thing.

A friend from Glasgow was coincidentally at the same performance and we met up with her in the bar beforehand with another couple on our holiday, also from Glasgow and who we have met at Scottish Opera events. That was fun. 

Vienna - Coffee and Cake

 

We got back late last evening and as you can probably imagine we've got a lot to do today. I did want to start blogging about Vienna, which I'm planning to do by 'topic' and I'm starting with the Coffee and Cake one because I suspect it will be the shortest.

One of the good things (one of? maybe the only?) about the timing of my recent operation was that it meant that I could go to Vienna and have coffee and cake without having to worry about how much fat I might be consuming at one sitting and the possible deleterious consequences. I thought we might do it every day to be honest with a different cake each time.

In the end we only did it the once. This was partly due to lack of time and partly lack of inclination. I found that I didn't want to eat rich cake every day, even if I did, in theory, want to sample several traditional Austrian cakes, but you can't go to Vienna and NOT do it at least once.

Of Vienna's many famous cafes we chose to go to Cafe Central, partly because of the fantastic Art Nouveau decor and and partly because Freud used to hang out there. We had to queue to get in, but this is true of all the more famous of Vienna's cafes so that was OK. It was 35 minutes though and quite cold so it was a relief to get in at last. Once you're in though you're not mithered to leave so you can relax and make the  wait worthwhile. 

The cold was probably the reason we opted for hot chocolate rather than coffee, and it was hot chocolate with amaretto which I have to say was delicious. There were lots of tempting sweet treats to go with it. The OH picked something called a Maroni Deluxe, which is a chocolate cylinder filled with kirsch soaked cherries and a chestnut mousse, topped with whipped cream, and I went for the Cafe Central Torte - well it would have been rude not to! Two layers of chocolate sponge with an orange flavoured layer between them, stuck together with orange flavoured marzipan. 

A very  enjoyable 'once-in-a-lifetime' thing. 

Fingernails and Finished Things

 

Not sure if I have mentioned we are off shortly for a few days in Vienna. All my favourite things; opera, art, coffee and cake plus the seasonal joy of the Christmas Markets. Looking forward to it very much. Naturally I needed my nails redoing in preparation, and I opted for icy sparkles, with just two snowflakes to reflect winter. I had hoped that the city would be all sparkly and snowy, but the internet tells me that Vienna hardly ever has snow, it just gets very wet and very cold. I won't let that put me off the place, but we'll be packing thermals I expect. 

The new cast-on I allowed myself has now become a finished article after I worked on it monogamously for several days. I had my doubts as I was knitting it but I am very happy with the finished article and I shall be sporting it at the Vienna Staatsoper on at least one evening in the near future. Sadly the photograph doesn't do due justice to its sparkliness, you'll have to take my word on that. 

Finally a recently completed jigsaw puzzle. During lockdown I had a good sort out of my puzzles and managed to get them all stored away out of sight, but since then numbers have crept up again and I have a pile of puzzles on top of a bookcase in the hall once more. I need another cull, and this was the first one selected. I had a whole bunch of these map type puzzles showing different areas of the world and I have done them often and enjoyed them but it's time for the remaining few to be done one last time and then go. I'll donate them to the library so that if I ever have a real yearning to do one of them again I can borrow it for the purpose! 

I won't be blogging while I'm away but the upside is I should have some lovely photos and experiences to relate when I get back! 

But Why Were You There in the First Place?

 is a question you might be asking, after learning of the problems we had with getting back to Orkney in my previous post. 

Well the main reason was this 

Son No 2's M.A. Graduation which took place at Paisley Abbey, and unlike his B.A. one which was held in late spring, this one was a 'proper' graduation with people getting bumped on the head by the Chancellor, and being presented with a certificate in front of their proud Mums, Dads and other family members. It was fab. I was sorry there wasn't a piper - UHI have a piper - but there you go. The organist managed to murder Highland Cathedral while we were taking our seats, and we were played out to Walton's Crown Imperial which I thought tasteless. But that's nitpicking. Afterwards there was a reception with fizz, tea, coffee and little cakes. Since I can now partake of little cakes, I did. Several of them in fact. The mini lemon cheesecakes were particularly nice. 

Obviously we stayed on a couple of days more; in Glasgow we had a celebratory dinner out with son no 2, some quite restrained shopping (licorice fudge at Tyger, plus a pair of new black boots for me, to replace the two pairs of black shoes that have gone to shoe heaven recently), and coffee and cake with K from Scottish Opera. On Thursday we visited a small town called Lanark which is south east of Glasgow, then continued on to East Lothian where we had arranged to meet my friend V for lunch. V has made sundry appearances in these blog entries as I meet up with her and another friend D quite often when I visit the Central Belt, and she has recently undergone a quite serious operation. Much more serious than just having your gall bladder out anyway. She seemed to be recovering very well, but I wanted to see for myself. We had a very nice cafe lunch and then visited a lovely shop next door, which was basically Scandi decor. Again I was very restrained, it was the sort of place you could spend a mint in if you were that way inclined, but all I bought was a small Scandinavian gnome to give to the lovely L who does my nails, and who has a bit of a thing for gnomes. I handed it over on Friday when I had my nails done for our forthcoming trip abroad. Of which more later.  

What Do These Two Phrases Have In Common?

 

Go Ruth and Hurrah for Northlink.

The answer is that they are both things that I have said in the last two weeks, while both being things that I never thought I would say, ever.

Just to get The Archers one out of the way, Go Ruth was my gleeful exhortation as the character let her sanctimonious and poisonous mother-in-law Jill have it from both barrels in a recent confrontation over something Jill had said to her grandson Ben. Three decades or so of justifiable resentment came tumbling out as Ruth told Jill how she had been made to feel ever since she married, and her cypher of a husband looked on in hapless bemusement. I normally have no time for the character of Ruth at all, but on this occasion I was happy to metaphorically hold her coat while she slugged it out. 

As for Northlink, we have long been disenchanted with them; hugely subsidised they nevertheless cancel many many ferries at short notice when their rival, private and therefore not able to rely on the money coming in whether they actually sail or not, continued to provide a service. The private one is much closer to where we live and also has a more convenient and more frequent timetable so it is a long time now since we stopped using Northlink and swapped to Pentland Ferries. 

However Pentland let us down in a big way last week when we were planning to return from Glasgow. To be fair it wasn't their fault. The weather was foul enough in Glasgow while we were there, but it was much worse here, because in addition to the driving rain which afflicted most of Scotland, Orkney had high winds. For days. Everything was tikety boo the day we left to go south; after that most of the ferries were cancelled and by Thursday night all the Pentland Ferries for Friday were 'under review' and we were booked on the last one of the day. We had seen this pattern all week, that sailings would be under review for the next day, and then get cancelled one by one as the day progressed and it looked as though we would be stuck down in the Central Belt for an unspecified time. Normally this prospect would fill me with nothing but joy but on this occasion I had to get back because I had two hospital appointments on Monday morning.  

On a whim, the OH checked the Northlink website without much expectation of there being any sailings, because if Pentland have cancelled you can normally bet the farm that Northlink beat them to it. But no, wonder of wonders! Northlink's morning service was leaving as usual on Friday. When we fond out it was late on Thursday evening, and we hummed and hahhed a bit but really we had no choice. The OH took to bed at 9, we woke him at half past midnight and then we drove through the night to the north cost to catch the morning ferry. Hearts in mouths for some of the time, as it was very very dark, but there was hardly any traffic which made things easier. When we got back I went straight to bed, but the OH stayed up, lit the fire, had some coffee and then played on his computer for several hours. No doubt his system was awash with adrenaline. 

So hurrah for Northlink for getting us home. They take a different route over the firth to Pentland and their side of the islands was sheltered from the worst of the winds last week which is how they were still going. The ferry was rammed with the normal Northlink people plus many of those who had had their Pentland bookings cancelled. We had been very lucky to get a booking, and we were duly grateful. 

As a postscript I should report that I got to both hospital appointments. An ultrasound scan that showed nothing untoward, and my flu and Covid 4 jabs. And apart from a slight energy dip in the afternoon I had no side effects from the covid jab, which was a (welcome) first. 

Three Little Things of Completed Loveliness

 although to be fair perhaps the loveliness is in the completeness, rather than the things themselves. 

First up, and rather to my surprise, the jigsaw is done. 

Very pleased to see the back of it, or I will be once it is on its way somewhere else. It's a very pretty picture but it got harder rather than easier on the way through, until about the last 50 pieces. 

The there's a book.

Ariadne by Jennifer Saint. I'm generally a sucker for retold Greek myths cf the several occasions when I have gone into raptures here about the work of Natalie Haynes, and to a lesser extent - but possibly only because she has written less - Madeline Miller. I was looking forward to this and sadly I was disappointed. Honestly it's such a downer. It's just so relentlessly downbeat. I'm not going to argue that women in Ancient Greece, especially royal or noble ones , didn't have a rough time. But the strength of Miller and Haynes is that although they allow for the particular difficulties of women, they don't pretend that men have wonderful lives either. They also often allow their women agency, give them justice (albeit sometimes through the actions of men) and show that some of them manage to circumvent the limits of their time and build something of value for themselves. Saint is having none of that. Her men are all weak, flawed and nasty, and her women come to bad ends. Not a book to pick up when you're miserable, unless you want to finish it and say 'well however bad things are for me, they aren't that bad.'

And finally some knitting. I finished this a few days ago having picked it up at the beginning of the week when all it needed was a second sleeve. 

It's in a beautiful Irish aran tween that was gifted to me by a friend. I chose the size that would use up most of the skein so that's 1 - 2 years. Sadly I don't know anyone with a little boy that age but I'm sure one will turn up in due course. There should have been another piece of knitting to show off too, but sadly ... it's a tubular cowl and I have now twice, using two different methods, tried and failed to join the two ends together. It was languishing in my craft room because I had messed up the first try, and wasn't very confident about taking out the grafting that had somehow managed to join a wrong side and a right side together. But with my new found zeal for finishing stuff, I picked it up thinking, all I need to do is undo this very carefully and find another way to join it up. I unpicked the incorrect grafting, found a YouTube tutorial that showed me how to do a three needle cast off for a tubular cowl and tried that. I can't quite explain what the problem was with that but when I came to tun it right side out having done most of the cast off on the wrong side as instructed, only half the thing would turn through. There is obviously something about the geometry of a tube that I can't get my head, or my needles round. So  that has gone back to languishing until I feel brave enough to tackle it again. I've also worked very hard on a crochet project this week but without managing to quite finish it. 

I did allow myself a new cast on on Friday. I got a free pattern from a designer last weekend and although I wasn't convinced I would use it, it suddenly struck me that I had some wool that would do perfectly for it. In addition to this I needed something calming to knit after the jangling of the nerves that came with the failure to join up the cowl, and preferably  mindless to knit too, so that I could take it  away with me, as we are off to the Central Belt for 5 days tomorrow.  So  this is my take away knit and with a bit of luck and a following wind I will finish the thing in time to take to Vienna in December. 

So progress on the irritating unfinished stuff is being made. Even if only slowly. 

Black Adam

Son No 2 is here just now and it wouldn't be a visit from him without a trip to the cinema. Normally it's just him and his Dad seeking out the latest  Star Wars instalment - I gave up on those a long time ago - but as it's  not Christmas there wasn't one out.  There was however something called Black Adam which is a superhero movie, not from the Marvel but from the DC, stable. 

As regular readers will know, I'm not averse to the occasional superhero movie, with the exception of Antman which I have been heroically resisting watching for what feels like forever but is probably only a couple of years. I'd never heard of Black Adam but that didn't really matter. 

Of course these things are generally crash-bang-wallop movies with a side serving of unquestioning American might-is-right, but I can take that in small doses. Well the crash bang wallop side of things anyway. In fact Black Adam is somewhat more nuanced in the political arena then most others ( I know, a very low bar, but they tried) and I applaud that. I also applaud the fact that one of the Good Guys Gang apparently came to an unequivocal end - that's something you don't often see in this type of film. 

We went to what is known here as a 'relaxed viewing' which basically means no adverts, no trailers, sound turned down a bit, lights left on a bit . I'd never been to one of these before but the boys had and recommended it, so that's the one we chose. We booked, just in case, but we needn't have bothered, as along with the three of us there was one other party of four teenagers and that was it. 

I did enjoy it, as much for the fact that we can go to the cinema without a second thought these days, which a couple of years ago I wouldn't have put money on., and acknowledging the fact that there are still people for whom that isn't yet true. 

Last day in Wales - Angelsey

 We went to Anglesey chiefly to visit Plas Newydd, because I wanted to see the Whistler murals. Now in the care of the National Trust it belonged to the Paget family, later ennobled as the Marquesses of Anglesey. I don't often take a great interest in the families who owned National Trust properties, but  was rather taken at the time by the stories followed in the house of the Paget family. 

The house has a gothic frontage

beautiful views ....

....over the Menai Strait

and in common with so many places we visited in Wales beautiful gardens where  I took a shed load of flower pictures

Sadly taking photographs of the Whistler murals is not permitted, which is understandable  but if you feel so inclined there are photos available on line. Nothing like seeing the real thing. They are amazing and looking at them I almost cried with frustration at my inability to draw. So much talent, lost so young.  

Anglesey also has many beautiful beaches, almost as good as the ones on Orkney! and after visiting 

Plas Newydd we visited one where  took even more photographs. 

Beach detritus

a shell banded in denim blue

and a piece of meaningful wood carving whose meaning I have of course forgotten, but it's still a good bit of carving. 

Looking back (and actually at the time) Wales was one of the highlights of the year. Beautiful weather, good company and lots of really interesting places to visit and things to do. Even without being a narrow gauge railway fan.