A brief warning... I'm having a tidy up. 

xxx

My head hurts, the sneeze quotient is a tad higher than normal, my feet (despite last year's gloriously warm Sockapalooza socks) are frozen, did I mention my head hurts, and I'm starting to feel bunged up?

My friends have been sharing a lurgy among each other.  I think it might have been passed to me.  What joy!  What fun!  This fits nicely with feeling terribly dizzy for much of Monday, and being utterly exhausted yesterday, good night's sleep sans rattling windows notwithstanding.

If I were at home, I could knit le pull francais.  I ought to photograph it.  I've done a sleeve, and I'm onto the back.  I love the colour changes.  Red and black.  Terribly chic.

xxx

I am stewing apples and blackberries for pudding.  See:

And the smell is glorious, partly because of the ground cloves, and the cinnamon stick, and the wine in there.  Yum.  Mum's blackberry and apple (or apple and blackberry, depending on how much apple there was to eat.  With two trees in the garden, it always seemed like an excessive amount of stewed apple) never involved spices.  I think this might be rather nice....

I appear to have come all over domesticated, which is probably a reaction to my stumping the length of Oxford Street today looking for papery items for a 'beautiful paper' swop that I signed up to, and then forgot about.  This didn't do much for my temper, it is all my own fault that I am late, and I feel deeply guilty.  I was not impressed to discover quite how expensive Notecards and so forth are at Symthson's either.  The cheapest item in the concession at Selfridges is a silk covered address book-let.  It's about the size of a credit card, and costs fifteen English pounds.  A set of Notelets practically requires a second mortgage!  I gazed longingly at the display, and then departed elsewhere for paper that is both beautiful and reasonably priced, and (this is necessary when one is shipping overseas), not of American Origin.  Selfridges is a home-from home for Americans.  Apart from Marshmallow Fluff, one can acquire Kraft Macaroni Cheese in a box, Instant Corn Grits (yuck), Blueberry sauce in a Squeeeeezy bottle, quantities of American Magazines and stationery, and Oreos.  I am still aspiring to a Smythson diary, one day, in many years time.  Possibly when I have increased my property empire and have a second mortgage anyhow.

Anyhow, I have to Get On.  There is

• Brownie Accounts
• Guide Accounts
• Guide Admin (again - this time I need to write envelopes for the letters I failed to give out on Friday night)
• Guider Admin (someone needs to circulate the dates from the County Meeting)
• Make list of what's needed for Friday night for Guides
• Sort out transport from Airport to Station in Mumbai  need to book train ticket, and I think I need to wait about three more days before the system will let me.  Can get taxi voucher at airport.
• Copy photo CDs from Jack Petchey awards
• Work out which photos need enlarging from Jack Petchey Awards, and prepare for enlargements at Boots.
• Email photo of Brownie with painted Tile to Guiding Magazine in yet another doomed attempt to get one of my photos into print (I promise, on my honour as a Guide, that once I've got a photo into print, I shall never again email a photo of a Brownie to Guiding Magazine).
• Package up items for Swop (I am very pleased with what I did achieve!)
• Packages up tiles to send to USA
• Tidy up the sitting room a little
• Mend Jo's necklace.
• Knit
• Communicate plans for Friday's Brownie meeting to the rest of the ladies.

I'd be further ahead with all this but for the fact that the Brownie cupboard in my bedroom required a bit of reaassembly this morning.  Too much stuff in the cupboard results in the back of the cupboard popping out.  Mending it meant emptying it, and moving it.  Emptying and moving the cupboard resulted in a massive sorting session, much disposal of bits of paper and decisions to shift old Christmas Cards to the cupboard at Brownies, and some very needed cleaning behind the cupboard, as the top of the skirting board was thick with dust, and even my unhouseproud self couldn't live in the knowledge that it was there.  Inspired by this, I then hoovered the bedroom and actually used the crevice tool to get into the narrow bits.

Having read Roald Dahl's biography, I'm now reading James and the Giant Peach for the first time.  I missed it when I was six.  I am not sure why.  Possibly because Mum thought it was too easy for me.  Roald Dahl was Not a Nice Character, but one would have to be somewhat twisted to write books like that for children.  James' parents are killed by a rampaging rhinocerous in the first paragraph.  Must have been on Camden High Street...Perhaps we need a plaque to commemorate this.

Which reminds me.  I saw Boris Johnson pontificating in a square while I was on my way to Brownies on Friday night (in a taxi, because I was running unbelievably late, and the amount of clutter I had to take with me was seriously heavy).  I wonder what he was up to.

xxx

I don't normally go for blogging news stories, but, how can this have happened.  Repeat after me.

"Reach, Throw, Wade, Row, Swim and Tow".

First, you try to reach the person in the water.  Then you try throwing something buoyant at them, such as a life ring.  Then you wade in, and try the same thing.  Then you try with a boat, and the very last resort is to lower yourself into the water, and swim to them (approach from behind, if they're flailing).

I have known this by heart since I was about eight years old.  I learnt it from a Ladybird book, and I hope never to have to use it...

Police chiefs have defended two community support officers (PCSOs) who stood by as a 10-year-old boy drowned in a pond.

Jordon Lyon leapt into the water in Wigan, Greater Manchester, after his eight-year-old stepsister Bethany got into difficulties on 3 May.

Two anglers jumped in and saved Bethany but Jordon became submerged.

The inquest into his death heard the PCSOs did not rescue him as they were not trained to deal with the incident.

Jordon was playing at the edge of the pond, known locally as John Pit, off Wigan Lower Road, in Standish Lower Ground, with his two brothers, stepbrother and stepsister on 3 May.

He was trying to support Bethany as she struggled in the six-feet-deep water before slipping from view.

Anglers managed to pull Bethany out but Jordon was out of sight before they could get to him.

The alarm was raised and the PCSOs arrived on the scene. Police said they could see no sign of Jordon in the water, so they radioed trained officers for help.

Greater Manchester Police said an officer was on the scene within five minutes.

Members of Jordon's family also rushed to the scene to join the search.

He was eventually pulled from the pond but despite attempts to resuscitate him he was later pronounced dead in hospital.

A verdict of accidental death was recorded.

OK.  How does it go?

R

T

W

R

S&T

(plus a half day training session on First Aid, so you know what to do once you've got them out of the water).

xxx

There were questions.  Pay attention....

Comment est-ce qu'on peut tricoter en francais?  Avec le catalogue nouveau de Phildar.  C'est le modele 'Quietude' (cliquez sur 'page suivant'). 

(translation available on request)

I managed a third of a sleeve, knits up nice and quickly.  Not sure about the acrylic-ness of the yarn, but it's very sproingy and nice, and makes a change from the Softest Socks in the World™, which are knit from something that claims to be 4 ply cashmere, but is more like 2 ply.  It is very glorious, though, and so so soft.

I've also cast on the Hanami shawl.  So far, one basket weave repeat, and very nice it is too.  I'm using something or other by Habu.  It's very fluffy.

Ravelry?  Anyone want to kill me now.  I have an invitation, I have done since early August.  I still have not accepted it.  I think it's sitting in my inbox.  It's probably expired by now.

Yes.  I am the one knitter in the world who hasn't joined in.  Why not?  I have not got enough time to maintain this blog properly, let alone upload my stash online.  I would far rather knit it than photograph it.  Which make make me some sort of strange weirdo.  However, when I am reduced to displaying socks in the Savile Club, next to my knitting pupil, merely in order to have a photograph of a WIP taken, you know, I think the Time Management thing needs to have its priorities re-addressed.

And now that I've managed to make several changes to various systems at work, and I have run out of excuses for sitting here waiting for processes to run, and really need to go home for Night One of Four spent Guiding this week (Tonight, the Brownie Planning meeting.  On Wednesday, the Jack Petchey Awards.  On Thursday, the Super Secret Surprise Party for Jo, who is no longer Division Commissioner.  On Friday, Brownies and Guides), I must stop and go home.

 xxx