Long Saturday

Went down to Bishop's Stortford on Saturday to drop off a knitting machine and give a quick crash course to Kerrie of Hipknits fame. The kids were dying to have a go too (we managed to put them off!) and I think she was impressed by how fast it knits. Hope she gets time to play with it, and hope I didn't bamboozle her with all the things it can do. Went into town with hubby and kids and had pizza. Didn't get chance to look at the town much, but it seemed to be a lovely collection of higgledy-piggledy buildings and worth a second look. Then went onto Stanstead Abbotts, and had a lazy afternoon catching up with uni friends and commiserating with their cat Sid, who scuppered their holiday plans by breaking his foot. Poor thing is an outdoorsy sort of cat and is confined to small cages whilst he gets better - he's already chewed his cast off twice - but he seemed happy enough, as long as he could see someone from his "prison".

Stayed for tea (excellent shepherd's pie with pepperami!) and Merlin, and then got back on the road - got in at 10pm and fell asleep on the sofa. It's amazing how four hours driving can take it out of you, even though in itself it's not all that physical. Tomtom performed brilliantly, although I could have done without dealing with the M25 and the London end of the M1 which has average speed cams and a speed of 50mph for some distance. Sometimes it would be nice to take the shortest distance and not the fastest. For example, I used the RAC website to work out a route from Rugby to Whitnash in Leamington, and it has sent me in a big counterclockwise loop, using the faster A roads. I think I need to try again - it's trying to use all of my petrol, the git! :)

Oh, and it looks like I have my knitting mojo back - it just needs to be less complicated at the moment. Cast on the Autumn Flare skirt last week. Did one repeat (it's a handkerchief hem skirt) and it was coming out too long, almost to my ankles, so frogged it and started again with a smaller needle. So the cabled aran is stalled, because it was on the same size needles - luckily I have end caps in my Denise set, so it's just parked. I also cast on a crochet shopping bag with "plarn" (cut-up carrier bags) - it's far easier to crochet than to knit with them, as the combined friction of many stitches on a knitting needle is ruddy hard work.