Cragside

Jim and Dawn were visiting this weekend. I decided to have a total break from work yesterday and felt much better. We went to Rothbury and after a short walk to some standing stones, we had lunch in a pub. Lovely fish and chips. Then we went to Cragside. Cragside was the first house in the country to have electricity. They had hot and cold running water, electric lights, an elevator and electric spit in the kitchen, before most people even knew they could exist. All that was powered by hydroelectricity. The house turned out to be shut. Apparently the 130 year old wiring doesn't come up to modern electrical standards and has been condemned. The grounds were still open and we had a good time walking around the formal gardens, pinetum, lake etc.

There were more wild mushrooms around the grounds than I've ever seen. We almost had enough photos of different types for a mushroom calender for 2007. We decided that this one was the 'perfect' specimen.

There were several art installations in the grounds. One was a four poster bed, floating in the middle of the lake. Something about it made it difficult to stop looking at it.

There was also a boat shape made out of little paper boats.

Sockedy of Errors

After posting yesterday I decided to have a quick knit of the socks I was working on. Thinking it would be relaxing. I was finishing off the last couple of rows of the heel. I've already had to undoo it a couple of times because I made mistake during the week. All I did was drop stitches and get confused. I've ended up making a total mess of it because I dropped a lot of stitches from the very edge of the short row shaping heel and even though I thought I'd got them all back there's now a big gaping hole on one side. I tried un-knitting but I can't figure out what's going on. I think I'll just have to undo the heal and start again when I'm less tired. Maybe I should resort to a plain stocking stitch scarf or something. Sigh!

School

I woke up this morning with that 'Do I have to go to school feeling?'. It's was all dark and rainy. I was with year 5 (9-10 years old) today. They were all fidgety because of the close weather. Fortunately the rain stopped long enough for outdoor playtimes. I find doing something new and different every day exhausting. I feel absolutely shattered. I can't wait for the weekend. Hopefully I'll have more time to do some knitting.

I just got an electric shock from the aerial cable for the TV? How odd, it's never happened before. My arm feels all funny. Wonder why it is.

The Group

Last week a couple of friends asked me, almost as an aside if I had many friends in Leicester and if I would miss them when I moved. The answer is yes to both questions. I wanted to write something about the people who have been a massive part of my life.

I moved to Leicester in September 2002, to do a PhD in the Radio and Space Plasma Physics group at the University of Leicester. The group consists of about 30 people, who are a mixture of technicians (building, running and designing radar components), administrators, PhD students, research assosciates (PDRAs), lecturers and professors and unusually for a physics department the group is about 50% female.

Right from the start I was made to feel really welcome. Not just by the other students, but by everyone in the group. The first day ended with a trip to the pub and that set a precedent for the rest of my time there.

It's a bit like being in a big family. People work together and socialise. Sometimes spending almost too much time with one another. There's always someone willing to join in with a sporting activity, or a trip to the cinema, a pub, the shops or a restaurant. Always someone to talk to when you're feeling down or someone to offer tissues when you need to cry.

Group members are not only sociable but they're extremely supportive when it comes to work. Everyone is always willing to offer help, encouragment and advice if required.

All that means that I am very sad to be leaving Leicester. The nature of a research group is that staff and students come and go, but I can't help feeling a sense of loss at having left. I don't think there are many people currently there who I don't consider to be my friends and there are a lot of people who I hope will remain friends forever.

On Thursday night I was presented with a folder, which had print outs showing presents that had been ordered for me. The first is a sushi making lesson, from a Japanese chef in Glasgow (I am very excited about this. There's also some rosewood DPNs, the Dr Who series 2 box set and some John Lewis vouchers, along with lots of pictures from the last 4 years. I was also given a card and these three fantastic cakes, which Sarah and Suzie spent many hours making.

I just wanted to say a massive thank you to everyone there for my leaving presents and for the last 4 years. I wish we had more than one word for thank you because it doesn't really seem like enough. I'll miss you all loads.

Teaching Begins

I had the first day of my primary school observation placement today. There were 5 other students observing. I started off in reception, which basically meant that I spent my day playing in the sand pit, building Duplo houses, looking at snails with a magnifying glass and cutting out playdough shapes. Obviously I was also making observations which will be extremely useful in my future career. It was still a million times more enjoyable than sitting at a desk running time series analysis routines on magnetometer data.

Moving

Well I've now unpacked most of my stuff and there's a little more breathing space in the house. I did have to spend all of last night reorganising my clothes and the linen cupboard in order to fit everything in. I decided I had to get rid of a lot of old clothes that I no longer wear. Most of them are too worn to be any use for a charity shops. I think I might try and turn the old T-shirts into a knittable yarn. I feel terribly guilty about throwing things out because on Friday I listened to a program about the environmental impact of people buying a throwing out lots of cheap clothing. I'll have to just be more careful what I buy in future.

I went to the Centurion knitters for the first time yesterday (after I managed to locate my clean clothes amoung the boxes). It was fun. Hopefully I'll be able to continue going now I've not travelling so much.

Sorry for the lack of photos. Have been too busy to remember to take pictures or to knit much.

All Change

Today I left Leicester and my job there for good. Feels very odd, but nice to be home and know that I am stopping.

For those of you following the degree notes saga, they ended up staying in Leicester because I couldn't fit them in the car. Their future remains uncertain, but they're currently hiding on a high shelf in my old office.

Moving

I've shed about 50% of my thesis work notes and papers today. I've kept the 'important' stuff and thrown out all the duplicates and slightly wrong plots that I was keeping because they seemed useful at the time. I also have all my undergrad notes sitting here. I'm not really sure what to do with them. It would be most sensible to throw them away, since I haven't used them since graduating, but every time I take them off the shelf I think about how much effort I put into the work and can't bring myself to do it. I should also mention that I realised today that I have 5Gb of pointless files on my computer, which I am keeping 'just in case'.

My grandad was a bit of a horder. I have hording genes. Every so often I have fits of ruthlessness and throw things out, because I also have some conflicting genes that hate clutter. I am a tortured soul. It's hard to say at this point which side of my genetics will get the upper hand. Maybe I'll snap when loading the car and decide to chuck them out. It's feeling like a stessful process.

Faffy Faff Faff

It's my last week in Leicester this week. I'm sitting at my desk, surrounded by half packed boxes. I keep trying to contact the education office in Newcastle, who said they'd get back to me in 10 minutes 2 hours ago, to find out whether I am going to be able to do my primary school placement next week. I still don't know whether I'll actually be doing the PGCE because I'm still waiting to hear whether or not I'm going to be interviewed for a research job I applied for. I just had to call up the people supplying my new laptop and remind them that it needed to be delivered to me. They said it would be here last week, and despite making some excuse, it seems that they just forgot to deliver. Probably more to do with the fact that the guy I talked to on the phone when ordering seemed more intent on giving me the hard sell, rather than actually lisening to what I said. Why do people insist on trying to sell you things which you've already decided to buy? All it does is put me off. I still need to arrange with my land lady when I am leaving my flat and cancel all my utilities. All in all it's not the most relaxing Monday ever.

We were planning to go camping over the weekend, but I decided that I just couldn't face it in the end, what with everything else I had to do. We thought we'd just go for a long walk instead, but when we got up on Saturday morning and saw that it was raining hard and was forecast to do so for the rest of the weekend, we decided to give up on the whole thing. I'm not too much of a wuss when it comes to rain. I've done my fair share of eating sandwhiches, while sheltering from driving rain in ditches behind walls, but it just seemed to take the fun out of the whole thing. Instead we decided to start decorating the flat so we can think about selling it. So we had a trip to B&Q, which is always fun, and then set about painting all the wood/metal work in the hall, which there's quite a lot of. The emulsion will have to wait until next weekend. I still keep finding paint on my arms and things, despite having two showers.

All this activity meant that I didn't get that much knitting done over the weekend. I finally got a ball of matching alpaca silk, so I did some work on my ruflette ruffle, and started knitting up my KoolAid dyed sock yarn.

I quite like the colour (sorry about the crap picture). I started knitting some lacey socks, but I just can't seem to convince myself that I or anyone I know would actually wear them. I also think they look wrong in the patterned yarn. Maybe next time.

My First Hand Dying

Inspired by Helen and Jen's efforts I decided to have a go at dying some undyed Opal sock yarn from Get Knitted. I used grape, pink lemonade and cherry. I was suprised how well it took the dye. I was expecting it to take ages of heating and soaking before the liquid went clear but it happened almost right away. It's still a bit wet. Can't wait to see what it looks like knitted. The photo doesn't really show the colours very well.

Bizarre things from home

It's taken me all week to get round to mention my mum's glasses. When my dad picked me up on Friday last week he complained that my mum had lost her glasses and had been making everyone look for them for the last hours or so. They had just about given up looking when I got home. My brother's fiance had gone outside for a walk round the garden, decided to pick and eat a plum from one of the trees outside. She looked up and saw this.

The explanation is that my mum had a ladder out earlier in the day and had he glasses on her head while picking plums. Good thing the magpies didn't spot them first.

On Saturday, while Graeme and I were taking a walk around the block, for fresh air, we spotted a cloud of black smoke coming from someone's drive. We went to investigate and this is what we found parked there.


They were gone when we came back from the shops. We didn't see it again. It must have gone for a drive around.

My Produce

I opened one of my three grow bags of potatoes today because the plant had completely died back. I'm not sure this is the most efficient way to grow potatoes. I've got about 1.5 times the volume of potato I planted in the first place. Oh, and I pulled up a couple of carrots to see how they were getting on. Not great it seems. Still, nice to have something. I don't have a proper garden, so it's all grown in pots.

August Bank Holiday Weekend

It's been a bit of a family weekend so far. We had a barbecue on Saturday with the Scoffield branch of the family (6 of us, 7 cousins and my aunty). We managed to sit out for most of the meal until we finally got rained on whilest finishing our desserts. I dug out some old toys from my parents' shed for the kids to play with. I didn't know they were still in there.

On Sunday I went with the other half of my Dad's family to the christening of little Millie. I performed my godmotherly duties without embarassing myself (I don't know why I was so nervous about just standing there). I even managed not to collapse into giggles while one of the older members of the congregation was warbelling out a hymn noone else knew, during communion. Afterwards we all went to the Forum for another barbecue (got to make the most of the Summer while it lasts.). As you might expect at a Christening there were an awful lot of pregnant women and babies there. Hope it's not catching.

Sorry if you're sick of hearing about this by now, but I finally finished the cardigan. In time to be blocked, dried and wrapped before the christening. I don't think I've been so pleased to get something finished in a long time. It will be so nice to work on something else.

Today is Becca's birthday. Happy Birthday Becca. So we get to go out for a pleasant meal this evening. Tomorrow we're back to entertaining family. Graeme's brother and family are coming to stay. Hopefully that'll mean getting to use up some of the 5000 plums my mum and dad gave us.

Buttons and Gloves

I seem to have lost my camera cable. It's probably lurking in one of my boxes of office stuff but I can't find it anywhere, so I can't show you the photos of the fabulous chocolate cake we made for Sarah's birthday. Happy Birthday Sarah.
(Yey! Found another cable that works)

We all went out for a curry at the Nila Palace (our favourite curry place) last night to celebrate. It was probably Jonny's last curry there before moving to America and one of the staff ran out after him, opened our taxi door and presented him with a Bangala glass to remember them by. He has been a very good customer over the years. Here he is displaying it in the taxi (sorry for rubbish camera phone pics).

Yesterday lunchtime I headed into town on various missions. I bought myself a selection of buttons, some for the bear cardi, a couple for the flaps on the gloves and some to make cardigan number three from a few posts previous.

I also got some brown wool to sew the bear's faces and because it seemed such a shame to only buy one ball of which I would use a tiny amount, I bought three, so I could make something proper (oops).

And just because I feel like I should show some actual knitting. Here's one of my finished Broadstreet Mittens.

Clearout

Thanks for all the messages. I am feeling much better thanks. I'm eating normal food again. I do love my food.

I've started the big clearout because I've only got about 2 weeks until I leave Leicester. I've been giving away my office plants and things from my flat which I won't be needing any more (I still need to get rid of a folding table and a set of crockery if anyone is interested). Rob came and took my stereo off my hands last night. I bought it in 1999 and it's one of the few items of furniture/electrical equipment which I've kept through many moves. I felt sad to see it go, but we just don't have room or need for it any more. Feels like the end of an era.

The only other things which have which has been with me that long are 2 yellow pans, a batik painting from Africa, and a throw, crocheted for me by my mum, in yellows and oranges. The throw has been on beds and sofa's in all my flats and has been sat on, spilt on and generally loved, by all of my friends and housemates. So much so, that I think it is nearing the end of it's life and will have to be put into retirement, at least for the time being. Even if I do end up doing a PGCE, I still feel like I'm packing up my student things for good. Maybe I'll make myself a new throw that'll see me through the next 8 years of non-studentyness. I hope they'll be as good.

(A belated throw picture)

Feeling Poo

Sorry for lack of posts. Seem to have some sort of bug, which has attacked my stomach. Felt too icky to post or even knit :S Bit better now, so I should have something to show tomorrow. Going home to vegetate and eat plain toast. I just can't take the excitement.

Summer Fruits Cake

I promised to make cake yesterday and bring it to work. We've had coffee-time treats almost every day this week. I wanted to use up ingredients that I had in my flat but do something a bit different. So I made a standard victoria sponge cake mix (4 eggs quantity) and chucked in most of a packet of defrosted frozen Summer fruits. I think it turned out rather well considering I didn't have anything to measure amounts in or any recipe books and had to guess. I also didn't know what temperature I was suppsed to cook it at, because I only work in gas marks, so I guessed at 170° C. It ended up being in the oven for 2 hours in total before it was cooked in the middle. I think if I make another one I'll stick to a smaller quantity. I hope people like it.

Knitting Plans

I still haven't finished the bear cardi I am knitting. I have procrastinated over it so much that I have now totally lost interest in it. If I'd paid more attention to it when I first started it I would have got it done in no time. Damn my sock obsession. I spent 15 minutes this morning pulling out most of Sunday evenings efforts because I made so many mistakes in it. The bear in that section is missing the left hand side of his chin, one of the cables is longer than the others and I forgot to shape for the armhole (dur!). Which all goes to prove, predictably, that knitting when hung over and sleep deprive is not a good idea. I have a definite deadline for finishing it so it really will get done before I go back to Newcastle (27th August) and am reunited with my stash. In the mean time I pondering what to start next.

I like to have a little thing and a big thing on the go at the same time. The first little thing I want to do is a tea cosy, requested by my friend Steve, for his big brown teapot. He gave me the dimensions this morning. I'd like to do something quite funky and interesting. I have about a million ideas, but I haven't yet found one which quite fits with my expectations. Plenty of time to think about that though.

The next big thing I want to knit is a jumper for myself. At woolfest I bought 1 kg of natural cream coloured aran (I could dye this). I also have 500 g of Debbie Bliss merino chunky from Lewis' sale.


I need to find a pattern which uses one of these. My current favourites are in the list below (Notice I am too cheap to go out and buy a pattern.). The biggest problem I am having decided is wondering how all of these would look with a pair of FF cups under them. A lot of jumpers which would look lovely on most people end up looking very odd on me. 3 would probably be the best looking but I suspect it would be extremely boring to knit. I would be greatful if people could let me know what they think or suggest alternatives.

1. 


2. 


3. 


4. 


5. 


6. 

Best Starter Ever

I was downloading some pics from my camera phone and came across this one which I had forgotton all about.


It was taken in Milazzo at a restaurant owned by a friend of the owner of the villa we stayed in. This is their ham and melon starter, which is possibly the best starter I have ever had. I love ham and this appeared as a towring vision of lovely parma ham with bits of melon and mozarella. I couldn't have asked for anything better.

Last night I had the pleasure of eating more lovely food. This time pizzas cooked by my Italian friend Enrico, with the assistance of all the rest of us. This is the one I made. Sadly I couldn't eat it bcause I was so full from the previous slices I'd eaten. I do like the shape though. Makes life more interesting.

Prize Marrow

Yesterday Suzie asked if anyone would like a courgette from her garden. I said yes and this morning she presented me with this beast.

It is 46 cm long and the circumference is 35 cm at it's widest point. It's going to feed me for a week.

BA halts flights

Long time no blog

OK, I suppose I should apologise or something because it's been about a week since I wrote anything on here. Maybe I don't need to because I'm not sure anyone actually reads it, apart from my mum who's been on holiday. I suppose the truth is that I'm put off about writing about my life by the thought that some creep/nutcase is sitting at home reading it, just in case I let slip any information about my anti-fashist (I spelt that wrong on purpose) activities. By in case you ar reading, hi to all of you and just so you know, I am not involved in any activist groups, I have barely done anything political in my life except vote and I don't know anything about anybody else that does. Just because I don't believe the same things as you do doesn't mean I deserve to be punished in some way.

I feel better now I've got that out of my system. I had a lovely weekend in North Yorkshire at my friends' wedding. It was a really relaxed doo in a marquet, outside a B+B on an farm. We had a hog and lamb roast (haloumi cheese for the veges), followed by some lovely local cheese and cake. There was a free bar with local ales on tap, and lots of wine too. Once the serving staff had left we all got to have a go at pulling our own pints. We danced the night away (well we danced till about 2am), before getting delivered back to out cosy B&B. Even the weather behaved itself and it didn't rain until about 11 pm.

Leicester drunks:

I think it's probably the most enjoyable wedding I've been to in a long time. I really enjoyed having a proper dance. There were no people dancing properly (i.e. with proper steps etc.), so we were all free to flail our arms around, bang our heads or indie shuffle as approriate. We were all a little bit worse for wear yesterday morning (some more so than others) and we had slow, lazy journey back to Leicester. I hope the happy couple are having a fab time on their honeymoon.

In knitting news, I'm part way through knitting a pair of Broadstreet mittens (i.e. fingerless gloves with a mitten flap) in Regia 6 ply. I'm doing them on 2.5 mm DPNs because I wanted them a bit smaller than the pattern suggested.


I've wanted to do some gloves for ages. There's something really pleasing about making them that I can't quite put my finger on. Maybe it's because they're so fiddly.

When I came in this morning I found a little parcel on my desk with this lovely choker in it, made for me by my officemate Natalie (of the North Pole Socks fame). It's from the Asphyxiation pattern from the Anticraft. It's so lovely to have something made for me, especially something so beautiful. Thanks very much Natalie.

I'll take a picture of it tonight when I am wearing something more appropriate.

Knitting Update

I was behind in reporting my knitting. Now I'm reunited with my camera cable I thought I should do something about it. So here is the current situation:

Finished sock, with short row shaping heel and toe, finished on holiday. They're made from a ball of Lana Grossa sock yarn I bought at WoolFest, but I lost the ball band in my excitement and now can't remember which one it is.

Bear Cardigan from the Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino Book 1. This section also finished on holiday.

and sleeves, finished yesterday.

And some more short row shaping socks, which are being made for a friend. The yarn is Opal in 'Owl' shade. It does look quite owly does it?

I also finished off something special which I won't be able to show you till next week. There's something to look forward to. :)

My not so secret pal

Yesterday I finally got to open the parcel sent to me by my lovely cousin Gill (of the -ianic tendancies).


There's some lovely blue-purple-green, 100% merino, sock yarn from fleece artist, some sweets (Real Fruit Fun Shapes), otherwise known as Gummi Feotuses, and a great T-shirt from Urban Yarns, with the slogan:

The parcel really cheered me up when I was really in need of a boost. The past few days have been really hard for me. If you don't know why then I might be able to explain why some time in the future. Thanks to everyone who's been supportive and speacial thanks to Gill. I don't know what I'd do without you.

Happy Yorkshire Day!

Apparently it's Yorkshire Day today, so happy Yorkshire Day everyone! Eee by gum... and all that.

Holiday Knits

Just in case anyone was wondering I did knit a bit while on hols. I finished the back of cable bear cardi I'm knitting and the pair of short row shaping socks. I messed up the kitchener on the second toe because I wasn't giving it my full attention. I think it'll have to come out and be done again. I haven't got any pictures of all this though because I forgot my camera cable and didn't want to fill my camera card with knitting pics while on hols. You'll just have to take my word for it.

However to be going on with here's a picture of some bronze age spindle whorls, which were in the Lipari archealogical museum. I got told off for taking this photo inside, which I find ridiculous since everyone else seemed to be doing what they liked. Typical. I always get caught if I try to break the rules.

I'm not overly convinced by the way they've got the thing set up, but then I'm no expert. Anyone else care to comment?

Short Row Shaping

Last night, after packing I knitted my first short row shaping sock heel. I felt rather proud of myself afterward. I took this photo of it this morning with my camera phone (I already packed my proper camera). I much prefer the look of it to the traditional heel flap. I am supposed to be making these socks for someone else but I want to keep them now.

We're off on holiday to Sicily tomorrow, for 8 days. I'll see you all in a literal or virtual sense when I get back.

The Forth's New Rules

Finished Poncho

I finally got my arse into gear and finished it. It took a while because I was making up the pattern and I wasn't feeling overly confident but I think it turned out ok.

I also started some new socks. I was missing not having and socks on the go, which I suppose means I've been sucked into sock knitting good and proper. I never thought it would happen to me. They colours look warmer in the flesh than they do in the photo. I have yet to decide who they will belong to.