Observations

Toibin minus three days. C'est tres passionant. There will be no more strawberries until our return. A friend today emailed to ask where my wisdom was. I told him he'd have to wait until I'd had my annual shot of Irish culture. Even the suns have the good grace to be excited. They should be. Street theatre and a playground in the castle grounds. What more could they want? (Real sun would be good, but we'll settle for dry spells!) So observations might abound from all next week.

Dry spells will be needed for C and W who are coming too. They have been to Outdoor Store tonight to purshase specialist equipment. It feels an enormous responsibility to invite folk on their first camping trip. No doubt they will have many observations of their own.

But what of today's observations? According to Saint J, whom I had to contact today for panic advice on turning corners of my alarmingly expanding crocheted square, it takes thirty rounds to produce a pram blanket. So I must be one third of the way there. Observing along said way that so far:

1. Crochet is more mathematical than knitting in its cyclical threes but less so in that you don't have to count very many stitches at all.


2. Crochet is kinder to the inefficient than knitting because you know that stitch four warns of a wrong thing. The inefficient should be finishing a chain of three upward instead of attempting to begin a new chain of three through the next gap. And it doesn't matter at all if you drop a stitch or need to rip out. A*.


3. Crochet is nonetheless more monotonous than knitting especially when you really cannot fathom how it could be turned into a rectangle instead of a square.


4. Crochet must be fabulous for the creative soul who can't abide patterns, preferring instead to juxtapose fabulous combinations of thrilling colours in all sorts of fluid inventions.


5. Crochet will be yet another tool of my ultimate humiliation in wool, displaying neither thrilling combinations nor even consistent tension.

I will however take my blossoming blanket to the tent and it will keep my knees warm as I mull over the creativity, nay genius, of others. Maybe I'll find some wisdom too!