Today I ate flat-out the worst chocolate cake I have ever eaten in my life. I swear it actually had Jeyes Fluid in the icing, I mean this quite literally. Normally I am fairly undiscriminating and think cake is cake, but, good Lord. Then I made my friend try it to see if I was just being effete, and obviously I wasn’t at all, so now instead of the disaster being contained there are two of us wondering if we will survive the night. Luckily we think Casualty will be quite quiet today as January is not much of a party month, so at least if we are having to be given antidotes or hooked up to drips at 3am we should get seen quickly.
Anyway, I have been going through some old knitting patterns of my grandmother’s which my Aunty Kath was kind enough to send me. In a weak moment last week I ordered a job lot of
Ethical Twist and thus am after DK patterns, and yes hooray there are indeed one or two.
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| I think Smith's Wool might still be in the market hall in Chesterfield |
I thought this one was rather nice but then, I have a weakness for woollies of the tank top persuasion.
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I myself use the stroke stroke stroke stroke STRIKETHROUGH! system. IIII, thus |
Do you scribble down your row counts everywhere, like this? On the newspaper, on the back of your hand, on the cat with an eyeliner, on envelopes. What an excellent use for the gas bill, that’s what I say.
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| Knitting patterns meet A Clockwork Orange |
This one is a little bit disturbing. I don’t know if she ever knitted this for Grandad but I am fairly sure he never had this expression.
Thank you everyone for your kind comments on the first chapter of Preserving Passion (credit there to Maria. How could I have missed such a perfect title?). You will perhaps be excited, or perhaps not excited at all, to know that there will be another chapter, as I have acquired a fan. Yes! A fan! Family communication systems have cranked into action and my mother has let me know that I must write a bit more so Aunty Kath will have something to read during quiet moments in the shop. I bet no-one ever said that to Hilary Mantel. But never fear, Aunty Kath, the next installment will be coming up shortly.
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9 comments:
I was given a bar of Hershey's chocolate as a thank you gift and it nearly killed me. We checked the wrapper to make sure it hadn't gone off, then reeled in shock when we discovered it was supposed to taste that rank. So I melted it to cover some fairycakes with - and had to throw the whole flipping lot out to the birds. No one would touch them because of the weird aftertaste ... yes, kind of like Jeyes Fluid or something else containing amonia.
So if someone wants to know what I think is wrong with the USA today - forget the economy. Forget foreign policy. Forget healthcare. NO ONE - and I repeat: NO ONE can tackle these issues before the MATTER OF THAT ROTTEN CHOCOLATE IS DEALT WITH!!
(Sorry. This subject forces me to use my outdoor voice.)
And, by the way, I happen to know who that psycho in the cardigan lured into his motel room. She's to be seen right here:
http://gingerschatz.blogspot.com/2010/09/balm-for-crafting-soul.html
Heyhey! I'm famous! Or I will be, when you sell the rights to this book and become the Barbara Cartland of the Ravelry set. Did I mention I was on Ravelry too? And on Self-sufficientish. Not that I'm stalking you. Honest.
I used to do the tally system, but now I am all technological and have a knitcounter on my iPod. Oh am so forward looking!
Oh by the way, after your review of Oh Comely (it was you wasn't it?) I bought it on a whim at WHSmith and it is a great magazine, I'm finding it hard to put it down as it is so pretty to look at, and interesting.
Bad chocolate cake is just BAD. I've some of those books from my late MIL.
I had to run for the bus today. I thought of your post on running. Except if I fell over it would have been on a cactus instead of a bush.
I tried the fancy digital row counter that could keep track of 3 projects at a time -- but I tended to forget which project was which, or the solar cell didn't get enough light and it forgot for me. Ultimately I went back to writing in the pattern margins and on sticky notes which tend to be less than sticky enough to remain with the pattern.
So spill the beans on where you got the cake/it's brand so we don't also have to suffer :-)
Did you notice that second pattern is 4ply ?? If I knitted that for my DH I'd be knitting it til the end of the world ....
Yes! Jeyes fluid and ammonia! This is exactly what it was like. Well it hasn't killed me but I will not be repeating the experiment. It was at Tatties in Cambridge, the one opposite the music shop (this only makes sense if you know Cambridge) not the one on Trinity Street which has not tried to poison me yet. (+++ I would wear that skirt, actually, Gingerbread Lady. I would wear it without shame).
Crafty Cripple, it actually wasn't me, I had never heard of it, but I have googled and it does look rather interesting. I am surprised they have it in WHSmith! I will have a look when I go in tomorrow.
Denise! Partner's favourite episode of Animal Cops Houston is when a cat falls into a cactus! It recovers fully I hasten to add but it is really mad for a while. (This makes Partner sound meaner than he is. The cat does recover, I promise it is fine ;-) ).
The vintage patterns are just gorgeous. The maker of the chocolate cake should be banned from any and all kitchens, from a lowely house kitchen to the largest industrial. If it's a kitchen, they should not be allowed near it. I say this, because chocolate cake is pretty hard to screw up (I could make them when I was ten, really), and anyone who can manage it is a danger to society.
I don't know what Jeyes Fluid is, but it sounds disgusting.
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