Injury Time

I thought the tragedy should be captured in majestic black/white and adorned with a Photoshop effect. Yes, it is my left wrist. No, I cannot knit. Yes, I'm icing it and am booking a doctor's appointment today. And I'm typing this entry with my right hand only which means blogging is really slow and annoying. Instead I'm reading and I'm very glad that I got the new Scarlett Thomas book out of the library instead of paying real money. I will tell you why when I can touch-type again.

Update: "bruised tendon" and I "need to watch the activity level". My doctor muttered something about I should have gone to A&E back when my injury first happened. Cough.

Ghosts in the Library

Mooncalf wrote a blog post today which hit home. "I have looked through my books," she wrote, "and I need to get rid of some of them." Almost four years ago I uprooted myself from Denmark. I packed twenty-four boxes and my suitcase, and I moved across the North Sea. I moved from my own two-bedroom flat to a flat I shared with others. Most of my belongings languished in unopened boxes until Other Half and I found the apartment where we now live. Twenty-four boxes. Fifteen of the boxes were filled with books.

In my Copenhagen flat I had a wall of bookshelves and the bookshelves were packed. I had books stacked on the window sills, on top of chairs and, yes, on the floor. I had books in the attic too. In other words, I had to choose between my books: which ones were important enough to go on that journey with me; which ones could be replaced; which ones were unimportant enough to simply be given away?

I bought small stickers and started sorting my library.

Green sticker: you will come with me, you are part of me, we will never part. Yellow sticker: I need to think about us; it is complicated; will I find you again in a dusty secondhand bookshop? Red sticker: sorry but we are over; it's not you it is me; you are replaceable; what was I thinking?

I left eighty per cent of my books behind me when I moved.

Regrets? I have a few, and not too few to mention. I gave away books I never thought I would read or re-read and now I often find myself running my finger along the spines looking for that Angela Carter novel I once began but never finished. There are huge gaps where Henry James and Charles Dickens used to reside. I really regret getting rid of my literary theory course books because I had some fabulous marginal notes and now that my brain is wasting away, I would love to curl up with Plato and those marginal notes.

And do not get me started on why I brought a standard paperback edition of James Joyce's Ulysses with me, but got rid of all those Georgette Heyers I have had to re-purchase. Self-delusion, I think.

Nowadays my library has mingled with Other Half's. We have a lot of Iain Banks, Douglas Coupland and William Gibson where once I had very few or none. We are running out of shelf-space once more (I have a cunning plan called "two-books-deep shelving") and I despair at Other Half's tendency to not put books back where they belong (I try to keep our fiction books alphabetised by author and under each author by date of publication).

And I feel haunted by books past because when I am standing in front of the bookshelves, I keep looking for the books that got away.

Time-Travelling

First, a link: this Cat & Girl comic strip made me chuckle quietly. Grrl travels fifteen years forward to meet her future self. 1990s Grrl is underwhelmed by 2010 Grrl. And I chuckled quietly because I saw myself. Having said that, I am mostly the same person I was fifteen years ago. I am older with a few new scars and bruises. I am also a bit wiser, less sociable, and more forgiving. I like the same things I did fifteen years ago (books, computer games, cake, my bed, old Hollywood musicals, vintage clothes, typography, Eurovision, and dogs) but I have added new things (my gawjuss Scottish boyfriend, yarn, coffee, philosophy, and matching colours). I think my 1995-self and my 2010-incarnation would get along just fine, although I bet my 1995-self would be appalled at my hairstyle (I just had my hair cut this past week and I am appalled).

In fact, almost fifteen years ago I made a deal with a good friend (who I miss dearly over here in Scotland). She would cook me a fancy three-course dinner if I wrote a book. Now it could not be just any old book - it had to be a special kind of book. My friend did not expect me to write an academic treatise nor did she want me to write a big literary sensation. She wanted me to write a frothy piece of Regency Romance.

I have read a lot of RRs - they are my comfort foods, my security blankets. I grew up in a household devoted to the weeklies' feuilletons, our local library's stash of Jalna-like books and, of course, Barbara Cartland (who I blame for my youthful infatuation with Lord Byron). Later I discovered Georgette Heyer who may be frothy but never nauseating (unlike Cartland). Today I go through phases: I may read a lot of RRs over a few weeks but then several years pass before my next RR frenzy. These phases usually coincide with stress, feeling homesick or going through a rough patch. Comfort foods and security blankets, indeed.

Could I write a passable RR? I think I could come up with a suitable plot involving, say, a Scottish laird's daughter who is sent to London for the season - on the way she meets a dashing highwayman who happens to be a notorious rake settling a wager. Add a couple of dogs, a duel, a dollop of gambling debt and a waltz at Almack's and I think we have a winner. Now all I have to do is write the darn thing and that fancy three-course dinner will be mine, MINE!

.. My younger self would be tempted, my 2010 self will probably just make the three-course dinner and skip all the writing.

In other time-travel-related news, Doctor Who made me cry this week with an episode about Vincent van Gogh, of all people. Your mileage may vary - the episode has divided fans in various online fora - but I took a great deal from it about beauty, art and life.

Completely unrelated: Congratulations are due to SoCherry who is on her way to becoming an honest woman and to Paula who ran a charity race today. Two of my best friends here in Scotland and they keep on amazing me.

On Frocks & Books

A few things to tide things over..

• With a few modifications, this is how I'd like to live. I would not sort my books by colour (in fact, it is a pet-peeve of mine), I would tone down the pattern-upon-pattern thing, and I would go for a different IKEA sofa*, but overall this is my sort of home. It has that Scandinavian-midcentury/vintage-thriftiness/art-junkie aesthetic I like.
• As I keep saying, I am not getting back into dress-making. Nope. Not a chance. Having said that, I am drooling over this sewing project. There is no way that I'd look anything like the girl in the photos, but that is one fetching dress. I never know what to wear during summer but I like the idea of wearing pretty cotton frocks. But I'm not going to make one for myself.
• Not getting back into dress-making does not mean I cannot look at gorgeous fabric, though. Spoonflower supplies a design/print-on-demand fabric service. Look! Steampunk-inspired fabric! Fabric inspired by early American feminist writer! UK-based company, Clothkits, sells beautiful Liberty fabric designed by Grayson Perry. Sigh.
• Meanwhile Danish ladies' magazines keep publishing lovely free knitting patterns (mostly donated by yarn companies). My recent finds include this awesome cardigan, and a very cool top. I might even have yarn for the top.. Hmmm.

* yes, I have opinions on IKEA sofas. I'm a bit scared by this.

And on a completely different topic, take a look at this MeFi post about the quality of paper used in contemporary publishing.

"Eight years ago we started to notice the shift in buying patterns from free-sheet Permanent Paper to groundwood paper for hardcover books. Groundwood is the type of paper used in newspapers and mass market paperbacks, and its production is such that it is much lower-quality and degrades more quickly than traditional book publishing paper." What makes a book permanent?

The discussion quickly descends into a "well, why print books at all now the digital revolution is here" argument. I have nothing against digital publishing nor against digital archiving (in fact, I support digital archiving as it allows for storage on an unprecedented scale whilst not taking up much room), but I do take issue with people saying books are going to vanish within the next thirty years because they are too low-tech to be anything but obsolete. Despite globalisation, that is a very First-World argument.

The Book's low-tech nature is exactly why it is going to survive - and why books needs to be of better quality. Needing the Book is not about cherishing the object itself, but understanding its role in the dissemination of knowledge. Oh, but the internet! Oh, but Kindle! Oh, but what about people who have no access to the internet, or have limited/censored access? What about people living in areas where electricity is a scarce commodity reserved for the elite? Picking up a book "only" requires you to be able to read. Using a Kindle or the internet requires compatible technology, electricity, the ability to navigate and process information online, stable access, knowledge of how to download content/patch your software .. and then how to use your reading device.

(I miss working with print culture - can you tell?)

Making It Real

Like most knitters I can get obsessed by certain patterns. I have designers whose work I really admire,  I have specific project types I tend to do over and over again, and I am drawn towards a particular aesthetic. Long-time favourite patterns of mine include Arisaig, Shirley, Flyte, Icarus and Aeolian. I have the yarn to make Flyte (mmm, Felted Tweed) and I have enough 4ply in various colours and qualities to make Arisaig about five times. My laceweight problem is well-documented, so obviously I have plenty, plenty, of yarns to choose between for Icarus and Aeolian. So, if the yarn requirements are not the problem - why am I not making these much-desired projects?

Last night I finally cast on for the Aeolian shawl. I was fed up waiting for "the perfect yarn" and "the perfect moment". I printed off the charts (mmm, charts) and located an old skein of 100purewool merino lace (i.e. non-branded Malabrigo lace) which I overdyed about two years ago.

And you know what? Even though this is not "the perfect wool" and "the perfect moment" I am really enjoying how it is working up.

The colour is ridiculously bright, but I'm reserving judgement before I start pondering another dyeing session. So far the acid green/lime yarn actually work with the pattern rather than against it. It looks fun and playful instead of all heirloom-ish. I like that. It was not how I had pictured the shawl (my imagined Aeolian shawl was rather vague but somehow super-dignified) but I'm happy to finally be knitting the darn thing.

And I can always knit it again in a more staid colour.

Also, my cardigan is now hitting the slow-growth stage (i.e. no more fun charts; a walk in the stocking stitch desert to follow) which may explain why I'm suddenly throwing myself at a complicated lace project. I'm woefully predictable sometimes.

Finally, a good friend of mine is participating in the Race for Life this Sunday. She has a blog contest in which sponsors can win some ace prizes including a generous Old Maiden Aunt gift voucher, Rowan yarn, an Ishbel shawlette knitted in Malabrigo sock (I saw this with my own eyes tonight - it is beautiful) among other things. Go forth and see for yourself.

Away for the Day

As today was a Scottish bank holiday, we both had the day off and decided to spend the day in a semi-productive way. We took the bus thirty minutes out of Glasgow and spent the best part of the afternoon walking a tiny part of the West Highland Way through fields of bluebells, hiking up fairly steep slopes and catching our breaths underneath old, gnarled oak trees. A beautiful sunny day with a defiant breeze added to our enjoyment, as did spotting several buzzards flying high over the Campsie Fells. Next time we will plan ahead, pack a proper picnic basket and maybe even check the map before we head out. We ended up on a bit of a detour involving a massive 19th century water reservoir (pretty, but not what we had in mind) which I'd be quite keen on avoiding on our next adventure.

PS. Eurovision? Wasn't it exciting?! Congratulations to Germany (who can almost afford to host the event unlike most of the other participants) and a big congratulations to Norway, a fabulous host.

PPS. I have cast on a shawl.