SAL Wednesday 24/15: It Never Rains ...

Old English Tarot

... but it pours. Let me share with you the list of things that have broken in the last week:

1. Mini Diva's laptop charger. For some who-knows-what reason, they required us to also drop off her laptop for the technicians to look at.

2. Mini Diva's behavior. She hits new pubertal lows. As a result Destructo Boy wants to move out. I do too, but I don't say so out loud.

3. The fridge section of the fridge-freezer that came with the house. I phone the landlady who tells me it's nothing to do with her. I book a repair man for it.

4. The shower. Water comes out fine, but at Arctic temperatures. Landlady agrees to send a repair man. Repair man replaces it.

5. Washing machine packs up. We fix this ourselves - a blocked filter and drain hose. Next time we get a short-haired dog that doesn't moult.

6. Freezer section of fridge-freezer packs up. Oh well, at least we've already got a call in for the repair man. Repair man comes and writes off fridge-freezer, a manufacturing fault, reckons it is about 4 to 7 years old. I use Titch's credit card to buy a new fridge-freezer for next day delivery. Thank you, Titch and thank you AO.com.

We have not yet decided what to do about the old fridge-freezer that the landlady wanted nothing to do with although it's hers. It's on the inventory. As a Zanussi when it is a Hotpoint. If you have advice about this, please share in the comments section.

After all this plus normal chores, I decide to reward myself for my ace survival skillz by finally getting out the sewing machine Titch bought me last year as an early Xmas present when it was on sale in May. I plug it in, I RTFM, I switch it on, I do some straight stitching. I turn the stitch selector dial - and it comes off in my hand, there's a crack in the part that grips the spindle.

I could have wept. And maybe I hid my face in the airing cupboard and did.

So this is what I did after lunch yesterday:

That is the pattern page for Sweet Dreams from The Best of Terry Kimbrough Baby Afghans, a 5.5mm hook, a new ball of King Cole Comfort Baby DK in pale yellow, a COLD gin and tonic, and a handsome gorgeous Sebastian. Note the weather - there's a reason I live here, the driest sunniest part of the British Isles.

If you have made it this far, you too have ace survival skillz, and I salute you. Pop off to Life & Yarn for people with unbroken things ...

Hidden Gems: Cotton, Suffolk

So yesterday I played hookey, and went to a little village called Cotton with Belo. It seems somewhat random, as many villages do - so hard to see what brought people to live in a small clump together. However, it has Hidden Gems.

The first Hidden Gem is a rambling building full of old-fashioned 'stuff'. I guess technically this place is an ironmonger's shop, but really it was an Aladdin's cave of Stuff with the surprisingly normal name of J.Lawes.

Stuff you'd never thought of because it's just there somewhere in your life quietly doing its job - but of course, someone must make it, and other someones must buy it .... for example, manhole and drain covers, Vim, Borax, several different types of string and rope sold by the yard from big reels, drawer handles, chains, sweetpea seeds, kerosene lamps, lasagne dishes (trying to tempt Alison down for a visit by mentioning that as she must need to add to her collection), bathmats, galoshes and a truly amazing variety of different mouse and rat traps.

And, well, really, just hardware wonderment in spades. Which they also sell.














To me, these two items are of academic interest only, of course my house is spotless and we have no need of such antiquities as my grandmother used as we have air fresheners. But I did buy the sweetpea seeds as not only are they guaranteed as ''heavily scented'' they are also ''floriferous'' ... and can be planted next month. Which is Saturday, of course.



And the second Hidden Gem was a gift/tea shop called Emzo which was rather like the Tardis in terms of external size related to internal size, but which looked way prettier and I bet smelled tons better too. Belo, who had not questioned that someone might need to buy a door hinge small enough for a dolls house at J.Lawes, along with teak garden seating and a Pyrex measuring jug at the same time, now queried why people might want to buy pretty decorative thingies that were lightly scented to clutter up their house with, or coasters prettily painted with this year's trend ie. cupcakes and ooh ! look ! a matching china mug, candleholder and notebook ! But I did buy some small girly-type pretties for Mini Diva as stocking fillers for Xmas.

Both these mind-boggling shops in this tiny village in the middle of nowhere. Go figure.

Today is the hottest 29th September - 28 centigrade, 82 fahrenheit - since 1865, says the news. So having been to the park and run the legs off the dog earlier while the morning was cooler, now I feel faint and that nothing will cure me but to sit gently and preciously on the patio soaking up some very unseasonal rays ....