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Alison Hawke

Alison Hawke

NaNoWriMo strategies

National Novel Writing Month is approaching fast. The St Louis kick off party is on Sunday 28th at the Clayton Bread Co. from 4-6pm, Hubby and I will be there in our NaNoWriMo 2007 t-shirts. My basic rule of NaNoWriMo is "write every day and make at least one

Sock race

I am hurrying to finish the Boudica socks before the novelling madness starts on November 1st. One is complete, the second is at the gusset increases. I have learned a LOT from this pattern: * Starting toe-up by knitting a flap and picking up stitches * Correct way to do m1b and

2007 Ig Nobel winners

The 2007 Ig Nobel prizes are out! There is a BBC News article on it, and this is the full list. I think the Aviation prize is my favourite, though the chemistry one is a close second. I'll stick to chocolate... Medicine Brian Witcombe of Gloucester, UK, and

NaNoWriMo preparation

This year will be my fourth National Novel Writing Month, fifty thousand words all written in the thirty days of November. I have my plotbunny in hand and a list of odd things to research (the French Resistance in WWII, neutrino mass and energy, how unions work, etc.). Three more

Custard Creams for the win!

BBC News: The strange appeal of the custard cream. The custard cream is the nation's favourite biscuit, suggests a survey. So why has it endured so long? They don't make them like they used to, it seems. The old-fashioned custard cream biscuit has annihilated its newer,

Socks and a destashing sale

The Boudica socks braid has a cable on every round which is slowing me down, this week I bottled out and got a size 0 circular. Five active needles plus a cable needle was twelve points to jab myself and it wasn't pretty. I love the colour of

Word Wars

BBC News: Small object of grammatical desire. It's small. It's flat. It's black. And according to the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, its numbers are shrinking. Welcome to the world of the hyphen. Having been around since at least the birth of printing, the hyphen

Myers House yarn store

I wouldn't normally put a yarn store trip in a blog post, but this one rocked. It has been a bad week and Hubby had stuff to do on Saturday so I drove out to Myers House on my own. The store feels like a library, except you

Boudica socks and a Turkish spindle

Started the first Boudica sock, ripped it out and restarted, having figured out the correct way to do the increases. I've never done a sock by starting with a flap and picking up stitches before. It was tempting to just rip it out and do a Sherman toe

Does a one-legged duck swim in circles?

BBC News: Police mocked for 'obvious' signs. A police service has been criticised for using blindingly obvious messages in its campaign posters. "Don't Commit Crime" is stated on one of Hertfordshire Constabulary's posters - "All fuel must be paid for"

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