This week at theworlddrivesmecrackers.com...

Well, I have definitely picked up since last week! One of the problems is that my usual morning carers have a new team leader and, when either of them is off, she keeps sending in carers from another area instead of using people I know.

This is really stressful - partly because I have had a stream of total strangers turning up to shower me, but also because I keep having to tell them, step-by-step, what the routine is. Mornings are not my best time, and having to face a barrage of, 'Where does this live? What do I do now? Where do I find...' morning after morning has been awful. Anyway, that has now been sorted out, and from now on I get only carers I already know. (Let's face it, it's no fun for the carers either - they're coming in blind, not knowing what I want done, what the routine is or anything.)

The other problem is that the insurance company which pays my pension from work suspended my payments - they sent me a form to fill in, to confirm that I was still ill, and because I didn't send it back, they suspended my payments.

I didn't return it because I didn't receive it. I didn't receive it because they sent it to the house I left two years ago, despite having written to me on several occasions since at my current address. They sent it to the wrong address because - and I can still barely get my head round this - the rest of the company uses a central computer database of all clients, which has been updated, but the admin section, which sends out the forms in question, is still using....

...filing cabinets.

We're talking about a big national insurance company, one of which everyone recognises the name. And one of their departments still uses paper files. AND DOESN'T UPDATE THEM.

Well, I got my payments back, and a letter of apology. I am now trying to get them to pay the bank charges that accrued over the five days I was without my money. I'll let you know how it goes.

...filing cabinets..... shakes head

Back soon

The last couple of weeks have been very stressful for a variety of reasons, so I'm taking this week off from blogging. I'll be back next Monday, though!

Socks and the Single Girl

I'll say one thing for the hot weather - it really encourages me to go back to the socks that have been lying around, unloved and unfinished, in the UFO pile!

In January I received some glorious rainbow-coloured Regia Color, and immediately cast on the Broadripple Socks pattern, which is designed to make the most of variegated sock yarn. I enthusiastically knitted the first leg almost to the heel.... and then got distracted. For the last six months, they've looked like this:

When it became too hot to knit my lovely warm woollen shawls, I cast about for something light and manageable, that wouldn't end up as a pile of yarn in my lap, and found the socks again. Within a few days I had completed one sock, and then in two more days, having rediscovered the lovely and soothing monotony of knitting with very little shaping, I finished the second:

I am beyond reason captivated by them :)

Having got the taste for socks, I then picked up the Paint It Black Socks which have also been languishing. I had actually finished one of these, and cast on the toe for the second, although this is the only photo I have so far:

These are my first toe-up socks. I'm undecided at the moment about whether I'll do any more. The pattern (Ravelry link), 'Sock Stew' by my lovely friend Ari Ridpath, is excellent, but I can do top-down socks on auto-pilot, so I'm still in two minds. It would be good to have another pattern by heart, though. Hmm. I feel more socks coming on.....

What next?

I think Merlin has become a vegetarian.

OK, I know all cats go off their meat a little in hot weather, and goodness knows it has been hot.

I also know that cats often eat green stuff to aid digestion.

I have never, however, had a cat who would sit in front of me while I eat salad, drooling and attempting to steal lettuce from my plate. When he manages to get some, he runs off with it, growling, and eats it in a hurry so that he can get back for more. Meanwhile his cat food grows crusty in the kitchen.....

He's a weird cat. It's a good job we love him :)

Merlin says: "Be fair, Mum. I eat flies, too..."