dolly dimple knits

Still Smiling

Thank you folks for all the sympathy (and back-up curses !) - it's a slow process but things are on the way to being sorted out. In the meantime, I'm being a "kept woman" as Al is having to fork out for pretty much everything :0)

It's a bit weird actually as I've never been in this position, I've always worked and had my own money, but it does concentrate the mind in terms of what I'm spending it on when it ain't mine ! And I have bought wool. Oops.

We had a truly fabulous time in Barcelona - I'm not going to go on and on about it, don't panic - but it really is a wonderful, vibrant, exciting, noisy, visually amazing place to be. Our apartment was lovely (would definitely recommend the company we booked it through) and I especially adored the Barri Gotic area of the city. I saw Perfume only the week before we left and didn't realise that a lot of it had been filmed in this area of Barcelona so it felt strangely familiar and slightly creepy in some parts !

When I wasn't walking I was all about beads. The Barri Gotic area has some amazing bead and haberdashery shops. I didn't go mad but I did buy a few -

No particular projects in mind, I just thought they'd make good buttons / closures on things.

Despite walking all over the city for about 7 hours a day, I didn't make it to either of the 2 famed wool shops - Barcelana and Persones Llanes and not for want of pointing out to my darling other half that it was "only just a little further along this way ...."

He payed for it though as by the time we were passing back through London to collect the children from my sister, I somehow accidentally fell into Stash. It was only for half an hour but you know how much damage a dedicated knitter can do in a yarn shop in half an hour - let's just say, Malabrigo, Smooshy AND Noro Silk Garden Lite .........

When I wasn't buying beads in Barcelona, I was knitting them -

I wanted to take a small lightweight, mindless project to work on and one of the beaded kits from the fabulous Earthfaire fit the bill.

Apologies now for almost using the C-word but I can forsee a few more of these being knitted up between now and December. Only 58 knitting days to go ....... I'll just shut up now then, will I ??

Bad Things Happen to Good(ish) People

Much as I would love this post to be about the wonders of Barcelona from the living art of La Rambla to the melted wedding cake of Sagrada Familia, I'm too majorly pissed off to get into that at the moment.

While we were away I discovered that some b"£$%rd, f%^&wit of an a£$%hole managed to clone my bank card and has completely emptied my bank account - not only up to but over my overdraft limit !! Given that the wee lassie on the phone (to the very irate me in Barcelona !) could tell me that the cloned card had a different issue number from mine, why the buggering hell was it not DECLINED then ???

Apparently the scam is that these are online transactions. They enter a random issue number and when that is declined they just keep trying different issue numbers until it goes through. As the issue number is only 1 digit it doesn't take many attempts to hit the right one. My, my, what a secure system my bank has set up for the 21st century.

I've been told I'll get the money back but in the meantime have to live off credit cards (ouch !) and have all the inconvenience of setting up a new account and making sure that regular payments - you know, minor details like the mortgage - are covered.

In a past existence, Al believes I must have been a witch (it's a long story involving me, a person I disliked and a bad case of piles) so can I just say - "may the thieving b$%^&rd catch his knadgers in his zip every day, twice a day for the next 10 years...."

Back soon with tales of Barcelona, some knitting and maybe even a smile ;0)

A Few Words

Progress - Love.It.

Baby blanket - Frogged. It.

A girl and her kitten - Adore. Them. Utterly.