Random thoughts on a Sunday morning when my body aches from working on the berry bushes yesterday. This is the time of year to remove all last year's canes, untangle the new growth and tie it to the trellis, and fight against the evils of vinca, wild passionfruit and couch, which invade the growing area. I did over 2 hours at it yesterday (about 2/3 or what was left to do) and, while I am sore and stiff, there is nothing like the agony I would have experienced B.L. (before Lyrica). I want to finish it off but my hands are very sore. If the sun comes out, maybe.

The Imp amazed me the other night by demanding some of what I was cooking for my dinner. Since I eat mostly fish and she never cares about that, I was surprised when she demanded kangaroo. Roo is the only red meat I eat presently, and it's very lean yet very tender. This was the first time I'd gotten unmarinated roo, so I was wondering if it would be as tender. She told me loudly that she wanted some. I had a skinny fillet so I cut bits off the end and she inhaled that and asked for more. In the end she ate the whole fillet. Go figure that one out from Miss Fussy Eater.

I wound off the BFL I had spun to be sock yarn and it looks good (it and the new hat are drying off from their first bath). It's a dusty rose. I can't decide whether to knit myself or take to BFLB who has sent me so much sock yarn over the years and actually got me on the sock addiction. I want to spin more alpaca to take over to her because I can see it being lace. I pulled out a couple of hanks of grey handspun and wound them into balls yesterday. I think this was grey from Brown Sheep mill ends via Carol Lee. I know I spun a lot of it and I have other bits of other greys. Now to find the perfect pattern out of all the mess in the studio.

I must have been asleep (doubtful) or they didn't teach the reality of early New England when I was in school. I am reading Early Americans by Carl Bridenbaugh and found out that 25,000 Puritans emigrated in the 1630's. There were settlements at New Haven, Stratford, and Greenwich, so maybe I am connected on the Cornwell side as well. I had this image of a few hundred people huddled in the snow in Massachusetts, whereas the "huddled in the snow" part is right but the "few hundred" was wrong. It was what he calls The Great Migration and the Puritans who were organizing this exodus from England were looking for specific people who were morally and physically strong and alloted land regardless of social status, altho the larger the household (including servants) the bigger the plot. To a working man in the 1630's who hadn't a hope of getting land of his own in England, the promise of 50 acres free must have been a real draw. Maybe they did teach this but I don't remember it.

Finished Women's work, the first 20.000 Years and it should be read by every weaver, if not by every woman. It is a history of weaving and what I really found fascinating was that a tensioned loom (like a backstrap) wasn't invented much earlier than it was. Weighted looms were all the rage in prehistory, and linen was the most common for most of the Middle East and Egypt. Starting to make fabric out of linen on a weighted loom sounds all too hard for me. No wonder women got the job. My new BBB is Enough by Bill McKibben. which put me off at first because it begins by talking about genetically modifying humans. That couldn't really happen, I said to myself, then he led you down one of those slippery slopes where one starts by curing disease and ends with designer babies. He uses as an example human growth hormone which was derived to treat a rare medical condition and then was seriously abused for other purposes. As medical technology becomes cheaper, it becomes more possible. Would I like to eliminate the gene that causes kerataconus from my hypothetical child (Charlotte if a girl, Michael if a boy)? You bet I would. How about changing the body shape that I share with my mother and sister which leads us to constant fruitless dieting? Tempting.

I also raced through three Janet Evonovich novels in record time but they are like chocolates. I only wonder that Stephanie had survived so long with nothing more than singed hair, exploding cars, and torn clothes.

P.S. the Weather Pixie seems to be having hardware problems and comes and goes. If it has permanently gone I'll put another weath link on like the Bureau of Meteorology.