I have been knitting again

I am the equivalent of a fair-weather friend to knitting: I am only spontaneously inclined to pick up my needles once there’s a nip in the air or a glowering look in the sky, and I hardly, if ever, knit during the warmer months in the usual run of things.  This is not to say that I only knit out of necessity, but that’s what it amounts to.  However, I am keen to make a few more friends while I’m in London this summer and thought a good way to do so would be to join a group or two*.  Thus I only took up my knitting needles in order to go to a knitting group, not thinking I’d get too much from knitting in thirty-degree heat, but I was surprised and pleased to find that it was just about the best thing I could have done.   As I’ve mentioned here already, I had a dry patch with work for a couple of weeks (mercifully finished now, though that’s not to say it mightn’t kick in again soon) and so the occupation of knitting was extremely pleasant.  Once I’d made the initial outlay for my yarn, it was completely free (and, further, kept me out of trouble – while placidly sitting knitting in the garden during the heatwave last week, I was not in town spending money).  That first purchase gave me an excuse to moon away some time in the precincts of the lovely Loop, which is sure to cheer anyone of a crafty disposition.  The project I’d chosen was involving without being wearing.  I practically always knit to the accompaniment of something else – at home, I would normally stick on a DVD and watch a couple of hours of a series while knitting away; over here, I took out a Poirot audiobook from the library and merrily knit away to a genteel murder in the warm sunshine.  There are worse ways to while away the time.  And I always get a kick out of the way knitting just grows, almost of its own accord.

I chose my project – a cushion cover – mainly out of necessity and a lack of imagination, as I wanted something reasonably simple, fairly portable and not requiring too much outlay in yarn.  Further, this project would create some much-needed decoration Chez Basil in glamorous Souf London.

Front view

Back view

I know it’s plain, but the yarn I used (Sublime Baby Cashmere Merino Silk DK in shade 0124) is beautifully soft and it’s very comfy, which is the name of the game.

Lovely buttons, 75p each, from Liberty

It has occurred to me more than once whilst making this project that, quite embarrassingly, this is just about the most ambitious knitting project I’ve done.  I call this embarrassing because I’ve been knitting for so long now, and I’m always to be found knitting, at the very least, in the darkest point of winter – I had pretty much assumed on the basis that I’ve been knitting for three quarters of my life that I was hot stuff at this game, but this is, on reflection, complete humbug.  Despite being a quick knitter, and well able to produce a nice, even-looking piece of material, I’ve never really attempted socks (which really made me feel like the new girl at I Knit – sock fever had hit Waterloo in a big way); I’ve certainly never gone near anything approaching a jumper, either in size or complexity (much to the BF’s chagrin – almost as soon as he learnt that I am a knitter he started annoying me to make him a jumper); I can’t remember having had to tackle buttonholes before now; and I’ve never even properly blocked anything.  I’ve almost entirely stuck to scarves and hats.

However, this did not so much knock my confidence as really get me thinking about other possibilities – what have I been missing out on, and what should I put on my to-do list?  I must say, I don’t really understand the widespread adoration of socks.

The knitting group even got me contemplating seriously, for the first time, that I may just make the BF a jumper.  Though I’d probably need to start it imminently to have a chance of it being done.  For now, though, I’m content to bend my will toward churning out another cushion cover or three – as one wise soul at I Knit put it, one on its own on the sofa would look very lonely altogether.

* I am also on the lookout for a good book group, if anyone knows of such a thing.  I would especially like a group that is not enormous and meets either in central or south-east London.

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The Hard Facts

I made the stitch pattern up as I went along, but it’s not hard – your total number of stitches will come to 6x + 9, where x = number of repetitions of the motif across the width in the line with the largest number of reps.  In order to fit the 45cm width of my cushion pad, the number of reps worked out as being 11 when worked on 5mm needles – in all, 75 stitches, for which I give the directions below.  Knit up a swatch yourself to check your guage and adjust accordingly.

Make up an inch or two of plain stockinette stitch (this is where you’ll place your buttons when you’re finishing up).  Then follow the motif pattern:

Row 1: k4, (p1, k5) 11 times, k4.  Row 2: p3, (k1, p1, k1, p3) 11 times, p3.  Row 3: knit.  Row 4: purl.  Row 5: k7, (p1, k5) 10 times, k7.  Row 6: p6, (k1, p1, k1) 10 times, p6.  Row 7: knit.  Row 8: purl.  Repeat to required length.

Then put in your buttonholes – their placement will depend on your guage and simply where you’d like to put them.  Stockinette stitch for another inch or so (give it more than you’d expect – I bound off a bit too quickly, in retrospect).  Weave in the ends and seam it all up and you’re done!

Delivery

I ordered Dude, Where’s My Career?, which is subtitled “The Guide for Baffled Graduates” (because I’m the kind of person who buys such a book two years before graduation), a few days ago on Amazon Marketplace.  Yesterday, I received this in the post:

J.W. Waterhouse at the Royal Academy

I wouldn’t ordinarily have gone to this exhibition – I’m by habit lazy in getting myself in time to paying exhibitions, because I always feel I should have “done” the freebie exhibits first before I think about the paying ones.  Luckily, however, my lovely friend H had possession of an RA membership card, which allowed us both into the exhibit for free.  I might as well say outright that I enjoyed the exhibition very much indeed: I learnt about an artist I didn’t know well at all and found that his style greatly appealed to me.  However, the RA charge EIGHT pounds and FIFTY pence even for a student ticket; while I’d like to say that I enjoyed the exhibition enough that I would have gladly paid the admission, I’m not sure I enjoyed it quite that much.  That kind of price sounds reasonable if you get to see an entire museum, not just three or four rooms, however well-curated.

What struck both H and me was the consistency of Waterhouse’s style.  Practically any previous show I’ve been to which aims to represent different periods from a single artist’s life will show some very definite progressions and changes of style.  The only example that springs to mind is that of Rembrandt (I’m stealing whatever I can remember of this argument wholesale from a TV programme I once saw on it – could it have been Andrew Graham-Dixon?  I think it must have been, as he’s the only art critic I ever watch on telly): compare the self-portraits of his youth to the latest one of his age.  It’s recognisably the same person both as artist and sitter, of course, but there are a number of important differences, in the way he presents himself and in the more soft-focus way he paints the picture.  Waterhouse, however, was completely different: it is the lack of this progression which struck me with him.  This is not at all to say that he was an unsophisticated artist – merely that he found his style very early on and stuck to it.  This was extremely unusual, at least to my mind, but added an attraction to the show: everything felt equal.

Apart from this, however, I don’t have a great deal to say … I’m no art historian.  The best I can do is to pick out ones I liked and, if you can shoulder the RA’s fairly hefty prices, encourage you to go, as it was an enjoyable show in a terrific building that I’d never been in before.

I was particularly taken with the description of the nymphs in the above painting in the accompanying information panel – that they have the same sameyness of appearance that lilies have in nature.

Waterhouse also seemingly had quite a thing for Circe, who was very well represented in the selection of pieces at the Academy (actually, he had a thing for women generally – very few men featured prominently in this set of pictures).  H especially liked this one, “Circe Invidiosa”:

I preferred this one of her offering the cup to Ulysses:

But I think both are highly reminiscent of the work of Alphonse Mucha, in a strange way – the “Invidiosa” one of one of Mucha’s narrow season paintings, the second one of practically any of his other work (I think it’s the circular mirror behind her that really reminds me of Mucha).

Artangel drop-in life classes

In keeping with my general cheapo outlook of recent days, I went yesterday to a free half-hour-length life drawing class run by the good people at Artangel.  It’s all to do with a new series coming to Channel 4 soon about life drawing – in the run-up to the programme itself, they have been holding classes in London, Glasgow, Bristol, Manchester and Southampton.  Unfortunately I only heard about this at the very last minute, and it seems that today is the last day of classes in London at least (though if you’re quick, head to the Channel 4 offices today at either 12, 12.30, 1 or 1.30 to nab a place).  The whole experience for me was very enjoyable – my class was held in The Place, a centre for contemporary dance, and I had a lovely walk past Gordon and Tavistock Squares through the unbeatable heat and sunshine yesterday to get there.  While I did some kind of life drawing in school, it was always with clothed models; yesterday’s class was a departure firstly because of the lack of practice I’ve had since my schooldays but also because this was a nude model (!).  It’s surprising how quickly you cease to be aware of this naked person in the room and just concentrate on trying to draw her.  The class was both enjoyable and frustrating for me – frustrating because a class of only half an hour couldn’t give you anything more than a taster, as well as my lack of practice (I did used to be quite good at drawing, but left to my own devices and away from a teacher and homework I have got completely out of the habit).  It was enjoyable, though, as it’s been such a while since I really concentrated on drawing in that way, and it inspired me to get myself some pencils and paper.  I don’t promise much will come of it, but we’ll see.

London public libraries

Hello!  I am well aware I’ve been on the quiet side recently, more so than I was anticipating.  This is because work has been a bit more sporadic than I’d hoped – I’m a temp, so stability can’t be expected.  This means I have a bit less cash for outings, but I think I’ve been keeping reasonably busy on a budget for the past couple of weeks.  Hence the topic of this post – libraries.

I’ve had a bee in my bonnet about public libraries since coming over to London.  I’m not overly keen on investing in too many books while I’m here; this is as a result of the inital cost, but more importantly because I’m not here long-term and so anything I buy will have to be brought home at some stage, which also costs money.  I also believe that we should really make use of public amenities if they’re to be kept up to any kind of decent standard, and so have been trying to put my money where my mouth is for the past six weeks.  This has turned out to be more difficult than I’d thought, however.

Forest Hill library

My first port of call was Forest Hill library as it’s my local one.  I had thought before my first visit that I’d got lucky in having this as my local library as there was much talk on their website of a new refurbishment and recent investment in stock.  While they have done it up nicely with a great deal of natural light, it’s a small library with correspondingly little floor space for books.  I have to say I was quite disappointed on my first visit to find that their non-fiction section was really quite tiny, with a couple of three- or four-foot tall bookcases for the entire subject of history.  However, through further use I’ve found it’s not a complete write-off – while there may not be fantastic choice on-site, you are very easily able to reserve books online and request items from other libraries in the borough for collection at the library of your choice, and I think their self-service computers for borrowing and returning books (the equivalent of the self-service tills in supermarkets) are pretty nifty when they work.  Also, a revelation for me, they open on Sundays.

However, not quite satisfied, I was advised to try out the main library in my borough if I was after a more comprehensive choice, so I took myself off to unlovely Lewisham’s unlovely Lewisham library.  While this did indeed have a better selection than Forest Hill spread over a number of floors, that’s not really saying much (Forest Hill is all on one level).  And the Lewisham building is unrelentingly grim – low ceilings, poor lighting, lack of seating, industrial shelving, confusing layout, etc.  I don’t advise a visit to Lewisham library if it can be helped.  Same goes for Lewisham, really.

Venturing out of my own borough, I stopped by the Islington South library when I was out there last Saturday on an errand.  This was most dispiriting, as I’d thought it stood a fighting chance of fulfilling my idea of a good library (lots and lots of books) as it is situated in a part of London where people are more likely to make more of a noise about public amenities than in Lewisham.  Wrong.  A trend that I’d noticed in the other libraries was taken to a farcical extreme in this library – more DVDs and CDs on show than books: I got the distinct impression that I had wandered into a Blockbuster Video which happened to have a few books at the back.  Another oddity I’ve noticed over here is that one pays to borrow DVDs and CDs.  In Ireland, at least in the public libraries I know well, there is a much smaller selection of multimedia than I’ve seen over here in any of the places I’ve mentioned, but they’re completely free, just like the books.  The London libraries ask for only a small payment (about £2 for a recently released DVD for three nights, for instance) but the very idea that you ought to give money to a library for anything other than a late fee is anathema to me.

Beginning to despair of finding a really good single library, I acted on another recommendation and took myself oop north to Swiss Cottage, where I finally found something to my liking.

Swiss Cottage library

This one seems to have everything I want – lots of space and light and full of books.  There are plenty of other services, too, with a large selection of DVDs, a smaller rack of CDs and plenty of computers for booking, but the main business of this place is clearly the printed word.  The only drawback is that I have a train and then a Tube journey to get to this one, a round trip of a couple of hours at least.  I’m still on the lookout for better facilities south of the river, so if anyone has any recommendations (or warnings), please do leave a comment.  I’ve heard good things of Peckham, so that may well be next on my list.

North by Northwest

Just a short note to say that this week I went to see North by Northwest at the BFI, which was, as ever, a delightful experience.  I don’t really know why they’re playing it – it was by no means a new print, though it possibly has something to do with the fact that it was released 50 years ago – but seeing it in the cinema really drove home the colossal importance to the success of the overall work of Bernard Herrmann’s terrific and pacy score, which benefitted tremendously from proper amplification on a real sound system.  The BF, who had never seen it before (film not really being his bag), decided that it was enjoyable hokum; I think it’s fantastic hokum.  Catch it while you can, as its run ends on 9 July at the BFI Southbank.

Raspberry meringue roulade

Leafing through the Guardian Weekend magazine, the BF spied over my shoulder a particularly nice photo in the recipes section and got me to make it (the original recipe is the third in this piece).  I substituted the strawberries in the original recipe for raspberries, as I had just bought a punnet of the latter at the shops, and I think the substitution worked extremely well.  Fearnley-Whittingstall also calls for 5 egg whites, which he claims serves “six to eight” – I thought this amount was probably excessive for just the two of us and went with three eggs, adjusting the rest of the quantities accordingly, and there’s no way you’ll need more than three to comfortably serve eight people for a very filling dessert.

Ingredients for meringue
3 egg whites
165g caster sugar

For filling
At least 150g raspberries (I used 225g, the size of the punnet)
A tablespoon or two of sugar
90g plain or dark chocolate
240ml double cream (or nearest size of tub you can find)

Method
Preheat oven to 200C/400F/gas 6, line a swiss roll tin with greaseproof. Clean your berries and douse with some sugar.  Leave to macerate.  Whisk egg whites in a completely clean bowl and, once stiff, start adding the sugar a spoonful or two at a time.  Continue until stiff peaks form.  Spread evenly into lined tin and bake for 8 mins; after this, turn oven down to 160C/320F/gas 3 and bake for a further 15 mins.  Remove from oven and turn upside down on to more greaseproof or a clean tea towel.  Remove paper from the base of the meringue and allow to cool while preparing the filling.

Melt chocolate.  Whip the cream and fold the chocolate into it.  Spread the chocolate-cream mixture on to the meringue, again evenly, but stopping short of one of the edges by at least an inch (the edge that hasn’t been covered with the cream mixture will be your outer edge – it will get covered in the oozing filling anyway, so leaving it bare at this stage will simply mean you don’t waste too much filling when it all goes flying out as you wrap it up).  Dot with berries.  Now, using your paper or towel to help you, roll it up, with your bare edge as the furthest one from you as you go.  Dust with icing sugar and cocoa, or as Fearnley-Whittingstall did it, trickle with melted chocolate.  Fearnley-Whittingstall also recommends wrapping it in greaseproof and chilling before serving; we ate it almost immediately with no ill effects.

Yum yum yum yum yum yum YUM.

Jarvis Cocker at the Troxy

Photo by aurélien

I have always wanted to see Cocker live, and I came away feeling that he hadn’t disappointed, but many elements of the show did.  For a start, the venue itself was pretty airless for much of the show, making Cocker’s relentless and dedicated dancing all the more admirable but making the audience experience unnecessarily stifling.  The crowd, or our part of it (we were right up at the front, which doesn’t make for good manners), weren’t the best, with some sustained and ill-natured comments from the people behind us when the BF returned from a trip to the bar and tried to get back beside me, to our original position, y’know, where we’d been before these people had arrived.  Much worse, however, was when just a couple of minutes before Cocker took to the stage we were very uncouthly elbowed out of the way by two photographers, one having the unmitigated gall to actually bring a STEP with her because she was so short.  The step-wielding photographer was directly in the BF’s eyeline and so he was justified when he deliberately blocked her lens a couple of times.  Happily, they pissed off after a few songs.

Now, I’m aware none of the above is down to Cocker, but this didn’t put me in the most receptive mood for the main set; what is perhaps more fair to criticise as part of the gig was the dreadful support act, the very aptly named Horrors.  For those not in the know, the Horrors are very much an Urban Outfitters band, playing music for wankers.  As the BF succinctly put it, they are what happens when you give more attention to your hair than to your songs.

While I did enjoy the thrashy sound of the main set and Cocker’s gung-ho performance throughout, there were some deficiencies here, too.  For a start, there was practically no rapport between Cocker and his backing band.  While this was billed as a Jarvis Cocker gig, the strangely detached way in which the band were treated gave the gig a weird atmosphere – no instrumental breaks or solos whatever, all attention focussed on the singer.  The greatest deficiency for me, however, was the fact that the songs, while fun, while competently performed by the band and passionately performed by Cocker, just aren’t anything special.  Everything last night was from Cocker’s solo output, which is fair enough - I had not come in the expectation that he’d trot out Common People – but there’s no comparison between with the best of his best catalogue.  This was highlighted by the performance of Fat Children, which was tremendous fun but as a piece of music is almost completely devoid of interest, buoyed along by Cocker’s lyrics (which were indecipherable on the sound system to anyone who wouldn’t have known the song beforehand) and the audience’s goodwill toward him.  This latter was plentiful but throughout I felt the adulation was overdone – to paraphrase Morrissey, I just don’t think he’s earnt it recently, baby.

What he certainly didn’t earn, but took anyway, was two encores.  The main set was well under an hour, which surprised me a bit, and he then had the cheek to come back on twice.  I’ve paid my money, now don’t take the piss: give me a properly sized main set and then, if you must, a single encore.  (In my opinion, most bands don’t merit any such attention and would do well to stick to a decent main set and leave it at that, but that’s an argument for another day.)  It was not stagecraft or any other lofty notion motivating the dramatics of a second encore, it was purely milking the audience for all they were worth, and it seemed that most were happy to oblige.  I was not.  Keeping me waiting around needlessly is a sure way to cool my affections.

On the plus side, it was mostly an enjoyable evening, and I am glad to have seen Jarvis while he can still throw shapes with such abandon without throwing his back out, and some songs, such as Big Julie, Black Magic and Leftovers, were very satisfyingly performed by both band and the main man.  Still, though, it was just good where Cocker could so easily be great.

Zappa Plays Zappa at the Shepherd’s Bush Empire

I am as surprised as anyone to report that last Sunday’s Zappa Plays Zappa gig was pretty good fun, all told.  This was very much the BF’s choice of gig – I know nothing about Frank Zappa’s output and anything I do know was told me on Saturday, when the BF had decided he couldn’t put off playing me some of Zappa’s music any longer.  I hadn’t a clue what to make of the recorded stuff or what to expect of the live gig, but I was pleasantly surprised by the experience.  I have to say that I’m unlikely to turn into a massive Zappa fan as the recorded music is still impenetrable to me, but watching a group of highly talented musicians wrestling with and completely nailing some tremendously difficult music was never less than interesting

What really added to it for me was the attitude of all involved.  This was exemplified by bassist Pete Griffin, who had the look of absolute absorption and intense pleasure that I’ve only ever seen on the face of an immense fanboy playing his favourite-ever music, rather than the calmer, more blasé face of one who has had a hand in the music’s composition, of someone to whom the music isn’t of life-or-death importance.  Am I making sense?  Basically, everyone up on stage was clearly playing music they loved, but particularly Griffin, along with the band’s new vocalist, seemed to be having the time of his life.  This was mirrored by the phenomenal audience reaction, including what was easily the most amiably demented dancer at a gig I’ve ever had the privilege to witness – he was exemplary in his behaviour*, in that he didn’t boorishly knock into others or take away from the enjoyment of those in close proximity to him, such as me, but simply danced his legs down to the knees in the most enthusiastic way imaginable.  I was delighted to see him rewarded at the end of the night by getting up on stage with other notable dancers to Bez it up on the last number.

*Unlike the couple beside me.  At one point the woman climbed on to the man’s shoulders but was quickly shooed down by a security guard, though she managed to expose her bra to all and sundry before she was made to regain the ground.  Hanging is too good for such people and they will be the first up against the wall come my bloody revolution.

Another thing that appealed to me was the fact that Dweezil Zappa, son of Frank, seems to be doing these shows for the right reasons – it’s not unreasonable to wonder why the son might be trotting out his much more well-known father’s output well after his death, especially since (according to the BF) the son’s solo career was not a stellar one.  However, these kinds of aspersions are, on the evidence of this gig, completely unfounded – Dweezil is an extremely talented guitarist who plays music he obviously loves and who gets off on the incredible amount of love that the audience displays for Zappa père’s music, to the extent that he sounded a bit choked when he spotted two young kids in the front row (10 and 12, it turned out) and began waxing lyrical about passing this music on to a new generation to appreciate.  (The kids got to go up on the stage too, with Dweezil getting a boy to strum the guitar with him.)

And Dweezil is a very good-looking man, which was completely unexpected.  This didn’t hurt my enjoyment of the gig at all.

Dweezil Zappa and Pete Griffin by bowtieneck

Ben Thomas and Dweezil Zappa by bowtieneck

TalkTalk’s temperamental internet connection willing, I will be posting up the approximate setlist* later on this evening in a comment.  Also, this week I’ll be going to Jarvis Cocker (my gig), Ornette Coleman (BF’s gig) and possibly Charlie Haden (BF again), so while I know I’ve been a bit quiet on the blog for the past while, I hope to have a fair bit of new material online over the next few days.

*The BF wrote it down on the way home from the gig, the way you’d write down the names of your family, i.e. much, much faster than the average bear could write down a setlist from memory (much, much faster than I could anyway, which is why I try to note things down in the gig if I’m trying to preserve it for posterity).  I was marvelling at his Rain Man-ish ability and he was acting smug about it and had put his notebook back in his pocket when, a couple of minutes later, he realised he’d missed out at least one, possibly two, songs and that now he couldn’t be sure of the order anymore.  I’m sure there’s a moral in there somewhere.

QI – “Green”

I am writing this in response to my friend Pádraig’s request for information on the QI filming I went to see a couple of weeks ago.  I have not already put something up simply because I found the night so underwhelming.  The theme of the episode was “green”, this series being the G series, and the guests were Danny Baker, Bill Bailey and Jeremy Clarkson.  Clarkson was overbearing and talkative while Bailey was comparatively quiet.  Bailey’s contributions were uniformly funny, though, and so I expect the edit will represent him well and the broadcast audience will be unaware of his reticence.  There was a longer wait than usual to get in and the night itself dragged on due to a technical difficulty.  The screen behind Alan Davies and Bailey ground to a halt and, quite spontaneously, the two men upped and went to the other side of the studio, chairs and all, to where Baker and Clarkson were sitting in front the other, working, screen.  This spontaneous move was hilarious but unfortunately the cameras, for whatever reason, didn’t adequately pick it up, so they were forced to film another explanation for their decampment to the other side.  This re-take was, as you might expect, very stilted in comparison to the first unplanned change and left a very unsatisfactory feeling in the mouth.  I went to two QI filmings last year and this was easily the least entertaining, though I’ve no doubt they will be able to edit it into a very passable episode.  I hope that helps, Pádraig!