Thursday 28 August 2008

Dis 'n' Dat

Two of my current non-knitting obsessions were combined on Sunday night in Britain from Above, when Andrew Marr showed the track made by an osprey's GPS signal on its way from Africa to the north of Scotland. It starts at 2:30 into this clip. Do you think he's been reading the blog? I got quite excited as you can imagine, and re-played it several times. Apparently pigeons are known to follow motorways when they're on the last stretch of the journey home - and have been observed to fly around roundabouts. I wonder if they give way to the right or the left?

I have belatedly realized that there were two series of BFA being shown at the same time, one showing current activities and one showing the effects of history. I expect they will be repeated endlessly and I will have plenty of opportunities to catch up on television as well as on the web.

Icarus has reached the stage where I need to choose beads, so there will be a short pause while I swatch and dither.

I've picked up the baby shawl again and am on the edging. I have to decide whether to ask Heike to spin a little more yarn, or take it back one pattern. I know it'll grow a lot in the blocking, but I still think it might be too small if I rip any of it.
You can see here that I've placed a marker earlier; now I can't remember what it marks. Sigh.

I don't know about watching Sleepers online, Knitting Linguist. I don't know much about watching things online legally. It's available on DVD in the USA and Canada, but not in the UK - althugh we can buy the Region 1 version. It's time the dvd business started thinking globally, or they're going to be left behind the like the record companies.

Speaking, or rather writing, of old television series, Takin' Over the Asylum is being repeated on BBC4 just now and has been released on DVD in the UK. This is a superb drama, set in a psychiatric hospital: there are lots of excellent performances, but the outstanding one is by David Tennant - he was 21 and was already clearly something special. He plays a boy with bi-polar disorder and is, well, luminous.
The DVD release has been held up until now because the soundtrack includes some Beatles songs and it was too expensive or complicated to get the rights for the DVD. I have had this on a dodgy DVD made from an ancient videotape, so it will be good to upgrade. Katy Murphy is in it too, whom we don't see often enough.

While I'm swatching and dithering, and deciding whether to rip back the baby shawl, I'll cast on for a hat for the shawl baby.

Gretchen - yes, I have Big Girl Knits and I think it's very good. I haven't actually knitted anything from it, but that doesn't mean anything. I've got the second one on my wishlist.

4 comments:

Knitting Linguist said...

Thanks for the update on Sleepers! I'll have to consider renewing my NetFlix subscription so that I can see if I can get it.. :)

Vivienne said...

I'm loving 'Taking' Over the Asylum' too. I can't remember if I saw it first time round - I think I wanted to but it was probably on a school night and past my bedtime. I would have been 15, so one of the very last years that bedtimes were that rigid.

Cait said...

I just happened in here through the jigsaw puzzle link. I am a new knitter and find your comments so down to earth and honest.
When I took my eyes off the print and saw "Lay flat to dry'', I just laughed and laughed. I have 'lay-ers' also, and when I hanag clothes inside on a small rack to dry because of bad weather outside, I find lots of furbaby hairs. Evidently they feel like they need to 'lay flat to dry' also.
Thanks for the wonderful thoughts and smile for the start of my day.
CeeJay

Anonymous said...

Region-free DVD players will play any DVD. I'm told that most of them are region-free now. There's a lot of information on the web.