This past week

I was typing away last week and suddenly my computer screen was swarmed by color, noise, a plethora of boxes with announcements I was hijacked, together with phone numbers to call to be liberated. This has occurred in the past and my solution has been Cntrl-Alt-Del, and systematic deletion of programs that are running.

It didn’t work this time.

The only other option I knew was call Microsoft, but not the number on the screen. I used my phone to find a tech support number I trusted. So, for $54 and change, plus $15 per month ($15.95?), cancellable at any time, plus an hour or so off line, my computer is mine again.

Except it’s not, yet.

My internet always opened on my blogger tab, with my e-mail tab also available. I had to read a whole lot of help pages in order to pin and freeze tabs. And thank the heavens I once learned how to open help in a separate tab and refer to it, line by line by word by word. I’m not a teenage geek I admit, and, I don’t have it totally resolved.

I made an appointment to board Toby while we are in Wisconsin for Christmas, and have him groomed again. The “chill” cat who was not sedated to have half his hair shaved off. He’s back to his behavior of a year ago; incessant grooming, then garfing, that was cured by professional grooming. I learned this only by the desperation groom last year, and I do hope it continues to work, especially since I specified number 6 clipper guards, down from number 8 last year. Lets’ see if I can save the carpet the last two weeks before Wisconsin next year.

When we closed up the old house and I gave every last paper and pin of my weaving stuff to Praxis, it included my Marguerite Davidson, guide to handweaving. Sometimes I wish I had it, and apparently Google reads my mind. Pinterest puts email after email of weaving pins in my mailbox, and last week there was a strip of bird’s eye diaper weaving straight from Marguerite.

I do not know the etymology of the word, but when you throw all the pieces on the table, they pretty well fit.

“Diaper” was the name for household fabric, from curtains and tablecloths to napkins and nappies. I’ve said I like my twill and plain weave Shaker towel because it exposes so many threads to absorb moisture, but keeps them secure for washing.

Diaper does much the same. I’ve never woven it because it requires a jack loom, and my loom of preference always has been counter balance. Now I have a jack and can weave diaper and a classic diaper pattern just fell into my inbox. I’m maybe fifty towels from emptying my loom, and now I know I’ll thread up some diaper for the next round of towels.

I also think the pattern looks like the feather ring around birds’ eyes. Dries dishes nicely. Wicks moisture away from guest's lips and babies' fannies.