I was in Bath for the past two days visiting with my lovely friend Isolde, who you may remember from the Pimp My Guide feature in The Missability Radio Show, and who is currently in Hospital.

Naturally I felt that cakes were an essential enhancement to our time together, so I made these using the last of my oats, polenta, lemons, poppyseeds and limoncello. I got the marzipan fruits last summer at the Berkshire county fair and had been looking for an occasion to lavish someone with their sculptural charms… The icing on my cakes was rather boozy with so much limoncello in it but I was pleased with the results of my hashed-together efforts and they went down very well with Isolde and everyone else on her ward! As usual in Hospital-land, there was an awful lot of hanging around and waiting for consultants/physiotherapists etc. so I did my best to provide some in-house entertainment.

This mostly consisted of 1. Adorning the Hospital statues with knitwear

(Why so grumpy?)

2. Playing with Monkl or rather, letting him play in my hat.

(Unnecessary cute)

3. Furiously trying to cast on and complete a pair of purple, fingerless mitts for Isolde. (I always wanted to make something by Ysolda for Isolde.)

(Completed at 22:00, 16/03/09!)

4. Recording all the machines in the hospital

(Listen out for ‘please gel your hands’ from the automated hygiene-reminder announcement…)

& 5. Walking around Bath in the sunshine between Doctor moments.

(Mmmmm…Pretty…)

I found this lovely fellow standing in a tree singing his heart out, and I recorded it. His podium was very near a nursery though, so the sounds of his divine, fluting melody are somewhat drowned out by the chatter of children, but I really enjoyed leaning against the wall, listening to these two sounds of kids playing and the bird singing, because it felt like listening to Springtime coming.

I also enjoyed wearing my finished but not yet blocked kerchief around Bath.

The Oxford Kitchen Yarns BFL sock yarn and Debbie Bliss silk are really gorgeous together; very light and somehow remeniscent of foamy lattes or cream tea. And that is just what the kerchief is like; a little of what I fancied.

Thus clad in my happy kerchief, I made a lot of sound recordings that I ended up writing about on the Sound Diaries website. After all the great recording action I am hoping that The Hub team will go for my idea to combine a sound diary (Bath and visiting with Isolde) with a Pimped Up Guide Dog Harness for Isolde’s Dog, Quasi as this week’s Art Object. I think The Hub needs a bit of Pimp My Guide action; what do you think? You can listen to The Hub on the listen again facility… we had a lot of Jazz in the last episode and the Sonic Breakfast Plate was unveiled ‘on air!’

So… the ceaseless knitting-up-of-stash continues, and I am obsessed with getting through as much of my yarn as possible, before it gets too hot to knit.