A Brilliant Conclusion

Erudite Mondays at HalfSoled Boots
Volume 3, Number 2

The End of the Alphabet

by CS Richardson

Right after I finished this book last week, I sat down to write a review. The problem was, with the few chapters of this slim volume still achingly, agonisingly clear in my memory, I couldn't come up with anything that even distantly approached rational, clear-headed or emotionally stable. Everything I wrote sounded like Sylvia Plath on the day she forgot to take her Paxil.

A week has gone by. I think I've regained my equilibrium somewhat, and I'm ready to give it another go.

The End of the Alphabet is a little book, the author's first. There are only two characters, Ambrose Zephyr and his wife Zappora Ashkenazi. (And, really, what more can you possibly want out of a character's name?) Ambrose, receiving word from his doctor that he has an imminently terminal illness, sets out with his wife to fulfil his lifelong dream of travelling the world using the alphabet as his itinerary. They begin in Amsterdam, and progress through as many letters as they are able - one location per day in an almost-frenzied need to check off this last of his life's ambitions.

He collected French-cuffed shirts as others might collect souvenir spoons or back issues of National Geographic. He rarely wore ties but liked them as challenges in graphic design. His footwear was predominantly Italian, loaferish and bought in the sales on Oxford Street.

The only critical analysis I feel able to give is on the author's choice to omit quotation marks. I read Cry, the Beloved Country years ago and hated it - utterly deplored the directionless, unattributed dialogue that seemed, to me, pretentious and experimental. Maybe it's because age has brought me insight (unlikely), but in The End of the Alphabet I loved this device. It's perfectly, beautifully suited to a novel about the difference between what we say and what we don't - how what is in our hearts sounds so different on our lips. You're never sure, reading the dialogue, what words are spoken and what words are cried, silently.



Her eyes were creased at the corners. She wore glasses when reading. The glasses were purchased in a small shop in Paris, around the corner from an antiquarian bookshop.



It doesn't take long to read, but you don't soon forget this framed, sunlit snapshot of the last weeks of a life. Delicate, prolonged moments in their clarity and sorrow are interspersed with tiny, urgent grains of panic.

You can't help but ask yourself, what have I left undone? And why?

The End of the Alphabet gets:
Reread? Definitely
Given to Others? Yes
Bookplate? Yes

3/3

Frothy Pink Confection

This is the second of my completed Amy March's Slippers for the knitalong. They are for my daughter Emily (now 4) who is quite chuffed with them.



Amy March's Petit Slippers

Pattern: Stephanie Dosen
Yarn: Paton's Shetland Chunky, colourway 03425 "Frosted Rose"
Needles: 2 5mm Clover Takumi bamboo circulars
Tension: I don't know. I just reached for the ruler and knocked a glass frame containing a picture of my sister and her husband to the floor, where it broke, and now I have to throw salt over my shoulder or something to break the bad omen so I'm too busy to check the tension. 4 sts per inch, maybe? Not sure. Distracted just now by doing the hokey pokey backwards.
Ribbons: FabricIand, one picot-edged satin and one satin-edged poly organza.
Modifications:

1. Cast on six to each needle as directed, but only increased (every row) to 24.
2. Knitted five rounds total before beginning the rib.
3. Used a 2X2 rib over centre 8 stitches of top (p1 k2 p2 k2 p1).
4. After short-rowing the heel, (where the pattern as given directs you to thread your ribbon through) picked up 10 stitches along one side edge, then knitted the held toe stitches, then picked up 10 more along the other side.
5. Knitted one round to add height to the edge of the slipper, decreased 1 stitch at each side of the toe for shaping.
6. Bound off every other stitch.
7. Ran elastic through all live stitches, put on foot, pulled up to tighten, and tied knot.
8. While still on foot, wove ribbon through to cover elastic.

Notes:
This was a cute pattern. It's very organic, so you need to be aware when knitting it that you might have to do some adjustments to suit yourself. Luckily, it's a quick knit and a small number of stitches, so this isn't a huge problem.

The elastic is a really good idea. The slipper is kind of low and the ribbons don't really hold them on well, because they have to be loose enough to pull on your foot. Just pick up a 1/4" elastic of an appropriate colour (my store has white and black, plus nude for lingerie purposes) and use that. Make sure you adjust the tightness with the slipper on - when the slipper is off, the elastic will pull the slipper quite a bit out of shape so you won't be able to tell if it's right unless it's on your foot.

I used the same exact method for my daughter's slippers as I did for mine. Using a slightly finer yarn and a smaller needle worked great for adjusting the size.

I'll make these again, for sure. I would like to eventually have a bunch of them in the house during the winter, since my kids are (typically) resistant to socks and always complain of cold feet. I think lots of these will look really pretty thrown into a basket in the living room.

Thanks Stephanie!

I hear Plato was eating breakfast when he composed the Iliad

Has anyone else noticed that H0ney Nut Cheeri0s used to be more nutty? There were little brown flecks on the Cheeri0s and they were quite crunchy, not too sweet, right? Well now they're smooth and white and sugary. Look at this picture - they look like....what, doughnuts maybe?

Not as good as they used to be. Not nearly as good.

Plus now that I've seen them this close up, I don't think I can even eat them again.

I Bruised my Butt Falling off the Wagon

All right, I really let you all down today. It's supposed to be Messy Tuesday and I cleaned up.

What happened was, I realised yesterday that my sister was going to be in town this week - she arrived last night, actually, and she is not one who wallows in the disarray. In consideration of her preferences, I cleaned up.




Sorry.


Anyway, look! Over there! It's a cute doggie!

Aw, he's so cute when he smiles like that!

Don't tell me it's just gas.

Snuffly kiss for you.

Here's What Really Happened

Erudite Mondays at HalfSoled Boots

Volume 3, Number 1

King Leary

by Paul Quarrington

"Percival, old bean, I'm afraid we're done like kippers!"

My lovely CBC Radio told me politely, when I woke one morning, that King Leary was the 2008 Canada Reads winner. On picking it up I saw that it had also won the Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour. I was a bit surprised about that, because I would have expected the Canada Reads winner to be....I don't know, heavier, maybe.

On the day that I took my four year-old daughter to a pediodontist to be sedated, gassed, shot with novocaine and have drill bits taken to her front teeth, I started King Leary in the waiting room. But I only got a chapter read before I realised I was doing a totally inappropriate amount of laughing. Other, less relaxed parents were looking at first amused, then suspicious, then disapproving as my grins became snickers, then my snickers became chortles, then my chortles became guffaws.

In Grade 4 I was asked to leave a classroom because it was "silent reading" time and, as I was highly amused by my book, I was not being silent enough for Miss Floral Print Dress. She said "Shannon, please go into the hall until you can control yourself". As much as I resented it at the time, I can't help but appreciate the lesson I learned, which stood me in good stead on the day I started reading King Leary.

After I left the waiting room, I devoured as much of this book as I possibly could. Between kids, family, cooking and dishes, I managed it in a couple of days. I went around for quite some time afterwards, thinking about it.

This is another book that is one thing at the start, and another at the end. The title character, Percival "King" Leary, is a former hockey star withered and aged and living in a nursing home. He is a faithful and evangelising drinker of Canada Dry ginger ale. He gets a call one day from an ad agent wanting him to do a ginger ale commercial in Toronto, for a whopping "ten thou". During his journey to Toronto and the few days he spends there, he relives his memorable and coloured past in a series of flashbacks that, as the pages turn, begin to replace his current reality.

I like flashback novels, especially when they're written in the first person. After I've read one, I spend hours pondering one question: is the narrator telling the truth? There's never a satisfactory answer to this, of course, which is the whole point. As my homeopath says, "Facts don't really matter. Your perception is what's important."

The narrative voice is very keen. It's consistent, and it's grounded. King Leary could be sitting there, on the other end of the bench at the mall, telling you something interesting, some 60 year-old story, that still lives and breathes behind his thick glasses. He's boastful and adamant, wry and stubborn. He forgets, and remembers, and thinks for a second that you are his nephew.

"To Keep a Boy Out of Hot Water, Put Him on Ice"

Definitely, definitely pick this up. And let me know what you think of it...just don't blame me if you get kicked out of class for laughing too loudly.

HalfSoled Boots' New, Highly Specialised, Book Rating System

King Leary Gets the Following:
Reread? Yes
Given to Others? Yes
Bookplate? Yes
3/3

Awwww! and Brrr.

Whew! Okay, having a puppy is exhausting.

And, obviously, being a puppy is equally exhausting.

I have finished one of my Amy March's Slippers, and hope to do the other tomorrow. My one foot is kind of cold.

Amy March's Slippers - Day One

Good afternoon everyone! Today is the first day of the Amy March Slippers Knitalong, with your kind and attentive hosts, Bethro and Challoner. I know some people jumped the gun and did their slippers early - and test knitting is always constructive, so good for you.

As for me, things have been busy around here the last 24 hours, so I don't know how quickly I'll get these done, but I have begun precisely on schedule.

I had to buy some chunky weight yarn for these slippers, as it's a weight I don't normally keep in the stash. I was in MichaeI's last week and got these.

The Shetland Chunky is the colour I prefer, but I thought the weight wouldn't be quite right...since I wanted to make more than one pair anyway, I picked up the Wool-Ease. It's got a lower wool content than I normally like but it takes all kinds to make up a stash...or something.

Anyway, I cast on today with my beloved magic loop method, using Meg Swansen's Turkish cast on. I think. I'm never sure what the difference is between the Turkish and the figure 8 cast on.

And here I am modelling the first twelve rounds against the backdrop of my Messy Tuesday post. This is what happens when a puppy prances into the house and you immediately discover the fifteen or twenty things you thought were up high enough but weren't. (And when you have tea twice and forget to put both pots away, and pin out your Cap Shawl and forget to put the pins away, and....and....and....)

More tomorrow.