Hoodie and Leggings: February 13th to 19th.

'We don't do Valentine's Day, do we.' A statement, not a question from my boy. I'm okay with that. It would be, otherwise, a case of buying and giving and also receiving things that neither of us would really want. It's a day that doesn't justify a useful present. It is usually something frivolous, fluffy and piano-worthy (my version of the pool room). So we went to dinner and had a huge banquet instead. Three entrees, three mains and coffee. I feel ill reminiscing. We did My Kitchen Rules meets Masterchef. No French accents or shovelling of food into our mouths from three millimeters above the plate, no cravats. Numbers were the only real link. The Wanton soup got seven for wantons and four for the soup itself (stock and lettuce); the cuffy puffs were sevens but the salt-and-calamari was nine-worthy (I think V—— may have rated it a ten!). Mains were lemongrass chicken, beef and cashew nuts and garlic prawns. Me: eight and a half; seven, eight. V——: seven, eight, nine. The best bit, for an inveterate sweet-tooth, is the Vietnamese coffee. I say Vietnamese because we most often get it at this restaurant but I first had it in Borneo. There the equipment far outsized the cup: a huge conical sieve filled with coffee was held over the cup; a large scoop of water from a bureau sized bain-marie was poured into the sieve. Then from high on a shelf came an industrial sized can of condensed milk which the server inverted for several minutes over my cup. It was decadently sweet and the best coffee ever. For the record, my best tea ever was from a greasy-spoon near Heathrow. Although I didn't see the creation of this gem, the result was the same: sweet, milky heavenness in a mug.

With coffee: a donut. I wish. Sugar-free diet and all. But, actually, I am a donut; we are all donuts according to Osho. We are outsides with no middles. What Osho would like us to know is that we are in fact more like a jam donut, or, because I don't like jam donuts, maybe a custard donut (take your pick). We have centers; we are just not aware of them. One great way, he says, to realise your centre is to block off all access to the outside world—by closing up all the holes in your head. Ears, mouth, nose, eyes. Aside: he doesn't ever get to tell you how long to do this for, so if you are to try this at home, please do stop before you turn blue. The author takes no responsibility for anything that may happen to you if you fail to use common sense in all things you do. If you close up all these holes then, bang, your consciousness smacks against the inside of your skull, you realise that the world is within you, you are a universe, you are the donut hole. Consciousness gathers at the point on the inside of your skull that is the third eye (remember we cross-eyedly talked about this before:Chevron Cowl). The point is that what is inside is what is important. The outside, the donut, is superficial and empty. To make the most of your life, of your potential (again, not in a superficial way, not with money and things, but with intense living and intense loving), you must know this centre. Everything is contained there.

Something about hoodies and leggings before I go—I always forget the little detail of why I am here. The garment is the middle size: for an eighteen month old. It does appear to be the eighteen month old of giants but I am not really all caught up with the size of children so I may be mistaken. The wool is Bella Baby's Bashful (alliterates like my other blog:Le Jog). I chose cheating colours of cream and baby blue—not hundred percent neutral. It's a fairly simple knit which had quite a few days dedicated to it because the pattern takes a lot of pages to write down. This is the only factor that affectes the timing given to each project—a pattern that takes one page to write but a year to make will still only be allocated two or three days. The yarn is intriguing (too much time spent looking at it). It is wrapped in a fine, shiny filament. How do they do all these weird things with wool? I will leave you to ponder that. And your donut hole of course.