Monday 29 February 2016

The Strategy Sort Of Worked ...

When I drew up my plan to get through February unscathed by dedicating the twentynine days exclusively to jigsaws  , I hadn't allowed for the impossibility of buying Charles Wysocki puzzles in Holland and still having enough money left over to eat . They seemed to average 70 Euros each on Amazon ... about 55 Euros more than the common or garden ones available here of an Roman piazza , a Highland glen or a flower arrangement  .
Still , I did find an untouched 1000-piecer entitled Autumn lurking in the hall cupboard so set to  and quickly built up a routine ... eat breakfast , settle and squint at orange/yellow/brown jigsaw pieces till I manage to fit one piece . Eat lunch , settle and squint etc. till find another bit , eat supper , watch Dickensian if on or , if not , settle and squint etc. till realise I'm not able to tell all the bits apart any more . Go to bed . Get up and repeat .


 And start to see crossword pieces everywhere ....



And so the month slid by ...

I did actually leave the house occasionally , eating pasta in Amsterdam with YD after a day admiring graffitti




and shoes ( no , I resisted .... ) .

And I stirred myself to go to a talk about how Parish Relief was distributed in Leeuwarden at the beginning of the last century ( sparingly ) ... though I gave the one on Frisian poetry ( in Frisian ) a miss .

Kept Fit -ish .



And read loads of library books ... I can recommend Louise Walter's Mrs. Sinclair's suitcase and Rosalie Ham's The Dressmaker , but I wouldn't advise reading anything by Susan Lewis unless you share her belief that a child's smile is a treasure that  transforms the little poppet into an angel .  

And tomorrow it's March and , though wet snow is forecast , Spring is in sight at last ....

4 comments:

Lucille said...

We had a similar jigsaw obsession one winter. Hours were lost to it and the world seemed to be entirely made of jigsaw pieces.
In the end looking down made my neck ache too much and I had to stop.

rachel said...

What a superb book review! The one that neatly defines Susan Lewis, I mean. Made me chuckle.

materfamilias said...

I've put Ms. Lewis on the list -- of writers to be avoided.
And you're making me rethink my own previous avoidance of jigsaw puzzles -- whatever gets one through a February. . .

love those cupcakes said...

I loved jigsaws when I was little but haven't been near one for years. Doubt I have the patience to have a go these days. I read an article recently about a man whose job it is to check donated jigsaws before they're put out for sale in one charity's shops. Referred to himself as a disectologist. The Queen is one, too, apparently. Happy March!