sporting heroes

On Sunday, I enjoyed watching Raphael Nadal equal Bjorn Borg's record 6 wins at Roland Garros (the French open). Borg was such a hero to me in my teens (any to many other girls!) and Nadal is no doubt inspiring a lot of teenage girls to follow tennis now.



Viktor sock

 While I was enjoying the tennis I started on a sock inspired by another sporting hero, albeit a fictional one. This is the Viktor sock (available on Ravelry), inspired by Viktor Krum the famous Bulgarian seeker (quidditch player) in the Harry Potter series and designed by Angela Tennant- fellow Whovian and SF geek.




Viktor Krum

 

I'm knitting it up in Dream in color Smooshy Lipstick Lava, because let's face it, if a girl gets to meet her sporting hero she should have her favourite lippy on!

I haven't finished Seraphina yet. I ripped back both shoulders to redo all of the neckline again, started on the left and got thoroughly fed up with the whole thing. I lost my knitting mojo completely. It was only when I was checking up the release date for the last HP film that I thought about knitting some HP inspired socks. All of a sudden I wanted to knit again-yay!! I'll go back to Seraphina soon, but Viktor needs me now (or rather I need Viktor!)

D and I watched a film about some unlikely sporting heroes last night. Out of the Ashes is a documentary about the attempts of one man, Taj Malik, to build an Afghan cricket team. Malik learnt to play cricket as a child on a refugee camp (during the Russian invasion of Afghanistan) and wanted to restore Afghani pride by taking a team to the Cricket World Cup 2011, despite having to train on a rubble strewn cricket pitch with very limited resources. It's a wonderful story, and you don't have to be a cricket aficionado to enjoy it. Afghanistan is now my second national team (after England of course!) and I'll follow their development with interest. Malik can be proud of his team- heroes every single one of them.

are you watching Don Fabio?

the England football team played so badly during the World Cup that if any English player does anything halfway decent the football press screams for Fabio Capello to call him up to play for his country.
Darren Bent did get into the inital team before the World Cup, but not into the final selection that went out to South Africa, and he might have made a difference, who knows?
We love him at Sunderland, he plays for the team, he scores a lot, and wins vital points for us. We beat Manchester City today 1-0, giving us the first win of the season and Bent's penalty giving the England coaching staff something to think about! Although the last minute excitement today meant that I had to put my knitting to one side or risk another frogging session!

The men in my life were also happy that Newcastle drew 1-1 at Wolves yesterday, with Andy Carroll getting the equaliser, and also getting pointed out to the England coaching staff! So, a good start for both our teams, 4 points from 3 games, Chelsea lead the pack with 9 points and look unbeatable.

I watch cricket only now and again, as Test matches can last up to 5 days, and that is a serious time commitment! But this week I've been riveted watching England turn around what looked like an embarassing collapse into a tremendous win.

Friday saw the team in disarray at 102-7, with Mohammed Amir (who is only 18!!) bowling fantastically and taking 4 wickets off 8 balls. But then Stuart Broad came to the crease, got his maiden century, and with his partner Jonathan Trott scored 244 runs. Saturday saw them take their total to 332 (a record for the 8th wicket). Then England dismissed Pakistan for 74 and had them 41-4 following on. The game finished on sunday, with England winning by an innings and 225 runs! Amazing stuff! England weren't great at all, though Trott and Broad were. But the win has been overshadowed by an alleged gambling ring bribing players to bowl no-balls.

David reckons we should go to Test matches when the kids have left home, and I can knit to my heart's content during the match. Sounds good to me!

everyone's a winner

this has been a great weekend for North East teams- Sunderland won at home beating Hull 4-1.

My big bro F was there with one of his sons (D)and was ecstatic after the match, texting me that our new signings are brilliant- especially Darren Bent.

Last season this match was a relegation dog fight but we seem to be doing much better this season, and it so enjoyable to watch and listen to , and we are 7th in the table ( 7th?? it's amazing!!)

Newcastle are leading the top of the Championship table, unbeaten so far, crushing promotion contenders Cardiff 1-0 at Ninian Park today.
Boro are playing out of their skins and beat Ipswich 3-1 at the Riverside yesterday and now lie 3rd. (West Brom are 2nd, so last year's 3 relegated teams are fighting hard to get back up, and I hope that they do ) .

I feel for Portsmouth fans though, as they are rooted at the bottom of the Premier league. They scored twice yesterday and still have no points. As a Sunderland fan I can remember that sort of pain all too well.


Over to cricket now (over??geddit ??) and Durham are League champions for the second year and this is wonderful news as my Dad spends most of his waking hours at Chester-Le-Street enjoying the cricket (much to my Mam's relief! He's 79 and he gets fidgety if he hasn't got something to do!).

And then, more locally J1 plays rugby for Ross High Colts and yesterday they notched up their first win of the season 44-5 against Portobello . I have no piccies of this, let's face I'm not allowed to go to the matches, but I was so pleased for him.

All this is great for churning out the knitting!!

winners!

I got a lovely bag of yarn in the post today from Yarnforward mag.

They'd had a contest asking people for 3 reasons why they liked the mag and I cheated slightly by parodying the sonnet "How do I love thee , let me count the ways. ".

I wasn't eligible for the main prizes of books & stuff but I did get some stash anyway. I'm sure J2 will want something made with the orange slubby yarn from Maggi Knits, and the pink Jaeger merino will be great for some wrist warmers for me. It's going to be fun playing with this.

England did win the Ashes back from Australia, and while there were moments of brilliance ( Flintoff taking Ponting's wicket) I don't think that England were amazingly good, and nor were the Aussies dreadful. Both sides appeared average to me.

It seems like the character of Test's is changing and I wonder if this is due to 20-20 cricket- the game seems to be ebbing and flowing more and maybe less strategic.

I'm making good progress on the good plain sock, the heel is turned and I'm working on the arch shaping now. Tolstoy is great to knit to, very engrossing . When I read Anna Karenina 20+ years ago I think I felt for Anna more and less for her hubby, but at the moment I'm more sympathetic towards Karenin and want to shake Anna & Kitty (& shoot Vronsky!). Of course I reserve the right to change my mind as I go along- I'm only about a third through , plenty of knitting time left!.

two centuries

exciting stuff !

Wayne Rooney scored his 100th league goal for Man Utd as Wigan paid for Burnley's victory earlier this week and were walloped 5-0 (to be fair to Wigan they did well in the first half, but games last 90 minutes, not 45). Missing Ronaldo? not really!


& Jonathon Trott got his first test century for England, which was needed desperately as Flintoff was out for 22 (and so far this test we've been awful against Australia. ). We might still win the Ashes back, though we probably don't deserve to.

Sunderland did well to beat Blackburn 2-1 at home (Blackburn were unlucky having a goal disallowed and not being awarded a pen, but that's as far as my sympathy goes. We want the points!).

Boro & Newcastle both won in the Championship and now stand at the top which is good, but it still looks weird seeing them in the second tier.

..and when not listening to/watching the sport I've gone back a couple of centuries too and have been listening to Anna Karenina . It's such a long time since I read it and I'm enjoying getting to know it again- lots of anguish. lots of soul searching and lots of drama- exciting stuff and great to knit to!

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright,

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright,

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

William Blake (1757-1827)

Hull's tigers took on Arsenal at the Emirates, and by jiminy, they won (2-1)! Geovanni's goal was an absolute peach, and Hull were organised they knew how Arsenal played, they blocked the channels and really took them on. They were great! To be fair, Arsenal weren't really switched on, and didn't play their best even though they took the lead early, but Hull took on the team that was there and they were great!!

It certainly made up for an awful day for the North East ( Phil Brown, the Hull manager is from South Tyneside, so we can claim him as one of ours).

D & J had a miserable time at St James', the Toon being beat 2-1 by Blackburn. The interim manager Joe Kinnear will have his work cut out. (I was a bit confused when I heard the name, I was thinking Roy Kinnear and wondering why he'd given up acting!).

Sunderland played reasonably well at Villa park took the lead but were beaten 2-1, and the Boro outplayed West Brom but were beaten 1-0!

Thank heavens for the cricket! Durham won the championship for the first time in their history, they've only been in the top flight for 16 years, so its a wonderful achievement. Dad will be chuffed to bits!

¡Y viva España!

My Spanish class started again today!



Hace tres años que estudiando Español, and my brain still defaults to the French that I learned 30 years ago. ¡Madre de Dios!

Still, it was great fun to see everyone again. We're not sure if the class will continue in its present format as there may be too few of us to make it viable, so I might have to move to the Thurs class.


I immersed myself in Brisingr yesterday and thoroughly enjoyed it, only finishing it today. The story should finish in book 4 ......aaaaaaaaaahhhhh another two years to wait!


I've cast on some fun fur yarn today to knit a Christmas tree designed by Alan Dart.. It's a great idea in theory but I think it's going to drive me mad.


Cricket news! Durham CCC may win their first championship title tomorrow, and my dear old Dad will be going bonkers. He loves going to the matches at Chester-le-Street and last year he went to Lords to see them win the Friends Provident Trophy. He had me searching the Internet for the best travel deals for him and his pal Albert and they ended up travelling by coach from Durham to London in the wee small hours.They had a fantastic time, and got back at something like 3 am Sunday. Not bad for two old blokes!