My favourite is the Stitch'n'b**** Handbook I have been eyeing up for quite a while (you will note in the picture I have covered up the cowgirl, out of natural modesty). I will figure out how to blog pictures on this site so you can see all the stuff! It's very frustrating, it keeps saying the page cannot be displayed when I upload pics.

Am looking forward to going home next weekend, am missing everyone. When are you coming to see me? That goes for everyone in Manchester, but especially Ray and the Cow. Get your skates on, kids.

 Edit: Am reading the book, and have come across 'A Field Guide to Knitters'. This sounds a little too much like me – but I'm gonna prove them wrong! Yeah!

Dilettante knitters: They just learned to knit last week, but already they've spent more on luxurious yarns than you did in the past year. Dilettante knitters throw themselves and their money at the craft of knitting for a short while and maybe manage to complete two thirds of a sweater before they get bored with the whole thing. The good news is that they'll probably sell you their leftover yarn for next to nothing.

I'm eating tinned sweetcorn with instant gravy. So please dispel all myths of perfect housewifeliness.

 Big Brother is awful. All the people on it are nasty. They talk about disgusting things. Why is it always on?

 I have uploaded a picture of my knitting, but it might not show up as I'm not sure how it works. If you like it, and would like a woolen scarf (in the height of summer), please let me know. It gives me an excuse to buy wool.

 edit: the picture didn't upload

 I thought it would be cool to have a chicks-with-sticks group at the riad in Morocco. On doing some canvassing, I found that Jug and Cow were up for it, but Fudge scorned the plan. Just you wait, Henry Higgins, just you wait..you'll be sorry but your tears will be too late!

 I am amassing large amounts of knitting paraphernalia, but am uncomfortably aware that I am not progressing or displaying vast amounts of talent in the field.

Finals were interesting. The first exam, was an exercise in willpower..question after question, long paragraphs followed by five impossible-to-choose-between answers. The practical exam, which I was scared stiff about, ended up being not as bad as I had expected, but then the last one was hard again, so I can't say whether I passed or failed. There was a time during the exam when it was touch and go whether I would manage to stay awake or not, but I battledvaliantly against the temptation. I hope inshallah all will go well and I'll pass, but if not, I have planned an exciting fun-packed year of "medical student tourism", working in the hospitals of the world – so I can find a bright side to failure if I need to.

In the midst of this, I finally I found a book I had first looked at in Cambridge last year, called Fast Knits Fat Needles and got very sucked into the whole knitting world. Fortunately, we had a useless internet connection at home (dial-up 44k and only after 10pm) so I wasn't able to indulge the whim as much as I would have done otherwise..possibly the only thing which may save me from finals catastrophe.

I've just started a placement in the same department that I'd be working in from August if I pass. It seems cushy as house officer jobs go – two house officers share two wards and cover for each other so they can each take the afternoon off on alternate days! The consultant is also pretty chilled out – a post-take ward round took an hour and 15 minutes (compared to the last nightmare one I did at MRI – 7.30am until 6pm) and then he took us all for a coffee afterwards. When he found out that, far from being a keeno student who was raring to go again straight after finals, I was being forced by my medical school to do this placement, he said it would be fine for me to skive off as much as I wanted, which suits me just fine. Gives me a chance to sneek off to Loop one of these days..

Anyway, will continue later, and will possibly even treat you all to pictures of my knitting!