Afternoon fruit snack.

Adrian with Lego.

Alchemilla mollis, Lady’s mantle, is called “dew mantle” in Swedish.

Fredagsmys, Friday night with movie and snacks.

A wooden cooking fork

I am not a luddite. I like my modern technology. I like computers and digital cameras, with their silicon and long-life rechargeable batteries and scratch-resistant screens.

But in more physical everyday activities I notice that old-school natural materials are still far superior to anything that two hundred years of industrialisation and modern chemistry and technological progress can produce.

Fabric shopping bags are better than plastic bags. Quite apart from any environmental concerns, they are just much more comfortable. The handles are soft and don’t cut into my fingers. They are strong. They have and hold a shape so they are easier to pack.

For cooking, nothing compares to a wooden spoon, and wooden cooking forks are awesome too. Wood is sturdier and more heat tolerant than plastic, softer and warmer than metal. For stirring cake batter, mashed potatoes or a bean casserole – anything that requires serious stirring – only a wooden spoon will do.

Wicker baskets are irreplaceable. My small basket for gardening tools is soft and warm and pleasant to hold. A bit of moisture and soil will not make it rust; years of exposure to sunlight will not weaken it. Dust and crumbs of earth fall through the cracks at the bottom.

Wooden chairs. Straw hats. Terracotta flower pots.

Taken during Ingrid’s riding lesson.

Yesterday evening one of the killer slugs somehow found its way into our house. How, is a mystery. I doubt it came all the way up the stairs and in through the door. I also cannot see it grabbing hold of a shoe or a bag and hitching a ride, and then letting go just in time.

What this gave me was a nice opportunity to observe the slug in motion. It moved faster than I expected – not at a snail’s pace. Now I wish I had measured it but it was several millimetres per second at least. Fast enough to cause blurry photos in low-light conditions.

I threw it out and sincerely hope that they haven’t decided to invade the house as a response to my extermination war. I imagine marching ranks of slugs all converging on the house…

Remember those stones that I was stacking back in May? And that I didn’t break any fingers?

Well, I didn’t break any fingers but I did damage a fingernail. It wasn’t even noticeable at the time but as it grew out, it had a big crack across. And even that was not a problem – it slowly grew out and behind the crack the nail was healthy.

But then the edges of the crack got more and more worn, until one day that ragged barely-attached bit of nail accidentally got torn off.

It turns out that torn-off fingernails don’t always heal very well on their own. Two weeks on, it was still not healed. I ended up having to go to the local clinic today so they could cut/scrape off a bit that was growing all wrong. (I learned a new word in the process; I now know what svallkött is.) Note to self: take better care of damaged fingernails in the future.

In addition to the new word I also got a very impressive bandage from the nurse, really out of proportion with the actual damage (but in proportion to the expected amount of bleeding according to the nurse). A great conversation starter at work, and with the kids at home.

And thirdly I gained a new appreciation for the importance of the middle finger. It turns out to be useful for much more than sticking up in the air. Adjusting my typing for the lack of middle finger was surprisingly easy. On the other hand, it was quite tricky to peel an onion or a clove of garlic, or do any other task that requires precision with a small knife. I don’t usually think of using my middle finger to hold the knife, but it makes a big difference to stability. Likewise, holding a pen or a toothbrush is much, much easier if all the fingers are present and work properly.