I thought we were done with winter but apparently not. The temperature outside is freezing again. And the almost ten-degree temperature difference outside hits by a degree or two inside, so I’m back to layers of wool upon wool.

My family walks through the house without noticing a lot of things that I can’t help but notice. They leave chairs pulled out from the table, at an angle. They leave rugs askew. They leave doors half-open in such a way that, when I walk into the space, I am met by the edges of the doors.

The family are clearly not bothered. But to me, the doors meeting me edge-on almost feel like the doors are attacking me. It’s like walking into hostile territory. A palisade, or a barred wall.

So I keep pushing the doors away to the side, all the time. And a few hours later, they’re back again.

I have been taking levothyroxine daily to compensate for my underactive thyroid for almost twenty years.

I can’t remember what the pill jars looked like in the UK. In Sweden, they looked like the jar on the left for many years. Until one day a couple of years ago someone tried to be clever and changed the design to the one on the right.

On the left: a normal lid, with a nice ridged edge for extra grip. With grooves on top, even, that you could use for more leverage – put a pencil in the groove and twist. Nice if you’re elderly, or have reduced mobility or grip strength. Human-friendly, in other words.

On the right: what is that even. Carefully align one tiny symbol with another tiny symbol, by twisting the lid. And then somehow lever it off. I don’t know how you’re actually supposed to do that. Pushing with my thumb doesn’t work; I normally claw it off with the nails of two or three fingers, with effort.

Once I’ve got it open, my immediate next step is to decant the pills into the old jar, and throw away the new jar, swearing at it while thanking my luck that (i) I had the foresight to keep one of the old jars, and (ii) the jar openings are exactly the same size so I can just hold the two against each other and flip them upside down and don’t need to look for a funnel or something, or chase dropped pills on the floor.

Now that I googled about it, I see that the new jar was introduced in 2017, and complaints were registered immediately. In 2020 they were working on it and now in 2024 nothing has happened yet.

The new jars are so bad that they’ve been written about in national magazines, and the pharmacy staff joke about it every time I pick up my prescription. I replied that “at least I’m young and strong and healthy so I can open mine”.

Then it struck me that, while I’m strong and healthy, describing myself as young is perhaps not entirely accurate any more. I’m closer to 50 than 40, after all. It may be time to re-frame things.

Vaguely, tantalizingly spring-like weather is here, with above-zero temperatures on most days.

Indoors it’s not a lot warmer than before. The heating is still set to the same target temperature of 19°C, but on sunny days the system is more likely to overshoot slightly than to fall short.

The bedroom is warmer at night, though. I’ve switched from sleeping in long-sleeved thermal shirt, to short-sleeved cotton t-shirt (under the winter-weight duvet, still, and the flannel sheets, still).

The mental shock of going from an active outdoors vacation to the humdrum realities of everyday life always hits me quite hard. It’s like coming down after an adrenaline high. Which I guess it is, just with different chemicals.

I don’t want to do anything. I especially don’t want to unpack. But I trick myself into getting it done, by picking up and putting away just one thing from the pile every time I get up for any reason.

It was more or less light outside still when I got home after a full day in the office. We’ve finally gotten to the point where each day feels just a little bit lighter and brighter and easier than the one before.

It was time to shovel snow again. Wet, heavy snow, that either will melt away in the next couple of days, or compact and freeze into a sheet of ice. I don’t want to take that risk, so away it goes.

It’s 17 degrees indoors and around zero outside, and yet I can almost go out in the same clothes that I wear inside. Adding mittens and a hat and proper footwear, and maybe a super thin waterproof layer to keep me dry. The (fairly light) physical activity suffices to get my body temperature up enough to compensate for the twenty-degree difference.

Tried and mostly failed to get a photo of myself and my newly finished cardigan, without too many of the bathroom fixtures or other crap in view. The more I tried, the worse the results got. After a while I was overthinking it so much that I sometimes didn’t even manage to get into position before the timer triggered. I think it just isn’t doable.

The cardigan fits super well, though!

Embroidery club. Didn’t remember to take a photo of what we were doing, but here’s a detail from a piece of embroidered artwork that was hanging on the wall at the venue.

This is the best part of the embroidery club – seeing other people’s work up close, and being inspired by work that is so different from anything I myself have done. Of course it’s also nice to get a nudge every other week to do some stitching, and to have company while doing so.

I’ve been to a local “knitting café” a couple of times, but never got hooked. I figured out why, after some time: I don’t enjoy hanging out with people I don’t know and won’t have a chance to get to know either. At the knit café it’s a crowd of new, random people every time. Some might come back, but overall it’s mostly strangers. The embroidery club on the other hand is folks I know.

And it’s done!

The pattern is a simplified version of Sweatrrr (check it out on Ravelry) and it’s one I used earlier. I liked the fit and the construction of it, even though I am still rather annoyed with its frustrating curling hem. This time I knew better, so I gave it a simple checkerboard hem (which you can see in yesterday’s photo). This worked out a lot better.

The yarn I bought Apmezga, a Lithuanian seller, at the Stockholm Sewing Fair this autumn. It’s a merino wool and nylon blend, and it’s as soft as a cloud. The sweater feels like a second skin. Except warmer.