Negative

The fan has been talking about the uncanny valley today. It's that gap between real and fake that causes gut reaction, that "eew!" moment when you take take a step back, realising that what you thought was real, and in this specific context, human, turned out to be fake, or an android.

It has struck a chord because I'm in the throes of two things which are no longer what I thought they were, and I am having to get to know them all over again. The first is a sock pattern. It's a different construction from anything I've used before, which has been challenging in itself. But the real stinker is nothing to do with construction, but with colour. The first sock has a purple pattern on a cream ground. The knitting chart, so as not to distract those who want, green and red socks, say, or pink and orange (believe me, someone might) is in black and white. So for the whole sock white=cream and black =purple.

The problem is that sock two is like a negative of the first: it has a white pattern on a purple ground, so now white=purple and black=cream. The main pattern, once I got going, isn't a problem, but the increases at the gussets are, and I keep having to stop to think which colour is which.

The fan suddenly spoke up this evening to say he didn't think I was playing Miss G quite right. I pointed out that I was following the dots, which I presented to him. He hummed through the dots and had to admit I was right (it happens from time to time!) He poked about the web and found a different version of Miss G, which is almost the same as mine, but not quite. My eyes are reading one set of dots and my fingers want to play another...And all along, "my" Miss G was an imposter, just like Barbara Wallace and the other girls who visited Dr Wiseman in Paul Temple and the Gregory Affair, which is keeping me entertained while I knit, knit, knit my back to front sock in time for Christmas.