A break from knitting related things... and all other things

The reason for my long pause in blogging is that I had to go to the hospital and spend over a week there, recovering from first a simple gall bladder surgery and after that from pneumonia. The only knitting related thought I had was that someone could knit gloves that would allow one to warm the hand attached to an intravenous drip. I.e. my left hand was cold after being given both antibiotics and 'liquid nutrition' through a drip. 

Here are my hands before the operation: 

The drip was really not that pleasant all the time. I have very bony hands so they had to put it closer to my wrist. 

Here are the fantastic anti-embolism socks they put on me before the operation and that I had to wear for 2 days: 

Truly functional knitting! 

I'm slowly coming back to knitting, mostly by reading the books Socks, socks, socks (edited by Elaine Rowley) and Folk knitting in Estonia by Nancy Bush. The former has sock ideas collected in a competition. I'm thrilled that there are some really original patterns such as "Freeform socks" and "Maple Swirl Socks", both by Debbie New (I have her book Unexpected knitting, a true masterpiece). The 70 patterns cover many  knitting techniques (double knitting, entrelac, intarsia in the round etc.). I'm actually considering buying this book, something I really rarely do if the most a book has to offer are patterns. But there is definitely more than meets the eye in these socks. Folk knitting in Estonia has some new techniques for me, and I'm mostly reading it for them. Not to say that the patterns aren't beautiful, they are, and actually the librarian who gave me the book told me so as well! I feel rather stupid to notice that joining after casting on for knitting in the round is a special technique. I'll definitely start to 'join' my cast ons from now on. The wick decreases and braids are also new for me.