I haven't posted for a while, I've been rather busy with work, as we had a deadline at the end of last week. This week has been rather scrappy, but I've been going home tired at the end of every day, as we have been in a very small room for three weeks now, and we have sometimes eight people in here, around a table that is not big enough. And the room barely contains the table and chairs, there is no space left when we are sitting down. I am very much hoping we will not be in this room next week.

There are various tensions here at present, since the Snowflake is one of the eight people, and two others are young women that think she is wonderful and agree with everything she says and does. I read a rather nice book recently called "How to be a Hepburn in a Hilton World", Audrey and Paris, respectively, of course. In my opinion, they are all what this book calls "silly girls", who do not realise yet that saying four letter words every three seconds and coming to work in the clothes that you were wearing the night before is unlikely to lead to a fulfilling career etc etc. Although I did have to laugh, one of them was proposing that our group Christmas party be fancy-dress. I told this to David, who said, oh she can wear what she wears to the office then.

Tomorrow I am going to Copenhagen, on the 1pm plane, hooray, and I am staying there for two nights, going to Paris on Sunday, staying there for two nights, and coming back here, until the 18th December, when I am going home for Christmas, double hooray!! I have to saying I am longing for the Christmas holidays, I cannot wait to get away from some of these people, there is far too much closeness in this room.

Plans for Copenhagen include Christmas shopping and going to the Christmas market in Tivoli - I went to the Tallinn Christmas market last weekend and enjoyed that a lot, as well. Lovely lambskin mittens that I have recommended the whole group buy, they are so warm.

We have a deadline tomorrow, so this week and most of last week has been spent testing things and dealing with errors. Plus lots more new people (not from our company, in general, but from companies who are helping our client with other parts of this project) have fronted up to ask me questions about things that I have got no idea why they are asking me or why they want to know in the first place.

Also we are in a new room, which is right by the lobby door in this building, since our usual room has been taken over for a training course. This room is very small, and we have seven people in it, mercifully not the Snowflake, who has not fronted this week. If she comes back next week, I may have to be ill or something and stay home. I am going to miss one day next week anyway, because I'm going home for the weekend and not flying back until Monday evening.

I think the only exciting thing I have done this week is to book my Christmas holiday, I've decided to go to thalassotherapy at Hyeres in the south of France for a week, because it must be warmer than Tallinn and probably warmer than Paris, and I can go there by train, and not by some horrible crowded plane. I mean, the train may be crowded anyway, but there are not all the other attendant horrors of the airport etc. I have not been to Hyeres before, so hopefully it is nice even in winter. I did think of going to Spain for thalasso, but it's impossible to find anything open that is reasonably priced. All the reasonable thalasso deals are either in France, or else in Morocco or Tunisia, which involves the whole airport thing, and thus cancels out the relaxing effect of the thalassotherapy!

Oh, I have to go............ someone has come in and said they have an error message that mentions the word "person", so of course it is I that has to look at it. I bet it is nothing to do with any of my customisations, but the word "person" is the trigger.

I got back here on Saturday night to find that the city was covered in snow, from a big snow fall on Friday. Yesterday we also had snow throughout the day, but now it seems to have stopped. I wonder if we will see clear streets again before April? Although a lot has melted, there are mini-piles of snow in places, and I have a feeling that these will become maxi-piles before too much longer.

Our dear Snowflake has gone home for a few days, which is extremely good, as far as I am concerned, because on Monday she distinguished herself by proclaiming loudly that knitting was "******* boring". She knows how to do it, of course (since actually she knows EVERYTHING), but doesn't actually do so because of this. I just ignored her, and pretend now that I am extremely deaf whenever she is around. After all, I am the one who has a constant supply of warm new scarves to wear - I now have both a Miss Marple and a Just Enough Ruffles, which I will post photos of when I sort out the camera battery (again! I don't know why it decharges practically every week).

We do have a couple of extra people here at present - one of them managed to poison himself somehow at a Russian restaurant last night, and has spent most of the day in the bathroom, while the other has been suffering from extreme jetlag and is presently asleep in the corner of our office wrapped in a shearling-lined coat. I don't think some of our colleagues are as hardy as we old-timers who are veterans of last winter in Tallinn!!

And just a note for Kadri - yes, I'm Allyparis on Ravelry. And I like Tallinn, for the history and the knitting, but I sometimes moan about the cold and the dark.

I've decided I hate working at home! I find myself talking to the potplants, as there is no-one else here. I have to go out in the middle of the day when it is still light and hopefully not raining or else go bonkers.

Yesterday I did go to Des Fils et Une Aiguille and did NOT find Joyeux Noel sadly, but I did find the pink breast cancer scissors from Kelmscott. Also went to Ulla Popken and bought six vests (caracos, as they are called in French), first time for years I've even thought of wearing these, but necessary in Tallinn, I think, plus a fleece jacket, a cardigan and a tenue d'interieur, which is fancy velvet pyjamas for wearing at home at the weekends. I'm wearing the top part of these now, having put them on this morning, then exchanged the bottom half for jeans to go out in.

Today I went to visit a cafe called L'Oisivethe, quite a long way from my place, it's in the 13th. They sell yarn as well as food - I had lunch, which was two boiled eggs with bread fingers, ham and salad, then a coffee with cookie, icecream and fruit, and I bought two skeins of yarn to make a ruffled scarf. I'm into ruffles at the moment, having finished the ruffled Miss Marple shawl.

Tomorrow I may go to the office, I have this heap of receipts, so I think they owe me money.... sigh, all that gluing, I hate glue, I always manage to get it over everything.

I'm here for a whole week, until next Saturday! And I had a perfect trip down here yesterday - perfect means the planes were on time, my bag arrived as well, plus there was no turbulence or other disturbance en route. In fact, on both planes I had an entire row to myself, so sat in the middle seat and spread myself out.

It is much warmer here, about 15 degrees, although it has been raining and heavy rain is forecast for the next two days. I have a mountain of shopping to do - I really want to buy some boots. Something practical, Giulia turned up last week with cream suede embroidered ones, they are beautiful, however good thing it has not rained too much, they will be useless when real winter starts, a single walk from the car park to the front door would ruin them. Suzette has coffee-coloured suede, also impractical, and Snowflake has stiletto black patent leather with bondage-looking zips everywhere. I'm looking more for dark brown calf-length ones with fur insides, for outdoor wear, with soles that will be ok on ice and definitely leather, so I can weatherproof them. I wouldn't say it's not important what they look like, but they probably will not be a fashion statement.

Apart from all the shopping I have to do, and work of course - I have to go to the office one day to do all my decoupage and collage (as we call the submitting of expense claims, it involves vast amounts of glue), plus continue what I am doing in Tallinn, but just at home - I want to have a fairly restful time. I really want to see if I can get to the patchwork shop in the 11th, as I still need fabric for my needlebook lining, and tomorrow I will go to the rue Chabanais, in the hope of finding "Joyeux Noel" by Blackbird Designs. I'm sure she will have it, as she knows the BBD ladies, hopefully it has not sold out yet. The woman there is very nice, she has a NZ daughter-in-law, and always remembers me when I come in.

Now I'm logging off and going to do my stitching - La-D-Da calls!

Even though it continues to be somewhat warmer, I am in the middle of knitting this:

It's the ruffled Miss Marple shawl by Facile Cecile, a French designer - it's a free pattern, using one skein of Noro Kureyon sock and the same amount in length of Kid Mohair. The pattern says Rowan, but I am using one I got from Sommerfuglen in Copenhagen that is a very good match for the yarn. The ruffle is around the edge, and there will be several hundred stitches by the time I cast off.

I also finished this one just before the recent cold snap, it's a "pelerine" to go over my shoulders under a coat (or if the office heating goes off):

Last evening, we had a "corporate event" which was with our whole team for both of our company's projects in Tallinn, plus the client, so there were over 40 people participating. The first part was a Ghost Walk in the Old Town of Tallinn. We went in two groups with guides and walked around the town, while they told us legends and stories about the buildings and other landmarks we saw - we learned about the Cat Well, the Devil's wedding party, and the Mummy of Tallinn, plus quite a few others, such as the Danish flag descending from the sky in a battle in Tallinn. I knew that one, of course, but the others were all new to me. Above is our guide, in front of a house where quite a few strange things happened. The colours of houses in the Old Town are quite beautiful.

The second part was to go for a dinner at the Olde Hansa restaurant, which is mediaeval themed, and has a lot of candles, also musicians playing on mediaeval instruments, such as recorders, lutes, two-drone bagpipes and so on. The meal was huge, with various appetizers, such as smoked salmon, quails eggs, dried beef and horseradish, pate with onion jam, then main course of lentils, spelt, sauerkraut and turnips with elk and wild boar stew, fish, game sausages and some sort of game bird. Finally a creamy pudding scattered with rose petals.

We had various drinks, for me a couple of glasses of wine - however I noticed at the table where the Snowflake was (we had three long tables, there were so many people) that large quantities of vodka were being ordered and it was getting rather rowdy. I left at about 10pm, since it was the first night that I had been out since getting sick (and getting better again, now, fortunately). It's actually got quite a lot warmer, we are up to 7 or 8 degrees, which seems pleasant after 0, but I didn't want to risk a relapse. Plus I get up at 6:30 am for work. This morning I thought we would have a missing Snowflake, but no, she is here, although clearly suffering from a surfeit of vodka.... a couple of others seem to be the same, but are present. I am not especially sympathetic, I have to say. I don't mind the occasional vodka, but not before a work day and not to that quantity in front of customers. I believe the last ones left at 1 am.

Yesterday we did also hear that our request for a winter clothing allowance was refused, no great surprise that, although I know some people will be upset by it. Giulia was very keen on it, she was going around saying there was no way they could refuse. Oh yes they can, if it involves giving us money.

So I had better finish now, as I have a heap of stuff to do today, and I want to go to bed not too late tonight.