Secret of the Straw

I had wondered about a piece of plastic drinking straw Jenny had taped to the top of her machine. Today the secret was revealed:

It is a carrier to hold yarn in exactly the required position for couching! It seems even the most advanced computerised machine can be improved with a bit of masking tape and a drinking straw. Later Jenny also showed us how to use a drawing pin and a piece of masking tape to sew a perfect circle, and amazed everyone with tips about loading spools of thread onto the machine.