As I mentioned briefly in the last post, I started a sock. If it goes well, I might knit two socks, and wear one of them on each foot. I know, I know... Anyway, the sock has become the new "knitting I carry around with me," and I pulled it out of my purse this morning to work on it before class, only to find that I only had four DPNs instead of five. I did not, however, collapse on the floor in a state of horrified panic. I merely rifled through my purse a bit to determine that the missing DPN was not in fact lurking near the bottom, then stuck the sock back into my purse and turned to my other form of amusement (Han Solo at Stars' End-and no, I don't read anything difficult in my free time during the school year, I love my brain more than that).

I would like to think that this is a sign of personal growth, that I am learning to accept and work with unexpected difficulties, but I think it was more a sign that I only had five hours of sleep and just didn't have the energy to panic.

On the bus ride home, I did manage to summon the energy to acknowledge that I could knit the sock with four needles instead of five, if the fifth one was indeed lost forever, but I found the deserter lounging on the tile in my foyer, so no harm done.

I was going to update with lovely pictures of progress (progress!), show you how many Weasley squares I've finished (58, 82 to go...), show you the Slytherin scarf and my lovely new sock (yes, a sock! I haven't gotten to the heel yet...), but as luck would have it, the camera has refused to operate until I bring it a sacrifice of four double-A batteries. What a jerk.

Usually, I talk while I type, but I didn't say that last part out loud because the camera is sitting right next to me and I don't want it to get angry and start demanding other things (like shrubberies).

Sometimes, when I'm feeling really adventurous, I use the printer to print things.

Booky McBookbook

Meme swiped from Carrie K's blog. =D

1. One book that changed your life: Hmm...I don't knowing about changing my life per se, but I've found all of C.S. Lewis's non-fiction, that I've read, to be deeply profound.

2. One book that you’ve read more than once: Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand

3. One book you’d want on a desert island: All of the Harry Potter books. I know I'm cheating! But it's one big story, right? RIGHT?! (That said, hopefully I don't find myself on any desert islands before book seven comes out...)

4. One book that made you laugh: Anything by Terry Pratchett, most recently Going Postal.

5. One book that made you cry: Ghost Soldiers by Hampton Sides

6. One book that you wish had been written: How to Never, Ever Procrastinate Again. Heh...

7. One book that you wish had never been written: Hmm...I can think of a lot of books I really disliked, but I know other people have really enjoyed (The Catcher in the Rye comes to mind...). However, I get really disgusted when I see trashy fiction targeted at young teenagers, especially girls. So that. "Trashy fiction targeted at young girls."

8. One book you’re currently reading: The Dante Club, but I'm having such a hard time getting into it. My mom said it was really good though, so I'm trying. I was also reading Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets earlier today...

9. One book you’ve been meaning to read: Marie Antoinette by Antonia Fraser

10. Now tag five people: Haha right, like five people read this.

rarr

I love it when she sleeps like this. She does so many ridiculous things. Everybody should have a pet that makes him laugh every time he looks at it. If Sassy weren't doing something strange, I'd probably think she was sick.

So today, she is obviously a happy, healthy cat, while I am a wretched, snot-spewing lump. I've stopped working on my roommate's Slytherin scarf because the idea of me intermittenly blowing my nose and then picking up her scarf again to work on it probably grosses her out. She wouldn't actually tell me if it did, but it kind of grosses me out too. Obviously it's going to get washed before she actually wears it, but still. Today is the age of the super-germ, and you never know what might be coming out of my sinuses. Grossed out now? Good. Because it'd just be really selfish of me to keep all the grossing out for myself.

Sloppy sinuses haven't stopped me from working on the Weasley squares, though. But obviously the Weasley blanket's going to get washed after it's all put together too! It really doesn't matter. I believe in the power of soap. Such is the advantage of acrylic yarn...as soon as the blanket's done it's getting tossed in the washing machine and I won't even worry about it.

My yearly fall cold has made its appearance in all of its lime green snot glory. But being sick does give me an excuse to knit and watch movies all day. Mindless knitting, of course, but the only projects I'm really paying attention to right now are mindless. The Weasley blanket? Garter stitch squares. The Sesame sweater? Stockinette flat. The Slytherin scarf? Stockinette in the round. Mindless! It's ok though. Mindless knitting allows me to knit on the bus and to knit in the library while I'm doing my reading for class (all of my textbooks stay open by themselves this year. I knew I picked good classes.).

Wednesday I had been working on a Weasley square on the bus on the way to school, and when the bus stopped, I got off and just kept knitting. I was halfway to my building before I realized I'd been knitting while I was walking. Part of me is proud of myself and part of me is really happy I was heading to a night class and there weren't that many people on campus.


The Slytherin scarf is slithering off the needles at a fairly respectable rate. I'm not a very speedy knitter (as evidenced by the sad lack of finished objects to appear on this blog), but I'm trying not to beat myself up about it. Plus, the addi Turbos do seem to make the knitting go faster...but maybe that's just the placebo effect.

good timing

Since my new 12" Addi Turbo arrived in the mail today, on my birthday, I'm going to pretend that I planned it that way so I'd get a birthday present in the mail...

What is the 12" Addi Turbo for, you ask? Well, actually, it's not for anything, I just knew that if I wanted to get in with the cool knitters I was going to have to own at least one Addi Turbo knitting needle. So can I be in the club now? Can I? Or do I still have to run into the yarn shop naked and throw myself at the Koigu?

Kidding. My roommate has announced that she's in Slytherin and needs a scarf to prove it. I decided that six inches wide was a better size for a Harry Potter scarf than eight inches, but of course the 16" circular that I had would not accomodate that decision. I suppose it is possible that other needle brands make 12" needles, but I figured if I was going to have to order it online anyway I might as well see what all the Addi Turbo fuss is about.

Oh, and speaking of birthdays, my ever so delightful siblings (brother 16 and sister 12) gave me a gift certificate to knitpicks.com. Am I excited? Oh yes...ever so excited...

It's a bird, it's a plane...

...no, it's an update!

I found this lovely stuff at the Zeilinger Wool Company in Frankenmuth, Michigan, while I was home in July:



So I swatched it a bit:



The Weasley blanket cometh...



...very slowly. But if you're interested, I made a Flickr album of the finished Weasley squares. Well, actually, they aren't really "finished," they've got ends sticking out and some of them don't look very square...ah well.

So...pretty.. *drool*

I've almost got the merino laceweight under control, so I was poking around on the internet looking for a lace pattern. I don't have enough yarn for that particluar project, which at any rate might be a bit too ambitious when I have about 5,349 other things going and school is going to start in a month. But one day...one day... *wistful look into the glorious, spider stole future*

More books.

I've been knitting Weasley squares because they are brainless, and my brain has melted from all the heat. Right now, I would probably sell my soul for an air conditioner. But I wouldn't sell it to just anybody. I have standards. Like I definitely wouldn't sell it to anyone named...Lord Voldemort...or...or...I don't know.

It's too hot to say anything funny.

I may now understand, just a little, how parents feel when their children get along.

I'm not too sure about this quiz. I mean, no, I wouldn't consider myself the Supreme Ruling Empress of Girl Nerds, but last year I stayed up alllll night making a Jedi robe to wear to a Star Wars premiere. I think that alone should earn me a permanent, high-ranking spot in nerd heaven.

Just so this has something to do with knitting, I had been mulling over the idea of a sweater with some sort of Tetris block pattern in it, although probably just in two colours, so it would give the idea of Tetris without being excessively tacky. I should include a drawing but I haven't made one yet. Maybe if I plug a USB cable into my brain... (things adapt to their environments, right? I mean I bet in the next ten years or so babies will start being born with USB ports in the backs of their heads. Just watch). Anyway. Tetris makes me want to punch things at the moment so I think that sweater may be on hold.

I'd like to knit a shark. Actually, my dad caught a shark last summer while he was fishing on a charter boat, and it just arrived from the taxidermist. Maybe I could knit him a shark cozy for Christmas. But he already calls me eccentric so maybe I won't.

I've been spending a lot of time in the living room lately...

Today I didn't have to work at all, which is a very exciting occurence when you have two jobs, so I went into my usual "no work" mode and curled up with some podcasts, some snacks, and some knitting. I spent a good four hours this way, but about three o'clock I started to get a bit restless. "I should go outside!" I thought, even though it's been raining on and off all day. "Why should I stay cooped up in my apartment when there's such a nice drizzly day out there?"

So on my bike I got and off I headed to the Place of Tempting Place of Beauty and Evil Place Where I Wish I Was Independently Wealthy yarn shop.

Now, I did say in my initial post about the yarn shop that I wasn't going to go back because it was really expensive, most of it. But, I needed a specific sort of fiber for the final hurrah of the One Skein secret pal exchange, and I thought that someone working at the yarn shop migh be more help than someone working at Michael's. I did find a reasonably priced, suitable yarn, so I bought it and turned to leave the shop...

...only to find that somebody had pressed the 'on' button for the rain and turned it up to eleven.

Well, whatever, rain is just water. But then I got splashed by a nice, large city bus driving kind of fast through a nice, large city puddle, and now I just feel kind of gross.

The Great Yarn Rescue of '06

It was twilight at my grandfather's cottage on a small lake in northern Michigan, and I had been sitting on the pontoon knitting. As the sun set, the weather had cooled, and the mosquitos had begun to salivate. Not wanting to be their next feast, I decided it would be best to take myself and my things up to the cottage and change into some more evening appropriate attire-the swimsuit and sarong look wasn't going to hold out against the insect onslaught. I picked up my book, my knitting, and the extra ball of yarn I'd been carrying around with me all day (in the event that I came to the end of the working ball, I didn't want to have to trudge all the way to my luggage to get another one), and stepped off the boat onto the dock. I was just stepping off the dock onto the grass when I looked down at what I was carrying and realized something was missing...

Horrified, I whirled around and looked wildly at the dock, but the extra ball of yarn was nowhere to be seen. I hurried back onto the boat, but there was no yarn there either. In the growing darkness, I looked mournfully into the water between the boat and the dock and realized what had happened. I had dropped the ball of yarn into the lake. Desperately, I knelt down on the edge of the boat and peered into the water, but I couldn't see anything (I didn't really expect to, but I was distraught and not thinking clearly). Now, I am not a person to give up when I know there is still a way to overcome an adversity, but I am also generally realistic. I came to the very logical conclusion that the yarn, like a few pairs of my mother's glasses, my dad's fishing rod, and an odd number of swim shoes, was lost forever in the murky depths of Wixom Lake.

I'm not really the sort of person to get extremely emotional about most things. I did cry for half an hour when Chewbacca died in Vector Prime, but that was Chewbacca (on a side note, do you think there are knitters in the Star Wars galaxy? And do you think that anyone spins yarn out of wookiee fur? Like...wookiee wool?!!). However, I did feel a bit nauseated about losing a ball of yarn, as I had only bought five of them and wasn't entirely sure I was going to have enough to finish the project I'd started. I knew there were stores I could get to easily that sell the yarn, but what if I couldn't match up the dye lot? These possibilities made me feel very pouty, so I went up to the cottage and whined about it to my mother, who did sympathize but obviously couldn't remedy the situation.

For whatever reason, perhaps a desire to return to the scene of the tragedy and find closure, I went back down to the boat and half heartedly looked around again, in case the yarn really hadn't fallen into the water and I'd missed it in my initial search. Realizing I was being silly and still hadn't managed to change my clothing, I stepped off the boat and happened to look out on the lake.

Floating there, about fifteen feet out, was my yarn.

At this point, something very silly happened. After an initial surge of joy at finding the yarn not at the bottom of the lake, I thought, "Dad won't let me go swimming when it's almost dark outside..."

Then I mentally slapped myself, realizing that I am almost twenty years old and can go swimming any time I want, and this was an emergency. I threw the sarong and my glasses onto the boat and jumped into the water.

This proved to be momentarily disconcerting, as I can't see that well without my glasses-beyond eighteen inches or so, everything is pretty blurry. As I have said, it was almost dark, and for a moment I couldn't see where the yarn was and I thought that I was too late, that it had soaked up enough water to actually sink, and that my one brief glimmer of hope was just that-a brief glimmer.

But then the water moved just the right way, and I could see the outline of the ball of yarn, and I swam with all possible haste towards it. Reaching it, I grabbed it out of the water and held it aloft. Then I swam back to the dock using only one arm, since the other arm was occupied keeping the yarn above the water.

Having successfully executed the rescue mission, I went back inside to comfort the victim.

Introducing...yarn from my one skein secret pal! It is 100% merino and it is lovely. "Blondi" says she had it dyed at her LYS "to your specs!" Is that cool or what? I feel special. Thanks Blondi!

Self-medication, variation 5783:

1 Smirnoff Raspberry Twister + Disney's Beauty and the Beast + mindless knitting

Still in test phase, but seems to be working.

The laceweight merino is still lying in a dejected, half-tangled mess on an end table in the living room. I feel guilty looking at it.

This morning I started my third attempt at knitting in the round with double-pointed needles. It's not a total disaster, although the stitch marker kept falling off so I gave up on it and just resolved to keep very good track of my stitches. Famous last words, probably, but so far I haven't lost track. I decided to try knit Kate from the Winter 2005 issue of Knitty. I just had a momentary image of Yoda poking me with a giant knitting needle and saying, "Do or do not, there is no try," so I guess I'd better see Kate to the end or I'll be a bad Jedi knitter.

I did knit in public on World Wide Knit in Public Day, but since I've been doing that for a month or so now it wasn't really that exciting. It might have been more fun to go hang out with a bunch of knitters in the middle of an intersection and knit, but I don't know any knitters with whom to do death-defying (or not so defying) knitting things. Rats.





Oh, the summer reading list has been updated...scroll down...

Over the weekend, I went to City Knits in Detroit, which was a bit on the small side but had a lot of nice, reasonably priced yarn (at least, it was less expensive than the yarn in the yarn shop here in London). I met a very friendly hank of 1375 yards of lace weight merino wool, and decided it needed to go home with me. The yarn shop lady at the counter said she had never wound that particular yarn, but if I wanted her to she would. However, my mom was waiting for me and I've wound plenty of yarn by myself, so I just paid for the yarn and left.

About an hour ago I started trying to wind it. I'm trying to stay optimistic, but it keeps cringing and wanting to know what happened to the beautiful life I promised it when I took it away from its yarn store home. I feel like a bad parent.

Summer Reading List...

...because, you know, all the other knitters are doing it.

Actually, I don't have an actual list of books I want to read this summer, but since my roommate went home for the summer, I'll have no one to jabber at nonstop. So, when I'm not in the mood for listening to podcasts and knitting, I'll probably end up reading, because talking to the cat gets boring after the first five minutes.

Books finished as of June 1:

June 4 Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis

June 6 The Giver, Lois Lowry
I should have read this book when I was ten, like normal children, before I read Brave New World and 1984, but, since I didn't, this book just ended up being extremely unsatisfying. There were so many things that were alluded to but couldn't be discussed and resolved fully in a children's novel, which really makes me wonder why it was written for children. It is a unique take on the post apocalyptic totalitarian regime theme, and I wish the novel had been more fully developed.

June 8 Ghost Soldiers, Hampton Sides

June 16 Legally Blonde, Amanda Brown
I've read a few books after I saw the movie, although it isn't something I normally do. Generally I only watch the movie first if I either didn't know it was based on a book, or had very little interest in the book. Legally Blonde fell into the former category, and it's taken me however many years since the movie came out to remember to track down the book and read it. I was disappointed. The movie was better.

June 17 Girl in Hyacinth Blue, Susan Vreeland

July 31 The Dark Is Rising sequence, Susan Cooper
Over Sea, Under Stone
The Dark Is Rising
Greenwitch
The Grey King
Silver on the Tree
I started reading this series when I was twelve or thirteen, but didn't finish it then. I spotted it at the library and, having always kind of wondered how it concluded, checked out all the books. The first two books and the fourth book were very exciting, the third book was forgettable, and the last book was...alright. To be frank, I thought the ending was terrible. But there's a lot of references to King Arthur mythology, and Cooper is a skillful storyteller, so the series was overall, reasonably entertaining.

August 11 Eragon and Eldest, Christopher Paolini
This trilogy is shaping up to be Star Wars with dragons and no space ships, but so far it's been a fun read so I'm not complaining. It's a good way to get my "classic tale of good vs. evil" fix.

August 21 Going Postal, Terry Pratchett
What can I say about Terry Pratchett? His books are nearly nonstop hilarity from cover to cover, and this one was no different. RIght now I want to go to the library and check out every single book he's ever written, even the ones I've already read, but I wouldn't finish them all in three weeks and then I'd have loads of overdue fines.