It Looked Good in the Hank

I don't have a picture of this Schaeffer Anne in the skein, and I regret that now. I regret it because, as knit, this yarn looks like an entirely different creature than it did when it was looped and twisted and on the shop shelves. It was mostly steel blue-gray, with a strong shot of rich purple, and just a dash of teal and yellow. Based on the color changes, I suspected it would knit to a purple/gray body with shots of hot color, maybe with a resulting pattern something like this:






















As you can see, though, the Schaeffer Anne doesn't look anything like that. It's barberpoling, which is like a pox on my house in any event. Me and the barberpoles, we don't see so much eye to eye when it comes time to knit the second sock, which never, ever manages to stripe in an acceptable manner.

But the bigger problem in the barberpole is the way the green and yellow come together. Separated, they looked like nice shots of color waking up the darker shades. Together, they make an odd, jarring splash between the purple and the gray. The green takes on a kelly cast, where it's actually more of a hunter-teal shade on its own.

I'm also disappointed with the way the gray is pooling. It's flat and a little dead-looking. The other stripes in the barberpole are shaded and intermingled with at least two tones. The gray is all gray.

Right now, I'm debating whether to keep knitting in the hopes that the pattern will grow on me. Option two would be to rip it, wind it back into skeins, and just overdye it some dark color. Like black. Black would wipe this mess right out of existence, right?

I don't know. Anyone have any better ideas?

Easing Back Into My Rut

I'm slowly -- very slowly, I'm sorry to say -- reclaiming a normal routine. Things continue to interrupt that process, things such as the phone company guy who spent hours at the new shop on Friday trying to arrange for our phone number to ring on our phones. This was more difficult than anyone anticipated, and I spent many more hours at the shop with him than I had planned.

And then there's the shoulder, which continues to ache intermittently, but is getting better. It's very strange to me to read submissions without working on a plain sock. The two things go together so much that I almost don't want to read if I can't also knit a sock. But my shoulder won't tolerate a lot of movement, so I'm learning how not to multitask again. Except, to be honest, it's hard for me to sit still and just read. Without that sock in my hands, I find myself popping out of the chair far more frequently, so instead of getting caught up on submissions, I'm just sort of picking at them. But at least there's forward motion in that department, too.

Anyway, with a few fits and starts and interruptions, normal life is resuming again. For the most part, I'm at the shop for a few hours in the morning. For the most part, I work at home in the afternoons and evenings. The mountain of laundry which grew during the move is back to manageable dimensions. I even have groceries in the fridge again.

And I have these:



















Two skeins of yummy new Malabrigo sock yarn. I've cut way back on my yarn shopping in the last two months or so, but I made an exception for these. Soft, luscious, with a depth of color and intricacy of shading that's hard to see in pictures. The skein on the left, for example, is steel gray shot through with a dark teal jewel-tone, and once I started looking at the way the colors threaded together, I got sort of lost in the yarn. It doesn't show at all in the photos, no matter the background I used, the photo doctoring, the lighting -- nothing can capture the subtlety of the colorwork in this yarn. It's almost kaleidescopic in person.

So I'm happy with these new purchases, even if it felt like the worst kind of self-indulgence to buy yarn when I can't even knit. And when I'm in stash-busting mode, on a personal quest to minimize the cubic footage of my stash. But the way I look at it is:

a) It's Malabrigo.
b) After the hell of the last three weeks, it was either buy yarn or eat a mountain of chocolate. I've lost six pounds in the last six weeks and would like to keep them off, so yarn is better.
c) This puts me two skeins closer to completing the sock club thingie at Nana's.
d) Did I mention that it's Malabrigo?

Change

Last night, I stayed up very late to watch the election returns. Yes, this one was called pretty early, but I wanted to witness the moment that Indiana turned blue. I lived in Indiana most of my adult life. I never thought I'd see the state cast its electoral votes for a Democratic president. The state is too stoically self-reliant to go in for all that Democratic social-justice stuff.

It's like a miracle. A skinny black sou'sider turns Indiana blue, and now there's a chain reaction of other miraculous change happening in my life this morning...

... Money we've been waiting for for months and months at the family business arrived this morning. (This was big money from a fat cat oil company -- they had no reason not to pay, except for being jerks.) But, get this. They actually apologized for the late payment. WTF??

... We were supposed to have another foundation inspection this morning at 9. Imagine my surprise when the doorbell rang at 8:15 and it was the repairmen themselves. They decided to stop arguing about details and just fix it already. They're down there banging around again. Still no word on whether they need to re-excavate the backyard.

... When I called my dad to tell him the repairmen were here, he told me the city inspectors are on their way to inspect the new place. I can't describe all the reasons this is good news. The building failed the first fire inspection, but that was before we took possession. The new place was a shambles when we moved in, and we've been busting our butts with an eye toward new inspections.

... Best of all, I actually get to go to stitch and bitch tonight. I might be late, but I still get to go. I might not get to knit much because of my ouchie shoulder, but I still get to go. :D

It feels as though the whole world is coming unstuck this morning. It's not even 9 o'clock yet. The new day is just beginning, and already I'm being greeted with smiles and miracles everywhere I turn. A friend sent me this quote from Daily Kos:

It's a great day for Democrats and Republicans alike. For Democrats, Barack Obama was elected President. For Republicans, there was finally dancing in the streets and Americans greeted as liberators.

I think I'd better go buy some lottery tickets. What the heck. Today it feels as though anything is possible.

Sign me,
An Inspired Swing Voter, Grateful for Change

ETA: Holy Crap. A couple of months ago, around the time of the conventions, I entered an election pool with some old buddies. I just got an email letting me know that I nailed the popular vote split to the tenth of a percent. Yeah, time to buy lottery tickets.

Hello, Life? Please Come Back. I Miss You.

Today is the first semi-normal day for me in weeks. I still have to unpack a gazillion boxes, and the phones at the new shop still don't work properly, and we're a loooooooooooong way from being moved in. But I've put myself back on a regular schedule as of today, so we're definitely drawing closer to the light at the end of the tunnel. The "all hands on deck" phase of moving the family business has officially drawn to a close, and now we're at the stage of "where the *&!@ is the (_insert lost item of choice_)?"

Fortunately, that isn't a phase that concerns me much.

Unfortunately, there will still be no knitting.

Remember the day it snowed last week? Was that Tuesday? It's all a blur. Whatever day that was, I was carrying a load out to the wagon, and I slipped on some mucky, snowy leaves. Because my hands were full, I couldn't catch my balance and went flying. Landed badly. Ouch.

I was pretty torn up from that fall -- bleeding palms and knees, sprained left wrist, sprained right shoulder. But the old, heavy typewriter I was carrying, well, I managed to save that. It landed on my legs. Don't ask me how. I still can't figure out how I managed to scrape my knee and land on my ass all in one fall.

The scrapes have healed, but when I tried to knit a row last night, I couldn't do it. Shoulder is still too ouchy. (pout, pout) I was really looking forward to knitting again, too, after the insanity of the last couple of weeks.

But it will heal eventually, and in the meantime, it's good to be back to a more normal routine. Every day gets a little bit better. In all departments.

Road Trip

Last week my mother asked me if I wanted to go to the Covered Bridge Festival in Parke County, Indiana, for a long weekend. We used to do this every year with a group of women, including some of her high school girlfriends and their daughters. In recent years, what with mom's health concerns and my travel schedule, we haven't been able to manage it.

Anyway, it sounded like a fine idea to me, so away we went for a long sunny weekend of shopping, eating, chattering --

-- and driving. We put 600 miles on the car, about 200 of which was at night. But the daylight drive time was sufficient for me to finish the HPYC socks pictured above. My feelings about this yarn haven't changed. Great dye job, lousy base. The finished socks feel a bit flimsy.



























Luckily, I brought another ball of sock yarn just in case I finished the HPYC socks. This is Alpaca Sox on size 1 needles. This yarn is lovely to knit, soft and springy and responsive to the touch. It's fuzzing a little already from the alpaca content. We'll see how they wear over the long run. Using size 1s instead of my ubiquitous 1.5s ought to minimize any pilling.

The editor in me is compelled to say this....
As you're listening to the news these days, regardless of your political slant, try to keep one thing in mind. The difference between "voter fraud" and "voter registration fraud" is much like the difference between "lightning" and "lightning bug." Get upset if you want to, but know what it is you're getting upset about.

(apologies to Mark Twain for that one)

A Friend Sent Me This Lovely Poem

All Over The World

women are knitting
in Ireland they are knitting thick
cream cables each with their special stitch
so when their man is dragged out of the sea
with his face bloated purple
they will know him

in New York they are knitting on subways
with bright orange yarn stitch after
stitch and folding up their needles
tucking them into the plastic bag inside
a flowering tote
in time to the train wheels as
the subway stops and they get off

in England they are knitting in airports
not only the English the Indians
the Pakistani the Americans they are
all sitting in Heathrow Airport knitting
long indecipherable scarves for persons
unknown

in Italy they are knitting black sweaters
for the saints with the methodical care
they perform upon their rosaries

women in Wales are knitting the dawn into
peat bog afghans girls in Ghana are
knitting tribal chieftains into unimagined
legends women in Chile are knitting
blood into the stockpile of tourniquets
waiting for the next round young women
in Istanbul are knitting far into the future
which is a replica of the past and it keeps
shrinking the closer they move into tomorrow

women in Iran are knitting insignias of the
oil companies to be sewn into the
covers of the coffins women in Ethiopia
are knitting green and white and red ribbons
to be worn around the heart of those who
will not recognize the outcome

women in Russia are knitting peaceful parables
that will win the Nobel Prize
with long Slavonic colours of melancholy
and heart despair

women in Kansas are knitting according to the
latest catalogue in yellow and white
they are knitting strands of wheat into their
needles and they will
fill their kitchens with the abundance
that smiles because Kansas has not been bloody
since the time of the fierce old man John Brown

women in Amsterdam are knitting blue and white
porcelain doilies that are brittle and break
quickly unless purchased by tourists
their daughters are knitting with the
precision of an etching deep brown
quilts to cover themselves and their
lovers against the piercing sky

women in Paris are knitting bright Picasso
sweaters that they will never wear because
even now they do not know what makes them
choose those colours

women in the swamps and rivers of Indochina
are knitting the reeds and nettles into the
steel of machine gun bullets that will
explode with warmth into the bodies of
the men that are cold with the ignorance
of trespassing and longing for comfort

girls in vacant towns
inbetween cities inbetween rivers on
maps are knitting their hopes in
small stitches echoing into each other
like muffled mirrors the needles
click smoothly in the language all
of the same word over and over
that no one can read the
same word over and over

Christina Starobin.

Pink Things, and Why I Love Australia (Even Though I've Never Been There)

Here's the back of the pink wool vest. Seven inches into the armholes. 4.5 to go. Also, that ball in the upper right corner is only ball four. I have thirteen. Which means this vest might end up with sleeves.

Blah blah blah, enough of that. Look what the mailman brought!

























Yes, I have Tim Tams. No, I won't share them. Mine! All mine! (And a clever viewer might note the package is already open.)

Tim Tams, for the uninitiated among you, are like the Oreo of Australia. Two chocolate wafer cookies, sandwiched with chocolate cream, and the whole lot drenched in milk chocolate. Dude. These cookies make me happy. Big happy.

Other good things from Australia:
-- Violet Crumbles. Imagine a crunchy honey pillow coated in chocolate. (Imagine, because I won't share these either. Heh.)
-- Chocolate koala bears filled with caramel. Like a chocolate Santa, only Australian style. (These didn't make it into the picture because my dad made off with them. The candy koala rescue posse will be meeting in the front hall in five minutes. Bring weapons.)
-- Wool. Of course! I didn't put it in the picture because I was wearing it and forgot to take it off, but Bron knit me a lovely buttoned scarf. That girl can knit.

Best thing of all from Australia:
-- that book!!! Hot diggity day-umm! I was going to read submissions all weekend, but screw that! I want to read Bron's book! It's not available in the US yet, and I feel downright special for being able to get an advance look at this book from "a thrilling new Australian voice." :D

So, if any of you are looking for me, I'll be the sugared-up reader clutching candy wrappers and turning pages as fast as I can read them. Oh, yeah, baby, that's what I call the makings of a great weekend!