Growing up, the only radio stations my parents tuned into was National Public Radio and the classical station. This meant I grew up with a slightly warped view of the world and a love for Vivaldi.
One winter when I was very small, there was a program on how people around the world celebrated Christmas. I don't remember a darned thing about it except that the narrator mentioned only Americans leave cookies for Santa - everyone else leaves biscuits, if they left anything at all.
This outraged me.
In the US, a biscuit is a (hopefully) flakey roll-like bread object, usually split open and buttered inside. Many people use them to sop up gravy. Mom taught me to put butter and honey inside. Most of my contact with biscuits was on the side of a meal at Kentucky Fried Chicken. I preferred the coleslaw.
And that's why it pissed me off so much. Here you have Santa, a man who spends his whole life in the coldest place on earth where it snows forever, supervising elves, making toys and going over lists. Some of the most boring work ever, in other words. Then he gets up and goes around the whole freaking world in one night, giving kids toys - and these jerks couldn't be bothered to give him an actual treat. No, instead of cookies or even a slice of cake or pie, they gave him...biscuits. No mention was made about butter, gravy or honey, but I suspected that anyone who was a big enough jerk to give Santa a biscuit wouldn't consider what he wanted on it. And besides - what kind of unsanitary person would leave butter or gravy out in the open like that?
Years later - long after I learned the truth about Santa - I found out that biscuits are indeed cookies. Go figure.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Friday, November 9, 2007
When the net goes down, the crazy comes out.
This was going to be a post about purses and the shades of difference between apple, acid and absinthe green. But I don't have pictures of my lovely purses, so that will have to wait.
Instead, I'll tell the bone-chilling story of what happens when the internet goes down.
See, the web is my source of entertainment. It's what keeps me happy and docile. It short-circuits my jittery distractability. When I'm online, the stupid thoughts get drowned out by a game, music via Youtube (hooray for French children's techno and Tom Waits!), a puzzle, role-playing games on IRC, IMs with four or five people, and whatever blog it is I'm reading. And usually there's a knitting site somewhere in there too. I loves me my knitting.
All this has a purpose: it keeps the crazy down. The crazy is responsible for some of the worst mistakes in my life, and a few near-fatal accidents. The crazy has always been with me, starting from babyhood with:
"I wonder what cement mix tastes like"
And then in early childhood with:
'You know. The only way this microwave knows the door is shut is if this little bit here is held down with this tiny stick thing here here. I could poke a pencil into this hole, and then I could get my hand in the microwave with it on, and then I'd be able to find out what a microwave feels li- hey, a kitty! C'mere, kittykittykitty!'
And then in slightly later childhood with:
"Well, crap. I'm stuck in this tree. Better climb onto the neighbors roof to get down. I'm sure that drain pipe can hold my weight."
Followed by:
"I can't think of a single reason why the cat [i]wouldn't[/i] want to be dressed up like a pretty, pretty princess."
Then in preadolescence with:
"Here I am in the slag dumps, the place where all the rock-like waste from making steel in Pittsburgh was dumped. Yep, it's a vast pile of treacherous gravel, and no one knows where I am. You get far enough into the middle of it, and you won't be quite sure which way you came in, because it's ringed with forests. Did I mention the bums and criminal teenagers down here? Yep, here I am. A highly awkward preteen apparently made out of sticks and rubber bands, topped off by glasses half the size of my large head.
Better go exploring."
And in teenagerhood:
"This Joop! perfume crap in a can that I got with my 'So you're a woman now' pack at school reeks. I wonder if it'd smell better if it was on fire. Ooh! Flamethrower! I wonder what would happen if I made an origami balloon, drenched it in this stuff, and then set *that* on fire? I'm sure there will be no consequences, especially with my waist-length hair!"
In college:
"It's just a *small* gorge.."
"There's nothing wrong with walking to the grocery store at 3 am so we can get some grapes, Becky. We'll just walk along the side of the road, because there's no sidewalk. In two feet of snow. You're tired and don't want to go? I guess I could go alone..."
"Don't be silly. What's the worst that could happen if I give some guy on the internet my phone number?"
"There's nothing wrong with using environmental scented oils as perfumes."
"Its only a small spider bite."
"It's only a small spider."
"It's only a - " *thunk*
So you can imagine what sort of crazy things I feel like doing now that I'm older and have more experience, and am legally an adult who can drink and vote, but not drive. Aren't you glad I can't drive? I am.
Fortunately, I've developed some sense of self-preservation at the ripe old age of twenty five. I'm also armed with helpful tools of not dying, e.g., a Geiger counter:
"Hey, Professor! This rock makes it tweet! ....why are you backing away?"
And my mother:
"You'll be walking through downtown at three am? The hell you will!"
And there's the internet. There's always something to do online, which means I'm not left to my own dangerous devices.
But Mom and the Geiger counter aren't always there for me, and sometimes the internet goes down. Thats when the crazy comes back out:
I have a large number of purses. My style varies between 'don't care', 'so wrinkled that you can see Jesus, Mary, and six disciples on the sleeves' and 'Jewish Mother In Law'. I've had this last part confirmed by several Jewish mother in laws, all of whom agree that I have nice clothes, though I'm a tad gaudy now and then. Remember that show 'The Nanny'? Remember Fran Drescher's mom? I'm like a younger, red-haired version of her, only instead of animal prints, I like absinthe/apple/acid green and royal purple. Together. Accessorized with amber. That's not to say that all I wear is disturbing shades of green and purple. I wear lots of colors. And I require a purse for each.
A frugal woman would have bought two, possibly three purses for this. A black one, a brown one, a light colored one. An average woman would have maybe six purses - you need some for good occasions, you see.
I've got..um...thirtyish. Something like that. Certainly, it's a two-digit number, for the moment. Honestly, I think it might be more. Like many people with a problem, I avoid facing the issue directly. This is also because they're all on a shelf in my closet, because I can't think of an attractive way to display them that doesn't involve many, many holes in my walls.
But yes. The crazy. That wasn't the actual crazy...that was more the constant acquisitive crazy. The point of this isn't the collecting crazy, it's the crazy crazy.
In the stillness of my non-internet-using self, a little worry pipes up. I've got all this cool stuff. Am I using it? Or am I just wearing the same thing day after day? What if.....oh, God. What if I'm giving people the impression that I only have four or five outfits that I wear in rotation, instead of the seven or eight that's closer to reality? What if people think I only have one purse?!
And then my eyes drift towards the computer. The computer which is my entertainment, my muse, the salve and slave of my worries.
The computer that has Excel spreadsheets on it.
You know what I used to do at my job? Enter things into a spreadsheet to organize them.
That's what I mean by the crazy. The net goes down and twenty minutes later I'm assigning serial numbers to each and every purse, and trying to work out a way to attach tags to my shirts so I can keep track of when they were last worn, when they were last washed, where they ought to be and where they are now. I start wondering if there's a way to calculate what's been worn the most. I start pondering ear ring circulation. Is it okay to wear the same ear rings three times in one month, even though I have close to a hundred pairs? What if they belonged to my Grandma? They are my favorite pair, and hey, rhinestones go with everything...
I'll have other issues of crazy when the net is out, too. Like trying to dress a cat. Some cats will let you dress them. Some won't. Still others will explode once you've got the frilly blouse over their heads. Sometimes, all three are the same cat. You don't know until you've come at them with a doll dress, and by the time you do know, it's all over except for the gentle weeping in the corner.
If the net is down for too long, I start making things. Not just cataloguing systems. Other things. I can knit (go figure) and crochet and sew, so this can come to great ill for those around me. Especially the cats.
Especially if the cat is sweet and obliging about being measured because he doesn't understand what's going to happen to him in an hour or so. Especially, especially, if there is something about the cat which cries out for a small crocheted item.
Like an eye patch.
This is Dusty. He's one of the two cats. He's only got one eye, which is why he hasn't exploded. But see the hand on his back? That's my hand. It's not holding him down, it's holding the unholy rage in.
And then there's the cooking crazy:
"I keep telling you, it's shrimp mole. Really. Try some."
"Tabasco will give a subtle zip to this cake."
"You act like I'm the only one who's ever tried to fry cream cheese."
"How was I supposed to know that would start a fire?"
"No, I don't see a problem with cooking flambe at three am. Why do you ask?"
"It worked on Mythbusters!"
"Martha Stewart said it'd be good."
"I'm almost positive it's supposed to smell like that."
It's all the internet's fault. Not mine. When the net goes away, the crazy comes out.
Instead, I'll tell the bone-chilling story of what happens when the internet goes down.
See, the web is my source of entertainment. It's what keeps me happy and docile. It short-circuits my jittery distractability. When I'm online, the stupid thoughts get drowned out by a game, music via Youtube (hooray for French children's techno and Tom Waits!), a puzzle, role-playing games on IRC, IMs with four or five people, and whatever blog it is I'm reading. And usually there's a knitting site somewhere in there too. I loves me my knitting.
All this has a purpose: it keeps the crazy down. The crazy is responsible for some of the worst mistakes in my life, and a few near-fatal accidents. The crazy has always been with me, starting from babyhood with:
"I wonder what cement mix tastes like"
And then in early childhood with:
'You know. The only way this microwave knows the door is shut is if this little bit here is held down with this tiny stick thing here here. I could poke a pencil into this hole, and then I could get my hand in the microwave with it on, and then I'd be able to find out what a microwave feels li- hey, a kitty! C'mere, kittykittykitty!'
And then in slightly later childhood with:
"Well, crap. I'm stuck in this tree. Better climb onto the neighbors roof to get down. I'm sure that drain pipe can hold my weight."
Followed by:
"I can't think of a single reason why the cat [i]wouldn't[/i] want to be dressed up like a pretty, pretty princess."
Then in preadolescence with:
"Here I am in the slag dumps, the place where all the rock-like waste from making steel in Pittsburgh was dumped. Yep, it's a vast pile of treacherous gravel, and no one knows where I am. You get far enough into the middle of it, and you won't be quite sure which way you came in, because it's ringed with forests. Did I mention the bums and criminal teenagers down here? Yep, here I am. A highly awkward preteen apparently made out of sticks and rubber bands, topped off by glasses half the size of my large head.
Better go exploring."
And in teenagerhood:
"This Joop! perfume crap in a can that I got with my 'So you're a woman now' pack at school reeks. I wonder if it'd smell better if it was on fire. Ooh! Flamethrower! I wonder what would happen if I made an origami balloon, drenched it in this stuff, and then set *that* on fire? I'm sure there will be no consequences, especially with my waist-length hair!"
In college:
"It's just a *small* gorge.."
"There's nothing wrong with walking to the grocery store at 3 am so we can get some grapes, Becky. We'll just walk along the side of the road, because there's no sidewalk. In two feet of snow. You're tired and don't want to go? I guess I could go alone..."
"Don't be silly. What's the worst that could happen if I give some guy on the internet my phone number?"
"There's nothing wrong with using environmental scented oils as perfumes."
"Its only a small spider bite."
"It's only a small spider."
"It's only a - " *thunk*
So you can imagine what sort of crazy things I feel like doing now that I'm older and have more experience, and am legally an adult who can drink and vote, but not drive. Aren't you glad I can't drive? I am.
Fortunately, I've developed some sense of self-preservation at the ripe old age of twenty five. I'm also armed with helpful tools of not dying, e.g., a Geiger counter:
"Hey, Professor! This rock makes it tweet! ....why are you backing away?"
And my mother:
"You'll be walking through downtown at three am? The hell you will!"
And there's the internet. There's always something to do online, which means I'm not left to my own dangerous devices.
But Mom and the Geiger counter aren't always there for me, and sometimes the internet goes down. Thats when the crazy comes back out:
I have a large number of purses. My style varies between 'don't care', 'so wrinkled that you can see Jesus, Mary, and six disciples on the sleeves' and 'Jewish Mother In Law'. I've had this last part confirmed by several Jewish mother in laws, all of whom agree that I have nice clothes, though I'm a tad gaudy now and then. Remember that show 'The Nanny'? Remember Fran Drescher's mom? I'm like a younger, red-haired version of her, only instead of animal prints, I like absinthe/apple/acid green and royal purple. Together. Accessorized with amber. That's not to say that all I wear is disturbing shades of green and purple. I wear lots of colors. And I require a purse for each.
A frugal woman would have bought two, possibly three purses for this. A black one, a brown one, a light colored one. An average woman would have maybe six purses - you need some for good occasions, you see.
I've got..um...thirtyish. Something like that. Certainly, it's a two-digit number, for the moment. Honestly, I think it might be more. Like many people with a problem, I avoid facing the issue directly. This is also because they're all on a shelf in my closet, because I can't think of an attractive way to display them that doesn't involve many, many holes in my walls.
But yes. The crazy. That wasn't the actual crazy...that was more the constant acquisitive crazy. The point of this isn't the collecting crazy, it's the crazy crazy.
In the stillness of my non-internet-using self, a little worry pipes up. I've got all this cool stuff. Am I using it? Or am I just wearing the same thing day after day? What if.....oh, God. What if I'm giving people the impression that I only have four or five outfits that I wear in rotation, instead of the seven or eight that's closer to reality? What if people think I only have one purse?!
And then my eyes drift towards the computer. The computer which is my entertainment, my muse, the salve and slave of my worries.
The computer that has Excel spreadsheets on it.
You know what I used to do at my job? Enter things into a spreadsheet to organize them.
That's what I mean by the crazy. The net goes down and twenty minutes later I'm assigning serial numbers to each and every purse, and trying to work out a way to attach tags to my shirts so I can keep track of when they were last worn, when they were last washed, where they ought to be and where they are now. I start wondering if there's a way to calculate what's been worn the most. I start pondering ear ring circulation. Is it okay to wear the same ear rings three times in one month, even though I have close to a hundred pairs? What if they belonged to my Grandma? They are my favorite pair, and hey, rhinestones go with everything...
I'll have other issues of crazy when the net is out, too. Like trying to dress a cat. Some cats will let you dress them. Some won't. Still others will explode once you've got the frilly blouse over their heads. Sometimes, all three are the same cat. You don't know until you've come at them with a doll dress, and by the time you do know, it's all over except for the gentle weeping in the corner.
If the net is down for too long, I start making things. Not just cataloguing systems. Other things. I can knit (go figure) and crochet and sew, so this can come to great ill for those around me. Especially the cats.
Especially if the cat is sweet and obliging about being measured because he doesn't understand what's going to happen to him in an hour or so. Especially, especially, if there is something about the cat which cries out for a small crocheted item.
Like an eye patch.
This is Dusty. He's one of the two cats. He's only got one eye, which is why he hasn't exploded. But see the hand on his back? That's my hand. It's not holding him down, it's holding the unholy rage in.
And then there's the cooking crazy:
"I keep telling you, it's shrimp mole. Really. Try some."
"Tabasco will give a subtle zip to this cake."
"You act like I'm the only one who's ever tried to fry cream cheese."
"How was I supposed to know that would start a fire?"
"No, I don't see a problem with cooking flambe at three am. Why do you ask?"
"It worked on Mythbusters!"
"Martha Stewart said it'd be good."
"I'm almost positive it's supposed to smell like that."
It's all the internet's fault. Not mine. When the net goes away, the crazy comes out.
Thursday, June 21, 2007
Oy veh
So, when I concieved of this blog, I thought I'd keep it to pure knitting. Or, if not just knitting, then at least knitting and other crafty sorts of things.
The problem is...I'm no Yarn Harlot. I'm not even a YarnHo. Or a YarnTramp. I'm more....a Yarn Sexually Repressed Librarian Who Might Be Hot If She Let Down Her Hair, Took Off Her Glasses And Unbuttoned Her Top Button.
See why I didn't make that my blog title?
I don't knit fast. I don't knit with any particular dedication, because there's always something else that grabs my attention. In fact, what I've mostly been doing lately is frogging sweaters for their yarn. And sure, this means I've got about half a pound of deep red Angora for only fifty cents and some work, but that doesn't make an exciting blog. I will be posting pictures of it, though, because it's some darned nice yarn. Really pretty and soft.
So I suppose I'm going to have to change certain details about my blog. It's no longer a blog about knitting. Nope, now it's a blog all about Lady. Yeehaw. My wild life and times. My heroic, unrestrained nerdiness. My geekitude.
And sometimes, my knitting.
The problem is...I'm no Yarn Harlot. I'm not even a YarnHo. Or a YarnTramp. I'm more....a Yarn Sexually Repressed Librarian Who Might Be Hot If She Let Down Her Hair, Took Off Her Glasses And Unbuttoned Her Top Button.
See why I didn't make that my blog title?
I don't knit fast. I don't knit with any particular dedication, because there's always something else that grabs my attention. In fact, what I've mostly been doing lately is frogging sweaters for their yarn. And sure, this means I've got about half a pound of deep red Angora for only fifty cents and some work, but that doesn't make an exciting blog. I will be posting pictures of it, though, because it's some darned nice yarn. Really pretty and soft.
So I suppose I'm going to have to change certain details about my blog. It's no longer a blog about knitting. Nope, now it's a blog all about Lady. Yeehaw. My wild life and times. My heroic, unrestrained nerdiness. My geekitude.
And sometimes, my knitting.
Wednesday, May 9, 2007
Not about knitting
My home is very clean. Not just clean for college students, but very clean. Freshly vaccuumed clean. There's a section of the carpet that you can't reach with any known sweeper, so I use a broom and a lint roller on it once a week. I putter around the kitchen cleaning the insides of cabinet doors while cooking. My housemates are just as persnickety about it as I am, if not more - I can tell you that the only time I use the sweeper is when I've spread lint from a sweater I'm unravelling.
Admittedly, my room gets a bit messy between the weekly cleanings, but that's not the same as dirty. We don't leave plates just chilling on the coffeetable. I've never seen a pizza sitting on the counter for more than a few hours, and then it was just because someone was taking a leisurely approach to eating it. I bring in cut flowers from my parent's garden on a regular basis, and they go straight to the trash as soon as they wilt. The fish gets fresh water every week or so. The dog is flatly forbidden to carry mouthfuls of food around. The dishwasher is run every few days, and whoever happens to be around when it's done washing puts things away. The point I'm making here is that this is a nice, neat, clean house.
So you can imagine how we reacted when we discovered we had a mouse.
The problem is that this is a rowhouse in a college section of town. And that means our neighbors are students. And hey, why take care of a place that's not really your's? Living in filth is fun! So, while we keep things nice and clean, they don't. So we get their vermin overflow.
Live traps were laid for the mouse (I'm not sure where they were planning to set the little bugger free, but okay). And then the traps were trapped by a combination of where it was shoved behind some pipes and the lack of a way to pick it up without putting fingers near a mouse. After two days of debate and feeding our verminy little guest, the trap was extracted and the mouse taken elsewhere. I don't know the details, and I really don't care. More traps have been laid in anticipation of more pests.
But we have a new problem now...
I don't sleep very well or regularly. This means that I'm up and around at a time when normal humans are either asleep or working the nightshift. I went to bed at about 4:30 am last night, but first I went to the bathroom. We have two bathrooms. One is upstairs, which would mean tromping past all my roommate's rooms. One is in the basement. I went to the basement one.
This is a darned nice basement, mind you, with some sort of octagonal gaming table and about four televisions, and a great deal of ugly stain-covered carpet.
I flipped on the light and went downstairs. I was halfway across the basement - in my bare feet, mind you - when I realized some of those smaller stains were moving. Fast. In fact, they were scurrying.
Roaches. We've got roaches. They're as long as my thumbnail is wide. I found one in the bathroom as well, which is why I need an airtight box to keep my toothbrush in. Because...what if one of them crawled on it? Or near it? I thought of this halfway through brushing my teeth this morning.
Shudder.
Tomorrow, I'm going to get some money for participating in some kind of cognitive speech study. This money will go to getting roach traps (can't spray, got a dog), and a plastic pouch to carry my toothbrush in. Because the only way I can be sure it hasn't been touched by a roach is to have it in my purse at all times.
Admittedly, my room gets a bit messy between the weekly cleanings, but that's not the same as dirty. We don't leave plates just chilling on the coffeetable. I've never seen a pizza sitting on the counter for more than a few hours, and then it was just because someone was taking a leisurely approach to eating it. I bring in cut flowers from my parent's garden on a regular basis, and they go straight to the trash as soon as they wilt. The fish gets fresh water every week or so. The dog is flatly forbidden to carry mouthfuls of food around. The dishwasher is run every few days, and whoever happens to be around when it's done washing puts things away. The point I'm making here is that this is a nice, neat, clean house.
So you can imagine how we reacted when we discovered we had a mouse.
The problem is that this is a rowhouse in a college section of town. And that means our neighbors are students. And hey, why take care of a place that's not really your's? Living in filth is fun! So, while we keep things nice and clean, they don't. So we get their vermin overflow.
Live traps were laid for the mouse (I'm not sure where they were planning to set the little bugger free, but okay). And then the traps were trapped by a combination of where it was shoved behind some pipes and the lack of a way to pick it up without putting fingers near a mouse. After two days of debate and feeding our verminy little guest, the trap was extracted and the mouse taken elsewhere. I don't know the details, and I really don't care. More traps have been laid in anticipation of more pests.
But we have a new problem now...
I don't sleep very well or regularly. This means that I'm up and around at a time when normal humans are either asleep or working the nightshift. I went to bed at about 4:30 am last night, but first I went to the bathroom. We have two bathrooms. One is upstairs, which would mean tromping past all my roommate's rooms. One is in the basement. I went to the basement one.
This is a darned nice basement, mind you, with some sort of octagonal gaming table and about four televisions, and a great deal of ugly stain-covered carpet.
I flipped on the light and went downstairs. I was halfway across the basement - in my bare feet, mind you - when I realized some of those smaller stains were moving. Fast. In fact, they were scurrying.
Roaches. We've got roaches. They're as long as my thumbnail is wide. I found one in the bathroom as well, which is why I need an airtight box to keep my toothbrush in. Because...what if one of them crawled on it? Or near it? I thought of this halfway through brushing my teeth this morning.
Shudder.
Tomorrow, I'm going to get some money for participating in some kind of cognitive speech study. This money will go to getting roach traps (can't spray, got a dog), and a plastic pouch to carry my toothbrush in. Because the only way I can be sure it hasn't been touched by a roach is to have it in my purse at all times.
Wednesday, May 2, 2007
The Plan
Today is the second of May. By my calender, that gives me exactly 34 weeks until Christmas.
Crunch time, in other words.
In other years, I sat around and did little of use until mid-October, which is when department stores in the US start playing Christmas music. Spurred on by shame at my grinchy reaction to hearing 'Hey, Santa' fifty times before Halloween, I'd start working on my Christmas gifts. If you crochet fast enough, the cursing at tangled yarn drowns out the the cursing at the music.
And I never finished the gifts.
This has become a bit of a snarky things with my parents. Whenever I mention starting a new project, they ask me when I'm going to finish the old ones. My mother's been waiting two years for a shawl she might be getting this Mother's Day. My father's been waiting three for a pair of special mittens that have a special fold-back top to the fingers and thumb so he can pull them back and make minute adjustments to his telescope when stargazing in winter. My sister.....my sister got a rock one year. Because I wasn't done with her gift. I don't even remember what the gift was.
But not this year. This year, I'm going to get things done, damnit. I've sat down and made a list of all my friends and relatives. I've planned out what order to make the gifts in, and who's going to get baked goods instead of wooly things. I've padded all my estimates, and I've even mapped out when I'll be going on yarn runs.
Best of all, I've already got some thrifty plans laid out. Some of my cousins, for example, will be getting airy lace scarves. They live in Ohio, and you might think this gift is a bit too light for the weather you get there - but these scarves will be made of an angora/lambswool blend that I'm carefully unraveling from a sweater. I got the sweater at a yard sale. It cost me three dollars. It is (was?) made of laceweight black yarn - in stockingette. This is one heck of a lot of yarn. Unraveling it is more fun than it ought to be. Man, I love destroying things.
I've got some charming female second cousins, too. The oldest is just about fifteen...ish....ish. Maybe. I see them at Christmas only, okay? But I'm thinking I'll stitch together satin envelope purses, slap in zippers, then knit or crochet some panels in a contrasting color and slap it on top. Voila. Beautiful handmade purses.
Their brothers will be getting hats. I can make a hat for a kid in a night. I'll be customizing them by putting dragon ridges along the tops.
There's a few babies. Say hello to storebought gifts, you snuggly little droolmakers.
Then there's my friends. Some of my female friends are in the knitting groups. They'll be getting the safest gifts possible - crochet hooks, knitting needles, tape measures, stitch markers, chocolate and darning needles. I'd get yarn, but not everyone shares my 'eeee! Sparkly! Do you have this in flourescent orange!?' aesthetic. And for my non-knitting group friends? They'll be getting scarves. And then there's Ryan, who knits but isn't in my knitting group. She also reads this blog. Ryan will be getting a something.
The males will be getting knitted wool scarves or hats, depending on how frustrated I am with making scarves. Each scarf will be in a different stitch. Thankyou, 365 Knitting Stitches A Year Perpetual Calender. My only quibble with you is that you don't show the wrong side of the knitting, and really, that's just as important. Oh, and your freaking long errata page. Funny, it looks like someone managed to knit all the stitches you have - how come they didn't pick up on the errors then? I'm still going to get the sequal if one is ever made. It's so nice turning the pages and seeing what's next. I'm a big nerd.
And I'm starting all this now. Tonight, while I'm watching bad movies over at Charles', I'm going to finish unraveling that there sweater. And if I get done quick enough, I'm going to start work on the first of the lace scarves. If I can pump them out at an average of one a week, I'll be done on them all before Halloween. If it takes me two weeks each....um. Well, some people are going to get baked goods insteas of scarves. I've already decided whom.
Crunch time, in other words.
In other years, I sat around and did little of use until mid-October, which is when department stores in the US start playing Christmas music. Spurred on by shame at my grinchy reaction to hearing 'Hey, Santa' fifty times before Halloween, I'd start working on my Christmas gifts. If you crochet fast enough, the cursing at tangled yarn drowns out the the cursing at the music.
And I never finished the gifts.
This has become a bit of a snarky things with my parents. Whenever I mention starting a new project, they ask me when I'm going to finish the old ones. My mother's been waiting two years for a shawl she might be getting this Mother's Day. My father's been waiting three for a pair of special mittens that have a special fold-back top to the fingers and thumb so he can pull them back and make minute adjustments to his telescope when stargazing in winter. My sister.....my sister got a rock one year. Because I wasn't done with her gift. I don't even remember what the gift was.
But not this year. This year, I'm going to get things done, damnit. I've sat down and made a list of all my friends and relatives. I've planned out what order to make the gifts in, and who's going to get baked goods instead of wooly things. I've padded all my estimates, and I've even mapped out when I'll be going on yarn runs.
Best of all, I've already got some thrifty plans laid out. Some of my cousins, for example, will be getting airy lace scarves. They live in Ohio, and you might think this gift is a bit too light for the weather you get there - but these scarves will be made of an angora/lambswool blend that I'm carefully unraveling from a sweater. I got the sweater at a yard sale. It cost me three dollars. It is (was?) made of laceweight black yarn - in stockingette. This is one heck of a lot of yarn. Unraveling it is more fun than it ought to be. Man, I love destroying things.
I've got some charming female second cousins, too. The oldest is just about fifteen...ish....ish. Maybe. I see them at Christmas only, okay? But I'm thinking I'll stitch together satin envelope purses, slap in zippers, then knit or crochet some panels in a contrasting color and slap it on top. Voila. Beautiful handmade purses.
Their brothers will be getting hats. I can make a hat for a kid in a night. I'll be customizing them by putting dragon ridges along the tops.
There's a few babies. Say hello to storebought gifts, you snuggly little droolmakers.
Then there's my friends. Some of my female friends are in the knitting groups. They'll be getting the safest gifts possible - crochet hooks, knitting needles, tape measures, stitch markers, chocolate and darning needles. I'd get yarn, but not everyone shares my 'eeee! Sparkly! Do you have this in flourescent orange!?' aesthetic. And for my non-knitting group friends? They'll be getting scarves. And then there's Ryan, who knits but isn't in my knitting group. She also reads this blog. Ryan will be getting a something.
The males will be getting knitted wool scarves or hats, depending on how frustrated I am with making scarves. Each scarf will be in a different stitch. Thankyou, 365 Knitting Stitches A Year Perpetual Calender. My only quibble with you is that you don't show the wrong side of the knitting, and really, that's just as important. Oh, and your freaking long errata page. Funny, it looks like someone managed to knit all the stitches you have - how come they didn't pick up on the errors then? I'm still going to get the sequal if one is ever made. It's so nice turning the pages and seeing what's next. I'm a big nerd.
And I'm starting all this now. Tonight, while I'm watching bad movies over at Charles', I'm going to finish unraveling that there sweater. And if I get done quick enough, I'm going to start work on the first of the lace scarves. If I can pump them out at an average of one a week, I'll be done on them all before Halloween. If it takes me two weeks each....um. Well, some people are going to get baked goods insteas of scarves. I've already decided whom.
Monday, April 16, 2007
My first garterstitch scarf
When I learned to knit, my spiffy teacher had me cast on about fifteen stitches and taught me the knit stitch. This is after all, the traditional way to start. About ten minutes later, she taught me how to purl. Ten minutes after that, she showed me how to make my first patterned stitch - moss. You know...K1, P1, over and overandover. Since I had an odd number of stitches, there was nothing too complicated to remember. Then came basket weave. After that I went home and started playing with the nifty tools I had in the knitting kit I'd bought years ago but never really used. I'd lost the directions so some of my uses were a bit novel. I think my decision that a stitch holder was a tool to twist cables with was especially apt. I was terrified that I'd drop a stitch and never be able to grab it again. Since I was using a smooth cotton yarn and metal needles, this wasn't out of the realm of possibility.
I had a pretty cool first swatch. I know this because a few days later, the Yarn Harlot herself was at my LYS. I bought my first knitting book from her, and she was impressed enough that she put a picture of me cheering over my swatch on her blog.
Major ego boost.
The next thing I embarked on was The Fucking Sweater. I'll talk about it when the tide of white-hot bile and rage subsides.
You might notice I skipped something there - the scarf. I skipped the Garterstitch Scarf. You know...the one everyone makes when they start out. Eight inches wide, seventy inches long, and the same thing repeated forever and ever. It's there to make people abandon the hobby in despair and boredom. It's like someone taking up painting as a hobby and deciding their first project will be to paint a grid of dots on every wall of their house....with the finest sable paintbrush they own. Dab....dab....dab....forever. The Garterstitch Scarf is there to weed out the impatient and smash the living daylights out of the weaklings.
I hate garterstitch. I don't even like stockingette. I don't even like to do the same lace pattern for too long. Change is good. So when I reached the traditional time to do The Scarf, I blew right past it and into a whole new territory of problems. I didn't own anything made with garterstitch, and I was happy about this.
Until I hit a yarn store that was having a Going-Out-of-Business sale. I picked up some great things. Among them was a single ball of this incredibly cool yarn that was a strand of colorchanging mohair along with a sparkly thing. I considered using it as trim, but I couldn't think of anything good to do with it. Any edging I might do would result in the mohair getting matted and ugly. I thought about lace, but experiments were not promising.
And then I remembered the Giant Needles.
I got them on a previous trip to the same store, and they were worth every penny of the two dollars. Shining. Metallic. Purple. Size 15. That's right, size 15. They're thicker than my thumb. Most guages don't go up that big. I got them mostly as a way to decorate a basket of yarn. They're good for wrapping a small amount of yarn around a large amount of space.
Lo, a scarf was born. The stitch wouldn't really matter because I'd be busy looking at the colors changing. I'm like that with varigated things. It'd be a chance to get that first garter scarf out of the way, too. It was a mere ten stitches across and lasted for as long as the ball did.
It took me a year and a half. Because I hate garter stitch. Damn stupid thing.
I had a pretty cool first swatch. I know this because a few days later, the Yarn Harlot herself was at my LYS. I bought my first knitting book from her, and she was impressed enough that she put a picture of me cheering over my swatch on her blog.
Major ego boost.
The next thing I embarked on was The Fucking Sweater. I'll talk about it when the tide of white-hot bile and rage subsides.
You might notice I skipped something there - the scarf. I skipped the Garterstitch Scarf. You know...the one everyone makes when they start out. Eight inches wide, seventy inches long, and the same thing repeated forever and ever. It's there to make people abandon the hobby in despair and boredom. It's like someone taking up painting as a hobby and deciding their first project will be to paint a grid of dots on every wall of their house....with the finest sable paintbrush they own. Dab....dab....dab....forever. The Garterstitch Scarf is there to weed out the impatient and smash the living daylights out of the weaklings.
I hate garterstitch. I don't even like stockingette. I don't even like to do the same lace pattern for too long. Change is good. So when I reached the traditional time to do The Scarf, I blew right past it and into a whole new territory of problems. I didn't own anything made with garterstitch, and I was happy about this.
Until I hit a yarn store that was having a Going-Out-of-Business sale. I picked up some great things. Among them was a single ball of this incredibly cool yarn that was a strand of colorchanging mohair along with a sparkly thing. I considered using it as trim, but I couldn't think of anything good to do with it. Any edging I might do would result in the mohair getting matted and ugly. I thought about lace, but experiments were not promising.
And then I remembered the Giant Needles.
I got them on a previous trip to the same store, and they were worth every penny of the two dollars. Shining. Metallic. Purple. Size 15. That's right, size 15. They're thicker than my thumb. Most guages don't go up that big. I got them mostly as a way to decorate a basket of yarn. They're good for wrapping a small amount of yarn around a large amount of space.
Lo, a scarf was born. The stitch wouldn't really matter because I'd be busy looking at the colors changing. I'm like that with varigated things. It'd be a chance to get that first garter scarf out of the way, too. It was a mere ten stitches across and lasted for as long as the ball did.
It took me a year and a half. Because I hate garter stitch. Damn stupid thing.
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
Mental health and the consequences thereof upon knitting
So, I'm currently in Adult Intensive Outpatient Therapy over at Western Psych for depression. And, let me tell you, they meant it when they named it intense. It's nine hours of therapy a week, including regular psychologist and doctor appointments, plus a little homework. In. Tense.
When I started, it worked out great for my knitting. I have this thing about not sitting still for more than a few seconds at a time. I get fidgety. If I don't have something to do with my hands, I'll idly dig my nails into them. Not hard enough to bleed, but I end up with all these hinky little half-moon bruises that take way too much time to explain to people. Fortunatly, no one objected to my knitting and crochet, so I churned out huge amounts whilst sitting around. I made my mother and sister scarves while sitting there, which is pretty impressive for me. I freaking hate scarves. Six feet of the same damn thing, my ass. At least with hats you get to decrease.
The thing is....the treatment is working. Trust me, I'm not complaining. I've been sleeping consistantly. I can think. Look at me, forming coherent sentances. I've got that whole subject and predicate thing down pat. No more mashing up parts of speech or switching from first to third person in the middle of a paragraph. No more forgetting that the verb goes after the actor but before the thing acted on. It isn't 'Judy ball dropfell'. It's 'Judy dropped the ball. It fell'. Mind you, the screwed up speech wasn't a constant thing - but I was noticing it enough that it really pissed me off.
Oh, and did I mention I can sit still? This is great. I actually watched a whole hour of television. I was looking at the screen the whole time, rather than at my knitting. Okay, I was knitting during the commercials and I did a bit of touch knitting when the show got a tad boring, but still. A whole hour of TV. I so totally didn't know there were two sets of partners on Law and Order: Criminal Intent. All this time I thought my hearing was going funny when their voices changed. And then I sat through most of a group session without knitting to much. I did have my knitting in my lap the whole time, but that was more a comfort thing - I wanted to know it was there to occupy me if I had the sudden, painful urge to do something, but I didn't need it.
I've even been looking at other hobbies. I tried my hand at sewing over Easter Weekend, for example. I took a pair of old pants and I turned them into a pretty darn nice skirt. It was hand sewing too, which I normally hate. I just have one seam up the side to do, and then the hem, and then the ironing. I'm going to finish it next weekend when my Mom can show me how to thread her fearsome sewing machine.
Of course, this all means that my knitting isn't progressing at it's usual speed. I dunno, I kind of think this is good. It means I can enjoy what I'm doing. I'm walking through the beautiful countryside instead of driving through it like a bat out of hell. I've started to explore some new stitches. I've even been working with yarns that I'd normally be afraid of - case in point, that stuff my mother gave me. And I've got two little balls of this stuff that looks and feels like Easter grass. I'm looking for a good lace pattern for those. I'm thinking something cool to drape over my shoulders. A mini!epic!stole of some sort.
Ooh. Oooh...or...or a möbius. A lace möbius. Because damn, those things are cool.
Yeah. A möbius. 'Scuse me while I go do some research.
When I started, it worked out great for my knitting. I have this thing about not sitting still for more than a few seconds at a time. I get fidgety. If I don't have something to do with my hands, I'll idly dig my nails into them. Not hard enough to bleed, but I end up with all these hinky little half-moon bruises that take way too much time to explain to people. Fortunatly, no one objected to my knitting and crochet, so I churned out huge amounts whilst sitting around. I made my mother and sister scarves while sitting there, which is pretty impressive for me. I freaking hate scarves. Six feet of the same damn thing, my ass. At least with hats you get to decrease.
The thing is....the treatment is working. Trust me, I'm not complaining. I've been sleeping consistantly. I can think. Look at me, forming coherent sentances. I've got that whole subject and predicate thing down pat. No more mashing up parts of speech or switching from first to third person in the middle of a paragraph. No more forgetting that the verb goes after the actor but before the thing acted on. It isn't 'Judy ball dropfell'. It's 'Judy dropped the ball. It fell'. Mind you, the screwed up speech wasn't a constant thing - but I was noticing it enough that it really pissed me off.
Oh, and did I mention I can sit still? This is great. I actually watched a whole hour of television. I was looking at the screen the whole time, rather than at my knitting. Okay, I was knitting during the commercials and I did a bit of touch knitting when the show got a tad boring, but still. A whole hour of TV. I so totally didn't know there were two sets of partners on Law and Order: Criminal Intent. All this time I thought my hearing was going funny when their voices changed. And then I sat through most of a group session without knitting to much. I did have my knitting in my lap the whole time, but that was more a comfort thing - I wanted to know it was there to occupy me if I had the sudden, painful urge to do something, but I didn't need it.
I've even been looking at other hobbies. I tried my hand at sewing over Easter Weekend, for example. I took a pair of old pants and I turned them into a pretty darn nice skirt. It was hand sewing too, which I normally hate. I just have one seam up the side to do, and then the hem, and then the ironing. I'm going to finish it next weekend when my Mom can show me how to thread her fearsome sewing machine.
Of course, this all means that my knitting isn't progressing at it's usual speed. I dunno, I kind of think this is good. It means I can enjoy what I'm doing. I'm walking through the beautiful countryside instead of driving through it like a bat out of hell. I've started to explore some new stitches. I've even been working with yarns that I'd normally be afraid of - case in point, that stuff my mother gave me. And I've got two little balls of this stuff that looks and feels like Easter grass. I'm looking for a good lace pattern for those. I'm thinking something cool to drape over my shoulders. A mini!epic!stole of some sort.
Ooh. Oooh...or...or a möbius. A lace möbius. Because damn, those things are cool.
Yeah. A möbius. 'Scuse me while I go do some research.
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