Insert Non-Cliche Title Here

Titles. Feh. Especially because what I have to tell you about today is so very ripe for a bad cliche.

Under Construction

I stayed home from work, yesterday and started the Tiger Eye socks from Socks, Socks, Socks. The yarn is Louet Gems Pearl, in Eggplant, and the needles are #2's. I'm a little concerned that the #2's are a bit big for the yarn (I don't remember what the pattern calls for, but it is certainly a sock weight); the knitting looks fine, but I'm concerned that these could wear out more quickly (the density that smaller needles lend the fabric makes socks more durable). How concerned am I? Not enough to rip these out and finding a heavier weight yarn, or to do the work necessary to go down a needle size (I've already tried smaller needles, the sock would have been too small). If they wear out quickly, so be it. Nothing is permanent.

This is a bit closer to the actual color

Now, stop singing "Eye of the Tiger". Seriously. That song will kill brain cells.

Bath Mat!

Since bspinner asked (and my sister is begging for one), here is what I can tell off of my Friday addled brain:

I have used Sugar n' Cream worst weight yarn, doubled, on #10 needles, mostly because I haven't bothered to get #10.5, which would make the knitting more comfortable. I think I will continue to use the #10 needles because I suspect the tightness of the gauge makes the mat a little stronger. I knit using Garter Stitch. The original pattern calls for seed stitch, but I like the cushiness of garter stitch.

The first two mats I knit are 2 colors (2 balls of each color) and checkered. If you have more tolerance for many balls of yarn flying around than I, you can use intarsia. I myself knit 3 strips, 23 stitches each. Knit the first color until relatively square, add the second color and knit that for the same number of rows, repeat the first color. You'll want 2 of these strips, and one in which the colors are reversed. Sew up the strips and Voila! Bathmat!

The balls of Sugar n' Cream I had seemed to be extra large, and I managed to get most of the way to a second mat. This time I just knit 2 rows of each color. It's almost square and I didn't have quite enough yarn to cast off (I cheated, don't tell).

One of THOSE Weeks

It's been one of those weeks. You know the kind, when nothing makes sense or works properly and you are quite certain it's your fault. And you don't think the weekend will be a respite because nothing is quite right there either. Nothing truly awful, you understand, just slightly off center.

1. I made someone angry Friday and was dealing with the reprecussions for most of this week. I finally apologized to her for making her angry. She told me that she forgives me, even though what I said was inappropriate. Isn't that sweet? {insert appropriate level of sarcasm}

2. I am trying to do something at work which will make a very large job that I have much easier and less cumbersome. It turns out that what I am trying to do, using a program I don't know very well, is complicated enough to not be explained well in any of the documentation I could find.

3. I finally sent an e-mail to Schoolhouse Press about the fair isle math issue; the response I got muddied the waters further.

4. I either made Len angry or hurt.

Then, starting late afternoon yesterday, everything starting falling into place:

1a. I spoke with a third party about this person. It turns out she has been having the same problems with her. It turns out that I am not (necessarily) a bitch from hell, but that she is very easily angered. Troubling enough, but I least I won't feel guilty when she gets angry at me again.

2a. My database guru K. came through with a clear, concise explanation for what I need to do to make my project work. It was not complicated. At all.

3a. I got another e-mail in response to my second desperate plea, explaining what is going on with the charts. It turns out that the repeat is actually 32 stitches, not 33. There are 33 stitches in the charts because of a publishing fluke: the first and last stitches are repeated in the chart. All is becoming clear.

4a. Len is neither angry nor hurt. I'm not sure he remembers that I said anything at all.

All is well in Lee-land.

Knitting!

It seems like it's been a long time since I posted about knitting. Oh wait! I've posted about the fair isle swatch, but that isn't knitting. That's the 5th circle of Knitting Hell (maybe someday, I'll post about the others, but I can only handle so much right now).

So. Knitting that doesn't make me want to hurt someone.

Progress on Icarus continues. This picture doesn't even begin to convey the deep, rich red of the yarn.

Also, I started a new hat for Len. This is essentially the same as a blue hat I've already made for him. My Oh-So-Limited-Color-Palette boyfriend has agreed to a blue stripe. His palette consists of gray, green and blue (he says red, too, but I have my doubts), and while the blue stripe is within the color range -- it is, in fact, left over yarn from the other hat -- he generally doesn't agree to anything so fancy as stripes. Freak.

I also knitted a bath mat. A knitted bathmat was one of my first projects, many years ago, and now they are the only kind I use. I'm obsessive that way. I'll spare you a picture since it is already in use, and who wants to see a picture of a used bathmat? If you have some sort of crazy desire to knit one of your very own, let me know and I will figure out the specs.

There has also been a bit going on on the weaving front, but I'll save that post for another day.

Ice, Ice, Baby

We had an ice storm Sunday night. We are lucky not to have any damage to our house, outbuildings, or vehicles, and while we did lose power early Monday morning, it was back on by the evening. Unfortunately, most of our pine trees lost several large limbs.

This is our little garden, next to the greenhouse.

My car was here. Len moved it before the branches fell.


This tree sustained the most obvious damage.


The landscape is beautiful, though. Remind me of that when we are cutting up those branches!

I have to admit, I went a little crazy with the camera, so there are a lot more pictures in Flickr.

Shuffle Up

The A.V. Club (which is part of the satirical newspaper The Onion) has a column called Random Rules -- semi-famous people (they might be really famous, but I've only heard of David Cross and Moby) "set their MP3 players to shuffle and comment on the first few tracks that come up -- no cheating or skipping embarrassing tracks allowed". I've been enjoying the shuffle function on my little toy and it doesn't look like anything too embarrassing came up ('cos, you know, I didn't just download two Asia songs):

1. Rank Stranger -- The Knitters -- The Modern Sounds of the Knitters
I heard about The Knitters from a review on the A.V. Club. I mean hello? The Knitters? It gets better: they are Joe Doe, Exene and DJ Bonebrake of X, Dave Alvin of the Blasters, and Jonny Ray Bartel. And they are doing some straight up rockabilly country. This is my favorite song from this album, I love Exene's voice on the track. It's punk and country and so utterly cool.

2. Let's Go Crazy -- Prince -- Purple Rain
I blew out my dad's stereo, twice, with this album. The movie is terrible (I own it, of course), but I think this is one of the crucial albums from the 1980's, a decade when there was so little crucial music. This song makes me want to do a crazy little spastic dance.

3. Greenville -- Lucinda Williams -- Car Wheels on a Gravel Road
Musically, this is such a sad, spare song, but the lyrics are pretty pissed off. I just love her voice, it isn't beautiful, but it's the voice of someone who been around the block many times. This album is a classic.

4. New Slang -- The Shins -- Garden State Soundtrack
This is such a pretty song. This is the song that's playing when Natalie Portman hands Zach Braff her headphones and tells him this song "will change your life". I don't know about that so much, but it is such a sweet song and fits that moment perfectly. I remember feeling that way about music.

5. Shake the Chandelier -- The Gourds -- Heavy Ornamentals
The Gourds. Good god I love this album. It's so cheerful and fun, without being stupid.

6. Dreams are Not My Home -- Roseanne Cash -- Black Cadillac
I got this album a while ago but haven't listened to it often enough. So I can't really comment on this song. I am very fond of the album, though. Moody, sad, dark, but not oppressively.

7. It Wasn't Me -- Jenny Lewis and the Watson Twins -- Rabbit Fur Coat
Some friends gave this to me a couple of weeks ago; I don't know it by heart yet. The album made it on to several Best-of-2006 lists, and it's easy to see (hear?) why. It's a gorgeous album.

8. Dear Someone -- Gillian Welch -- Time (The Revelator)
Gillian Welch has one of those voices that I just love, like Lucinda Williams' and Paul Simon's, it isn't pretty not does it have any frills. She has a plain songwriter's voice. This song has a lullaby feel to it.

9. Brother Love's Traveling Salvation Show -- Neil Diamond
I quit being embarassed by liking at least some of Neil Diamond's music after seeing that he performed in The Band's The Last Waltz. His music isn't all Heartlight and You Don't Bring Me Flowers (a song I knew well enough, by the way, that I could sing it to the single's B-side, which left the singing off. My best friend and I would duet, I don't remember who was Neil and who was Barbara). Anyway, this song wasn't overplayed in my youth, so I still like it a lot.

10. Run That Body Down -- Paul Simon -- self-titled
My love for Paul Simon is pretty well documented. This is a nigh on perfect album. I feel like his attempts at falsetto in this song should annoy me, but they don't.

More on the Fair Isle

I went home yesterday and checked the numbers for, ummm, the hundreth time. I was wrong (of course). You cast on [some number], plus 7 for the steek*, plus 2 for "balance". Once you've done the oh-so-fun corregated ribbing, you increase to 320+7+1=328. Not that 320 is any more divisible by 33 than 312 is.

*This set of 7 steek stitches is for the cardigan opening. Valerie is right, there will be another 2 sets for the arm holes, but those will be added later. I suspect the sleeves will be another brain bender, but I'd rather not think about that for now.

Useless Knitting

Well, not exactly useless, but not really useful, either. This is a very large, tubular gauge swatch and represents the most advanced planning that I have ever put into a sweater. I said when I first posted about this, that I was getting about 7.5 stitches to the inch, which would make a 44" sweater. After finishing the swatch and washing it (yes, I am even taking sweater care into account), it seems that I am getting more like 8 stitches per inch and would be getting more like a 42" sweater. Also my original intention was to knit more of the colorwork using the brown as a background color. I ditched that idea -- the brown in the above picture is quite a lot lighter than it really is.

So. I have ripped out the brown section and the next two sections and am trying again with a larger needle. This might get me closer to the correct gauge. If not, my plan is to add two 33 stitch repeats and hope for the best. One of the big problems I'm having is that I don't really understand what is going on with the numbers. The pattern calls for 320 stitches in the body, including 7 steek* stitches and one stitch for "balance" (I don't quite know what Swanson means by this). Shouldn't the rest of the stitches (312) be divisible by 33? They aren't and I don't understand why. I'm really feeling like I'm not going to get it until I do it. What could happen? I might have to rip it out. I've never had to that before!

*For those of you who don't know: a steek is extra stitches that you eventually cut open, for sleeve holes, and/or cardigan openings.

Little Electronic Gadget Woes

I know, I said I would post again a few days ago and I didn't. Mostly because I've been pretty busy trying (and failing) to get caught up at work.

My adorable boyfriend got this little toy for me for Christmas. There is nothing like a tiny little gadget that "all the kids" have to make me feel like a middle-aged Luddite. It is a long, convoluted tale of woe, and I shall spare you the details (most of which involve strange numbers like OS X 10.3, 10.3.4 and 10.3.9 and so on). After much confusion, getting kicked off of my dial-in service (after 4 hours of downloading fun), crashing systems, tears, ripped out hair, and the gentle prodding of my good friend K, my old iMac is now as up to date as it needs to be. Tonight I will find out if it and the iPod will be on speaking terms, or if the rift is permanent.

Christmas-Palooza is Over

...and the kitties are resting.

I will try to post tomorrow with stories of little electrontic gadget woes.

Doll Sweater and Merry Christmas

Here is the sweater I knit for one of Len's niece's dolls (you know the one, 18", massive marketing campaign?)

It is not without it's problems (cable splay, anyone?), but I like it nonetheless. There are more pictures of it over at the Flickr site. Several years ago, Knitters magazine had a short series of matching sweaters for girls and their 18" dolls, one of what was an Aran style. I don't like that sweater so much, but figured I could steal their numbers and plug in cables that I like. I've wanted to do this for an adult size sweater and thought this would be a non-threatening way to start. My next plan is to make a lace sweater for my stepmother's doll (not an 18" one). I have a vision, we'll see if it works.

I have the next 10 days off. I may try to post once or twice during that time, but mostly I think I shall be lying around my house watching very bad television. That is my idea of a divine vacation!

Have a Merry Christmas or a Happy Festivius!

Judy's New Bed

It turns out, I'm not a complete moron just about knitting. I've managed to save some of my dork brain cells for weaving, too. I don't know how I should feel about that.

My stepmother's mother, Jan, found some yarn at Goodwill As Is. It's an odd, acrylic boucle in pink, blue and purple. After many strange machinations (involving a kitchen scale, a warping board and a lot of tangles. Don't ask.), I decided there is about 2600 yards/18 ozs. of this stuff. It isn't the sort of thing I would knit with -- the yarn is pretty fine and loopy -- but it seemed like weaving a shawl with it wouldn't be too hard. And it isn't. My brain, though, is not on. Also the math universe is broken.

I decided I wanted the piece to be 30 inches wide in the loom, which would allow for some draw-in, and 8 warp ends per inch. How many ends? 240 you say? Um. No. I measured that many, but ended up with way too many warp ends. Like 100 too many. In what universe does 8 x 30 = 140? My weaving room, apparently.

Luckily, the extra warp was easily separated while I wound onto the loom. Winding on, I'm happy to say, was a breeze. Which is a very good thing, because:

Oops

Yes, I had tied onto the front by this time. So I untied, pulled out the warp, untied from the back end, fixed the problem, tied back on, rewound and tied back onto the front.

This works a little better. The fabric looks nice, too. I kind of wish I had gone with a 10-dent reed, rather than the 8, but I am so not re-doing this warp. Instead I'm just beating the weft a little harder.

Face Not Exploded

No, my face hasn't exploded, but this cold just won't let go. I am now in the dry hacking stage, which pretty much sucks nuts.

My friend, Stef, and I went up to Threadbear in Lansing a few weeks ago (I'm very much in love with this shop). While wandering around, I made a sudden decision to knit a fair isle sweater. I don't really know what came over me. I think, in part, it was Eunny's Venezia Pullover (scroll down) in the latest Interweave Knits. So beautiful, so utterly inappropriate for me -- too small, I can't wear wool next to my skin, too warm for my office or home (where Len routinely pumps the wood stove up to 75 degrees). I enjoyed knitting the Philosopher's sweater, but the sweater is too big and floppy and the neckline continues to annoy me to no end. I hate wearing it.

I flipped through Meg Swanson's Knitting, which I have done many times and (finally!) decided to buy it. I haven't bought it before because, well, you may have noticed that I am maybe a little dim. Once I decided to buy the book, I was overcome with the desire to knit the cover sweater. Right Now. Threadbear, being the best shop in the universe (did I mention my love?), has Jamieson 2-ply Spindrift, so I made piles of colors. There were seven symbols in the key, so I picked 7 colors (8, actually, because I couldn't decide on the light background color). It turns out that one of the symbols is a purl of one of the colors and there are two colors so similar the difference doesn't show up in the book's photos (the light background). Since I couldn't commit to a background color (either light brown or light green), I bought just enough yarn to make a very large swatch.

The colors here are: Foxglove, Mulberry (dark purple), Atlantic, Twilight (the lighter blue) and Rye (the light green in question). My plan for the swatch is to knit one more of the charts with the Rye, then do the same charts again (except the ribbing) using the brown (the name of which escapes me, maybe Mooskit?). I was thinking that I would go down a needle size to see how I like a slightly tighter gauge. I'm pretty sure I won't do that since having a tighter gauge will introduce some serious complications: this sweater needs a multiple of both 5 and 33 stitches (the large patterns are 33 stitch repeats and the peeries in between are 5 stitch repeats), I'm getting 7.5 stitches/inch which is already tighter than the 6.75 called for. At my current gauge, I should get a 44" sweater and that is about right.

That might have been more information than you wanted. All I meant to say was: I love Threadbear. I love fair isle knitting. And I love these colors. Which is good, 'cos I'm sick to death of coughing!

Feeling Crummy

I've been working on yet another nasty cold. Two colds in as many weeks. How festive. I'm going home and plopping my head on a pillow.

I'll leave you with these two pictures.

With light green

With brown

These are for a new project I'm contemplating. More on this tomorrow, unless my head explodes.

Things You May Not Have Heard About

A couple of interesting things came across my desk today, thanks to Docuticker:

The American Sociological Association filed an amicus brief last week with the First Circuit Court of Appeals in support of the plaintiffs in Cook v. Rumsfeld (challenging the constitutionality of the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy). The signors of the brief (go here for a list and press release) argue that there is no empirical evidence to show that gay men and lesbians serving openly in the military would harm military performance or unit cohesion.

Bill Clinton signed Don't Ask, Don't Tell into law 13 years ago today. I couldn't imagine anything more damaging or inhumane than that policy and didn't vote for him again (and couldn't bring myself to feel particularly sympathetic during the Lewinsky thing).

Also on Docuticker was the Human Rights Campaign's Buying for Equality 2007. The guide rates companies based on their support for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender equality. What I like about this is that so often we are told who to boycott (I still haven't forgiven Shell for not pulling out of South Africa during the apartheid era), and rarely who we can support (without guilt).

Finished Towels

I've been feeling a touch of writer's block lately, so I'm going to just do a quick post. I finally pulled the Cat Track and Snail Tail towels off of the loom (much to Judy's chagrin) and got them washed and dried. The colors are not coming out in these pictures: the towels are dark purple (not black) and off white.

I'm pretty sure I wound enough warp for 4 towels, plus a little extra, but it was so long ago, who can remember. I have 3 towels, plus a little extra. Not exactly a set.

I love that the Buttonhole Stitch held up. It was a wee bit tedious to do it (who wants to do buttonhole when you could be weaving, after all), but it got a lot faster as I got better at it, and then at the end, no knots to tie, or hem sewing. Just rip the things off of the loom, cut 'em apart and throw 'em in the washing machine. Nice.

I also started Icarus. The yarn is Alpaca with a Twist Fino (alpaca and silk) and this picture doesn't begin to do justice to the color. It is a deep, rich blood red.

Happy Thanksgiving

I don't generally have nice things to say about Thanksgiving. I'm from a divorced family and the day always involved what felt like hugely complicated decisions, hurt feelings, guilt and way too many people.

So I will say this: may your crazy relatives be merely entertaining, may your turkey breast be moist (brining!), and may the drinks flow liberally. Eat some real stuffing for me; I'll be having Stovetop.

By the way, one year ago I wrote my first post (there was a post the day before, but it was really just a test).

Books!

It's been a while since I posted about anything I've read. Frankly, I've been in a bit of a slump. I've been reading, but slowly.

In the last couple of months, I have finished "Home Cooking" and "More Home Cooking" by the late, very-missed Laurie Colwin. I've probably read these books 20 times by now. They are collections of essays Colwin wrote for Gourmet Magazine (mostly), and if you love food you must have them. They are gems.

I've also been reading "Ascending Peculiarity: Edward Gorey on Edward Gorey". I didn't know anything about Gorey, so it's a bit of a revelation. I really had no idea that he died in 2000, I honestly thought he was a Victorian era illustrator. Yes. I am a dope in most aspects of my life!

I'm also reading the new edition of Janet Szabo's "Aran Sweater Design". Yes. I am a geek. I lie in bed and read about cable crossings and gauge. Don't you?

And last night I finished "Cross Country: Fifteen Years and Ninety Thousand Miles on the Roads and Interstates of America with Lewis and Clark, a Lot of Bad Motels, a Moving Van, Emily Post, Jack Kerouac, My Wife, My Mother-in-Law, Two Kids, and Enough Coffee to Kill an Elephant" by Robert Sullivan. What a great book! It's about pretty much what the title says: driving across the country with family, odd details about Lewis and Clark, the history of the U.S. interstate system and the coffee cup lid, a bad luck story about a moving van, and more obsessions than should really be crammed into a 256 page book. It's funny, smart, and incredibly interesting.

When my brother Ken and I were 9 or 10, my dad drove us from Michigan to Montana to visit his parents. In a pickup truck. One of us sat up front, one of us rolled around the back (yes, at least there was a cap). We had a two person tent (which my dad made, from a kit, himself!) which my dad and I slept in, and Ken slept in the truck (his choice). I remember fried spam, crummy campgrounds, and severe boredom. Good times! Seriously. I would totally subject small children to the experience and I would willingly sleep in a tent again to do so (I wouldn't otherwise). I remember that KOA campgrounds were the worst (they put us next to the trash dump) and National Parks were the cleanest, even if you had to pee in an outhouse. According to my dad, one night we were surrounded by the KKK (my brother is black): he described it as a bunch of headlights in the night and the park ranger apologizing in the morning. They weren't exactly menacing. I remember looking up one night and understanding why it's called The Milky Way.

We went across the country again when we were about 13, this time with my stepmother, Linda and a pop up. I don't remember what they were driving, I can't imagine it was the pickup again. Maybe they had the mini-van by then. I don't have as much nostalgia for that trip, mainly because Ken was in a bad way.

I drove to Seattle with my cat in a Drive Away. And not much money. I drove through the Badlands screaming Pearl Jam. Nope. I wasn't cool enough for Nirvana. I drove home again, with the same cat, a couple of years later when my life fell apart. I think it was on that trip that I went into Walmart for the first time.

I wouldn't trade those trips for anything. This country is huge. "Cross Country" is an approximation of the experience, but only a slight one.

Maybe You Don't Come Here For the Cats

...But today you did!

Knitting and Bad Lighting

This isn't going to be very exciting. Just pictures of knitting taken in very bad light. Photoshop can do only so much.

This picture isn't so bad: the colors are right anyway. This is a scarf I've been knitting for my mom since last winter. I took it out again this past weekend.

My head is too full of snot to be able to explain this properly, but I'll try. This is going to be a sweater for a doll. Len's niece, Emily, got another American Girl doll (her fourth!) for her birthday, and while I find these to be less offensive (but far more expensive) Barbie dolls, she likes them. It seemed like a good an excuse as any to try my hand at designing a miniature sweater.

And here is another scarf (oh how I hate them so!). Why do I keep making scarves if I hate them, you ask? Good question! I don't really have an answer. Moving on: this is a Berroco rayon ribbon yarn that I bought many years ago. It is also an example of how all the Photoshop in the world can't make bad lighting good, especially in my inexperienced hands. The colors are right, but the picture is sort of blah.

I made this stitch pattern up. I sort of feel like a genius. Only sort of though. Mostly I feel like I have a lot of snot in my head. I need a nap.