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March 31, 2005

The Internets are so cool.

Aw man. Thanks for the nice comments ya'll (even though I'm apparently too dumb to work the Internets). And my mom came to read my site, which is cool, but now I have to cut waaaaaaay the fuck down on the cuss words. Whooops.

A few nights ago I was thinking how much I want to make another hat. Because out here in Los Angeles, you always need a hat, like if you're Johnnie Cochran (rest in peace, brother) and you need to illustrate to the jury why OJ didn't do it, you need a knitted hat. That is what freed OJ, and you know it. Or, if you're going to go rob somebody or do some carjacking and evade the po-po, or if you plan to join the Crips, or the Eighteenth Street Playboy Homies, you need a hand-knitted hat. Only maybe sans the pom pom.

So, I have this back issue of Interweave Knits with a cool fisherman's hat pattern (no pom pom) and I pulled some of that grey Patons I like so much from my stash and I was all set, with some help from Frankin Delano Rosencat on the bamboo circs:

But ... uh, Beavis ..... this pattern calls for some yarn about half the thickness of my Patons bulky. And it calls for US size 6 needles for the little tiny yarn. My Patons lopi wool stuff knits up best on size 11 needles, and did I mention this hat starts out with the double-pointed needles (ARGH) instead of the circs?

Yeah.

But I was having a beer, and all set up with my supplies, and thinking, "I can modify the pattern!" (Author's note: This is where I get into trouble every time. "I can modify the pattern!" either means "I don't need no stinkin' gauge!" or "I am already sitting here and drinking and if I have to get up for different size needles, that will ruin the feng shui." Really now.)

So I started casting on with this giant size 11 dpns -- and this pattern calls for a 4-needle cast on -- and I got about this far:

And I said to myself, ARE YOU CRAZY? And, being crazy, I answered myself back with "THIS SUCKS! NEED MORE BEER!"

So, anyway, my mohair scarf is coming along real nicely. And I put the dpns back in their little drawer, and pretended like the whole thing never happened.

Posted by laurie at 07:09 AM | Comments (10)

March 30, 2005

Another time I embarrass myself.

I haven't been sleeping. AT ALL.

Six months of not-sleeping can make a person insane. And ya'll, I can actually feel myself aging from the stress. Today, I decided to take some time off work and go see my doctor to ask for medicinal help with the not-sleeping. I never really go see my doctor, because I'm not sick very often, or at least not sick enough to require me schlepping all the way out to Woodland Hills where Dr. Feelgood is and where, coincidentally, LOTS of other sick people are. (You have a better chance of getting sick from all those coughing, wheezing, oozing people than you do just staying home and watching Oprah.) But anyway.

So I made an appointment for a checkup.

After waiting with the sniffling, germy masses for about 15 minutes, I get into an exam room. I promptly break out the wet wipes and sanitize as best I can. Ten minutes, wait wait.

Then, finally, Dr. Feelgood comes in.

Doctor: So, you're here for a check up.
Me: Uh, well, not really, but I didn't want to discuss My Issues with your whole staff.
Doctor: (closes door.) Yes, sure. So what's up?
Me: (feel the tears starting) (OH SHIT, I'm going to cry in front of my Primary Care Physician who I have not seen in over one year. Shit shit shit.) Well, I am having trouble sleeping.
Doctor: Hmmmm. Why is that, you think?
Me: Uh, my husband is filing for divorce and I smoke a lot now.
Doctor: I see.
Me: (sniff sniff)
Doctor: Well, let's try some Ambien for sleeping, for the next month or so.
Me: (sniff) mmm okaysoundsgood (sniff).

That, in itself is not truly embarrassing. However, as Dr. Feelgood is writing out a prescription and looking over my chart, he makes chitchat. CRUCIAL MISTAKE.

Doctor: So, how long were you married?
Me: Eight years.
Doctor: Any kids?
Me: No. No kids. (In my head: Four cats. Don't even get me started.)
Doctor: So, was this ...ah... breakup ... completely unexpected?
Me: Uh, well, you know. He turned 40 in April. And so, he, you know, earring... new car... midlife crisis.
Doctor: Ah.

Me: So, Dr. Feelgood, did you go through a midlife crisis?
Doctor: (silence)

(silence)

(more awkward, uncomfortable silence)

Doctor: Well, Laurie, I'm a little offended you think I'm mid-life already.

Me: Oh shit.

(dies of embarrassment)

The end.

Posted by laurie at 05:48 PM | Comments (7)

March 29, 2005

I. Am. So. Embarrassed.

I never post comments on blogs because I'm afraid someone will think I'm a weird nutty stalker or something ("I'm being stalked by this spinster with four cats and a drinking problem!") (Note to Dad: I don't really have a drinking problem. That was a joke.) but then I was talking to a friend who said that all blog-readers should comment so blog-writers know they get readers. (Of course I get no comments ... except for Jennifer and Crystal who love me and my no-comment self.)

Anyway.

So I have a few blogs I read faithfully, mostly knitting stuff. And I decided to take this big plunge and COMMENT, but just on the three blogs I love the most. So I broke through my comment-a-phobia and did it. Except that on one of them, I was trying to leave a comment and blogger was being all STUPID and it kept saying "proxy error, try again" and I kept hitting the back button, and none of my comments worked. Until the one time it *did* work, and, um, this really nice person (who I never wrote comments to before) (because I didn't want her thinking I was a stalker) got SIX of the same comment from me. I. Am. So. Embarrassed.

Posted by laurie at 02:10 PM | Comments (12)

Mohair bus knitting

Now that I've finished my hat, I really want to knit... well, another hat. Breaking free of the rectangle was like smoking crack. But I promised Jennifer I'd make her a Noro basketweave pattern scarf like my Kureyon monster (only hers won't be a nine foot long scarf because, you know, I'm not crazy) (oh wait, I am crazy), and so anyway I'm working on her Noro scarf in a black/silver/red colorway. But there was this sale, you see, at Unwind, and they had all this great yarn marked at 30% off, and how can you afford NOT to buy yarn at that price? Really now.

I have a bad habit of buying shit on sale. This applies to all sorts of stuff -- paper plates, T-shirts, lamps, shoes, furniture, anything on the clearance aisle at Target, sunglasses, you get the idea -- but lately it's been all about yarn. So I'll buy two little tee tiny balls of something (it's on sale! I'd be a fool not to buy this!) but I'll have no pattern in mind or any plan for the yarn, and there isn't enough of it to make an actual garment, so whaddayaknow I'm making another scarf.

So, anyway, I'm making a mohair scarf from some yarn I got on sale at Unwind.

It started out as a swatch (like so many of my scarves do) and after about five rows I decided to try a drop-stitch and it looked pretty cool so I kept going. Only, can I just tell you, knitting with mohair is a lint disaster. Carry a lint brush if you don't want to look like a magenta cat shed all over you. Fur real.

And how bummed am I that I can't take the 8 a.m. bus pretty much all week? I have meetings lined up all early and I have to get in before the butt crack of dawn to prep and get my caffeine time in. Now that is just sad. Because you know how I love a man that drives a big bus. I do I do I do.

Posted by laurie at 08:39 AM | Comments (3)

March 28, 2005

Of knitted hats and HOTT bus drivers

I finished my hat! It is my first official knitted hat, and I do love it. I made this little pom-pom for the top while I was on the bus, but just like that time I made fringe on the bus, it turns out the only thing I had for winding some yarn into a somewhat pom-pom shape was a pack of cigarettes and that seems wrong. But hey, it worked. Then I liked my pom-pom so much all loopy like that that I decided not to cut it and make it fluffy, so it's sort of a flower pom pom, which may be dorky, but hello! How much dorkier can you get than having a pom pom on your hand-knitted pink hat anyway?

But let's get back to the part about the bus.

Usually I take the bus around 7 a.m. each morning. And everyone at the park n' ride is just a working schmoe like your Aunt Purl, and there they all stand politely in a single-file line and wait for the bus and we see each other every morning but we all have the good sense God gave us to act like we don't know each other, because the last time you want to be friendly is at 7 a.m. on the bus.

Anyway.

So I missed my 7 a.m. bus due in part to waaaaaaay too much red wine the night before, and I just barely caught the 8 a.m. bus and as we all stood there in a nice, polite, single-file line I noticed that everyone waiting was female. Every last person. Usually there's half men, half women, and this morning at 8 a.m. there were, like, 20 women all standing there with lipstick on and looking way more awake than the 7 a.m. crowd on their best day. I just thought, wow, who knew what a difference an hour could make in your getup?

Then the bus came. Then the door to the bus opened and suddenly it all became clear ... when what to my wondering eyes should appear but a WAY WAY HOTT bus driver of, like, 22 years.

Now. I was just as surprised as you to discover that there is a HOTT bus driver on this whole planet. All I can think of when I think "bus driver" is Large Marge from the Pee Wee Herman movie. ("Tell 'em Large Marge sent ya!") But this boy is HOTT. He is Latin, and he is young, and he has a shaved head all gangsta style, offset by the two cutest dimples YOU EVER SAW in your whole life. And there was just a whole gaggle of women old enough to be his mother waiting in line to ride his bus to work. If you know what I mean. And I'm sure you do.

So, obviously, I've got to find a way to switch to the 8 a.m. bus. Even though this gets me into downtown perilously around the 9 a.m. mark, which is a little late to arrive at the office in the exciting world of banking. But you know it's just for that extra hour of sleep. I swear. It has nothing to do with anyone and their BIG, STUDLY ARMS or their CUTE ADORABLE DIMPLES. Really. I just need my beauty sleep.

More pictures of my hat now. Because all I can think of are those CUTE ADORABLE DIMPLES, and that will never do. Hat. Think "hat."

Posted by laurie at 08:17 AM | Comments (5)

March 25, 2005

Spoiled Cat Habitat; Bob loves kitty pi

Posted by laurie at 10:37 AM | Comments (2)

March 23, 2005

Dumped on the crosstown bus.

All we're missing are the locusts.

Los Angeles is being punished by nature. We have wind, and rain, and lightening, and thunder and we even had an earthquake today. I'm looking for the locusts and the three horsemen of the apocalypse. I'm sure they're here somewhere.

You would think that a few raindrops wouldn't be enough to bring the second largest U.S. city to its knees. Other cities face REAL weather, like snow and hail and tornadoes and hurricanes. But we're just not built for weather out here. I suspected traffic would be bad, BUT I HAD NO IDEA what was in store for me (oh, in so many ways) when I got on the bus around 4:45 p.m. By 6:30 p.m., I concluded that I was a prisoner of the Los Angeles Department of Transportation. In almost two hours we had managed to creep about 15 miles. For those of you doing the math, that means we were going MINUS FIVE MILES PER HOUR. Who knew it was humanly possible to go slower than zero? I knitted through the entire body of my hat, but foolhardy me didn't bring the pattern (or my dpns) with me since I had no idea I would be knitting for THREE STRAIGHT HOURS.

I got this much hat done on the bus (switched to dpns this morning before picture-taking time):

Luckily, I brought Jennifer's Noro scarf as well and it's a damn good thing. The mindless diversion of endless knit and purl helped me keep from going stark, raving mad and crying in a heap on the (dirty, germy) bus floor when Mr. X called.

In the six months since he moved out, I have received approximately zero phone calls from Mr. X to check in on my well-being. In fact, after he moved out, he did not bother to call me for an entire week. I could have committed suicide, or run off with the gardener, or revived the legwarmers trend of 1986, or become a snake handling Born-Again Bible Thumper, and he couldn't have cared less.

When Mr. X is calling my cell phone at 6 p.m. on a Tuesday night it's not to shoot the breeze, chew the fat and talk about the good ole' days. Since he begins his phone calls with a lot of diversionary chit-chat to get you warmed up, it can take a while to discern his true agenda. By now I have discovered that the amount of prep work/chitchat he does is inversely proportional to how bad the bombshell is going to be.

About five minutes into our conversation, I could tell we were in deep chitchat, so I finally said, "You know, I'm on the bus, so .... was there something you needed?" More stalling from Mr X. This had to be a real whopper. And I knew the bombshell was bad because before long he was saying, "Well, we can talk about this later. I don't think you want to hear this on the bus."

Ahhhh. So this must be a big one. THE big one. I was quiet. Silent. Panic set in. And then, oh fuck it, is there a good place or a good time for whatever new piece of bad news he's going to spring on me? No. There isn't. "Just tell me now," I said.

(cue violins, as now we begin our sob story, the story Of Mr. X and his one sleepless night.)

He tells me he's having anxiety. Anxiety! He woke up the other night -- in the middle of the night! -- because he was anxious. (Anxiety? Poor guy! I mean, I haven't slept a full night in SIX MONTHS since my husband rejected and abandoned me, and sometimes I cry for no reason, like when I see a tomato and remember how he hated tomatoes, and I think how I learned to make all these new dishes for him that were tomato-free, and then I think of how I used to make dinner every night, but now I eat microwave popcorn from the bag five nights a week for dinner, alone, and then I realize I am ALL ALONE, and I look at my cats and wonder if they're going to eat my dead body when no one comes to find me and I die alone, and old, and ugly, and yet he has anxiety! Poor thing! Wow, I really feel bad for him!)

I chose this moment to refrain from asking him how the creativity was going. Because, you know, he moved out so he could GET HIS CREATIVITY BACK and be free of responsibility. (His words. A drect quote.)

Mr. X continues. Sad music all around. He tells me he "needs to get his life together." He needs to "move on." He needs to be happy. ("I really just need to move on with my life and be happy." Translation: He has a new girlfriend. Me, the wife, I am repulsive. The only way he can be happy is if he divorces me.)

This whole conversation, in fact our whole situation, is happening because what he really wants is to be happy. (He says this about five times. Because it's all about him. And his happiness.) (Fucker.)

And I start feeling like I'm going to throw up, right there on the bus, because he's basically telling me that happiness, to him, means getting away from me. At some point, I found myself unable to make out a single word of the conversation. I was sitting there, on the bus, and he was talking, and I could hear the sound of the talking and I wanted to hear him (because when you're getting the final nail in the coffin, you want to hear every last pounding of the hammer!) but I must have slipped into a weird, spinster-to-be form of shock because it all sounded like "Immuffle erga waaaalamma ahargh erghuffle." The more I tried to hear him, the worse it got, so finally I said, "Um, I have to go..." and we hung up.

Then I concentrated very hard on knits and purls and tried to keep from crying. On the bus.

Frankly, I'm surprised by how upset I got. It's not like this was a big shocker. He moved out. He met another woman. He went to Italy without me. He started wearing an earring. (Desperate attempt to regain the bloom of his lost youth.) At any moment a red convertible was going to appear in the driveway. For him, our relationship was over months before he told me he was moving out.

Maybe I was in denial. Maybe I just hadn't really faced up to the reality of divorce. It's almost like ... even when you know someone is dying, their death is still a sad shock. It's the finality. Maybe the death of a marriage is similar. I knew the divorce was coming, but having him tell me he's starting the paperwork was like a kick in the stomach. The death of a marriage, my marriage, the disintegration of the years that make up practically my entire adult life... all going to hell in a cross-town bus.

Posted by laurie at 02:17 PM | Comments (0)

March 22, 2005

Kitty pi with all the cat filling

Can I be completely frank with you?

I have simply the smartest, most superior cats on the planet. And this is an unbiased fact, not just merely opinion. For many of the knitters who created a kitty pi, just as I did, their hopes of an appreciative kitty audience were dashed when their felines refused to acknowledge the hard work and effort put into constructing the kitty pi. (I know this because I read every single comment on the Kitty Pi Gallery page.)

My felines, however, are INCREDIBLY SMART and more than just the average amount of typical feline adorable. Once again, that is fact not opinion. (Says the crazy cat lady.) As soon as I got home tonight, I pulled the kitty pi off the blocking form. I really blocked it to kingdom come, so I wasn't sure what to expect (would it be stiff? a floppy mess? too thin?) but it turned out relatively soft, and floppy but not excessively so. (I do wish there was a way to make the fiber itself more stiff on the sides, but oh well.) As soon as the kitty pi landed on the floor, Inspector Franklin Cluesoe was on the case. Click on any picture below for a larger view:

I had fully intended to spray a tee tiny amount of catnip in the kitty pi if they hesitated for even a moment to appreciate its goodness, but that was totally unnecessary. Before Frankie could hunker down and get comfy in the new kitty pi, she was joined by the rest of the MOST INTELLIGENT and SUPERIOR cats in the entire world:

Of course, Roy isn't pictured in all this Kitty Pi positioning, because Roy is a patient guy. He mostly likes to lay on me, and uses designated cat beds only when I'm not around to be his own personal pillow. After the initial hullaballoo over the kitty pi had died down here at chez spinster, I waited until the knitted pi was empty (momentarily) and moved it onto the sofa, right next to me, where Roy promptly got in and curled up for a long night's sleep:

Awwww. The end!

Posted by laurie at 09:55 AM | Comments (1)

March 21, 2005

Kitty Pi (lots of pics!)

This is the story of my kitty pi.

Technically, this is my first project knitted in the round. (I started a hat, but frogged it midway through because of my "Pattern? I don't need no stinkin' pattern!" problem.)

This time, I made a commitment to follow the pattern through, no matter what. The only deviation I made from the original Kitty Pi pattern was in my yarn. The pattern calls for two skeins of Nor Big Kureyon, but I have big cats that like to cozy up on each other, so I needed a big bed. Having just completed the world's longest Kureyon (and on and on) scarf, I knew the knitted gauge of that yarn well (after nine feet of scarf knitting, you get the general idea), and so I selected a much thicker lopi-style yarn combo for a bigger gauge and ergo, bigger bed:

My contrast color yarn, a multicolor "Caldo" by Lana Grossa, is so pretty! I'm using it for stripes and for the edging instead of the eyelash yarn called for in the pattern (we have enough real fur at chez spinster, no need to add some faux to the mix.)

Since this was the first time I have ever used double-pointed needles (dpns), I was sure I would cry midway through. I did not cry. It was fine. I am dramatic at times. The pattern moved along swiftly after I switched to my circular needles. Since I was using a thick wool yarn, the kitty pi was heavy and hefty just halfway through:

Traffic has been really awful lately (translation: lots of time spent sitting on a crosstown bus, knitting like a maniac) so I moved fairly quickly on the kitty pi during the week. With all the rain on Saturday there was no use attempting to work in the garden or otherwise leave the house, so I happily indulged myself being a lazy spinster on Saturday as well, doing lots of kitty pi knitting. I knitted all the way through several TiVo'd documentaries: "The Farm: Angola, USA" and a Travel Channel show about crab fisherman in in the Bering Sea called "Alaska On The Edge." (I LOVE LOVE love shows about really cold destinations. Especially while knitting up some bulky wool!) By the end of the evening, the kitty pi was ready for felting on Sunday morning:

Instead of a zippered pillow protector, I used an old pillowcase and safety-pinned it closed. I'm cheap, what can I say? Next time, however, I will definitely buy a zippered pillowcase because the pinning and unpinning through each load and felting-check was tedious. (It was free, but tedious.)

After one run throught the wash on warm cycle with a capful of Woolite and some towels, my kitty pi had only barely fuzzed up. There was no felting in sight:

After two(!) more cycles through the wash the grey had felted perfectly, but the stitch definition was still clearly visible on the Caldo. I should mention there was also one accidental spin cyle during the third felting attempt, and yet we still have visible stitches on the kitty pi colored stripes. (!) At this point I decide that I intended all along for there to be some stitch visibility so folks would know the kitty pi was a hand-knitted item, and the stitches add a nice artistic contrast blah blah blah. (Honestly, at this point I had washed the kitty pi with all my loads of dirty laundry and I had run out of Woolite and I was impatient to begin blocking. But's let's assume it was an artistic "I like the stitch definition" choice and move on.) The final felt -- third time is the semi-charm -- produced a smaller, denser item:

For blocking, I used the bottom of a Booda cat pan (all clean, of course) turned upside-down and covered with a towel. (Some cat talk here: I stopped using the Booda litterbox when I moved into chez spinster. Until then, I had never noticed that the round and expensive Booda was just way too small for my ginormous cats, and so I switched to the unglamorous but very serviceable $10 extra-large, plain old rectangular cat pan of their dreams and they love it. Go figure.) Here is the gorgeous kitty pi, after some extremely zealous blocking on a beautiful (and finally sunny!) Los Angeles Sunday afternoon:

Tomorrow the kitty pi should be dry enough to take off the blocking form and throw to the lions. I left it outside to dry for several hours before bringing it indoors, and I think that accidental spin cycle on the final felting attempt helped wring it out a fair amount, too. I LOVE this Paton's Up Country wool for felting, it produced a lovely, dense and sort of fuzzy fabric with minimal fuzzballs. Overall, the kitty pi construction and felting was a breeze. I'm completely happy with the project this far, and apparently so is Sobakowa.

As you can see from the image below, Sobakowa (a superior cat) already knows the kitty pi is meant JUST FOR HER and she stakes her claim on it as it's still semi-damp and blocking on the kitchen table:

Posted by laurie at 04:17 PM | Comments (3)

March 15, 2005

The Existential Knitter

I finally have a better understanding of gauge and how to multiply stitches per inch by blah blah blah and do some long division and get the circumference of a hat.

I hate math. I prefer philosophy to numerics. But I have had to learn the tedium to fix my hat, which is becoming a burr in my knitting ass. Figuratively speaking, of course.

While normal people may not mind a hat with a little decrease path in the back, I myself have stared at the flaw so intently that the flaw, in true Nietzsche fashion, is staring back.

Ergo, I must rip. Therefore I am.

Before ripping, I got out the stitch counter and figured out what my true gauge was here. I'm way off from the pattern -- which, in my defense, I knew already and had calculated for. However, my way of "calculating" was to say, "Hmmmm, I have more stitches to the inch than the pattern. The Pattern says to cast on in multiples of six. So, I'm only getting a few stitches per inch more, and if a bear poops in the woods and a rooster flies at night, I guess the magical formula would be... cast on 66 stitches!"

I'm a visual person, I figured I'd notice a weirdly sized hat after a few rows. Which I did. So that started the whole decrease pattern which has led me to Dante's seventh circular needle of knitting hell:

 

Oh well. To rip is to always have a new project. Or something like that.

Posted by laurie at 05:23 PM | Comments (0)

March 14, 2005

Scarf it up: Nine feet of Noro scarfdom!

I love long scarves. I really do. I think they are a formidable thing to behold. However, I have been working on the Noro Kureyon scarf for what feels like ten years. People have asked me, as you ask a slow child, "You're still working on that scarf, dear?" Then I begin pulling the scarf out of my bag. One foot at a time. As I show it to the naysayer, the questioner of my abilities, they see with their own eyes that I have gone STARK RAVING MAD and have, at last count, a scarf which measures 8.75 feet long. In basket weave/checkerboard pattern.

And I say, "Yes! I am still working on the worlds largest scarf! I must Kureyon!"

It's taken time, to be sure. Creating a monster scarf is no quick romp in the garter stitch. The pattern ups the time due in part to the you-must-concentrate factor (I am a novice, remember, obsessed as I may be I still lose count). Plus, there's something I haven't told you yet. THIS YARN IS WACKY. It's so thick in some places it doesn't even look properly spun, like it's right off the ol' sheep's back. (The aforementioned twigs and hay really add to the raw wool vibe. Ahem.) In other places, the fiber is so thinly spun, it's practically fragile, like thread. I'm not sure I will do another Noro project for a while (though I do have two balls of regular Kureyon in black/silver/magenta balled up and a'waiting me in the stash).

But I digress. What I meant to say was that this is one long L-O-N-G scarf.....

 

I only have a tee tiny bit more yarn to knit up, so it will end tonight. Then the monster blocking begins. I have NO IDEA how to block something this massive and long. We're talking a possible 9-foot blocking space. In my house. With four cats. Who are SO HELPFUL.

ARGH.

 

Posted by laurie at 05:17 PM | Comments (2)

March 10, 2005

I'm Kureyon Your Love With Me

I'm Kureyon Your Love With Me
West Virginia down to Tennessee
And I'm movin' with the Good Lord's Speed
Kureyon your love with meeee....

Guess you have to be a country music fan to get that one ;)

My very first date with a big hank of Noro Kureyon and already we have a tempestuous relationship. I love the Noro, I hate the Noro. And it's totally indifferent to me.

On the one hand, the texture is so earthy and appealing ... I'm using warm, organic Color #7 in celery, green, brown, reddish brown, pale sand, etc. It's nubby and the basket weave/checkerboard pattern I'm using is perfect for it. Very uber-texture.

On the other hand, this yarn may be a little too "textured" ... I cannot tell you how many pieces of hay, twigs, and burrs I have dug out of the strands. At first, being the knitting newbie that I am, I thought that very miniscule "twig" in the wool was from my beloved Lantern Moon needles splitting, or burring, and I was not pleased. At all. After the burrs, twigs and hay kept a' comin', I finally figured out it was the yarn. (Yes, I am Laurie, master of the obvious.)

I was almost 3/4 of the way through my first ball when I encountered a knot, something I hate hate hate in cheaper yarn but utterly loathe and feel offended by in expensive yarn, especially something that's $16.25 a hank like el Noro.

I had not yet searched the internet for better ways of joining yarn, so the first Noro Knot became a nubbier row. I unknotted it and sort of double-stranded for a stitch, being careful to weave in the ends (I can't bear a knot right in the middle of a scarf. I don't know how you experienced knitters handle this, especially when the knot just sneaks up on you like in the Noro.)

Close-up shot of the pattern, sans knot:

My next Noro no-no moment occurred when I realized the end of skein numero uno was completely different in color than either end of skein numero dos. My basket weave scarf was ending it's ball-y-hoo on a dark, sage green strand. My new ball had one brown end and one rust colored end.

Not even close to sage green, and it was too obvious a difference for me to start a new stripe. *

* Yes, I am OCD, perfectionistic and neurotic. However, in knitting one can only control so much. For example, there are lots of bad, bad things in my scarf. I like to think of them as "character-adding" traits. But a jog from sage to immediate rust would. not. do.

When I bought my second hank of Big Kureyon from Knit, Purl & Co, I saw another dreaded knot just as it was being spun into a ball. But it was the only hank in my color and dye lot so I took it. This morning I found myself carefully unwinding the professionally wound Noro ball to dig out the knot, hoping the bastard knot would be tying together two pieces of yarn in different colors, one of which (cross those fingers!) would be close to my sage-green scarf tail.

Now, you may be thinking at this point in The World's Longest Noro Story that I have way too much time on my hands, but the story gets better. Or worse, depending on how your tolerance is for yarn talk.

After some seeking, I found The Dreaded Noro Knot in my new skein. The knot joined two pieces of ivory yarn. No easy out here! No sage for Laurie! So, I unknotted the Noro into two pieces. Then, I began unwinding each half of the skein looking for a deep green to match my scarf tail. When I found the nearest sage-y green, I cut the noro -- yes I cut the noro! -- and I felted the green ends together for a felted join (no I did not use spit) (gross!).

So, at this point, I have theoretically joined a new ball of yarn. However, if you've been following along closely, you would have noticed that I have TWO balls of yarn out of skein #2, plus some leftover yarn from the cut. Not good. We'll call my new Noro children Ball A and Ball B. The bastard stepchild yarn leftover from my Noro cutting expedition goes into the pile of unused bits.

Ball A is attached to my scarf, green on green. He is a very small ball of yarn, and he ends on an ivory note.

Ball B is a naughty, uncooperative yarn child. I'd like to give him back and pick out a better, more well-behaved child. Oh well. Ball B begins with rust brown and ends in the other sagey/brown stuff that I cut to get my green colorway in Ball A. Confused yet? I looked at both ends and decided the best thing to do was find something, anything to join to Ball A. Found some ivory on Ball B a wee bit down on the brownish colorway, and snip! I am a yarn cutting fool! Felted the ivory tail of Ball A to the new ivory beginning of Ball B and voila, the weirdest yarn ball situation ever:

I found a colorway in Ball A that was close to the ivory tail of ball B and hand felted the ends together (no spit! no spit!) for one crazy lunatic Noro ball system. Voila!

What a pain in my ass.

But it's pretty.

Posted by laurie at 05:06 PM | Comments (1)

March 07, 2005

An Unmarried Woman

Knitting in the round is awesome. You're garter-stitching the whole time, so I can watch TV without goofing up. I'm not making mad progress on my Noro Basket weave/checkerboard scarf because I'm only doing it on the bus, where I can fully concentrate on the pattern. Becky at skinnyrabbit.com is able to knit and read a book at the same time, which freaks my shit out. How do you knit and read? Good grief, overachievers! I can barely knit and watch TV. But all garter stitch in the round ... now we're talking.

I got through two TiVo'd documentaries, some old CSI and the best 1978 movie ever, "An Unmarried Woman" starring Jill Clayburgh as a woman whose husband leaves her after 16 years of marriage. She dates and goes to "analysis" and basically lives it up in the freewheeling 70s when, apparently, nobody had herpes or AIDS or body image issues.

As I sat on the sofa in my most comfortable clothes (read: ugly, ugly clothes) with a cat on my lap and another at my feet, I spent the entire day watching Bad TV while knitting away, and it suddenly dawned on me how peaceful and happy I was. Gasp! Did I say, "Happy"??

So, apparently, it is possible to have a happy moment when you are the dreaded Unmarried Woman. A truly peaceful, happy moment! I was glad I could recognize this aberrant emotion, happiness, because I have been numbingly unhappy for so long.

I wouldn't say I'm ready to pull a Jill Clayburgh or anything freewheelin' and footloose. But at least I had one really, really nice day all on my own. It's a start. String a few of those together and it wouldn't be half bad.

Posted by laurie at 05:03 PM | Comments (1)

March 05, 2005

Round and round on circular needles

I finally started my first knitting-in-the-round project on circular needles... the pink multicolor hat. I have a pattern (I really do) but of course I decided the pattern wasn't as cool as I am, and once I got the hang of working with the circular needles, I made up my own pattern as I went along.

Or, at least I thought I had the hang of working with circular needles.

Halfway through my completed project (Hat! I'm making a hat! Breaking out of the rectangle and making me a hat!) I discovered that I was knitting it inside out. Ahem. Luckily it's just a hat and you can turn that sucker right side out no problemma.

The best part of this circular knitting thing... drumroll please... when you knit in the round, in some magical, mystical way you use the simple knit stitch (no purls needed!) all the way around and yet it makes the most beautiful, even stockinette pattern you have ever seen. Magic!

The bad news is my freeform Who-Needs-A-Pattern? ways have made the hat slightly lopsided. I was just decreasing wherever the moment felt right and now there's a distinct, um, ridge in my roll-brim hat. It's only truly noticeable to me, but I think I'm going to rip the whole thing and start over. Because I am an OCD perfectionist freak and DAMN PROUD OF IT.

My nearly completed but soon-to-be frogged scarf:

I'm making Shannon a hat next, after I finish mine. I love me some hats!

P.S. No class attendance today either because I had to take Roy to the doctor. Will I ever return to class? How can I be the truly obsessed knitter of my dreams if I'm the one teaching myself from a book?

 

Posted by laurie at 05:00 PM | Comments (1)

March 04, 2005

Fav yarn haunts; Fraggle Rock 'n Roll scarf

Now that I have spent an embarrassing amount of money on yarn and snooped around every local yarn shop in the Valley, I have decided that my favorite haunt is Unwind. I love Lani's Needlepoint in Studio City and the classes there are wonderful -- but that's largely because Linda is such a neat lady. The Stitch Cafe is very nice, too, but every time I've been there it's crowded and hard to move around all the other yarn sluts. (You know you are.) Unwind is big and bright and comfortable and no one ever follows you around or makes you feel you've overstayed your visit.

When Shannon and Karman came over on Thursday for Survivor and pizza (mmmmm, pepperoni trio....) I gave Karman the finished Fraggle Rock n' Roll Scarf. Here she is modeling it on the sofa. Click for big:

Fraggle Rock 'n Roll scarf: Paton's Divine on size 15 needles, with some Lion Brand fun fur stranded in here and there to make stripes. Very plush and soft and raggedy-chic.

Posted by laurie at 04:57 PM | Comments (1)

March 01, 2005

No Poncho Villa for me

Swatched the Big Kureyon. I'm not ready to take on a sweater yet (and frankly, between just you and me, I think a sweater in this stuff is a little too Pancho Villa for me. For some reason the self-striping reminds me of those horrid Mexican anoraks we all wore in college during the grunge period. God help us.) But I didn't want to make garter stitch out of this, stockinette is so purty and flat and shows off the nubbiness.

Of course, stockinette rolls, so that's out.

Then, coincidentally, I stopped in to A Major Knitwork to poke around in the stash (stated purpose: picking up some size 13 dpns for my hat project, since I am a crazy tight knitter and the size 11s gave me too many stitches per inch), and I saw a fancy schmancy basket weave scarf (checkerboard?) done in knit 5, purl 5. Went home and swatched it on the Noro Big Kureyon and ding! ding! we have a winner. I kept knitting directly on my scarf swatch, and now it's a scarf bottom. The corners roll in a tee tiny bit, but I can block-n-tackle that baby.

Roy gets into swatching the Noro Big Kureyon

Posted by laurie at 04:53 PM | Comments (0)