never a lonely knitter

I think whenever I'm lonely I'll sit in a crowded place knitting.

In the last year I've started knitting in public more that I had before: on the bus, on the train, at knit nights / meet-ups, in the park, in the lobby... I've gotten used to most of the weird looks and comments - usually positive, sometimes perplexed. A man on a train a few weeks ago leaned over me to plug in his laptop and said "If you knew there was power, you would have brought your knitting machine, eh?" To which I laughed nervously and didn't explain that's not how it works.

Today I brought Vivian sleeve #2 to university so I could knit a little when I needed a break from the computer lab. Sitting downstairs behind the Tim Hortons, I attracted the attention of one of the Tims ladies who exclaimed she used to knit when her children were small, but she doesn't remember a thing anymore. I don't know why, but it made me smile. I said something dumb about how she could learn again, but she was off.

Anyway. Little moments. Back to work now.

finishing

November is nearly over. No more inane daily blog posting for me? Haha.

I'm excited for December for a number of reasons, in no particular order:

-end of the semester
-4 weeks off before my last semester of grad school!
-going home, where this year there is no bus strike
-winter (maybe even snow)
-going to England for Christmas!

In preparation for the above, I am working hard to finish:
-2 gifts
-2 presentations
-some blog posts
-1 digital library
-1 final paper
-Vivian

So that's where things stand here. In terms of my workload, the worst is over, and although I'm not looking forward to the inevitable scramble before the very end, from this vantage point it all feels so manageable. :)

suburban music

I might have posted this before, but I rediscovered it recently and it's so awesome I thought I'd share.



Six musicians break into an apartment while the owners are out and create a musical masterpiece.

FO: sneak peek

I finished knitting up the Debbie Bliss Fez, and here's an engimatic macro shot to prove it.



Those of you on Ravelry can click on the photo to see the project details, but for now this one's staying in the deep web. A successful improvised project, if I do say so myself: I should try this more often.

Fez is really soft, and it nearly disintegrated when I tinked back a few rows... Not a yarn that frogs particularly well.

thursword

Decuman

adjective 1. large or immense, as a wave.
2. (in ancient Rome) of or pertaining to the tenth cohort of a legion.

3. Also called decuman gate. (in ancient Rome) the main gate of a military camp, facing away from the enemy and near which the tenth cohort of the legion was usually stationed.

~Dictionary.com

Also apparently a Celtic saint from the 7th century

To stash or not to stash

Looking at the growing pile of yarn in my closet and thinking about the odds and ends I left behind that I plan to return to, I fear that I have acquired a stash. How did this happen? I'm careful to buy yarn with a specific project in mind, but my project-related ambitions are greater than the time I have to knit them with. In the time between purchasing yarn and the present, the intended project often shifts and shifts again while the yarn languishes in the closet waiting for me to make a final decision.

So I have a stash. It's not a large one, but it is definitely a stash of some variety. This may not be a bad thing. Plenty of knitters have a stash and enjoy it. That's fair enough. But since I'm mentally gearing up for a huge move in the next 6 months or so, having a stash makes me nervous. I won't be able to take it all with me if it grows any more. I can hope that I'll get around to making all the things I intend to make with all this yarn before June/July 2010, but I don't know if it will happen.

Case study:

(excuse the re-used picture)

I ordered this Sweet Paprika yarn for a gift knit. When I received it I fell in love and after some hemming and hawing decided to use it for an Ishbel for myself. Then I questioned that decision when I found Herbivore by Stephen West. I love the colour of the original scarf/shawl, and my yarn happens to be a similar green (though less variegated and more semi-solid), and hey. Love. Then there's the matter of my 101 in 1001 list: #4 is knit a lace shawl. Ishbel is lace, but Herbivore isn't, so if I end up knitting Herbivore with this yarn, I'll have to get some more to make Ishbel / other lace shawl. I definitely intend to knit Ishbel eventually, like everyone else in the universe,

But until I decide between the two patterns - or find another entirely - the yarn gets to sit all skeined up in a plastic bag in my closet. Stashy stash.

Camel teaser

Trying Fez. I know 15% isn't a lot of camel content, but it's still pretty neat.