Everybody Loves Saturday Night

The last couple days have been incredibly busy no-time-to-knit days. No time to clean, either, although I have been motivated to do so. It's so sad, really--when I want to clean and get organized, all I can really do is sit at the computer and fantasize about doing it. Seriously. Today should be better, even though today I am exhausted.

When I work from home, I have a PC laptop that sits on the coffee table, and I work in the living room. This has to change, because sitting on the couch and leaning over to use the computer is hurting my back, my legs, my shoulders. So what I really need to do is fix up the dining area (not a separate room, but where the dining table happens to be), which means removing the clutter and getting new chairs--none of the original chairs that came with the dining set have survived my many moves. We don't use them. They are covered in dust. I keep forgetting to just put them out on the curb. That has to be done this weekend, and new chairs must be purchased.

For now I'll just move the laptop into the general computer room that we have, though it will make things a little more crowded. This is the room that needs the most work, since we haven't really done anything with it since we moved. There's a sizeable bookshelf that isn't getting used to its full potential, and then there's a recessed area behind the door that would be perfect for more shelves. What I really need is a month with this apartment. A month and an extra paycheck and an extra set of hands.

"Don't look at me."

it only took a day

before I returned to my old habit of falling asleep in front of the TV before 10:00 p.m. Sad, because that's 9:00 p.m. CST, and I only did that once at the very beginning of my Chicago stay.

Then I read in bed for three hours. It's always when I think a page or two will be enough to get me dozing off when I wind up completely engrossed in whatever it is that I'm reading (which is currently Eat, Pray, Love, a gift from my aunt and uncle).

To try and counteract that, I did not get up at the crack of dawn to feed Scout, though he was mighty persistent. It's easier to ignore him when I am by myself--Michael was staying at his mom's last night because of a late work night and early morning lab, both on the Upper East Side. When Michael is home and I try to ignore Scout, Scout just goes over to Michael, who pushes him back on me. He has not learned the "push OFF the bed, not towards the middle" rule of early morning cat avoidance. But Scout and I, we have our own routine that dates back at least 12 years. And that routine let me sleep in until 7:00.

Enough about that. I put my Chicago pix up on Flickr. There aren't many, partly because there are only so many pictures one can take of a city covered in clouds:

but mostly because I was having too much fun to be bothered to record any of it.

I went shopping and got a couple new sweaters and a shiny new coat. Not shiny, really. But red! And on sale!

I had chicken from the Chicken Hut, which I highly recommend.

I went to three movies: Gone Baby Gone (well done), Enchanted (cute), and Margot at the Wedding (not cute, but intriguing. Not sure I would say it's the best movie ever, I think I liked Squid & Whale better, but I find myself still thinking about this movie days after I saw it, and that's something).

I went to a show: Over the Rhine (good show), with opening act Griffin House (OMG AWESOME). Bought two Griffin House CDs.

Found amazing coffee right around the corner from Carolyn's apartment. Intelligentsia. It's a Chicago chain with about three shops around the city. Apparently the one in her area has a line out the door on Saturday mornings. The coffee is seriously the best I've had in a long, long, long time (fortunately I can order it online!), made all the better because the baristas are trained to do a lovely leaf design when pouring the milk part into lattes and the like. I kept meaning to take a picture of it but never did. Next time.

Had a Thanksgiving dinner that couldn't be beat, with my aunt, uncle and cousins, and the same amount of food that they usually make when it's 12 people at the table. Or so it seemed. Not that I'm complaining.

And of course, there was knitting. I brought a number of projects just in case I got bored or suffered ADD, but I worked mostly on Starsky. I bought the yarn for it (Knit Picks Cadena, formerly Sierra, in Mahogany) several months ago and had actually started working on it back in September, but put it aside for whatever reason (most likely unfinished sweater guilt). I had a sleeve and the start of the back done before I left, and now the back is done

as well as a front and a half.

Close up:

I think I have to put it on hold for a little while though, because holy crap HANUKKAH IS RIGHT AROUND THE CORNER and I need to finish a couple things before I leave for Minneapolis (that's right--back to the Midwest!) to visit Joe, Jhen and the Neph.

back in brooklyn. details to follow.

Pretty much sums it up.

Until last week, the last time I spent more than a couple hours in Chicago was in 2000, and then I was in a completely different part of the city than where Carolyn lives. Hers is nicer.

I barely checked email, thought about blogging maybe once or twice, checked in with Bloglines and  Ravelry and Facebook a few times, but overall I managed to not be as tied to the internet as I am when I'm home. I'm sure that contributed to the sense of peace and restfulness that hit almost as soon as I arrived. I also think not working and being in the Midwest played a huge role in how relaxed I felt.

Man, I needed that. I gotta figure out a way to hold on to that feeling.

As I said, more deets to follow. I have a lot of catching up to do. But I'm going to try to do it all chill-like and cool.

it's been a week

and in that time I have:

--had the mother of all colds (which I am still not entirely over)

--knit a hat that wound up being too big for me.

--had an existential crisis due to knitting everything either too big or too small lately.

--decided not to continue working on the socks I had started at Rhinebeck.

--bought yarn.

--bought knitting pattern books.

--padded my Ravelry queue.

--waited for more than two suggestions for what to do with the Country Mohair (thanks, Laurie and Ann!) which never came.

--tried My So-Called Scarf pattern for mohair, found yarn too slippery for Addis.

--decided to give up on NaNoWriMo. My only excuse is that I lack the discipline to stick with it. I had no plot, no characters, no idea, so after a week and a half I had less than 5,000 words and about five false starts and my inner editor got the better of me and told me to just give up. So I did.

--finished an online copy editing course.

--watched a bunch of TV, planned on writing about it, never did.

--did nothing else that I had planned on doing: taking pictures, buying new clothes, buying a new winter coat, apartment cleaning...all because of the mother of all colds.

I leave on Sunday for Chicago, for a week. A whole week. I cannot tell you how excited I am to have this time off, to relax, to hang out with Carolyn, to see my aunt and uncle and cousins, and basically just be away from this city, my job, the apartment for a while. I really need this break. I need to reboot.

camera moment i wish i'd captured

Scout just jumped up on my desk, en route to windowsill, and started grooming a hank of Fleece Artist Country Mohair that's been sitting here for a few weeks. "What a weirdo," I was about to type, before I remembered my yarn-smelling proclivities. At least Scout's behavior is instinctual. I have no such excuse.

(Not that I can smell anything right now, as my nose is currently fighting off the third or fourth version of the cold I can't seem to shake.)

I've only just got around to taking pictures of the yarn for Ravelry, and I am now facing a decision.

I bought them from The Point at least a year ago, probably more. I had no idea what I was going to do with them then, and since I've been on Ravelry I have toyed with the idea of putting it up for sale/trade. It's pretty yarn

but if I haven't used it yet, will I? And it's also kinda scratchy. Though it would probably soften with washing. And the halo is beautiful. And the colors are watery and muted, with just that flash of light green. But will I use it?

I did a brief pattern search and learned that the yarn is now discontinued, which means two things: a) I wouldn't have to deeply discount it if I wanted to sell it, and b) now I don't want to sell it.

Does it work that way for you, too? You're kinda on the fence about something and then you learn it's somewhat rare, and so it becomes more valuable to you?

 

For now I am keeping it. In fact, the more I look at it the more inclined I am to just wind it up and start knitting with it. Two hanks = 400m/437 yds. Gauge is listed at 3 sts/in. It seems destined for Scarf City. I thought about other patterns, but I don't want a hat, or mittens, or socks from this yarn. It could be a pillow, but this yarn isn't really giving off a home decor vibe. I think it wants to be worn, wants me to trust it past its initial scratchiness.

So I have a couple initial ideas for what kind of scarf this yarn could turn into, but maybe there's a pattern I've overlooked. What do you think? What should I make with this yarn?

just a bunch of stuff

la la la la la la la it's 7:44 am and I don't know what to write here, just that I want to start the day with writing. I mean something other than email writing.

I could tell you that I received my sewing machine...twice. The first one came the day I left for Rhinebeck. Then a second one came the Monday after. It was a shipping error: I only ordered one, but it got shipped twice. I have a UPS label to send the second one back, but I haven't gotten around to that yet.

I also haven't gotten around to playing with the new sewing machine. This is because I haven't gotten around to finding scrap fabric to play with.

I could also tell you that I went to see American Gangster on Monday, and I recommend it. Not the best movie I've ever seen, not the kind of movie that will make you pump your fists in the air, but a  solid, well-crafted, beautifully acted film.

Knitting continues apace. I am reaching the end of my first two skeins of Koigu for the Chevron scarf and had a moment of stupid, because I thought the whole thing took just two skeins, one of each color. So I'm at 44" on the thing, and this is all the yarn I have left:

I checked the pattern, realized that it's two skeins of each color, and felt both relief and despair, because I am really tired of knitting the damn thing. No matter how pretty it is.

I started another winter-oriented project, and this one is going much faster.

These are Rose's Wrist Warmers, based on the ones Billie Piper wears at the end of Doctor Who's second series. I knew I wanted a pair when I saw them, but never got around to making the pattern up. Thankfully someone else did. The yarn is Karabella Margrite, a DK weight yarn that I'm knitting on US 3 needles in order to get gauge. Which, by the way, I am getting perfectly. I'm modding the pattern slightly to make them long enough to cover my fingers to the second knuckle, and I did mirroring twists on either end of the diamond. I started this on Sunday, so I could have a finished pair by this weekend, if all goes according to plan.

word play

The one thing I'd been waiting to happen in all my adult Scrabble-playing years finally happened.

I had QIVIUT on my rack.

In my daydreams about this I never once imagined that I would have no place to put it. Of course not! In my daydreams QIVIUT went on a triple word score with the V on a double letter score, giving me 66 points. Worst case scenario, QIVIUT misses the double word score tiles and only lands on a double letter score tile with a low-scoring letter, which would be acceptable because I would have played QIVIUT. There are times when the awesome word trumps the high score. Thus is my Scrabble philosophy.

perspective

A little while ago I was complaining about waking up at 5:30 in the morning. After Rhinebeck I was able to sleep in until 6:30, even pushing 7:00 some mornings. But now I realize that I had a pretty good routine with the 5:30 wake-up time. I could read email, read blogs, write blogs, goof around on Ravelry, score an obscene number of points in Facebook Scrabble (muah ha) and still have time for showering and hair-doing (I owe you a shot of my new hair cut/color) and maybe even a row or two of something knittery. Waking up at 6:30 or 7:00 means I have to cut one or two of those things out, and I've gotten used to doing them, so it's been a difficult transition. Careful what you wish for, and all that.

And now with NaNoWriMo, I really need the extra time in the morning. Yesterday I was facing an incredibly long day of being in a car and various meetings, I had to leave at 8:30 am which meant waking up by at least 6:30 to get everything done. Instead, I woke up at 5:30 and had an hour of writing time, in which I got 1,012 words in. Not bad. Not ideal (I figured that I need to write round 1,666 words a day in order to make it to 50,000) but I'll take it.

I had thought that I would get home with enough time to write more, but all I wanted to do when I got home was drink a whiskey and shove a pizza in my face.

Today should be a better day. It is 6:46, I am finished with blogs, someone on Ravelry is going to take some yarn off my hands, and after a brief meeting in the morning I have the rest of the day at home. And I have more coffee in the kitchen, which I am going to get right now.

So, yeah.

CeCe has blocked. CeCe is too big. I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, yay? On the other hand, will I get any wear out of it? I will take a picture soon and let you be the judge. One thing is for sure--the Moving Mud button is too big/heavy. It needs either a pin closure or a tie of some kind, but the sweater is too big for a button to make sense.

How did it get to be too big? I tried it on frequently. I measured meticulously. I blocked accordingly. All that should have worked for me. It does drape divinely, though. Maybe I just need to wear it with a particular kind of shirt underneath.

In other knitting news, I have already fallen behind on the Mystic Waters Mystery Shawl project. I am only halfway through Clue #1, which looks like this:

Pretty, isn't it?