Took Me Long Enough

I don't have any pictures for today because last night was remarkably similar to last Thursday. Apparently, drunk on sangria and broke from eating fortyelevenhundred plates of tapas is how we knit EVERY Thursday.

Wait, I forgot, Kathleen sent pictures:

Christina and Kathleen pose for a super-cute picture. And then there's the picture that Christina took of US.


Yeah. Thanks for that. My tapas of choice, apparently, was rocks. (What DO I have in my mouth here?? Is that my sexy face? PLEASE tell me that's not my sexy face!)

Anyway, the point of today's post is to point you, probably for the millionth time, to Aimee's blog. She's doing good things, raising money for her Lupus walk. (Er, it's a walk to raise money to help find a cure for Lupus.) There are prizes, too. Not that you'd be giving for that sole purpose, of course, right? Right. So go throw some money at her!

(PS: I need to destash some yarns so I can throw money at Aimee -slash- pay bills. I have a few skeins up on Ravelry, so if you see anything you want, please message me.)

Conversation No Doubt Taking Place Somewhere In Orlando Today

Person 1: Oh, did I tell you? I saw the strangest thing yesterday.
Person 2: What?
P1: I was at the park, right, Loch Haven down where the museum and the Rep theatre is?
P2: The one downtown?
P1: No man, that's Eola, I'm talking about the one off Princeton.
P2: Right, right! Okay....
P1: So I'm driving up to drop my kid off for a rehearsal...
P2: Your kid's in a show?
P1: Oh, yeah, didn't I tell you? Yeah, The Frog Prince. He plays the crown. Or a tree. Something like that, anyway...this girl walks across the street right in front of my car, and she's dressed all business-like, but - and I thought for a second I was seeing this wrong, but I swear to GOD, she was carrying a human leg.
P2: A WHADDAHUH?
P1: Yeah, a woman's leg! Just slung over her shoulder like no big thing. It had a sock on it too. Effin' WEIRD, man.
P2: Who carries around a leg? Was it bloody, like, was there a stump??
P1: No, I'm pretty sure it was plastic. It wasn't all bendy or anything like a leg might be.
P2: Well, if it was like, an old leg, like a leg that had been dead for a while and had that rigamarole...
P1: Rigor mortis?
P2: Yeah, that - okay, Grisolm, nice work there, CSI - then it might be all stiff like that.
P1: I guess, but I'm pretty sure it was fake.
P2: Shoulda called the cops anyway. Who carries around a leg in a park? Somethin's up.
P1: Last I saw she was trying to jam it up in a tree.
P2: The hell? Like, to hide it?
P1: Naw...I slowed down to look and a guy sitting on a bench with his dog, he said something about how she'd been dragging the thing all over the park and taking pictures of it. His dog looked a little freaked out.
P2: I'm tellin' you. Shoulda called the cops.
P1: Yeah, maybe...............

(Maybe it's the drama queen in me, but I LOVE carrying a severed leg and a camera around a park. Oh, and yes it is plastic.)

Stuff I Am Excited And Happy About, Yay

I found a project I was working on months and months (andmonthsandmonths) ago. It was a pattern I was drafting, and I had to knit six (six!) items (or at the very least, four, but preferably six) and I knit two and they were glorious...and then I lost them and my mojo went with them. Yesterday I stuck my hands into the pocket of a jacket (not needed since, what, February probably) and lo, there they were! No idea why they were stuffed into jacket pockets, but I digress.

Also, there's a yarn in stash that I'd forgotten about, a dark green Malabrigo worsted that I'd bought to work on Hourglass, that long abandoned quarter of a sweater that's been in the WIP basket for ages. The yarn might be perfect for Juno, and I may not need to buy yarn after all. I'd love something tweedy (something you'll rarely hear me say) but I think this will do. But does Malabrigo hold up well for a sweater that gets a lot of wear? Juno would probably be a jacket I'd wear a lot on cooler days - though there aren't many cooler days, so "a lot" is relative here - and I'm concerned about Malabrigo's hold-up-yness. Anyone have any input on that?

And if you do have input, you better talk fast:

My gauge is a little off, I think...it's hard to tell when your gauge swatch is in rib, so you can just stretch or scrunch it until you get the numbers you want...but I think it's running a bit small. I don't want to knit the sweater on larger than US9 (5.50mm) needles, so I'm knitting the size 36 (knowing that I'm going to come up with negative ease around three inches, based on what Knitting Betty told me) and theoretically, it'll fit like a glove. Theoretically. It might fit like a corset. That would be not so good.

Some of this yarn was knit into that Hourglass sweater (which I had tired of very quickly). Since Heroes was on last night (Heroes!!) I didn't have the time or the desire to wind yarn, so I skipped a step in the rip-wind-knit process:


Meh, it's just easier this way.

(It bugs me that photos look so different on PC and on Mac. I always adjust and edit my photos on my Mac at home, and then I post or look at my blog on a PC, and the photos are much darker and harder to see. I apologize, PC people.)

News in World of Real Life: that promotion I got seven months ago put me into a position with a partner in QC/Training. I say "partner" but I think of her as my superior in every way, since she's been here a long time and Knows. Her. Stuff. Well, she's been deservedly promoted, and now I'm the only one in this position. Eeek! It's cool but scary and while I'm not completely freaked out, I'm about halfway there. Maybe two-thirds...

Also, I would like to sell you on a miracle product I have discovered. Over the year(plus-ish), I have directed you to spend a lot of money on a lot of things. Today, I'm asking you to spend fifty-nine cents. Go buy yourself a box of baking soda. Throw out every single cleaning product you own. Okay, it's not that simple, but baking soda is a miracle oh my God how did I ever live without this? After reading the Crazy Aunt Purl post about miraculous non-toxic cleaning products, I decided to load up on vinegar, lemon juice, and baking soda, plus some funny scrubby tools and things designed to make cleaning look fun (I even bought the exact same bucket and caddy that Purl did). The baking soda actually removed those ugly rusty coloured irony water stains in our toilet, something I've been trying to do since we MOVED IN. Gone! Yucky weird toilet stains not created by us but still embarrassing nonetheless, gone!!! And lemon juice + chrome or nickel fixtures = happy beauty shiny. I'm so thrilled with this decision. (A little bit of bleach diluted with water serves for surfaces that require disinfecting, by the way, so you won't freak out and tell me how many germs my vinegar might be leaving behind.)

Finally, I have a tribute. A while back Anita Roddick died. She was the founder of The Body Shop, and until she died I didn't realize what a profound effect she had on my life. My very first fledgling attempts at being green and shopping cruelty-free came about at the age of about twelve or thirteen, when I discovered The Body Shop and their wonderful never-tested-on-animals fair-trade philosophies. I sent off for information from PETA on other companies that didn't test on animals, and I started to pay attention to what was in the things I put on and in my body and what those products did to the world around me. And while I'm obviously not excited and happy yay about her passing, I truly didn't know what an inspiration I'd had in Anita until she was gone...so I'm enormously grateful for her life and her work. Yay for you, Anita - thank you.

Sudden Obsession

First, a photo - because I really must show a photo with each blog:

Black and white so I don't reveal much about what I'm working on...lookit my guy, though. Rooster almost NEVER curls up with yarn, so I think that speaks volumes about the lusciousness of what I'm working with here. Pardon my poor overloaded couch - it was bogged down with books, stitch dictionaries, scraps of paper, and frogged bits of yarn all weekend.

Also, Ravelry is the devil! Things that never particularly caught my eye before are suddenly becoming an obsession. Like Juno, for example. (Ravelry link - you can also see an example of the (perfect) Juno sweater here.) Sure, I'd seen Yarn Harlot's Juno, and Coloursknits' Juno before her, but it's this one (non-Ravelers, look here again). This is the one that made me think "I NEED THAT SWEATER IN FIVE MINUTES OR RIGHT NOW GIMME GIMME!!" There's something to be said for a well-photographed FO, and this one makes me want to weep. Maybe it's because it's not modeled on a person, so all of the potential design complaints that could come up (neckline is too low, fit is too loose in the arms, etc.) don't apply. But I don't care about any of that - it is beautiful and wonderful and glorious and magnificent and I NEED IT. It's pretty incredible that this should come up now, since I've had Rowan 40 for months and I've watched the parade of Juno FOs with absolutely no compelling need to knit it whatsoever. Thanks a bunch, Knitting Betty. You and your camera, and your snow, and your mannequin.

(Reminder: I'm still pretty sure I'm not a garment knitter, so this could be interesting. But it IS knit on big ol' needles in worsted weight. So it could happen....once I have the yarn. Do I have enough worsted weight yarn for this sweater? Sure. Do I want to use it for this? Nah.)

As a matter of fact, Juno has moved above Tangled Yoke Cardigan in my List of Must-Knits. (Couldn't have anything to do with that whole huge needle vs. tiny needle thing, could it? Heh.)

Any obsessions currently throbbing in your brain? Has this ever happened to you, when a pattern lay dormant and unnoticed in your world for months/years and then suddenly jumped up and bit you on the arse and wouldn't let go? It's not just me, right?

Umm...This Is How We Knit On Thursdays, Too.

Hi, my name is YoYo, and I'm a knitaholic. And by knitaholic, I mean I leave the knitting in the car in favour of sangria.

Good times, good times. (Oh, but I did have a skein of Zen Yarn Garden with me, so that kind of counts as this being knitting-related.)


Kathleen's husband heads back on Saturday, so we had to have another hurrah before he goes - I ate a LOT. I had a little sangria. (A little sangria. Yeah. Like saying, "Oh, I knit a little." But I did know when to stop, so I have progressed beyond my college days.)


Four people. Two designated drivers. Three pitchers of sangria. (Can you spot the DDs? Hint: there are two people carrying on a coherent conversation, one making a goofy face in front of a camera, and one whose head may have fallen off.)

And because every picture is horribly blurry due to my intense hatred of the flash, here's one where you can see our faces and we don't appear to have extra noses.


The waiter insisted on using the flash. Oh, and we're splotchy because we tried to go next door to the putt-putt place but they closed and it started pouring rain, so we got a little drenched. (It wasn't a sangria fight, I swear.)

Enough of that, mmkay. Here's some knitting:


This is my Pomatomus progress (bus shot). I've been using this as my commuter knitting. Hot DAMN if that ain't some slow going (I love and hate you, twisted rib.)

I never have a damned thing to show off around here anymore, I know. I'm sure everyone wonders why I never knit anymore, especially since I do seem to get plenty of spinning done. And I do - because I'm very lazy on the weekends and I rarely do crazy things like leave the house or clean stuff, so it's mostly all spent on the couch in front of the wheel. Usually while absorbing whatever ridiculous thing is running on marathon (America's Next Top Model - I've seen some entire seasons three times now - or CSI, or Monk, or whatever).

But see, I AM knitting. I just can't show it off. And I haven't really mentioned it, but it's because I've been writing patterns. I've been working on kind of a lot of patterns, actually. Some are exclusives, and some are just things I'm working on for fun. I didn't want you to think that I won't share my knitting with you - once the patterns are released or ready, I can show you what I've been up to...but until then, it's all very hushy.

I am still working on Green Gable and the Pomatomus, though, so that I have something I can show you progress on - I like to have accountability.

Have a wonderful, wonderful weekend!

This Is How We Knit On Tuesdays

I went to the knit night at the LYS again last night, and Travis went with me. Kathleen's husband also went along, and about nine seconds after Travis walked in and shook David's hand, David announced, "Pub?" And off they went, after promising to come back and buy us yarn in return for not having to stay and "suffer" through the knitting...and hours later when the shop closed, we found them still at the pub, where it was decided to go find food, and maybe more booze. And so it was written, and so it was:

(This looks like a lot less fun than it really was, but trust me.)

We blew through two pitchers of margaritas and some pretty decent mexican food - the company was great and our boobs server was cute. Kind of resembled Sandra Bullock, only with a higher boob kitten factor. (She had REALLY great hair. I don't think the boys noticed.)

I think I got about four rounds of my Green Gable and two or three rounds of my Pomatomus sock done all total. But look how much fun we had "knitting"!


Travis thanked me for dragging him out of his "awww, but I was gonna sit on the couch tonight!" mood and taking him along. I think he was worried he was going to spend the night listening to women swap muffin recipes and clack needles. (He's not really schooled in what a Knit Night ACTUALLY is.) It always surprises us a little when going out is so much fun - we get so stuck in our rut of monotonous nights at home that we forget that leaving the house is a GOOD thing!

(Thank you, Kathleen - how HAVE I made it through the last six years??)

Oh, and thanks to the margaritas, the enchiladas, or both, I had a dream last night that I was waaay late for a training class I'm conducting today because I got on the wrong elevator and ended up at the pier. (There is not a pier anywhere near here, and in order to get to the pier, the elevator had to travel west. Yes, many elevators tend to travel north and south. But my enchilada-margarita elevator moves west.) I think I may take the stairs down to the training room today, just to be on the safe side.

(PS: Yarrrrrrrr!)

Mission: Find a Clever Title

Psst: I updated the shop with a few pretty things.

You know what I love? I LOVE that every time Helen Mirren shows up at an event (i.e. the Emmy Awards) looking stunning and glamorous and like a fine and shining example of the aging process every woman should aspire to, and her name is announced, Travis runs into the room, skitters to a halt, plops on the couch, exhales deeply, and exclaims, "She is SLAMMIN'!!" Seriously, every time the guys at work discuss hot women, he really and truly I'm-not-kidding claims to want just twenty minutes alone with Helen Mirren. (Though, for the record, he does also have the more standard crushes like Scarlett Johnasson.) But Helen - he's completely smitten with her! It gives me hope for the future, that he'll still find me sexy at 60. (As long as I can keep myself together like Helen has....eesh!)

(He also made it a point to be effusive about America Ferrera and declared mostly everyone else to be "pretty.....but too damned skinny!")

That's all I'll say about the awards - I get a little overly enthusiastic whenever I watch these things, and I know that's not what anyone's here for. I could give my Tony Bennett rant, but I won't. (It's not directed at Tony personally - I just don't think the musical-or-variety-program category is a fair one.)

Okay, so! I totally missed the Fiber-In altogether, although I'm kind of glad. No offense to any of the organizers, but from what I heard, I think I would have been disappointed. Besides, I have plenty of festivals to prepare for, right?

I'm trying to knit - I picked the Green Gable sweater back up, because I am determined to finish a garment. (I think I'm about thisclose to determining that I'm just not a garment knitter, but I really REALLY want my Tangled Yoke Cardigan, so I'm not willing to concede just yet.)

I did this too:

This is (unset) navajo-ply merino in Funky Carolina's "Singed" colourway. It's half the roving - I still have a little pile to play with, yay! I think I'll call it "Toasted Marshmallow" 'cuz I like my toasted marshmallows reaaaally toasted - like, light-'em-on-fire-and-let-'em-burn toasted, and this skein kinda reminds me of them.

And I did this:


Handspun from Sereknity's superwash merino in "Clownin' Around", two-ply. Travis named this skein "Sweet Tarts". (Why do all my skeins end up named after food??)


I cast on for Pomatomus (do I even need to link that?) finally - I tried these once before, but it was maybe a bit over a year ago, when I still wasn't able to "read" my knitting and I was rubbish at reading charts, so this was a much more difficult pattern than it is now. I cast this on yesterday and even though it's slow going (lo how I despise thee, 1x1 stuff) I'm totally loving it. The yarn (Funky Carolina's merino/silk blend in "Hermione" colourway) is perfect for it - nicely variegated but not too much, and not a stitch of pooling so far. I'm thinking these might be for my mom - she says Hermione reminds her a LOT of me (I was a darling child) and I thought Pomatomus seems like the kind of sciencey pattern Hermione would be nuts about. (Yes, "sciencey" is a word.)

We had a Game Night on Saturday (how suburban are we?) and a bunch of friends came over and we drank wine and ate guacamole and played Cranium and Last Word. Travis and I got into a shouting match over.....something, I can't even remember now, but it had something to do with him thinking I made some word up.....and the whole thing ended with me screaming, "You wanna Google it, m*****f*****?" and everyone (including us) bursting into shrieks of laughter. (It was a good-natured shouting match - fortunately for everyone involved, I don't take games nearly as seriously as I used to.) So yeah, now that's our catchphrase of the moment. (Dainty, no?)

I finished these, too:


These are Fiesta Boomerang "Sedona" worsted weight socks, men's size ten with a ten-inch cuff, and still with 30g of yarn leftover. They're for Travis, and he can have them for Christmas. (Let me tell you how much that chapped his arse.) And rather than let the leftovers go to waste....


I'm making twee matchy ones! (Before you can ask, no.) I brought this in to show it to Travis, along with his full-sized ones, and I actually felt the parenting instinct in the room raise about 15 degrees.

But we have all the kids we can handle right now:


This is one of my most favourite pictures now - all my boys in one place. Look how cute they all are! Awwww...

Well, this was long enough, eh? Sorry - I'm going now.......ta ta!!

(..........heheheh "ta-tas".)

Yeah, About That Fiber Festival....

That didn't happen today. Stuff came up - nothing major, just stuff that meant I couldn't leave the house and drive 90 minutes away for half the day. I may give it a shot tomorrow.....

More later!

Oh, Have I The Yarn For Porning Today!

The sun finally came out for a few minutes yesterday, so I managed to get some hasty shots off of my goodies. Also, I got photos of a *something* I finished. I can't show it to you (neener neener!) but it's purdy. I'll say this - if you didn't sign up for The Sweet Sheep's Semi-Solid Sock Club, you're missing out!

Wanna see some evidence of the nasty wind/hail/rain storm from Wednesday?

It blew the covers off of manholes.


It also blew the bed liner out of someone's pickup truck and deposited it on the sidewalk - yikes!

Okee, yarny nummies!


Remember how I mentioned that I finally got Navajo plying down with the help of Naomi posting this video by The Yarn Wench? Well, then I finally pulled out this wonderful BFL dyed by Funky Carolina in her sought-after "Vampyr" colourway. Naomi had split this with me in a swap, because I was a big whiny baby about not getting it when it went up in the shop. (Naomi comes out of that sentence looking much better than me.)


This is about two ounces, about 90 yards, navajo-plied. (And it's mine, all mine - no shop for this little one. The merino Vampyr I have might make it in there, though....MIGHT!!)


This is the companion yarn to the fun artyarns I spun from Traveling Rhinos. This is about 1.6 ounces of BFL, also navajo-plied, and I think it's about 66 yards.


I'm a navajo-plyin' fool!


The Loopy Ewe recently had a Wollmeise update. Did you miss it? Yeah, I didn't buy any - I thought about it, and I almost did, but then I didn't. But when I showed up to Knit Night and met up with Kathleen, Karma congratulated me on my restraint and Kathleen presented me with a skein of Wollmeise!! (!!!!) Oh, the colours!! I petted it and sat very close to it all through the night, and left it when I got up. Kathleen reminded me to take it - see, I had thought she was kidding when she gave it to me. I figured no way she was actually meaning for me to take it home. (Again, clearly she is more generous than I.) So this is my new Wollmeise in the colourway "Wellensittichvogelfeder". My German is rusty, but I think that translates to "We, as a people, generally don't believe in using spaces to differentiate words, so good luck translating this one, bitch."

So what do you like from the Fall Knitty? Has anyone noticed that Aija is the new Cookie - there's a new brilliant sock pattern from her in every issue!! So -anything you're dying to cast on for right this minute?

Have a wonderful weekend! I'll be back with a zillion photos (or none, depending on when my brain kicks in) from the Florida Fiber-In!

April Showers Bring September Big Rocks Falling From Sky

Edit: NEW KNITTY!!!!

The weather has been pure crap the last few days - yesterday we had crazy huge hail and wind and torrential rain spring up from out of absolutely NOWHERE and they actually shut down the interstate until the storm passed. Weird. What does that mean for you? Crappy weather for pictures. I've gotten some great goodies and yarns and Etsy fabulousity, and I can't photograph any of it yet.

But I do have this update: my sock class at SAFF is full! Woohoo! And my other class only has a few openings left. I'm very excited about being a workshoppy person....though still vaguely terrified. Edit: I'm now teaching TWO sock classes - because of the fullness and demand - hee, I have demand!! - we've opened up another class.

Also, a cool tip that came to me by way of Kathleen, which she picked up from a lady at the knitting group at the LYS (yay prepositions!). It's a wonderful trick for yarn storage...you won't believe it's not butter! ('Cuz it's yarn. Check that out...yay, cheap clever solutions!)

Speaking of Kathleen - that's a really cool story. You can read it on that same post at her blog, but basically she was my joined-at-the-hip friend for a week - I met her like nine days before she moved to Germany six years ago, and we spent about every second together for that week and then *poof* off she went to Germany and we lost touch (PS: I suck at keeping touch.) But then in one of my Google fits a few years ago, I found her blog. (She's a knitter, which is where it all started for me. Between her and my mom crankin' out cool stuff, I had to try too!) So now she's back in the area, which rules!

Speaking of my mom, she is working on a knitted blanket for us - she's knitting squares that have special meaning to our wedding day, and the blanket will have its own little storybook to explain it. She's been giving me progress updates, and it's almost finished and sounds completely incredible - she just has to knit the border. (I say "just" but it's like twenty feet of border.) The finished size, she said, will be 54" by 66" - holy crap! I think my mom just lapped me in stick-to-it-iveness. I am so. dying. to. see. it. Seriously.

Finally - I never shared my swap goodies from my Funky Junkie swap! I was matched up with RaineyDayKnitter (this was a swap from the Flickr group) and she spun me this yarn that is in colours I absolutely and completely LOVE.

Gorgeous, huh?! This is Funky Carolina's "Tolan" colourway. What should I knit? I was thinking hat, but I'm ALWAYS thinking hats. I want something I can get a lot of wear out of, because I really really really like this yarn.

There were other goodies too:


She rules! I'm such a Bee Bar addict, too, so that was AWESOME. There's another swap starting up right now (we don't waste time spoiling each other, and we're ready for another round. (If you're interested in joining up, visit the Flickr group and check out the post.)

I guess since the swap's done, I can finally reveal what I spun for her, too!


About sock weight, a superwash merino wool, 310 yards of two-ply in the Summer Sunrise colourway. I really dug this yarn - I may have to get this colourway again, 'cuz you know I love rockin' the orange.

Happy Thursday!!

Wahoo!!

Finally, someone said that Britney looks good with a little meat! Thank you!! I don't see why we get all excited about celebrities gaining weight and the new hot un-anorexic stars (see also: Jennifer Hudson, Alicia Keys, Beyonce, America Ferrera, Kelly Clarkson, etc.) and crying about the over-skinnification of Hollywood, and then retching when Britney shows up on stage looking slightly larger than her old self yet still better than ANY of US. I think she looked hot (other than the bad, bad, bad weave - I want nothing more than to see her bounce out on stage with a twee pixie cut; own the short hair, girl, you crazy and we all know it, stop pretending there's hair there!)

In other news - spinning!

(Horrible dark photo - bad blogographer! Bad!) I love these skeins. They're both spun from August's fiber installment from Traveling Rhinos. (Best. Club. Ever.) I also have a little skein of BFL navajo-ply that I whipped up from leftovers. (My Navajo plying freakin' rules now, thanks to Naomi posting a link to this Yarn Wench video, which is basically Navajo-plying for the coordinationally-challenged.)


This one has a bit of everything - some felted beads I made (a first!) and some vintage lucite beads and sequins included in the club kit, and some locks (also included in the club kit - told you the club rules!) and some silk hankies I had on hand that just happened to match perfectly...


Can you spot the lucite bead? Shhhh...it's hiding!


And this other skein is almost the same, but this one has just the locks and sequins added in. Both skeins are plied with a very thin strand of BFL spun from the 2 oz. of roving in the kit, along with the 3 oz. of batt (seriously RULES).

Each skein is a little over two ounces. I'll be putting at least one of these up in the shop - I may not be able to part with both. Also, I'll put up the BFL skein (to be photographed soon). This is part of a new plan for my shop - in addition to my usual four ounce put-ups, I'm going to be doing something new. I love spinning up a whole bump of fiber, but sometimes people want some handspun without spending about $30 (I try to price as reasonably as I can without totally robbing myself) so I'm going to be offering *EL CHEAPO SKEIN-O-RAMA!!* (tm), my new half-sized put-ups. This way you still get enough yarn for a small project, and you could buy two skeins if you want more, but if you want less....you get the idea.

Look for it - *EL CHEAPO SKEIN-O-RAMA!!* (tm)

In still other news - any Florida people-types going to the Fiber-In this weekend?? I'll be there Saturday! Let the fall festival season BEGIN!! :-D

Grandmas Might Enjoy This...

But it has nothing whatsoever to do with knitting.

In keeping with my "all grandmas are cooler than me" theory, a speaker at the work convention I recently attended quoted a Rihanna/Someotherperson song, "Umbrella". I've never heard the song, and other than seeing this Rihanna person on some best-dressed lists, I'm not really familiar with her. (She is pretty, though.) The speaker was a woman who could easily be a grandmother (she's been with The Agency since 1977, two years before I was born) but she was hilarious and clearly infinitely more hip than me.

So I am braving the MTV VMAs tonight, in an attempt to discern what "The Kids" are listening to these days. And basically...uh, not much. Highlights so far for me include:

Sarah Silverman being bitchy (I love her, I do).

Justin Timberlake being presented with an award and then bringing some beefy guy up on stage to re-present the award to him (solidifying my Justin-Timberlake-Is-Kind-Of-A-Tool theory, as well, although Travis tells me the re-presenter is some guy named Timbaland, Mega-Producer and bearer of a name I recognize first as a brand of shoe); also, the irony that the guy who was loudly railing at MTV for all the schlock and "reality" shows and lack of music videos played anymore was presented an award by the beetches from The Hills.

Watching Jennifer Garner (beautiful and classy) put up with Jaime Foxx's drunk ass. Hint: if you are being looked at with frustration and amazement by a woman who chases a two-year-old around all day, and you've only been talking for seventeen seconds, you are ANNOYING.

I also am completely blinded by the ADD-ness of it all - hell, even on the VMAs no one can sit still for an entire song - snippets of live performances are being flashed from about twenty-seven different rooms and the whole thing makes me feel like I'm going to stroke.

And of course, Britney. Oh, seeing her half-heartedly strut around on stage while not even bothering to remember the words to whatever schlock she was lip-syncing..... Win or lose, I was prepared to enjoy every second of it. (Here's where I shame myself: I was really rooting for her. And I was almost happy to see her half-naked despite being significantly heavier than is socially acceptable in Hollywood. Her ass might be pushing a size six, but like glorious Stanley Tucci said of the respectable size six in Devil Wears Prada, "Oh, that's the new fourteen!" And of course all the press is about how horribly out-of-shape she is. Hell, I'd trade my lazy body for hers any time.)

But have you ever been to a club where there was a kinda hot girl there who was dancing like she really didn't want to be there because she's just WAY too good for this place but since she's here she might as well flail around for a while and call it dancing, rolling her eyes and sneering at everyone else in the club? Yeah, that was TOTALLY the vibe Britney was giving off. Maybe she was just terrified and unsteady and unsure of what to do (she'd been threatened within an inch of her career, after all, to keep it tame and behave)...but I think it may be time to hang up the hot pants. (I know, I know, everyone else has been saying that for like two years now, but I just can't give up on her! She's so....so....I don't know, I want to brush her wig hair and make her spit out her gum and Eliza Doolittle her up a little, you know?)

I will have knitting and/or spinning content, probably tomorrow, if this VMA thing doesn't kill all my remaining brain cells before it's over. Thank God for the fast-forward button on the TiVo; I don't think I'd survive without it.

More Sale Goodies, And So On

Traveling Rhinos: She's having a studio sale on some handspun yarns, batts, and other yummy stuff. (I'm in her fiber club and it's fanTASTic.)

Loriola: It's not fiber-related, and you may have seen it on Aija's blog too, but Loriola, maker of great lampwork goodies, is also having a sale. Her stuff is so nuts and cool - I picked up a couple of bones (one for me, one as a gift) and I LOVE this necklace. I may drop heavy hints to Travis on this one, since it TOTALLY reminds me of our wedding cake. Don't you think?? Edit: And now it's on sale, too, and oh my God don't you dare buy it before I can whine Travis into getting it for me because if you take it from me I KNOW WHERE YOU LIVE!!!

Back to Seattle (still can't show you my knitting, so instead, distraction. Shiny object shiny object).

We went to the original Starbucks:

We went inside, but I didn't drink - no Starbucks on this trip! Not when there's Caffe Ladro around! Who can resist picking up a latte from baristas who pride themselves on their Foam Art??


Coffee leaf! Heh! (On our last day there, we went to the store in Fremont for the *mumblemumble*th time in two days, and he did a "safe journeys" foam picture for us - a road and a sunset. I didn't take a picture, like a jerk, but it was really neat.)

For some reason, I took a lot of pictures of my food on this trip. My best friends are yarn and food. And cats.

I really should get out more.

Sale Alerts and Stuff:

I haven't enabled in a while! Let me catch up:

Flawful Art Fibers and Yarns: Sale on nummy rovings and beautiful handspuns (till September 6th, that's today!)

Schrodinger: Schrodinger's awesome box bags (only a couple left) are way underpriced and she's also offering free shipping! Buy fast before she realizes how much more they're worth! (Ms. Dinger needs a spinnin' wheel!) This is one of my favourite bags ever (I have a prototype, neener neener neener!) and I've already snatched another one up from the shop, too.

The YoYo: Self-serving, yes, but it's my blog - I've dropped the prices on several of my more mature listings, plus there's a couple of new goodies in the shop since I returned from Seattle.

The Sweet Sheep: Bunches of stuff on sale (and good news for the US, the exchange rate has swung back in our favour!) There are links to the stuff that's on sale here. (Also, did you check out her self-striping sock yarn club?? Umm, awesome!!)

So here we are looking mildly juiced at the Chateau Ste. Michelle winery:

Heh. Lilypads. Look at 'em. Heheheheh...

The aforementioned peacocks (I said cocks *snicker*):


And the funny pants lady:


Okay, it's not so much that the pants are funny, it's that the bamboo print bag matches the bamboo print pants PERFECTLY. I was in awe and maybe a little giggly about this. (We might have hit the gift shop and reserve tasting table before the tour, so I might have unabashedly chased this woman around the tour trying to get a decent photo of her pants/bag combo.)

After the winery, we went to Mama's Mexican Restaurant in Belltown. The booths were "decorated" - they encourage graffiti, so I whipped my Sharpie out of my purse:


For the record, I just drew the yarn and needles originally, but Travis insisted I add "The YoYo" as a signature. He thinks I'm famous. It's cute. (But to someone who doesn't have any interest in blogging, an average 200 hits a day sounds like a lot of popularity!)

Oh, and I didn't forget poor shaven Rooster. Here ya go - Travis managed to get more "accomplished" before heading up to Seattle. This is what my sweet beautiful kitty looks like now:


He's the anti-mullet! Business in the back, party in the front. *sob* But look at his face. He's not even aware, he's certain he's still a stud - he is also certain he smells quality catnip (I found some really good stuff on the trip) and he wants at it BAD. (See how he's standing there looking all innocent like he wasn't just rooting around in my bags? Yeah, don't buy that.)

So, now, go buy stuff on sale. :-)

Two Birds

I'll show you my sock-in-progress (revealable) and while I'm at it, I'll share the GREATEST SOCK PROJECT BAG EVARRR!:

Bwah! Ha ha!! I found this in a strange little toy-and-oddity shop (a rich man's Archie McPhee, if you will). I'm sure it's meant to be a purse for a little girl, but whatever! It's a bit on the small side, so it has to be used for smaller yarn balls (I tried stashing my other sock-in-progress, non-revealable, in there and it didn't fit). But seriously, I love it.

The sock is for Travis, Fiesta Boomerang in the Sedona colourway. I think this is one of my new favourite yarns; it's squishtastic and I adore it.

I noticed I get a lot more attention knitting in public in Washington; maybe it's just that Florida is kind of, um, impersonal (sorry, but it kind of is) but people don't tend to address strangers around here. On the ferry to Bainbridge Island, I got at least six people expressing awe that I can walk while knitting, a woman who squeezed my sock, and another who asked to see the ones I had on. (In Florida I get strange looks but never a word.)

Something else I loved about Washington: strangers will share food with you. At the Bellingham Farmer's Market, I approached a woman who was carrying the most delectable-looking muffin I'd ever seen. She said she'd gotten the last one, and I joked that meant she'd have to share. I was kidding, but she actually broke off a piece of her muffin for me! (I didn't take it - she earned the muffin.) Down here, I think someone would be as likely to throw something at you as do that. (Florida is a strange South-not-South hybrid; we have a lot of the qualities of the South but we can seem to be missing some of the charm and hospitality. See, how's that for a blanket statement! Your experience may vary, especially in smaller towns and other regions of the state, but I've found Orlando to be, taken as a whole, a rather rude city.)

Anyway, back to the sock. The pattern is improvised, although I always take notes so that I can make the second sock at least somewhat similar to the first. I tweaked the toe on this one, so the notes are a little more detailed than usual. The pattern, such as it is, is scribbled on a 2" square post-it. Wanna see the pattern?

CO - 40
2x2 - 2"
E-o-P flap 20st
(10 chains) sl1, k11 (turn)
D=40
toe @ 8 1/2", D @ EOR to 6 st/ndl, D @ ER
G 6-6

Makes perfect sense, right?? (Make ya nervous, Michelle?) It's all I need to know, though - and given my penchant for taking nine words and turning them into a book, I would probably write a four-page pattern based on this tiny post-it.

And for some weird reason, I measured my gauge (I have to assume out of curiosity, since I didn't really need to know it) and it's noted as a cramped note in the corner: 23st/32row:4".

Random vacation picture: Travis and Bono at the Space Needle:


Oh wait, that's not Bono. That's me. (I have GOT to remember to take the ridiculous sunglasses off for photos.)

Finally, some Nerd Candy:


I didn't take this at some museum for geeks. I wasn't allowed to take photos at that museum. So I definitely did not sneak a photo of this Battlestar Galactica costume just to entertain my friends. (I geeked out by proxy for this one - the Star Wars costumes genuinely excited me, but I don't watch this Galactica show - I just know people who do, so I got all excited on their behalf and took a picture.)

Tomorrow, some photos of Travis and me after a bit too much wine at Chateau Ste. Michelle. ("Hee! Peacocks are funny! Hahaha I said cocks! Let's open one of these bottles! Look, lilypads! Hahaha look at 'em! Ooh, that lady's pants are funny! Hey funny-pants-lady!!")

And All New Yorkers Are Rude Pigs

I hate blanket statements. I'm as bad as the next guy about throwing them out there, I'm sure. But I'm tired of having to hear about the Opinionated The View Panelist's latest moronic statement and the fallout that follows; first Rosie, and now Whoopi. I will say, however, that I'm proud to be a part of the follow-up to Whoopi Goldberg's coming to the defense of Michael Vick with beyond-ridiculous and offensive argument that he isn't a bad guy, just a Southerner.

Um, f*** you.

Here's the email I sent to The View (as though it could make a difference):

As someone from the South who's not in the habit of murdering animals, I'd like to ask Whoopi to please use caution when throwing out blanket statements that are hugely offensive to an entire region of our country. I know a whole mess of southerners, and not a one of them was raised to think that killing animals for sport is fun or acceptable; actually, I wouldn't associate with anyone who did believe that. I know we're not seen as being nearly as sophisticated as the fancy New York types, but we're also not wearing barrels and shouting yee-haw while firing guns at pit bulls. Enjoying dogfighting to the death and electrocuting live dogs is NOT a Southern value, it's a huge character flaw.

Generally speaking, I shrug and keep moving whenever I hear something ignorant or offensive, but come ON. The South has a hard enough time being seen as remotely respectable without some uppity bitch declaring that we can't even be expected to know the difference between right and wrong. She even went so far as to say she would have been shocked by this if he'd been from New York. (See, because New Yorkers have morals, wear underpants, and eat with utensils, unlike us cross-eyed inbreds down South.)

(By the way, about the title - of course they're not. It's just a literary device I'm employing.)

Back home now - I'll get around to posting stuff and photos eventually. I'm feeling excruciatingly lazy and worn out right now. (Not too worn out to rant and rave, of course - I'm still me.)