Time!

Okay, a little housecleaning first:

In case you missed it in the comments, Necia (my SP) ALSO runs her own business making soaps and other bodycare products. (Note that sort of thing is pretty time-intensive.) So, let's amend that. She works, runs her own business, does an ungodly amount of crafting, AND raises a small child. (I'm going to assume she doesn't cook or clean. And honey, if you do, keep it to yourself!!)

So....does anyone else feel like a schlub, comparatively speaking? :-) Ah, it gives me something to aim for.

Now....today I read some of the blog of a commenter (but just one of the commenters - I have so very many that it's just impossible to keep up, you know). Purl Needlemeyer (how cute is that) wrote about a world record, and I decided to do a little experiment.

(Sidelining here for a minute - how badly do I want one of these Gettin' Knit Together kits? This is Ms. Needlemeyer's - seriously, I love that - brilliant invention for discombobulated knitters like me. My LYS must start carrying this. I need one. For real.)

So, on to the experiment....the fastest knitter in the world knits 255 stitches in three minutes. (See also: feeling like a schlub, definition 2.) I wondered how well I could fare in three minutes. (Heh.) Before I reveal my count, a few notes.

1. I am lazy. I'm not casting on for this sort of thing. So I worked with what I had, and what I had was my Picovoli.

2. My Picovoli is knit with Debbie Bliss Splittay Cathay, on Addi Torturas Naturas, the ones with the freakin' nightmare join that forces me to continually tug my knitting along for the workin', which is the only 24" size 4 circ I have. (I think - see also: need for Gettin' Knit Together kit, which includes a handy needle reference card that would tell me how much of each sort of needle I had....in what I consider to be a design glitch, however, it would fail to take me by the hand and show me where in my cave I might have left that needle - not that it would matter, because inevitably, it would not be there and would instead be found weeks later, covered in slobber and teeth marks, rendered useless, in the dog's crate.)

3. Stitch markers. Slipping a marker counted as a stitch (but I think, for some bizarre reason that involves how klutzy I am, it takes me much longer to slide a marker than it does to knit a stitch.)

4. OCD. I had to tink and re-knit a stitch that I deemed unsatisfactory. I counted this as three stitches (one to knit it wrong, one to tink it, one to knit it right.)

5. Stress. When I started, I fumbled quite a bit. I usually do well under pressure, but I was kind of tense during this. What - because there was so much riding on it? I don't know. I didn't adjust for stress, but I know I would normally knit faster than I did for the first 30-45 seconds.

So my total, given all that? 87. Well, 85 actual stitches, without that tink adjustment, or 83 stitches and two stitch markers....but hey, I might do way better with regular old yarn on regular old needles during regular old time. I'm pretty happy with this. Onward and upward! (I will never get anywhere near 255. I don't think I'd want to....knitting that fast doesn't even sound like fun. That's my excuse, and I'm sticking to it.)