Saturday, March 29, 2008

Rare FO Sighting

Whoa, whoa, what?! Nemo actually finished something?! Which project was it? The Holi belt? the Rangoli tam? that Sakura scarf that's been sitting on a stitch holder for a month?!



Nope! New project! New tam, actually. Using Crazy Aunt Purl's easy beret recipe, modified for size 8 and 10.5 needles, using a skein and change of Patons Rumor in Duberry Heather. Pictures:


Look Ma! DPNs!


Showed this one to a non-knitter and they said "... That's a hat...?"


Blocking! Yes I am actually blocking something.

The pattern was quick and easy and fun. I'd never used DPNs before, and Chris's advice ('think of them as just a bunch of cable needles') really helped. I am loving the bamboo, too - I'd have dropped so many stitches on metal or plastics. I used my Addi Turbos for the brim, I do quite like them as well. The yarn is very nice and soft, though I wish it weren't quite so hairy.

The verdict on the FO, though? Well, the jury is still out. I tried it on unblocked, and... Well I'm not sure if I just made a gigantic, ridiculous-looking mushroom or if I just look like crap with this kind of hat. The roommie is housesitting again so she's not here to tell me. I'm gonna wait till it's dry (that last shot is of it blocking with a plate in it, in the sink) and then try it again. Maybe bring it to work and ask the girls what they think. And yes there is a gaping hole in the top - I decided I was sick of decreasing and to hell with it, the stitches can be pulled together tight, right? Um. Yeah. Not quite. But I don't mind so much. (I'm more worried about the possibility of the whole thing being a complete failure, to be honest.)


In other news, if you want to have a laugh, try explaining a ball winder and swift to a non-knitter, very dirty-minded family. Somehow they ended up with, and this is a direct quote: "The balls whack the skank, and you can do it with your elbow, too."

Yeah, I don't know either.

Saturday, March 22, 2008

Holi Hai!

Happy Holi everyone!

I posted a while back about Holi, and how I wanted to celebrate it. (Quick refresher - Holi is the Spring festival of colors, celebrated in India by throwing colored powder or water at each other, most often while wearing white clothing so the colors show. I can't run around a call center throwing powder at everyone, so my plan was to get some colorful stickers and stick them on people.) Well, I didn't finish the Holi belt - actually, I finished zero of three incarnations of it - but my amazing roommie came through for me and lent me a white blouse and a gorgeous colorful scarf for the occasion. Then I got these:



which were perfect. Little colorful hands, like I smeared a handful of powder on someone! How cute!

So today I celebrated by running around sticking those things on everyone, yelling 'Happy Holi!' (and then explaining what it was about). It was quite fun actually. I think the only person who enjoyed it as much as I did was the one person who actually knew what the holiday was (he's Hindi). The look on his face was priceless when I got him. I also listened to 'Holi Re' on repeat on my mp3 player. And just so you guys don't think I'm making this up and have gone off the deep end, I went on YouTube and hunted up a bunch of Holi videos for y'all. These are just the Bollywood ones, song-and-dance numbers from movies, but if you put in 'Holi' in the search on YouTube you can find some news coverage and other assorted stuff.

Holi Ke Din from Sholay.
Let's Play Holi from Waqt.
Holi Khele Raghuveera Awadh Mein from Baghbaan.
Rang Barse from Silsila.
Holi Holi Holi from Meri Jung.
Soni Soni from Mohabbatein (this one has Shah Rukh in it, so pay attention...!)
Holi Re from Mangal Pandey (which is what I've been listening to all day.)
Holi Aai Re from Mashaal.
Ayi Hai Holi from Ilaka.
Aayo Phagun and y'all I don't even know what movie that's from, but I'm putting it up here because the quality is hilariously awful.


And now I will go celebrate some more - in the form of cherry cheesecake my grandmother made for me!

Sunday, March 16, 2008

Longest. Post. Ever. Seriously.

The thing about slacking off on blogging is that when I get back to it, I have a lot to catch up on. So this post is gonna be a bit long-winded.

Let's start by getting the bad news out of the way. In point-form, because I am a dork.

  • I had to frog the Celtic Cable scarf. I dropped a stitch somewhere in the second pattern repetition... in the middle of the Saxon braid... and I wasn't using a lifeline. (Hubris much?) I probably could've laddered it, but let's be frank, I'm not that good at laddering stitches even in plain stockinette, so I said #$@! this and ripped it. (Actually I said a lot more than just #$@!, I'm sure the neighbors were scandalized.) I'll recast it at some point.
  • The bib was also frogged, since I'm not so sure about using a satiny acrylic for a baby bib... I'll hold off on that and see if I can find a nice cotton, though I doubt I'll get the same chocolate-brown color.
  • Still more frogging: I frogged Kaitlan's Rangoli tam, having figured out that yes, it does bother me that I knit the rim inside out and thus the cables don't line up properly.
  • Boys are stupid. Let's leave it at that.
  • So when they were writing the third season of Buffy, do you think they just went, Oh, let's turn all Buffy's friends/family/acquaintances into raging arseholes? (Show's still good, it's just... I kinda wanna punch Willow, Buffy's mom, and especially Xander in the face.
  • Oh my GOD there are dirty dishes in the sink again I swear I just did them and what is the DEAL with all these spoons and no forks?!

Right. Now that that's out of the way... The good.

My mum called me the other day to tell me that she'd bought me a new mattress, and they are apparently delivering it on Thursday. My current mattress is old, and uncomfortable, and causes me a lot of back pain, so this is Really Good News. The caveat being, my room has to be clean and clutter-free for the delivery on Thursday. (Let me put this into perspective for you: I have lived in this apartment for six months. I have not unpacked the boxes in my room. Stuff has been piling up in jumbled heaps. It is... The Disaster Area. This is quite normal for me, but perhaps not conductive to mattress delivery... especially if I can't even get the door all the way open.) I am taking this as good news, since a clean room would probably be a good thing.

My mum also said she would take me to London-Wul as an Easter treat, and - her words - get me 'some wool... as a gift'. MY MOM RULES.

Yesterday I went to Cricket Cove, and expanded my needle collection by a lot. I got some bamboo 8's, and double-pointed bamboo 10.5's and 8's, and circular Addi Turbo 8's with a 24-inch cable. (Yes, I realize I now have three different pairs of size 8's. Sshhh.) I also found this gem:



That is 12-ply 100% Cashmere, y'all. It is the most gorgeous, soft, cushy, squishy, yummy yarn I have ever seen. The colors are gorgeous. Trust me, that photo does not do it justice. The pattern it came with is also adorable, and really easy, and done on size 13's so it just flies off the needles.



I am maybe in love with this kit. (At 36$, it's probably a good thing I got the last one of this colorway... Otherwise, helloooo bankruptcy.)

Nathalie the GENIUS fixed my computer monitor, sort of. See it's this old CRT that has seen better days, and when you power it on it'll go black for a while, then really light, then power off, or get white lines through it... When it warms up it works fine, but there's a like, 20-minute span where you have to hit the side of it for it to get to a point where you can see what you're doing. And when I say hit I don't mean 'gently tap' like my friends think when I tell them to hit the monitor. I mean 'really unleash your frustrations on the thing'. But then Nathalie - my awesome roommate and UNCONTESTED GENIUS - said, What if you just leave the screen saver on and don't power off the monitor? Well hot damn, it worked. I just leave a blank screen saver on all night, and in the morning I wiggle the mouse and voila! The monitor works! (Someone remind me to get Nathalie a cake or something.)

Nat and I had a pretty darn good weekend, which included me getting seasons 4 and 5 of Buffy on sale, the world's best waiter, amazing sweet potato fries with curry dip (y'all, seriously, go eat at the Old Triangle. Get Mike to wait on you if you can. That guy is awesome.) and a lot of Guitar Hero 3. Crystal even came over to play, it was fun.

And then today was the Knit-In, which Nat and I attended and thoroughly enjoyed. What a day we had though, let me tell you. See when we signed up we didn't really think of where Saunders Country Inn was in relation to us and how we were gonna get there. "Oh, we'll just cab it!" said we, foolishly assuming it'd be a relatively short drive. Well. Let's just say Saunders Country Inn is not exactly next door, yes? It took us about a half hour to get there, but dang did we ever luck out on the cabbie we got. This guy was hilarious. He kept telling us stories of how he freaks out the drunk people he gets after clubs close. Like, one drunk passed out in the passenger seat without telling him where to go, so the guy drove a block, stopped the car, shook the drunk guy awake and said, "Ok buddy, we're here, now what part of Halifax did you say you wanted to go?" Then he did this hilarious imitation of the drunk guy freaking out, before he looked around and said, "Wait a minute, we're still in Moncton! Don't freak me out like that man!" to which the cabbie replied, "Well now that you're awake, tell me where you really want me to drive you."

Hilarious. I just couldn't stop laughing, and he kept telling us more stories. Eventually we got to the inn, and I looked at the meter... $38.50. Ouch. And we didn't have a ride home, either, so I mentioned how we were gonna need a ride back... So he says, "Ok, tell you what. Just give me 30 for the ride here, I'll give you my cell number and when you need to get back just call me." How nice is that?! (We ended up getting a ride from one of the other knitters, which I feel bad about because we didn't tip him... I was expecting to do it on the way home. I left a message on his voicemail, though. I hope he calls back. If anyone deserves a tip, that guy does.)

The Knit-In itself was really nice. I met the lovely K of Ladybugs and Yarn (and she showed me what I was doing wrong with the long-tail cast-on... As predicted, I am a dumbass and was making a dumbass mistake that was easily fixed!) I was the youngest person there, but I didn't feel weird about it at all. I recast the Rangoli tam, worked on that for a bit, then worked on my Handmaiden cashmere kit for a bit. I met some nice people, saw some gorgeous projects, and had a good time with my best friend. (Also, they served us chocolate cake. What more do I need.)

I picked up these beauties:



Manos del Uruguay 100% Wool. Just gorgeous, I had a hard time picking just one color. Nat got three skeins of a really nice red with subtle pink variegation, it's beautiful.

One of the very nice and generous Cricket Cove staffers drove me and Nat back home. We helped them bring back the stock they'd brought from the store, and some new stock, and I just had to take a picture of the trunk of the car:



That's all yarn, and there were two more garbage bags full of it in the backseat with us. (K and I both took pictures of this momentous event. You can identify bloggers by the crazy, I guess.)

Right, 1:12 am and the towels should be done in the dryer. If you made it through this whole post... pat yourself on the back.

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

I Need More Hands...

No new knitting at the moment, as the roommie and I are busy...

Guitar Hero 3. Seven day rental.




See you in seven days.


(Okay, I'm exaggerating. The Knit In is on Saturday, and I will definitely be posting something then.)

Sunday, March 9, 2008

Ten Things

My shift at work is changing, which means I finish at 7:30 instead of 10, which is good... But it means that my days off have changed, and instead of having Sunday and Monday off I have Thursday and Friday. So right now I am on day five of what I thought was an eight day stretch with no days off, but I learned today is really a nine-day stretch. Oy. Plus my back hurts, and I bought myself some muscle analgesic... but I can't reach to put it on. (Damn stubby arms.)

So to keep my mood up, here are Ten Things I am happy about today.

1. Season 2 of Buffy. Specifically, Angel, Spike and Oz.

2. Roses on the coffee table. I went to the grocery store yesterday and picked these up because they were pretty... They're making me think of spring.



3. Dumbass-proof Olivieri noodles and sauce means I had three-cheese tortellini with rosée sauce for supper tonight, and will have it for lunch tomorrow. Yum!

4. Kate Nash. I stumbled upon her video for 'Pumpkin Soup' last night, and since then I've had that and 'Foundations' stuck in my head. I really like her style.

5. Not being homeless, especially tonight when it's pouring rain and hail and pretty darn cold. I'm feeling pretty grateful for my heaters and that roof over my head right about now.

6. Nathalie is finally coming back to the apartment tomorrow! She's been housesitting for her parents for six weeks, and it'll be nice to have her back in the apartment. Especially since I'm done work a lot earlier now and we can actually hang out.

7. Knitting. I am apparently the Queen of Cables. Check it:




That is a Saxon Braid cable in the middle, and the pictures show one repeat of the sixteen-row pattern for the Celtic Cable Scarf. I am pretty dadgum proud of this, especially since the first few rows looked really crappy and I wasn't sure if the yarn was right for it... But once you have a few rows done, it starts to look okay, then when you see the whole repeat, it just pops. I can't wait to see what consecutive repeats look like.
(We'll just gloss over the fact that I screwed up the side border on the right...:)


8. Laughing at myself. This morning I wanted to plug in my mp3 player to load it, so I sat on the edge of my computer chair and leaned down to plug the USB cable... and the chair sliiiiiiiiid out from under me, I landed on my butt on the floor and the chair rolled into the hall. I laughed myself silly for ten minutes straight. I wish someone had been there to see it.

9. My Harmony cable needles from KnitPicks. I said it before, and I'll say it again... those things rule. (See point 7, above.)

10. My paid time off request for the Knit In on the 15th was approved, so while I am enjoying myself with my extra day off on Saturday, knitting and whatnot... I'm still being paid! Paid to knit! Does it get any better than that?

Saturday, March 8, 2008

My Knitting Badges

I stumbled upon this page a while back, and I think it is a really cute idea. So, in no particular order, here are the badges that I feel I have earned for myself.


The Proselytize Knitting badge: "A requirement for all Knitting Scouts, the recipient must do his or her bit to present knitting in a positive light, whilst at the same time avoiding all references to “hipness”, grandmothers, and yoga."

Well, it's a requirement, right? I mostly deserve this one. I talk and talk about knitting and yarn, and most of the time people seem to go "Oh, that's pretty neat!" I do lose points for mentioning my grandmother, I guess.


The I've Knit Items With No Conceivable Practical Application Badge: Recipients are those “special” campers who have knit items which somehow missed the mark of their intended application. There are probably more who are deserving of this badge than one would expect.

I really hope, given yesterday's post, that not too many of you are surprised that I am awarding myself this. The story behind this one goes, I was trying to knit my preggy friend some baby booties. My first attempt was successful, but they were made of Red Heart super saver acrylic yarn in bright red - not the prettiest things ever. So I bought some baby-weight yarn, a pretty variegated one with bright pastel shades, and cast on. The yarn had a much smaller gauge, so I figured I'd up the number of rows to make it long enough - but I didn't make it wider, so I ended up with this really misshapen... thing. It looked like a golf club cover... that a fairy threw up. Needless to say I did not bother knitting the second one...


The MacGyver Badge (Level One): The recipient must demonstrate clever use of a non-knitting tool in a knitting-related scenario. For instance, recipient has used paper clips as stitch markers, or successfully whittled and then utilized bamboo skewers as dpns.

The paper clip thing, for starters. And I've used a pen as a cable needle... It worked less than amazingly, but still decently enough for what I was doing (of course, I realized afterwards that I had a dpn I could've used... Again: dumbass.)


The Inordinately Fond of Novelty Yarn Badge: In which the recipient professes an arguably unhealthy affinity for yarn with slubs, sparkles, spangles, fur, feathery bits, and an unconscionable proportion of man-made fibre. Recipient makes no apology for the preference.

Uh, you've seen the stash, right?


And I have also decided to award myself two badges that aren't on that page (read: that I made up myself while bored at work).

The Eagle-Eye Badge (Level One): The recipient can instantly differentiate a knitted item from a crocheted item, at a distance of up to five feet. (I did this on the street today - there was a girl walking towards me on the sidewalk, and at about five or so feet I thought, That hat is crocheted!) The knitter is comfortable reading his/her own simple knitting, able to spot where a mistake has been made and quickly correct it. He/she will also openly gawk at anyone wearing a store-bought knitted item, and be able to recognize the pattern used, often muttering under their breath: "Geez, I could make that. And I could probably make it better." (Disregarding, of course, that it would be much less cost-effective, not to mention the amount of time it would take.)


The Yarn Hoarding Badge: Do I really need to explain this one?


(And in case you're wondering, the Eagle-Eye Level Two, the way I see it, consists of a knitter being able to read someone else's knitting, including cable and lace patterns; able to guesstimate gauge closely enough to do it on the fly when needed; and who, just by looking at a piece of knitting, can tell the type of fibre used, the weight of the yarn and possibly even the size needles used. Yeah, I am not there yet.)

Friday, March 7, 2008

And Now For Something Completely Different

It has been stated before that I... am a dumbass.

I know this. This is not news to me. I don't think I'm particularly stupid, but sometimes I just do stupid things. And then I call myself a dumbass. It happens, you know? If you look over to the left, you will read the sentence in my profile that goes like this: "... book-smart but street-stupid". That's what I mean, I know things and I'm intelligent when it comes to academics, but sometimes the street smarts just aren't there. I think everyone has their 'Oh damn, that was stupid of me' moments. I... just have them more frequently and publicly.

Like when I answer the phone and I mispronounce my own name. "Hi, my name is Eeuuuwwioe and I... um. Can I help you...?" Who does that?! This happens to me surprisingly often... (Actually when I do that it reminds me of this guy I once met, Keith? He was French, and had a really thick accent. He had trouble with the 'th' sound, so he could never pronounce his own name. "Hi, I'm Keit'," he would say. It was adorable.)

Er... where was I? Oh yes. Dumbass. Right.


The worst part is almost anytime I do something stupid, I both a) know I'm doing something dumb but apparently can't stop myself from doing it, and b) make a big deal out of how stupid what I just did was, thus drawing attention to it, which in turn makes it worse. And I do this all the time. Like, excessively so. Even mice know to stop reaching for the treat when it shocks them... My friends think it's funny, and it's a quirk of mine they've gotten used to.


Now understand I'm not talking about anything overly serious here. At most I mean something like, putting a chair in front of the cupboard to reach the high shelf... before opening the cupboard door, and then struggling with the door while standing on the chair and wondering why it won't open. (I did this when I was six. My mom sat there and just stared, and wondered how the hell I had taught myself to read when I couldn't even open a cupboard door. True story.)

I promise I have a point.

See, I've been watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I watched the first season while knitting the Neverending Scarf from Hell (look back a few posts and you'll see the one I mean), and while at first glance I just kinda went, "Well it's nice but I don't see what the big deal is about"... when I finished I realized I was hooked and wanted to watch the 2nd season now, now NOW. (Also, David Boreanaz? I never saw what the big deal with him was, either, and then I started watching Buffy... and a little light went on in my head. And today I watched part of season 2 and Spike showed up. Yum.)

So I watched the first three episodes of Season 2, with the aforementioned Spike appearance, and enjoyed it thoroughly. Now when I like something the first thing I usually do is run to Wikipedia and find out all I possibly can about it. Can anyone see where this is going? Anyone? Bueller?

Spoilers, right.

Below is the paragraph detailing the second season, with the spoilers edited out and replaced with what I am pretty sure is an accurate transcribing of what the intelligent part of my brain was yelling out to me at the time.

"The emotional stakes are raised in the second season. New vampires, Spike and a weakened Drusilla, come to town [Hey hey, that was humongous spoiler!]. Xander [Maybe you shouldn't be reading this!], while Willow [WHY ARE YOU STILL READING YOU TWIT!]. Buffy [AARRGHH!] Angel. Consequentially, she [WHAT! WHY?!?!]. He [That's it. I give up on you.]. Buffy [Consider this my two weeks' notice.]."

At least I stopped before I read the third season...

(What? Knitting? Oh yeah, right. Um. Cast on for a bib. Slacking off on scarves. More news when I have 'em.)

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

I'm Picking Up Good (Yarn) Vibrations

I'm on a little bit of a yarn high tonight. Chris just came over with my order from KnitPicks, and oh my gosh it is just gorgeous. I cannot believe so much yarn, so much beautiful yarn, cost so little. Combine that with the fact that last night I found more orange Wildwood yarn for the Holi belt, of the same dye lot, and some very very pretty pink beads for Sakura, and you have a slightly overwhelmed Nemo. It's a wonder I'm not hyperventilating.


If you want to see what I got, I will point you over to my Flickr set. (While you're there, check out the full stash!) Not pictured there are my new cable needles. Those things are so awesome! I'm also especially happy I got the Shimmer yarn (those hanks of brown/gold lace weight). They are soooo soft and pretty. Too bad the pink/yellow one was sold out.

Now here's where my good yarn karma steps in. I was kinda bummed that I only got two skeins each of the Wool of the Andes (the blueberry, pumpkin and avocado yarns), because they had less yardage than I thought (yeah, why didn't I check on the site before ordering? Because I am a dumbass.) They're beautiful, but what am I gonna make with two skeins? Not a whole heck of a lot. Well. It turns out, that tam pattern I'm making for Kaitlan? It's designed for 'just under two skeins of Knitpicks' Wool of the Andes'. HA! How frickin' awesome is that! I can make three more of these doohickeys! Which is good, because I love that hat. I hope it turns out well, is all.

Also, last night I went to Chapters and got a really awesome book called Super Stitches Knitting. I swear, I cannot put this thing down. I'll pick it up, flip randomly, and go "Ooooohhh, this is pretty... And this one... ohh that's nice... This'll be great for when I want a new project!" and then I put it down. And then twenty seconds later I'm flipping through it again, oohing and aahing.


And in case you didn't already think I was completely obsessed, this morning I was looking at some drop-spindle techniques for spinning yarn... And well...

I kinda wanna try it.

Sunday, March 2, 2008

Ring Around The Rosie...

I am super excited. Check it out:



That, my friends, is circular knitting by yours truly. That's right, I am breaking away from the rectangle! I am embracing the circle! I am enjoying the circle, even! I'm pretty freaking proud of myself for this. It's just k2 p2 rib so far, but soon it will (hopefully) be this. Yeah, wish me luck on this one, mkay?

This project so far is a learning experience, not just in circular knitting but also in casting on. I usually use a backwards loop cast-on, which I have learned is basically the redheaded stepchild of the cast-on family. The problem with a backwards loop cast-on is that when you start knitting the first row, you end up with a length of yarn between your needles that gets longer with every stitch you knit, until you end the row and it becomes tail yarn. I will attempt to illustrate (if you are a non-knitter, I guarantee you will not give two shits about this and you may as well skip it):

You start with a slip-knot.


Then you wrap the yarn around your thumb and pick up the loop with the needle, so you end up with this:



Tighten, and you have a stitch. Lather, rinse, repeat.



With me so far? Ok, so when you start knitting, this is what happens:



The knitted stitches are on the right, and the unknitted stitches are on the left. That long strand in the middle, on flat knitting, is not a big deal - you knit the first row, and when you're done you just have a longer tail than what you started with. No problem. But with circular knitting... That doesn't work, cause you're knitting a circle and joining the first stitch with the last stitch. So basically, that annoying length of yarn would be there the whole time you were knitting. I thought pulling on it would get rid of it, but it didn't, so I had to rip everything off my circs and try again.

So I went to Knitting Help, and learned the long-tail cast-on (the thumb method, because the regular method just does not work for me. I end up with a bunch of twisty stitches and the working yarn like four stitches behind where I need it to be. Clearly I am doing something wrong, but there's nobody around to correct me, so thumb method it is.) It works like a charm, the join is really nice - I'd heard horror stories of lumpy joins and was worried, but woohoo, mine looks good! - and I am loving not having to turn the work at every end of row. I even McGuyver'd myself a stitch marker out of a paperclip.

So Crystal is here and apparently she will aid in the Great Cleaning of Nemo's Room, and it looks like I ain't getting out of it. Wish me luck.

Saturday, March 1, 2008

Argh.

Okay, so I fail at beaded knitting so far. The silk is fraying, the dropped stitches don't look the way I want them to and the beads just end up looking lost on them. So I'm rethinking the whole concept, I'll probably end up not doing any dropped stitches at all and just doing the whole thing in garter stitch. In the meantime to stop the silk from fraying too much, I'm gonna practice my beading technique on something else. But I can't do that until I start another beaded project, which I figure I'll do when I get the laceweight I ordered from Knitpicks. If I have time to make the Holi belt after I get that so that I can wear it for Holi, then awesome, I'll make it. But in case I can't, I cast on a different one, out of Sean Sheep Wildwood yarn in bright orange:


The color is actually a lot brighter than that... blame the crappy camera.

I'm using a no-frills garter stitch and drop stitch sequence, no beads. It's the same kind of yarn as I'm using for Sakura, but I could only find one ball of the orange, so I'm a little bit worried about having enough to finish the belt. So I guess this weekend it's off yarn-hunting for more orange, or for another alternative for the Holi belt... I'd use something else from my stash but none of it is bright and colorful enough for my tastes, except the Noro Kureyon:



I don't want to use the Noro since I already have a project planned out for it (plus it's felting wool, not quite the texture I want for this project). The Wildwood has shiny nylon thread through it, which is why I like it for this project. I hope I can find some more.


I still love the Recycled Silk though, even if it is fraying to high heaven. (Which is mostly my fault anyway for frogging and recasting and refrogging and recasting and... so on.) The best part is finding the little bits of red silk buried in the pink - a red sari is usually a bridal sari. It tickles me that I'm knitting bits of someone's wedding dress.

I'm slowly chugging along on Sakura, and I frogged Cuddles (...again) and recast it using my 9s instead of the 13s, they were too big for the yarn and the scarf was too unsubstantial. I seriously have to get spare size 9s, I use them for everything... But if I'm gonna get more needles I think I'll get myself some wooden ones instead of these plastic jobbies. My 9s are the needles my grandmother gave me when she first tried to teach me to knit, they're these cheapie plastic ones and they are way too long but dammit, they are my favorite size (width) needle that I own, so... yeah. I keep switching projects back and forth from stitch holders just so I can keep using them.



I just finished watching Matusalem, which is a French movie made in Quebec with Marc Labreche in it... (when he was still hot). It was one of my two favorite movies growing up, along with La Grenouille et la Baleine which I cannot find anywhere which makes me sad. It's about pirates and ghosts and it is incredibly campy, but man do I love that movie. There's this one line in it that makes me giggle every damn time no matter how many times I've watched the movie, even though I know the line is coming. I even start laughing ahead of time because I know he's gonna say it soon. (I'd write the line down, but... it really wouldn't make any sense to anyone.)

I know I had a point... But I can't think of it now. Clearly it is time for me to go to sleep.