December 16, 2008

Dear Christmas, I hate you. Please go away now, kthxbye!

So, Christmas knitting is not going so well. I finally finished one sock of the pair of the Giant Blue Socks of Doom, and have finished the ribbing and about one inch of the leg on the second sock. Just to show you that I am not kidding about the giantness of these socks, here is a picture of the giant sock side-by-side with a "normal" (women's medium) sock:

Yeah. I am maybe a little crazy.

I cast on a My So-Called Scarf with the pretty Peruvia Colors I picked up last month, and have managed a couple of feet so far. I had to rip this back and start over more times than I care to admit, but I finally seem to have gotten the hang of this pattern. I actually really enjoy it.

I have made next-to-no progress on any of my other Xmas projects, including my partner's mittens. I am so screwed.

Besides the knitting-associated stress, I am just not looking forward to the holidays this year. My mother died around Christmastime (four years ago this January), and though it has gradually gotten better over the years (meaning I generally don't burst into tears at random moments), I still miss her most around this time of year. There is also some Family Drama going on at home that I don't want to be dealing with. It stresses me out. We are not a Family Drama kind of family, we actually are more of a repress-all-your-feelings-and-pretend-everything-is-okay kind of family, so I haven't had a lot of practice dealing with this kind of conflict. Unlike my partner, who seems to regard family in-fighting as normal and can't figure out why I am so bothered by it. Oh, well.

Anyway, here is a cute cat picture to make everyone feel better (please ignore my ghetto toenails in the background)!

Hope your holidays are shaping up to be cheerful and conflict-free!


December 09, 2008

Coffee

I often refer to coffee as the sweet brown elixir of life, and there is a reason for that. Like so many, I am literally non-functional in the mornings until I get my first cup, and if I go without I get the classic withdrawal symptoms (headache, fatigue and general crankiness). However, my relationship with coffee goes beyond the physical – I have a deep emotional attachment to coffee. It is so much more to me than just a simple caffeine source (of course, decaf is still blasphemy, or as Letterman put it “useless brown water”).
My love affair with coffee started very young. When I was small, my mother would let me (after much begging and pleading on my part) sip coffee from her cup with one of those tiny McDonald’s spoons with the long handle (does anyone else remember those? The bowl was about the size of my pinky nail). I genuinely liked the taste, but there was also the excitement of being allowed access to something so adult, and the pleasure of sharing something with my mother, despite her warnings about it stunting my growth.
Mom herself was a fellow devotee, starting most of her mornings with an extra-large from Tim Horton’s, picked up on her way to school (she taught first grade). I guess that’s why she never put up much of a fuss when I started to get serious about my coffee habit in high school, taking a to-go cup on the bus with me each morning and hanging out in coffee shops with my friends on weekends (hey, we couldn’t go to bars). Actually, I distinctly remember introducing her to the glory of the mochaccino with whipped cream one afternoon at the mall, likely during one of her epic Christmas shopping trips.
Coffee provided me with an income the first summer I lived away from home. I worked in a coffee shop in one of the downtown malls in Calgary. The pay was crap but the coffee was free! I think I did irreparable damage to my stomach and kidneys that summer, actually, and also my lungs since the shop was one of the few places inside the mall where smoking was permitted.
Coffee was my constant companion through my undergraduate and graduate degrees, and fuelled many a late-night study session in law school (there was a brief flirtation with green tea in there, but I rapidly returned to my true love). Coffee was also there on dates, and at meetings with friends. Even when I was at my sickest, and was told to stay away from it, I still couldn’t cut out that one cup in the morning, just that cup and five minutes to relax and organize my thoughts for the day ahead.
Coffee is a ritual. Grind the beans, pour the water, push the button – so simple I can (and probably do) do it with my eyes closed. Sharing it can also become a ritual. On Sunday mornings, I would make a pot and bring my mother a cup before leaving for church (I put in some time in the choir – I’m not religious but the choirmaster is a friend and desperately needed some sopranos who were not eighty years old). I love that we shared those casual, intimate moments, that without really thinking about it I found a way to show her that I cared about her and appreciated all that she did for me. I hope that’s the message I got across, anyway.
Independence and familiarity, stress and relaxation – these are all associated with the taste and smell of coffee for me. But most importantly, it is a tangible connection between my mother and me.
My mom loved coffee too.

December 04, 2008

Interview Preparation By Numbers

2: Number of eyebrows plucked
7: Number of times wondered whether I wanted a job where eyebrow pluckage would be important
1: Pair of pantyhose purchased
11,000: Number of times worried that hair would look "stupid"
2: Number of hours spent deciding what knitting to take for the bus ride (4 hours in total)
0.5: Number of hours spent actually knitting on the bus
3.5: Number of hours spent napping on the bus
0.5: Number of hours spent actually preparing for the interview

Actually I think it went pretty well. It is a government job and therefore the interview process is very structured - a lot of situational questions, and some reading and analysis, which I am good at now thanks to four years of law school. So I have gone straight from worrying about the interview to worrying about what I am going to do if they offer me the job, since it is in Ottawa and I live in Montreal. Although a four-hour daily commute would give me a lot of knitting time (due to my driving phobia I would be taking the bus), it would most likely involve me getting up at some ungodly hour and dudes, I am NOT a morning person. The idea that I might have to get up before 6am on a daily basis makes me feel physically ill.
So I might have to move back to Ottawa...BUT I DON'T WANNA!!!! I love Montreal, I love my apartment (that I lobbied hard for and that my partner cannot afford on his own) and I love actually LIVING IN THE SAME CITY AS MY PARTNER OF FIVE YEARS! We did the long-distance thing for four years while I was in law school in Ottawa and it was such a relief to finally move in together.
Why can't things just work out the way I want for once? Why can't I just get a great job here (or even a decent job)? WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY?
Okay, seriously, there are other options. The government is pretty good about flexible schedules and teleworking, so I might be able to split my time between here and there after a few months. I still have a few friends in Ottawa so I might be able to find a place to stay for a couple nights a week, so I would not have to drag my a$$ out of bed before the butt-crack of dawn in order to make it to work at a decent time. And the promise of a steady paycheque, with benefits and a pension plan and all that good stuff, is oh so tempting to me and my negative bank balance.
Anyway, they haven't even offered me the job yet so all this cogitation is perhaps unnecessary. I should just get back to my Xmas knitting and stop with the obsessing (I can't help it, it is my nature).
Knit on, my gainfully employed friends! Knit on!

December 01, 2008

I think I need to lay off the drugs...

...because last night I had one of those weirdly vivid dreams that are only possible when you are on mood-altering substances. No, I don't have a habit - I am on medication for chronic stomach problems, and this is one of the side effects. This particular dream featured some James Bond-like plotlines involving sharks and nuclear explosions, followed by a visit to a convenience store that sold ice cream and yarn (STR, to be specific). That part was pretty awesome, actually. Maybe I'll keep the dreams.
I am also on drugs because I somehow managed to convince myself that the Seattle Seahawks colours are turquoise and purple. They are not. They are, in fact, a mid-blue, navy, bright green and white. It might be the result of wishful thinking on my part (see blog header...). Anyway, I had already bought some turquoise Cascade 220, which will now have to be repurposed. I also made the mistake of assuming I could mix purple Cascade Pastaza (llama and wool) with the gold Cascade 220 I bought for a stranded University of Washington coffee cup cozy - I cannot. The weights and textures are too different. So now I also have a skein of Pastaza that has to be repurposed (purple Cascade 220 is on its way to me now). The Pastaza keeps telling me that it wants to be a slouchy beret, but there are only 132 yards in the skein, which is probably not enough. I don't think it is justifiable to go and purchase more of the yarn I bought by accident for a project that is intended to use up said yarn (because of course I cannot return yarn..that would be sacrilegious).
Back to my Seahawks problem - I do have some navy and white Cascade 220, which is currently tied up in my partner's Selbu Mittens (literally...ah ha ha I kill myself). Should I ever finish those mittens and should there be enough left over, I would still have to acquire some "Seahawks blue" and some bright green. For a simple, inexpensive project this is starting to be complicated and expensive (relatively speaking, but then relative to my NEGATIVE INCOME everything is expensive).

Solutions:
  1. suck it up and buy some more Cascade 220 in the appropriate colours
  2. turn purple and gold yarn into a scarf instead of a coffee cozy and forget about the Seahawks thing
  3. feign ignorance of actual Seahawks colours and use purple and turquoise anyway
  4. give up on this whole handmade gifts thing and buy everybody a book

Option 4 is starting to look more and more attractive since it is DECEMBER FIRST, PEOPLE! Holy crap, where did that come from? Gotta get going with the Xmas knitting since I only have one gift completed (out of the multitude I have cast on, but we're not talking about that today). I also have to prep for a job interview on Wednesday (yay for interview, boo for job location that is NOT Montreal), which I am a little worried about since I think my brain may have atrophied.

Happy December everyone!

November 27, 2008

Snow!

The view from my balcony window two days ago:




I love snow. We haven't had a lot yet this year (and this snow is all melted now because it rained), unlike my hometown of London, Ontario where they have already had a couple of storms.
What do we do when it snows? We bake!

Chocolate chip cookies with pecans. I use this recipe, but I make normal-size cookies instead of the big ones - the recipe yields about 3 dozen. Bake at 350 F for 12 minutes for perfection!

Why am I posting pictures of snow and cookies? Because my progress on my Xmas knitting is not photo-worthy. I am about two inches away from turning the heel on the giant blue sock, and I did some work on my partner's Selbu Mittens. I also purchased the yarn to make the school colours mug cozies from Red Bird Knits (Robyn has a sale on right now) - it is on its way to me now. I might have also purchased some *cough* sock yarn - Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock in Pilsen, which I can now take off of my Loopy Ewe wish list. C'mon, it was on sale! And priced in Canadian dollars...I have to say that the exchange rate right now is definitely deterring me from making cross-border purchases (although if there was any Wollmeise at Loopy I would be all over that).

Hope you are warm, wherever you are, and that your Xmas knitting is stress-free.

November 22, 2008

My kitteh

Just a brief post to introduce my kitty, Sabrina, since posting cat pictures seems to be a requirement for having a knitting blog. She is a perfect knitter's cat - meaning that she has absolutely no interest in yarn. She's currently snuggled up next to me on the couch, which unfortunately means only one thing: a hairball is imminent. Sigh.

Progress has been made on the blue sock and on the druid mittens, but nothing photo-worthy. I'll update again soon.

November 21, 2008

Over-zealous Xmas knitting

As promised, my Xmas knitting list. With pictures!



Garter Rib socks, from Sensational Knitted Socks by Charlene Schurch. These are being knitted for my cousin, who (as mentioned in my previous post) is 6'2" with size 13 feet. Ugh. Since he is a big Toronto Maple Leafs fan, my original plan was to make blue and white socks with a maple leaf on the heel. However, I could not for the life of me find a pattern for a maple leaf, and I don't have the time or the skill to make my own. So, blue socks (Berroco Sox in Doon). I might embroider Go Leafs Go on them somewhere.


Druid Mittens, from the Fall 2008 Vogue Knitting. I originally started these a while ago in a different yarn, but they didn't turn out so well (too short). These are made in Dream in Color Smooshy, in Good Luck Jade (link to The Sweet Sheep, where it is on sale). They will most likely be given to my sister, who loves green and who admired them when I forced her to look at the magazine with me (I was trying to figure out what kind of sweater she would actually wear. No luck so far, which is just as well since I really don't have time to make a sweater now!).

Selbu Mittens, from Folk Mittens by Marcia Lewandowski. These are for my partner. I am possibly the slowest colourwork knitter ever, so I am actually kind of worried that these will be gifted on the needles. It doesn't help that I can only work on them when he's not home, either. Yarn is Cascade 220 (beloved Cascade 220...inexpensive, many-coloured wooly goodness).

Nutkin Socks (free pattern!), by Beth LaPensee, in Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock, colourway 403 (Tuscany) (link to The Loopy Ewe). I'm not sure who these are for yet. I bought the yarn in the summer, and I wasn't really thinking about Xmas knitting at the time (which means that they were supposed to be for me, but now will most likely be pressed into service as a gift. Sigh.)

Ditto on the original intention for these - Monkey socks by Cookie A., from Knitty.com, in Koigu KPPPM P531 (I know I'm not the first to say it, but Koigu really needs to come up with some names for their colourways.). I loooooooooove this sock, and it will be very difficult for me to give it and it's unfinished mate away. Le sigh.

I also have a couple of things planned that haven't been cast on yet. I really want to make the Waves of Grain scarf from this past fall's Knitty for my aunt (the only other knitter in the family). I have some alpaca laceweight kicking around somewhere that would work, and I can get beads at the local dollar store (suprisingly, they have a pretty good collection.). If I don't start it soon, though, that scarf will have to be abandoned in favour of the My So Called Scarf, which I will make with the Berroco Peruvia Colors I picked up the other day - since it is worked on 8mm (US 11) needles, it will be a fast knit. I also had a brainwave last night about a gift for my other cousin who lives in Seattle - I was going to make her a scarf but decided instead to make her a couple of coffee cup cozies, one in Washington Huskies colours and the other maybe in Seahawks colours. Personally I think this is genius - a personalized gift that I can probably make in a day or two, and that she is more likely to use than a scarf (she does love her Starbucks, and warm woolies not such a necessity on the west coast). The only problem is I don't have the right colours in stash, but that can easily be remedied (more Cascade 220, perhaps?).

Other fast gift ideas - I know I can knock off a Calorimetry in a day, and I have a couple of hat patterns stowed away as well. I've also already purchased a couple of books, which I don't think violate my intention to stay away from commercial crap gifts - no matter what you may think of the publishing industry, at least a book is something crafted by an artist.

For post-holiday knitting (yes, I'm already looking forward to it), I need to finish my February Lady Sweater, which I really would like to wear someday. I have the yarn and pattern for a shawl (Evelyn Clark's Forget-Me-Not) that I am excited to start - it will be my first major lace project. Also, back when I had more money than sense and was still in the major stash acquisition phase, I dropped quite a bit of cash on the yarn for the Modern Quilt Wrap from Folk Style (that would be 9 skeins of Kidsilk Haze...yeah.). At the time I was not an experienced enough knitter to deal with the slipperiness of the mohair and silk, so I abandoned the project. Now I think I might be up to the challenge...maybe. Hopefully. I also have my beloved skeins of Tanis Fiber Arts to turn into socks...and my Malabrigo Sock (link to Valley Yarns, a Canadian web retailer) that I want to make into a stole...and...and...well, I think you get the picture.

So that is what I am making for the holidays - what are you all making? Good luck with your knitting, all!

November 18, 2008

Crap.

So, yeah...it's been almost two weeks since my last post.
Time to decide how much I want to reveal about myself here. I think I'm comfortable enough to say that I had a pretty serious bout of depression a couple years ago, and occasionally I still go through bad periods. It doesn't help that I have a bit too much time on my hands of late; time to dwell on stuff.
On a lighter note, part of my process of dragging myself out of the depths of despair involved some retail therapy of the yarn variety. I decided a while ago that everyone on my Xmas gift list is getting something handknit, or a book. Or both, if I really like them. I'm trying to knit mostly from stash since part of the point of this exercise is to save some moula - I can get a bit out-of-control with the shopping around the holidays - but since I tend to acquire stash in colours that appeal to me, I was a little low on manly-appropriate yarns. Somehow I can't see my 6'2" cousin wearing pink and purple socks.
S0 off to the yarn shop I toddled. I decided to visit a couple new (to me) stores, Tricot Quartier in NDG and Mouline. Tricot Quartier is cute, with a decent selection, but nothing particularly appealed to me for socks, especially socks that I am going to be knitting for a loooong time (6'2" man with size 13 feet...). However, I managed to grab a copy of Charlene Schurch's Sensational Knitted Socks (I'd been looking for a good sock reference for a while) and some of those cute SOAK garment labels. Oh, and some Peruvia Colors in Berry Bush for a scarf (which will be gifted, I swear! Shut up, stop looking at me like that!)
Mouline is a yarn shop after my own heart - wicked selection, including some locally-dyed sock yarn (Tanis Fibre Arts - that link is for her etsy shop), the biggest Malabrigo selection I've seen here so far, and most importantly beaucoup sock yarn in guy-friendly colours. In addition, the owner Scott was a great help in figuring out some yardage issues (again with the ginormous socks for gigantor feet, but he has size 15's so he knew what he was talking about) and just generally super-friendly and chatty. He also really knows his stuff. I grabbed some Berocco Sox in Doon and...two skeins of the TFA (chestnut and stormy). These are also potentially for gifts but I may be tempted to keep them for myself.
Next time I think I will post the details of my Xmas knitting list, complete with pictures!

November 06, 2008

My first meme!

Well...I have failed in the keeping the blog regularly updated department, but there is a good reason (I swear! I swear!). Said reason being, I finally killed my devoted laptop. My Toshiba had been with me since the summer before I started law school, making it more than 4 years old - a good run, especially considering how much abuse I dished out to it. It was starting to show it's age, though - the fan was dying, it was taking forever to boot up, and it was generally doing unhappy computer things. However, I have to take responsibility for the final death knell - I spilled about half a glass of (wine) water on it, and it finally just stopped booting up at all.
I have now replace it with an eeePC 1000H, which I have named Obama in honour of the fact that it arrived on the day of the US election. My love for it burns strong and bright, especially since it weighs less than half of what the Toshiba did.
Another reason I have not updated the blog...Molehill Empire. Do not click that link unless you are strong-willed, or have masses of free time on your hands (or have already been sucked in). I am a Tomato Dealer right now, and am eagerly awaiting the arrival of my first quest.
So I'm cheating a bit here, since I wasn't actually personally tagged, but Glenna posted this list over on her blog and I think it's a good opportunity to get some knitting content on this blog!

Seven Knitting Things About Me:
  1. I have been knitting since August of 2007. I started because my doctor recommended that I get a hobby, and I flashed on a memory of my Aunt teaching me to knit when I was seven, so I wandered into a LYS and picked up some yarn for a scarf. I made three of those scarves (2x2 rib in a fuzzy mohair-acrylic blend) and gave them away as gifts in December.
  2. Since I joined Ravelry, I have become much more adventurous in my projects, and have learned (I feel) a lot of new techniques, not to mention a lot about really great yarns. Yay Rav!
  3. I love sock yarn. Love it. I spend more time than I am willing to admit seeking it out online and mentally fondling it. I am not quite convinced that it does not count as stash, though, probably because the kinds I like are expensive.
  4. I did not finish the first sweater I started, because I fell out of love with the yarn I had chosen for it (it was a single, and had the unfortunate habit of pulling apart as I knit it). I am determined to finish my current sweater (February Lady Sweater, because I am a follower), hopefully before the month it is named after arrives.
  5. I have a mild obsession with really complicated mittens. I very badly want a copy of Lizbeth Upitis' Latvian Mittens book (second one down), despite the fact that I am very, very slow at colourwork (as evidenced by my snail-like progress on my partner's Selbu mittens...they need to be finished for Xmas).
  6. I do not have a ball-winder or a swift, so I hand-wind quite a lot of my yarn, when I forget to have the nice people at the yarn store do it for me (or when I buy it online). After some pretty harrowing experiences with tangled skeins of laceweight, I have perfected my technique (involving the back of one of my dining room chairs and a lot of patience) so that I don't dread winding up a new ball anymore. I still wouldn't say no to a ball-winder and swift, though.
  7. Wow, this list is turning into a bit of a wish-list...I'll try not to make this one about commercial aquisition. Okay...I intend to start making mitered squares out of my leftover bits of sock yarn, which I will eventually turn into a blanket. Maybe for a baby...maybe for my baby, since it will likely be years and years until I have enough sock yarn bits to make anything that would cover a baby.

There you go - seven things! I will absolutely update the blog more often, despite my obsession with growing tomatoes.

October 27, 2008

Dear Rhinebeckers...

I would like to request that you stop posting about Rhinebeck. Those of us who were unable to attend, due to reduced circumstances or gruelling work schedules, are tired of hearing about how much fun you had, the great food you ate, the fantastic yarn you bought, the famous people you met, the perfect sweater weather, the great Ravelry party, and the general awesomeness of Rhinebeck. It is heartless for you to continue to rub it in the faces of we non-Rhinebeckers. Furthermore, the fact that some of you have acknowledged that you are aware that we non-Rhinebeckers may not want to hear about it, and have gone on to post about Rhinebeck anyway, indicates a level of callousness that I am shocked to find among knitters. What are you, sadists or something? Do you not see how you are torturing us? So, I am asking you to immediately cease and desist discussing Rhinebeck on your blogs.

(um, except for the photos of the yummy yarn and fibre...those can stay.)

Thank you,
The Management (of this blog)

October 24, 2008

The Basics

I suppose the first order of business is to introduce myself, so here is some pertinent information about me.

I live in Montreal with my partner of five years. I am not a native but I consider this city my spiritual home. My love for Montreal and it's inhabitants will likely figure prominently in my entries here.

I am currently unemployed, despite (or maybe because of) my three (yes, three) graduate degrees - a Master's in science and two law degrees (common and civil law). This may make me the most over-educated jobless bum you know. Since graduating in April I have been exploring alternatives to traditional legal practice, which mostly involves a lot of sitting on my butt watching TV and and surfing the Internet. I am doing some freelance work as a medical writer and copy editor, which I'm hoping will help keep the wolves at bay for a little while - after six years of graduate school, I am beyond broke. My secret desire is to be a 'real' writer (still not sure what exactly that means), but I haven't written anything other than academic papers in six years, so I am using this blog as practice (that way I can tell myself it doesn't matter if/when nobody reads this - it's all about the process).

I knit. I knit quite a lot, actually (see above re. unemployed), but this does not mean that I churn out vast swathes of knitted objects, since I am pretty slow. I started knitting in my last year of law school, as a relaxation technique; however, due to my slightly obsessive nature and a bad case of last-year-of-school ennui, it soon became more of a replacement for, rather than distraction from, my schoolwork :). Now I do it mainly to keep myself occupied in between fruitless internet job searches. I also spend way too much time window-shopping for yarn online and reading other people's blogs. This blog, then, is the natural progression from passive to active participant in the online community.

I am a feminist, and a pretty hardcore one at that. This conflicts rather heavily with my current day-to-day life, which more closely resembles that of a housewife. I try not to dwell on this contradiction too much - it makes my head hurt.

Teal and aubergine are my favourite colours (ooh, two Britishisms in a row!). Aubergines (um, eggplants, for those who aren't up on their snooty colour names) are also one of my favourite things to eat, so it has double significance (teal does not - the only other meaning I can think of for teal has to do with ducks, and I am not fond of ducks. AT ALL.). I realized after naming the blog that I had kind of ripped off Limenviolet - sorry ladies, it was unintentional (though I have been listening to their podcast a lot lately, so who knows what was happening in my subconscious).

So these are the basics - more details will doubtless be revealed in time (if I can motivate myself to keep this up, that is!).

October 23, 2008

Testing, testing...

My "real" first post will be up shortly, this is just so I can play with the format.

Link