This blog is going back to schizophrenia, fiction mixed with personal thoughts.

I am moving the knitting content over to here: Georg's Thing, and will make more of an effort to update that every week.

This blog will be updated when and if the spirit moves me, and is just going to go weird like it started out as.  ¶ 11:29 AM

  Ode to My Socks
by Pablo Neruda
(translated by Robert Bly)

Mara Mori brought me
a pair of socks
which she knitted herself
with her sheepherder’s hands,
two socks as soft as rabbits.
I slipped my feet into them
as if they were two cases
knitted with threads of twilight and goatskin,
Violent socks,
my feet were two fish made of wool,
two long sharks
sea blue, shot through
by one golden thread,
two immense blackbirds,
two cannons,
my feet were honored in this way
by these heavenly socks.
They were so handsome for the first time
my feet seemed to me unacceptable
like two decrepit firemen,
firemen unworthy of that woven fire,
of those glowing socks.

Nevertheless, I resisted the sharp temptation
to save them somewhere as schoolboys
keep fireflies,
as learned men collect
sacred texts,
I resisted the mad impulse to put them
in a golden cage and each day give them
birdseed and pieces of pink melon.
Like explorers in the jungle
who hand over the very rare green deer
to the spit and eat it with remorse,
I stretched out my feet and pulled on
the magnificent socks and then my shoes.

The moral of my ode is this:
beauty is twice beauty
and what is good is doubly good
when it is a matter of two socks
made of wool in winter.  ¶ 9:46 AM

  Another day on the lake:

Loon42 to Control Tower. Come in Control Tower. Requesting clearance for take off.



This is Control Tower. You're cleared for take off. There's no other bird for hundreds of yards.

Roger Control Tower. This is it. I'm taking off...



Or... maybe not.

  ¶ 9:18 AM

  Dear Giant/Weis Markets (a grocery store for those not local):

I have been a loyal customer of Giant for about 10 years now. You have carried most of my favorite brands and have lots of workers that I have become friends with over the years. True, I have to buy some groceries at the two other stores in town (Wegmans or Price Chopper) because you haven't carried everything I like to have on hand. But I have done the majority of my shopping at the Giant every Monday morning for one reason only - the Giant has never had a shopping club card. If an item was on sale, it was actually On Sale and there was nothing extra necessary to make it so. No coupons, no cards, no gimmicks. I loved and respected that about the Giant, and preferred to give this company my money because of this fact.

This week, this changed, and my local Giant became a Giant-Weis store, and there was one of my friends who is a line manager there offering to sign me up for a shopper club card. I was Not Happy, but I did sign up. Because if I don't sign up, nothing that normally would be on sale would be on sale for me, and I like saving money as much as the next person. Then I went into the store, and of course, there had to be some rearranging done, or else we would not know it's a new store. The signage of course also had to be different. But these are minor annoyances. But then I started noting little things that the Giant normally carries, that you don't. Like the bacon bits I like, the Gyro kits, and Adirondack Lemon-Lime Seltzer. Or any lemon-lime seltzer for that matter. I should mention that I was very proud I got off of drinking regular soda and diet soda by drinking lemon-lime seltzer all the time. There's less chemicals and calories and it's inexpensive. This is what I normally drink, about a liter and a half a day. Every Day. And now you don't have it. The sodas that I will drink have also gone up in price, when I loved the fact they were 99 cents for a 2 L bottle at the Giant for a very long time. This was not the only increase in price on items I regularly buy. Sure, prices for groceries have gone up overall for the past six months since the rise in gas prices, but the prices did not go up that far at Price Chopper or Wegmans. But I chose not to shop at Price Chopper or Wegmans, because they have shopper club cards.

So now you have the shopper club card, your prices have gone up, and you don't carry my favorite drink. I'm beginning to wonder why the heck I ought to go to your store ever again.

Fuck you, Weis. Fuck you.  ¶ 1:19 PM

  Some of us are having way too much fun with that squirrel.



This is where you can play with a squirrel too.  ¶ 9:30 AM

  Once upon a time, I played a computer online role-playing game called EverQuest, and I played it pretty hard core for more than three years. I used to read forums and gaming stories related to that game, and one that caught my eye most referred to a guild called Seibwen Dekan. Yes, that's right, Naked Newbies written backwards. There was a great deal of role-playing back story related to the name, but it all boiled down to an essential philosophy I like to hold dear today.

We're all Naked Newbies when we start, and under our clothes and skill sets, we're all still newbies. We face something new every day. Because of the way the world is right now, our only constant IS change, so there's always something new to do, something to learn, something to discover. The other side of the coin of learning is teaching - sharing what you know with other people, because they are now standing where you were, and helping just feels good.

I embrace my newb-ness. I celebrate the learning and the seeking of things I do not know. I have resolved to help others along the path wherever I can- whether I perceive them as ahead of me or behind, they too will have something to learn, and in turn, something to teach. I love going to beginner classes, because I will always learn something new and I will always have an opportunity to share what I know. This is who and what I am. I am a newbie.  ¶ 3:37 PM

  If you find yourself with several hours (or just one hour at a time) of sitting in front of the computer and would like some thought provoking entertainment, I suggest watching all or some of the James Burke Playlist on YouTube. It's great to knit to. It makes me wish I had a stronger light on my desk, or I was working on a brighter colored sock.  ¶ 11:43 AM

 

And some days, Jazz actually wonders why I don't like politics.  ¶ 3:39 PM

  Why bull terriers should not be left alone with small children:

Markers aren't always washable.

  ¶ 6:40 PM

  One of the Fun Things To Do this summer includes spinning for the Tour De Fleece - a spinning event that runs concurrent with the Tour de France every summer. The idea is to find something that would challenge you personally, and try to achieve that goal during the three-week Tour. I have now been spinning a year, so why not try to do an achievable goal? I have friends who are also participating, which helps in the fun.

My friend Abby Franquemont is directly responsible for my wheel, so when she formed a team, I had to join in. Her team is called Team Suck Less, and that's the goal, one must by the end of the tour Suck Less. Oh, and you have to spin a mile in a day by the end of the tour. I'm not that good at production spinning - the most I have spun in a day is perhaps 500 yards (if I spun an abby batt and navajo plied it to about 125 yards which means three ply worth of singles and then the plying job in a day, which is exhausting for me). So I made the comment, can I just walk a mile while spinning? And Abby said, "You define the mile." So I vowed to walk a mile while spinning, and try very hard to Suck Less at spinning, and joined the team.

Today, Heather and I picked up our spindles and some silk and headed to the local high school track.

Here we are!

and we're walking

I dropped my spindle a few times more than Heather did. We had to stop and untangle at least once. We got lots of odd looks for spinning in public, and we walked on the outside edge of the track not to disturb the serious joggers. It's very hard to hold a spindle in motion and operate a camera at the same time. But we did succeed.

Just me

And I suck less. :)  ¶ 12:23 PM

  This is the beauty that is life at Camp in the early morning before anyone is up:


This is how I'll always remember my da:
  ¶ 10:51 AM

  In case you aren't aware of the Doings of the Sock Knitting World, and most of the readers of this blog just know me, there is a major event coming soon the first week of August that is being hosted by the Yarn Harlot and Tina of Blue Moon Fiber Arts called Sock Summit. This event is new this year, and seems to be Shangrilah for them what knits socks. They have acquired for teachers simply amazing people and all of the classes sold out within 24 hours of registration opening. This is not stopping people from planning to go and hang out in the merchant area or sit around and discuss socks and knit socks and meet other sock knitters internationally.

The sheer fact that such a convention will exist means I have to carry a mop around me when I think of it, because of course I'm going to drool. Realistically, looking at my budget, it won't happen at all, and I'm comfortable with that. Really.

We have a place on Ravelry for the store and the Tsarina's Flock to discuss things related to our Sock company where I am the Tserf and general office grunt. Now, the business is going to the Sock Summit - both the Tsarina/Lisa and Gwynivar/Jen will go and run the booth and sell sock yarn and tsock kits. Naturally, they have asked if I will be there too. I have foolishly stated that if the company does $5000 in sales between TODAY, July 9, and when Gwynivar leaves for the Sock Summit (probably August 3ish), then they will take me along too. What amazed me was that Gwynivar and the Tsarina have both agreed to this.

So, while the odds are Slim to None of this happening, I'll keep you posted. For those actually interested in helping this happen, I thank you from the bottom of my heart.  ¶ 6:10 PM

  Dear Mrs. Sanford:

I realize this is probably going to be a very rough time for you, and I'm sympathetic in that regard. I am writing to you to thank you for having a spine. Thank you for not doing the walk of shame at the press conference to tell the world that while yes your husband has been naughty, you will still stand by your man because he's in politics. Thank you for saying fuck that shit and slapping his ass with a legal separation. You go girl. Show your boys that it's not okay to cheat so they can be real men when they grow up and not dicks.  ¶ 2:44 PM

  Dear Vein and Laser Center of Central New York:

Your radio commercials creep me out.

No college-age daughter would brag to her parents that she's had all of her hair lasered off on her legs, under arms and bikini line. Not unless she wants her mother to think she's working the pole when she's not at school - because there's no other realistic way for a young adult to pay for the procedures when the bank of mom and dad are coughing up for school. Granted, she could have found some sort of sugar-daddy arrangement who has decided to fork over the dough, but we could debate if being an expensive whore is better than dancing on the pole.

I also don't care how much of a sasquatch dear old dad is - I don't think he's going to want mom to schedule his appointment either.

As for your actual target demographic - oh yes, I can see where getting rid of my chin hairs permanently might have an attraction, but I don't really want them mentioned in the same conversation as my daughter's bikini line.  ¶ 7:12 PM

  Knit furmiliation is fun. This is not our dog or my knitting, but I had to share it anyway.

Max says, "How you doing?"

  ¶ 5:24 AM

  Have you heard of the National Marrow Donor Program? This is a database almost anyone can join and you might be able to save a life.

Right now, June 8 - 22, registration is free and the usual $50 fee for a test kit is waived. So now, you don't have an excuse not to sign up.  ¶ 4:25 PM

  Sometimes it's nice to do a selfish thing to help someone out.

Piddleloop, a Ravelry friend, is selling knitting bags and accessories this week for the benefit of another Ravelry friend - we all have bassets in common. Our mutual friend, Amymacbeth, lost Hannah yesterday, after emergency splenectomy to try remove a cancerous mass. But now she's stuck with more than $3k of vet bills, and she doesn't have the cash. She's selling pottery on eBay, but I can't find a link to that.

Here's a pic of Hannah:



She loved cottage cheese and stealing Kleenex.  ¶ 12:29 PM

  Politically commentary for the week:

  ¶ 4:32 PM

  Because some lols are too perfect not to share.

  ¶ 5:40 AM

  More spinning:

This:
(which is black-faced liecester dyed in Deep Blue Sea colors by Gale's Art)

Has been turned into this:


It's navajo plied and unfortunately very over twisted. I tried for a more uniform ply, but I am still pretty new at this sort of thing. I may have plied in the wrong direction too. It's very springy, even after drying with a weight hanging from it. 243 yards, 4 oz. That puts it close to Aran/DK weight, and yes, I have no idea what to do with it. I had lots of offers for it at the event Saturday - or more correctly, I had people tell me I could sell it as an "art yarn" for big bucks, but no one actually offered me any money. I think it's lovely.

Next on the wheel is an abby sock batt. Yum.  ¶ 12:19 PM