Best Quote I Heard All Day
Really, all you need to become a good knitter are wool, needles, hands, and slightly below-average intelligence. Of course, superior intelligence, such as yours and mine, is an advantage.--Elizabeth Zimmermann

Who would have ever thought that when needles and Red Heart yarn were placed in my hands at age 8, I would have found an unending, lifetime fascination that beggars explanation.

So, for this week, let's ponder this:

Open Mike Tuesday

Who, other than Elizabeth Zimmermann, has been your greatest knitting inspiration? And that person need not be famous.

Tell your stories. And then I will tell you mine.

Best Quote I Heard All Day
I want to believe in intelligent design, and hence I am suspicious of anything that seems to confirm my desire to believe.--James Lileks

Thank you, Steve, for reminding me how much I love this guy's site. I highly recommend Lileks's Gallery of Regrettable Food. Check out Meat, Meat, Meat and More Fun With Coffee. And all the rest of his writing. He should do a number on '50s-era knitting patterns.

Have you ever Googled your name? Of course you have. I've done it and I admit to it.

Let's put it this way--these are Marilyn Robertses with whom I do not foresee sharing confidences. Or bologna sandwiches. The first one on the list is some kind of Scientologist. She completed the Scientology Service course, Celebrity 325, which may or may not have included making tea for Tom Cruise.

But then, when Googling The Knitting Curmudgeon, I found that I was a reference for the Wikipedia entry for Aran Sweater, based on a post that I wrote some time ago, entitled Heinz Edgar Kiewe--Crackpot or Historian?.

Who knew?

Open Mike Tuesday
Joe just wrote about the wiki phenomenon in his post from yesterday. Open-source wikis allow anyone to write, edit, and otherwise expound on subjects, whether they are knowledgeable or idiots. And as you may or may not know, some knitters are jumping on the bandwagon. So here's the topic:

Are knitting wikis going to be a valid source of information or are they going to become the domain of KnitDweebs ready to add to knitting misinformation already floating in the ether?

I'm tempted to start a Warshcloth Wiki but I'm afraid of who may visit. And contribute.

Yeah, Loopy, you're thinking of the same person, I'm sure. The Queen of Warshcloths. And we're not talking about Joe, either. He's an exceptional Mary but never a Queen.

Some Not-So-Wonderful News
I am sad to say that Corinne miscarried last week. And also found out that she has Lyme disease, although it's unlikely that the Lyme contributed to the miscarriage, according to the doctor.

Yes, we were all disappointed. For all my curmudgeonly ways, I adore children and I was very much looking forward to being Gangsta Gram to a new one. But these things happen, and they'll give it another shot.

The Punk Princess was a bit disappointed, too. She was looking forward to dressing her new sibling in black and red. But Liz is pretty circumspect, like her grandmother. She knows that she will be sharing her drum kit with a teensy Punk Baby soon enough.

And as it is almost the witching hour, I will post this and crawl into bed with Cleo. That's the best I can do for a warm, cuddly body. A human one is rare but unbelievably handy.

Speaking of cats, here's the kind of stuff my sister, the self-proclaimed Scrap Curmudgeon, sends me just as I've hit "Publish Post." Will someone please explain the difference between crocheting and knitting to her? Clearly, I've failed abysmally.


Cleo would never stand for this.

Best Quote I Heard All Day
I used to work in a fire hydrant factory. You couldn't park anywhere near the place. --Steven Wright

Well, as usual, work seems to be getting in the way of what I'd rather do--knit, spin, blog, pee. With two conference calls yesterday and two today, it's talking heads time.

So this will be a severely truncated post until I actually have the time to write something other than:

1. In the view on the Under Review page, select the checkbox for the project to be reviewed.
2. Choose Mark Project as Completed from the Actions drop-down menu and click Go.
3. The page will refresh and display the Project Review window.
4. Click Close Action Status Window. The Project will be moved automatically to Completed.

I knew you'd be thrilled.

Open Mike Tuesday
I enjoy reading the Wolvies' e-mail. And one topic, which has sort of been tossed around, started with a stupid web site name and then segued into stupid yarn shop names. My favorite, from Lisa McNulty is: Fuck Ewe.

So this week's Open Mike topic is:

What's your pick for the stupidest yarn shop/web site name?

I imagine many will have the word "Ewe". I would substitute "Ewww" for them all.

Back later in the week with the rare and handy alpaca plying. That's the only thing I've managed to get done. Oh yeah, and unraveled the toe-up sock. I hates it, preciousssss.

Best Quote I Heard All Day

Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family in another city. --George Burns

Well, it's not large--there are, at last count, 25 of us, which includes two wives and one husband who married in. The Meyers, the Robertses. the Petersons, the Roths. And the two Carsten girls, Eleanor and Nancy, from whence all of this goodness emanated.

It's been seven years since all of us were in one place at one time. But this weekend, the sibs and I took Mammy up to Connecticut to see her sister, my wonderful Aunt Nan, and we got to see two of the cousins, Carole and Mark.

Carole definitely displayed the fine family trait of snarkiness with some choice comments. If she knit, she could do me one better in knitsnark. I gave her the URL for the blog. Now, if she reads it, she'll find out just how snotty her cuz is.

Here are the ladies and the bro, on a lovely May Saturday in Connecticut.

From left: Ma, Rich, Karen, Nan, and Carole

Sherman's March
I've never bothered to do toe-up socks. Why? Because I have my Formula 1 sock pattern that fits nicely and that I have memorized. But having finished one pair on Sunday, I decided to muck around with a toe-up to see what all the fuss is about.

First, there was the Sock Wizard-generated pattern. The short-rowing in the Sock Wizard is wrapped, so I decided to give that a shot with some of Carol's wonderful merino sock yarn, Rainbow Bright, which I bought a few weeks ago.

Well, the wrapped short-rowing sucked, big time. Hated how it looked. And it was a royal pain in the ass, besides, picking up those damned wraps. You can't really tell from the picture but trust me, it sucked.

Then, I remembered reading last week about the Sherman technique on Mel's blog. So I ripped out this toe, read the excellent tutorial Mel has done on the Sherman shortrowing, and reworked the toe. This is unwrapped shortrowing, with compensation for the wraps by making one and then decreasing it with the prior stitch or, as Mary Sherman Lycan, the originator, calls them, "encroachments." Just read Mel's tutorial and you'll get it immediately.

Much better. Whether this will fit better than my stock cuff-down sock with common heel and wedge toe remains to be seen. I don't like the look of it as much but then, fit and function count heavily. You need to try it all. I really need to pull out Lucy Neatby's Cool Socks Warm Feet and revisit it.

Open Mike Tuesday
In an e-mail, Carol brought to the Wolvies' attention an ad in this Sunday's New York Times that evidently shows a woman of babyboomer age knitting. She had heard at MD S&W that knitters were fomenting a protest. So the topic this week is:

Do you give a rat's ass as to how knitters are portrayed in the media? Or do you have your posters ready for the protest march?

Go for it, babies. More cowbell.

Woolee Winder Banshee
I had thought at first it was simply a noisy bobbin. Not. While spinning Carol's alpaca, the Matchless started to make gawd-awful clacking noises. OK, out comes the oil. No good. New drive band. No good. Tighten all the screws. No good. Then off comes the winder and on goes the original flyer. That worked.

I've not had this problem with the winder on the Joy but I'll be taking apart the Matchless Woolee Winder at some point to see if I can find wherein the problem lies. It took me a while to get used to using the old flyer but I'm back on track.

Birthday Presents
Now, Barb insists this was not a birthday present; however, it did arrive during the Mar Birthday Festival Week. A thoughtful gift from a good friend, much appreciated. Barb's company, Wild Geese Fibres, has much worth buying. My fingers are itching to work with this alpaca/silk laceweight.

And then, there was my sister's birthday present, which she claims isn't my "real" present. Huh.

Yes, Wallace & Gromit lovers, it is Shaun posing as a hot-water bottle cover. Which delightful article Karen found at a garage sale. The seller said that it was bought at Bootts. No doubt. You'd never find anything like this in the States. I haven't decided whether or not that is in our favor as Americans.

However, there is a certain charm to it. You have to search, but it's there.

Some Enchanted Evening
I'm so disappointed that I didn't receive an invite to the white tie extravaganza at the House o' Shrub. It's highly likely that I was excluded from the guest list because my hat collection does not meet HRM's standards.

It would be a treat to see Shrub give her a shoulder massage. Or perhaps say, "Hey, Queenie, how y'all doin'?" Unfortunately, behavior like that is not rare for the Fucktard-in-Chief, and it's continuously unhandy.

Best Quote I Heard All Day
Why slap them on the wrist with a feather when you can belt them over the head with a sledgehammer.--Katharine Hepburn

You know, my kid Corinne has wielded a sledgehammer since she popped out of me 35 years ago.

Yesterday, with my girls and their significant others gathered in the living room, with Ian dancing around and Liz slowly snaking downstairs, everyone ready to take Mamoo out to a birthday dinner, Corinne stated, rather emphatically, after her Sisty Ugler made a snide comment about Corinne only going out because she wanted a Margherita, that she could not have a Margherita with her dinner.

Huh? Now, Corinne seldom drinks. So when she goes out, she enjoys her Margherita. What wid dat?

And then it dawned on her sister. Holy shit. And then on me.

I'm going to be a grandmother. Again.

Yikes. Time to get buying those Dale baby books. And yes, I do know about Jil Eaton, et al. And no, I am not going to knit any Debbie Bliss stuff.

Open Mike Tuesday
Well, after having put in a 12-hour day editing, formatting, and doing a clean-up on five manuals for tomorrow's application build, I'm writing this late Monday night while nodding off at the keyboard.

Eunny was the clear favorite from last week's topic. And I totally agree with that. Kate Gilbert, too. I was interested also in hearing about the others.

So here's this week's topic of disgustion:

Is it possible to integrate knitting into your sex life? And no, we're not talking about knitted lingerie or Willywarmers, either. We're talking kinky. As in kinky circ cables. Maybe.

I'm sure that those into S&M will have many fabulous ideas.

Short Spurts
I'm really beat tonight, so there are no pictures. Work sucks when it keeps me from doing what I want. However, they do put money in my checking account twice a month.

I have managed to get a fair amount of spinning done on the alpaca. And some mindless stockinette rows done on the back of the Lavold sweater. It's almost done, at which point I may shift gears and get some finishing done. I can at least join the shoulders, set in the one sleeve, and even put in the collar, before I finish up the other sleeve. We'll see.

Barb Brown of Wild Geese Fibres sent me some glorious alpaca/silk laceweight. I will definitely put up a picture in my next post. This is some beautiful yarn. Go visit Barb's web site and see what she's got.

I'm not going to MD S&W next weekend. I wouldn't have, in any case, but I must go with my mother and the sibs up to Connecticut to visit my Aunt Nan. These days, I am only interested in going to Rhinebeck in October. Shall we have a show of hands as to who's planning on going? I know the usual Wolvies will be there--Joe, Carol, Kathy, Selma, maybe Lisalisa. And hopefully Ted, Mary-Helen, Lee Ann, Katherine, perhaps the wonderful Peter from Oz, and a few other friends.

If nothing else, blogging has brought me so many terrific friends. My life was so unrare and unhandy before they all showed up. I love them all.

[Ed. note: I'm cheating and posting this at 11:04 PM on Monday night. I'm fucking tired so I fixed the date and time to read otherwise. Bite me.]

Best Quote I Heard All Day

It takes a long time to grow young.--Pablo Picasso

So, another year will bite the dust tomorrow. Numero 57. Yikes!

The older I get, the more ambivalent I become about my birthday. On the one hand, I'd like to celebrate the fact that I'm alive for yet another spring. Watching the mallard float on the pool upon the pool the other day made me laugh. Dopey duck. He kept diving and finding nothing.

On the other hand, I hate looking down the barrel of the gun that is 60. Sheesh. Whyfore how come I don't feel any older than, um, 35?

Yeah, numbers are numbers. I'm still the wild child I ever was. That hasn't changed much.

Any birthday dinner invitations will be gleefully accepted. Heh.

Spring on the Delaware with the Wolvies
Well, Joe and Carol beat me to it but I'll throw up some pictures, with blessedly none of me. It was a perfect spring day down in Stockton, NJ and we had a lovely brunch. I hadn't seen Kathy since Rhinebeck, so that made it all the betterer. The Punk Princess deigned to come along, knowing full well that Carol would make her pay if she didn't show.

I just can't help myself. Too kewl.

A good picture of Kathy and a rather goofy one of Carol. What does Joe have in his hand?

Live fast, die fun. Certainly my motto, too.

Why I love spring in New Jersey

They Say It's Your Birthday--It's My Birthday Too, Yeah

My sibs and I sing that to each other on our respective birthdays. Karen was born a week before me, albeit 12 years later, and brother Rich exactly 7 weeks before, 4 years later.

Carol gave me the most wonderful birthday present. Look at this--alpaca top, dyed by herself, the Mistress of All Messy Dyepots.

And you know that as soon as I got home, I hit the Matchless with a vengeance. (Well, after oiling it, fucking around with a new drive band, and fiddling with the tension.)
This begs to be laceweight. It cannot be anything else but a lace shawl. So for the hell of it, I separated the two plys of some leftover Jaggerspun (formerly used for the Melanie shawl) and compared my single. I've made some observations about spinning laceweight that I'll write about in my next entry.

Topeka! (Shut the fuck up, I'll make my puns and be damned.)

My pictures do not do this alpaca top justice. It is a magnificent sunset of pinks, reds, and a dab of purple, orgasmic to spin. The shading is unbelievable. If you don't buy from Black Bunny Fibers, then you've lost out on an experience worth having time and time again.

Open Mike Tuesday
OK, gang, we're back to this. And I promised a topic that's more positive, so here it is, courtesy of Carol, if I recall correctly:

Who's the best new knitting designer
(say within the past two years)?

I know who my choice would be, but I'll leave for you to clutter the comments.

You know it's time to go to bed when Letterman has Sanjaya doing the Top Ten. Sleep is much rarer and handier than a 17-year-old talentless wonder enjoying the last of his 15 minutes.

Please, God, let him drift back into obscurity. For music's sake.

Best Quote I Heard All Day
Poetry has done enough when it charms, but prose must also convince.--H.L. Mencken

I stopped writing poetry when I was about 18. Just around the time I realized that simply being charming was not going to earn me a living. (Although it's helped a lot during job interviews.)

Lately I've been on a Dixie Chicks kick. Their Grammy-winning album, Taking the Long Way, is one that I highly recommend. Wonderful lyrics, outstanding music. And I'm not a country music fan, per se, so this is not your typical "D-I-V-O-R-C-E" kind of album.

The title track, Taking The Long Way Around, has lyrics that truly remind me of my own life. Because I always seem to take the long way.

Open Mike Tuesday
Two suggestions, one from Patsi Purl and the other from Gauss. In deference to Patsi's fine suggestion, I think many of you opined on that topic already. So it's the Gaussian equation this time around. (Sounds like something that was discussed in my senior chemistry class, the one I barely passed.)

What is the fugliest design you've seen this year? Name names.

Next week, though, let's have a more positive topic of discussion. Negativity can be tiresome. That doesn't mean I want the Pollyannas to crawl out of the woodwork, mind you.

Ongoing Lavold
Put the socks down and went back to the Lavold sweater, since I'd rather like to get it done and move on to the next thing. The front is done, so I will do a sleeve, then the back, and finally the other sleeve. That's usually the order I use when knitting a sweater that's in pieces.


I realize the picture sucks but I was too lazy to take it downstairs to the living room, where it might photograph better.

I will say one thing. If you've never knit a Lavold design and use this book, you won't have the foggiest idea how to make the increases a la Lavold. And as I was reading through the directions for the sleeve to check the sleeve increases, this one sentence struck me as absolutely astonishing:

If necessary, work the last few increase rows closer together.

Excuse me? That tells me two things. One, that whoever wrote these directions--Cornelia Hamilton Tuttle, I believe--really doesn't give a shit about some poor soul who has no experience in calculating sleeve increases and won't have the foggiest idea as to how to figure out if this needs to be done. Or that it's possible to get away with not doing the final few increases. Two, that perhaps the sleeve increases weren't calculated against the row gauge. You have to wonder.

I'm shortening the sleeve and using the directions for the next size down, since I hate baggy sleeves. I opted not to do the sleeves as set-in, since my other Lavold sweater has dropped shoulders, which I modified for a better fit. I will do that on this one as well.

Crochet Shit and Assorted Rants
Whenever one of the Wolverinas does something wonderful, I reserve the right to make a big fucking deal out of it.

My friend Kathy Merrick has made the cover of the latest Interweave Crochet. And it's about time, too. Kathy is unarguably the best crochet designer out there. When you see the crap put out by people like Doris Chan (where on earth did she come from?) and most of the others, Kathy's work is sublime.

One thing I will say in agreement with the comments made about last week's Open Mike discussion. Wenlan Chia's designs are absolutely ghastly. I worry that her "sweaters" will make already bulimia-ridden models believe completely that they are indeed fat.

Uh oh. I have a new name to add to the KC Glossary. ChiaPet.Sorry. Can't help it. Bite me. She's fine fodder.

Lefthanded Knitting and Other Tedious Topics
Obviously, I was being much too obtuse for some readers when I said, quote unquote:

Personally, I'd like to see opinions about the excrutiating difficulty endured by lefthanded knitters, whether knitting needles would have been considered weapons of mass destruction on a JetBlue plane resting on a runway for eight hours, or whether combined knitting is a bigger pain in the ass than it's worth.

Did you honestly think I was asking for a discussion of lefthanded knitting? Please. Perhaps my feeble attempts at sarcasm went over some people's heads.

And I think we've seen altogether much too much whining elsewhere about "I'm scarred because I was told I knit wrong." Shit, I've been a southpaw for years, so what? I knit weird and I don't give a flying fuck. Heh. My fingers do little crab-like movements when knitting. Now that's bizarre.

Combination knitting? I thought perhaps that some Modesitt aficionados might have screamed, "Combination knitting saved me from the depths of despair and the knowing, sly looks of other knitters." Ted, dear, of course anyone with half a brain should be past all of this nonsense. But I maintain that if you can't comprehend the construction of the stitch by some intelligent observation while you knit, learning combination knitting isn't going to make you all the better informed.

Time for bed. Staying up this late isn't so rare and handy. I will post this at the stroke of midnight, just so it's actually Tuesday. And then turn into a rutabaga. Or a pumpkin. Pick a veggie.

Best Quote I Heard All Day
Let's make a law that gay people can have birthdays, but straight people get more cake - you know, to send the right message to kids--Bill Maher

Tomorrow, April 4, is QueerJoe's birthday. Please go to his blog and leave happy birthday wishes for the hits-whore. He'll be watching his stats counter all day.

Gloss-hairy
I see that there have been a lot of new readers. That's great. Lia asked, "Who's the Tiny Diva?" Although it was answered, I'm guessing that many of my references may leave some readers in the dark.

So here's the KC's official glossary of terms that I use frequently. Some to disparage those in need of it.

• The X-men - Alexis and David Xenakis, mutilators of Knitter's magazine
• DragonBoy - Rick Mondragon, fashion disaster and blue-pencil wannabe for Knitter's
• KnitDweebs - The unknowing, the uncaring, and the clueless. Credentials include publicly announced Random Acts of Kindness, overt ego-enhancing charity knitting, an aversion to Google, and a predilection for petroleum-based yarn.
• Tiny Diva - The frenetic, pulsating, and frequently pink Fun-Fur clad Lily Chin
  
• Vague - Vogue Knitting (I don't necessarily take credit for this one.)
• The Wolverinas - my hoodlum knitting friends, who include the aforementioned birthday boy, Kathy Merrick, Selma the Axe-Murderess, Carol S., Lisa the Human Gaydar, Franklin, Liza Prior Lucy, and the inimitable Loopy
• The Punk Princess - granddaughter Liz
• The Scrap Curmudgeon - My sister Karen, who just can't seem to come up with an original handle for herself
  

I know the Wolvies could add more. They may, if they like.

Canada Redux
I promise never again to make fun of "aboot" et al. However, stop being so fucking sensitive, my dear Canadian friends. No one gets more abuse than a New Jerseyan. Not even Canadians, eh?

If you live in New Jersey, and I have many readers who do, you know that most people's image of NJ is the Turnpike and all other opening sequences of the Sopranos. And if you land at Newark Liberty Airport, that's what you see.

As for my accent, bite me. So I say "cawfee" and use other horrific pronounciations. Fuck that. At least I'm articulate. Besides, every time I hear Loopy on the phone, I get audio hallucinations of Ann Landers. (Now I'm gonna get it.)

There's still plenty of farmland here. We can only pray that the current housing market decline will keep it that way.

Open Mike Tuesday
I guess everyone liked last week's, so I'm going to make it a regular feature. That is, as regular as I make anything. Not much going on with fiber. I'm in stasis, dontcha know. Haven't done a damned thing in the past two days, not a stitch to be discussed. Probably more on the weekend.

So here's your topic:

The one knitting designer or "personality" up whose ass you'd most like to stick a hot knitting needle.

Go for it. And gay boys, let's answer this in an appropriate manner, OK? I can almost hear Franklin now.

If you have a topic you'd like to see in this space, let me know. I'll entertain it.

Make sure it's rare and handy, especially if you're new to the blog. Because the old-timers will tell you what happens if it isn't.

Update: First--if you didn't get the Letterman April Fool's joke, don't admit it publicly. Second, today we'll finally know who DannieLynn's father is. I'm breathless with anticipation.