Procratina-meme

I saw this on And she knits, too, and thought to myself, self, you've read a lot of those books. Let's tally the data on this.

The guidelines: bold those books you've read; underline those that were read for school; italicize those you began but never finished. For simplicity, I'm just going to bold books I've read and italicize the one's I never finished.

Ready? Here goes:

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
Anna Karenina
Crime and Punishment
Catch-22
One Hundred Years of Solitude
Wuthering Heights
The Silmarillion
Life of Pi : a novel
The Name of the Rose
Don Quixote
Moby Dick
Ulysses
Madame Bovary
The Odyssey
Pride and Prejudice
Jane Eyre
The Tale of Two Cities
The Brothers Karamazov
Guns, Germs, and Steel: the fates of human societies
War and Peace
Vanity Fair
The Time Traveler’s Wife
The Iliad
Emma
The Blind Assassin
The Kite Runner
Mrs. Dalloway
Great Expectations
American Gods
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
Atlas Shrugged
Reading Lolita in Tehran: a memoir in books
Memoirs of a Geisha
Middlesex
Quicksilver
Wicked : the life and times of the wicked witch of the West
The Canterbury Tales
The Historian: a novel
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Love in the Time of Cholera
Brave New World
The Fountainhead
Foucault’s Pendulum
Middlemarch
Frankenstein
The Count of Monte Cristo
Dracula
A Clockwork Orange
Anansi Boys
The Once and Future King
The Grapes of Wrath
The Poisonwood Bible : a novel
1984
Angels & Demons
The Inferno (and Purgatory and Paradise)
The Satanic Verses
Sense and Sensibility
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Mansfield Park
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
To the Lighthouse
Tess of the D’Urbervilles
Oliver Twist
Gulliver’s Travels
Les Misérables
The Corrections
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
Dune
The Prince
The Sound and the Fury
Angela’s Ashes: a memoir
The God of Small Things
A People’s History of the United States: 1492-present
Cryptonomicon
Neverwhere
A Confederacy of Dunces
A Short History of Nearly Everything
Dubliners
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Beloved
Slaughterhouse-five
The Scarlet Letter
Eats, Shoots & Leaves
The Mists of Avalon
Oryx and Crake : a novel
Collapse: how societies choose to fail or succeed
Cloud Atlas
The Confusion
Lolita
Persuasion
Northanger Abbey
The Catcher in the Rye
On the Road
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Freakonomics: a rogue economist explores the hidden side of everything
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: an inquiry into values
The Aeneid
Watership Down
Gravity’s Rainbow
The Hobbit
In Cold Blood: a true account of a multiple murder and its consequences
White Teeth
Treasure Island
David Copperfield
The Three Musketeers

Summary:
31 of 106 books read
7 out of 106 started and unfinished

Conclusions:
1. I usually finish what I start. Wish it were the same for my knitting.
2. I've not read nearly as much as I thought I had. Should I create a reading life list?
3. The Red Badge of Courage, which I read at least 6 times for school, was not on that list. To this day, I hold a grudge against Stephen Crane.

Cat or mouse?

Those of you who use Gmail are, perhaps, aware that you can set your 'status' in the chat box to anything at all. Available, Out-of-office, Blue or Red, whatever. I regularly set my status to simple questions: Plaid or stripes, Boy or girl, etc. Yesterday, I changed my status to Cat or mouse. Late last night, our cat, Acadia (the chunky one, natch) caught a mouse. And proceeded to play cat and mouse into the morning.

I'm thinking of changing my status to chocolate or chocolate.

Crumpets and Crones

I harbor deep fantasies, well, delusions of owning my own business one day. Most of the time, I revel in owning a yarn store. I have no idea what the particulars would entail. No doubt I would be horrific at choosing yarn (how do you settle on which to stock?), too tight with the money and miserable with advertising. But you can be sure I'd come up with a snappy company name. To wit:

The Naked Sheep (yes, this store already exists, but I didn't know that when the name occurred to me). I see quite a few Wooly Sheep stores, which makes no sense since the sheep must get naked in order to stock the store.

Twist and Shout. A combination knitting store and karaoke bar.

Crones and Scones. Not a knitting store, this would be a bakery (another fantasy) that I'd open later in life.

What would you name your shop?

I have issues

Well, that should be obvious by now, but when I say issues, I mean knitting issues. Two, to be precise.

Issue the first:
Knitting with cotton - three strands of heavy worsted weight cotton - hurts. My wrists hurt, my fingers hurt. For such a simple project (Absorba, the great bathmat), there's a lot of pain involved. With just two 'strips' remaining, I'm confident that I can knit through the pain to a pleasant FO. No pain, no gain, right?


Issue the second:
Row gauge. I swatched like a banshee for the Sunrise Circle Jacket. I got stitch gauge, but not row gauge. Fine. I can do math (even calculus, shh!), so I can futz my way through to an acceptable product. I cast-on the back, made some minimal calculations and modified the pattern accordingly. Back complete.


I love the darts.


So warm.

I went to cast-on the front left and hit a wall. I've got no clue how to modify this pattern to accommodate my row gauge. Further, I'm not sure how row gauge affects this pattern. See, the patterns asks you to cast on the cuff of the sleeve and knit the sleeve up through the raglan shaping. That's fine. I can do some fancy math and make the increases work out. But then, oh then. You continue into the shaping of the raglan and at the same time you begin work on the front. In this manner, you increase every single row to create a semi-circular left front. Understand? No? Check out the pattern. Will the front be too long, overlap too much? What's going to happen? Aieee! Can I modify the pattern and if so, how? Can I modify my row gauge and if so, how? Will I ever have a finished sweater that fits me, me, me?

Clearly, distractions are in order.

Distraction the first:

A very bad picture of my socks from Sockapalooza. Better pictures available from Yarn Thulu. These are beautiful socks, just the right height and they came with other sock-knitting goodies. Lucky for me, I got over the sock nausea, huh?

Distraction the second:

Cute kid. Clearly dressed by Daddy. Note the clashing pinks in the stockings and onesie, combined with the orange of the fleece vest. I love this outfit.

ETA: I found a somewhat useful link to row gauge issues. Basically, Kate says knit the fronts with your gauge (they will overlap more/less depending on row gauge) and make the back match. So I will sally forth on the left front and see where it takes me. It may mean ripping the back to ensure it matches the length of the front (but since my stitch gauge is spot on, who knows?).

Finished object, the first

As life settles back into a routine that doesn't include writing a dissertation, I hope to update my little world on some of the projects I've completed. First up, I offer an actual photo of the socks I knit for my sockpal.



It's up on Ravelry, too (I'm Jeneric, for those interested). Specifics can be found there. I loved knitting these socks and will almost certainly knit a second pair to keep, perhaps in a pale pink to add a cheery touch to the cold winters coming my way.

I make no promises, but I will try to photograph several other completed projects and, if you're good and don't stick things in your mouth, I'll even show some in-progress things. Is it really that obvious that I live with a toddler?

I passed. Can I knit now?

It's been a while, hasn't it?

For those interested, there is a direct and negative correlation between dissertation writing and knitting production.



I valiantly tried to knit through the entire month leading up to my defense (which included a trip to a conference in California with a baby). It was not successful. My project of choice? The mystery shawl. Who was it who said complicated lace and dissertations don't mix? That would be me.

So to recap the knitting:
1. Mystery shawl. I got to the third chart and abandoned it. It wasn't for the mistakes (though there had been several). It wasn't for the complicated nature of the beast. Really, it was because it was a beast, a swan to be specific. When the theme was revealed, I lost all interest. It's sitting quietly in a bag, awaiting the frog pond and greener pastures.

2. Black socks for Eric. Good grief. I lost interest in these months ago.

3. Shedir hat. I cast on for this and frogged it the same night. Love the pattern. Love the yarn. Don't love them together.

4. Various other projects were cast on and I don't remember them now.

5. Sunrise circle jacket. It's on, baby. Love the yarn (Brooks Farm Solana). It's like knitting with cherry juice (and I said so on Ravelry user name: Jeneric). I ripped the back once, to tidy up my darts. I'm now chugging along at a slow but respectable speed. Fingers crossed that this jacket is both wearable and a pleasure to wear.

6. Just last night, the yarn arrived for Absorba, the great bathmat. Those folks at Elmore Pigsah sure are quietly efficient. I ordered three cones of the Peaches and Cream Double Worsted Sunday evening and heard not a peep until Wednesday afternoon when a little e-mail alert notified me that it had arrived on my doorstep. I cast on PDQ (pretty darn quickly) and immediately noticed two things: (1) cotton is not wool nor does it pretend to be; (2) knitting with US 13 needles is gawd awful. I feel like I've lost the use of my thumbs or been stuck in a hoggy faze. Nevertheless, I love the resulting fabric and I will stick with this project until I have a bathmat. Or lose all feeling in my wrists, whichever comes first.

Knitter's Nightmare

I woke last night in terror. I couldn't remember the date and I thought surely I had missed the Sockapalooza4 Mail date. My brain whirred. It was Monday, tomorrow was Tuesday. When was August 2nd? Let's work backwards. What was today? Today was, ah, well, Monday, yes I know, but the date? I couldn't remember. Think, McFly, think! Eventually I remembered that Monday was July 30th and July has 31 days which puts August 2nd on Thursday. Fantastic! Plenty of time to box up the socks that I finished a month ago. And didn't blog about.

Sigh. It's been busy around here. I'd show you what I've been working on, but it probably won't upload well and it's interesting only to Ecology geeks, like me. Yes, the thesis is written (150 or so pages. It's tought to keep track) and will be sent to the committee today or tomorrow. My attention is now on writing a presentation for ESA and my defense.

Cross your fingers and toes and if all goes well, I'll have some FO and WIP pictures soon.

Gratuitous Garlic

Siskiyou Purple Garlic

I had to share. Isn't it lovely?

Update!

It's been a while my friends and boy, have I been busy. Not so much with the knitting, though. I've been told that this is a good thing. Finishing one's dissertation is important, especially if one hopes to get a job. Sigh.

The good news is that my defense is set for August 24th, which means I must be done writing by the end of July. Knitting time will still be limited as I prepare two presentations (one for a scholarly conference, the other for the big day), but you may notice that I am slightly more productive in those interim weeks.

And now for some gratuitous scenery. Yep, that's where I did my dissertation research. Pretty, eh? It's the Great Swamp National Wildlife Refuge, located mere minutes from New York City. You should visit.

Wrong way

I think most of you who read this blog know exactly where I work. And if you don't, just imagine a one-way road that loops around a pond, in a complete circle. A circle, as in, if you've missed your exit, you can continue around the loop until you again reach the exit.

Now imagine an SUV tearing down said one-way loop, flying by his/her exit. Three seconds later, s/he hits the breaks, does an illegal u-turn and accelerates the wrong way back around the loop.

Horrific, I know. Even more upsetting when you learn that I recognized the driver as a long-standing citizen of this institution. There was no call for that behavior.

We interrupt this silence

for a quick FAQ and update on the knitting.

Q. Have you been knitting?
A. Of course. Sadly, the knitting is not daily but I try very hard to squeak in at least 15 minutes of knitting when I can.

Q. What are you knitting?
A. Good question! I had good intentions to continue plowing through Eric's Na Craga, but when the temperatures starting topping 85, I cried uncle and cast aside the 100% wool sweater for smaller, portable, light-weight things.

Q. A wise decision, but you never answered the question.
A. Ahem. Yes. Well, you see, there's been a snafu. I have successfully completed one sock for Sockapaloooza. See?
Pattern: Spiral Boot Sock, by Veronik Avery from Summer 2007 IK
Yarn: Brooks Farm Acero, in blue
Modifications: Not a darn one!

I have cast-on for the second. See?

But alas, I know I will run out of yarn. I carefully divided my skein into two even balls. I knit feverishly while in several airports over the course of two days. As I turned the heal on the first sock, I knew with every fiber of my being that I would not have enough yarn. Brashly, I carried on, dipping into the second ball mere inches away from the toe.

I contacted Brooks Farm about purchasing more of this yarn. As I suspected, this dye lot sold out at Maryland Sheep & Wool. However, they are dying another batch soon. I intend to purchase one skein to complete my sock. I know it will not match and frankly my dears, I don't give a (beaver) dam. These socks will not be for my sock pal, I will keep them and love them as my own. I will knit my sock pal another pair - perhaps this very same pattern - in yarn that I have purchased sufficient quantities of.

Q. A good plan. Why were you in airports for two days?
A. Visiting East Lansing, Michigan where I was interviewing for a postdoc opportunity. Which I got. Which means I have to write, write, write and defend this summer. Hopefully by August. Which means few knitting posts.

Q. Ah, so really, it's not me, it's you?
A. Yes, it's me. My fault that I won't be writing much of anything knit-wise in the coming weeks. Take solace, however. It appears the sock-knitting nausea has passed. And that's a really fantastic thing.

A first time for everything

(The onesie says: 'Mama is a yarn ho.')

Maryland Sheep & Wool was fantastic, overwhelming and satisfying. I didn't knit a stitch on the trip down or back, nor did I knit during 'down times' at the festival. Why? We drove mainly at night (and I did a lot of the driving) and when you have a 6-month old, there are no down times. Let's look at the haul, shall we?
First up, some wool in a blue (blue mist) that matches Baby Jeneric's eyes and will make a spectacular hooded jacket from Debbie Bliss' Simply Baby.
Next, we have Solana, a red Brooks Farm yarn that I coveted and tried not to buy. It's more than I usually spend on yarn, but the color and texture will make a fantastic Sunrise Circle Jacket. This marks the first first - buying the yarn I love and not skimping. Will it make a difference in the final object? We'll see.
Finally, Acero, more Brooks Farm yarn, this time a blue sock-weight yarn, destined for my Sockapalooza4 pal. I love the Spiral Boot Socks from Veronik Avery in the Summer 2007 IK and this yarn is going to make a fantastic pair.

I have to come clean, though. The patterns calls for 3 skeins of Reynolds Soft Sea yarn, which at 1 62 yard per skein, totals 485 yards. This skein of yarn is 420 yards, which is about 65 yards short. Will I make it? Will I have to rip back to shorten the leg? Should I have just purchased two skeins? (probably!)

The second first thing was that I actually admitted to being a blogger! Inadvertently, I encouraged a random knitter to purchase some of the same red yarn that I was purchasing. She got in line behind me and struck up a conversation. At one point, she asked if I had a blog and instead of lying (which I normally do!), I said yes. Of course, being the doofus that I am, I didn't say my name or the blog, but Kristy, of Eleven Stitches is a very put-together person and handed me a business card with her blog information. Go visit and check out that drop stitch sweater she knit. It's her own pattern and looked amazing in person. It's also thanks to Kristy that I picked up the sock yarn.

As Brenda Dayne would say, it's time to Cast-on.

Sockapalooooza!

The 4th round of sockapalooza has begun! I signed up as a declaration of war against my sock nausea and I'm coming out fighting! I've surfed the usual suspects, including Knitty, MagKnits and the Interweave Knits website. While my decision isn't final, I am leaning towards the spiral boot socks by Veronik Avery in the yet-to-be-released Summer 2007 issue of IK. Yarn shopping/splurging will occur this Saturday at the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival.

On the flip side, my sock pal has already sent me something - an e-postcard of Babs, the knitting obsessed chicken from Chicken Run (who else loves everything that comes out of Aardman Animation?). I can tell this knitter has good taste and will create a fantastic pair of socks to warm my feet this fall.

Oops!

Does this count as breaking my self-imposed yarn diet?


Yeah, that's what I thought. But it was on sale (60% off!)! But it was souvenir yarn (Florida vacation)! But it was a gift (well, from Eric for being a great Mom)! But! But!

Sigh. Yeah, I didn't mean to buy it, but the colors were fantastic, it'll look great on Autumn (sweater?), and it was so cheap. I could have bought more, but I did show some restraint. And I didn't actually purchase it - I made Eric do my dirty work.

If anyone's looking to purchase a yarn store in Florida, I know where one's for sale!

Better late, eh?

Yes, as predicted in the last post, I completed the back of Na Craga. I know, all along I've been saying front, but in a hasty decision mediated by the discovery of a small mistake (fixable!), I've decided this will be the back. This sweater has not been knit in the traditional order. I began with the sleeves, then the back and now (well, tomorrow night) the front. Who thinks I can finish this in time for the county fair (in August)? I'm thinking yes!
Two notes: 1. Blocking will help even out those two sleeves - honest, they are the same length! 2. Yes, my husband really is that tall and skinny. I am knitting the smallest girth and longest length on this sweater.

In the meantime, I am questioning my travel knit project. Florida + white cardigan = sun glare and blindness. Might be a good time for those black socks, huh? Speaking of socks, I have decided to wage war against the sock nausea phenomenon. I joined Sockapalooza4. In this manner, I will be forced to knit an entire pair of socks, perhaps in a complicated pattern (perhaps not), perhaps knee-highs (perhaps not - although I am itching to try my hand at something like this), perhaps striped (perhaps not). You get the picture. Socks will be knit and maybe by the time I graft the 2nd toe, I'll actually be enjoying myself.

Did I mention Maryland enjoys all the sheep, llamas and alpacas. Maybe we can get a few photos of her with the animals (although her petting skills aren't top notch just yet). At the very least, we'll pick up some soap and a few skeins of yarn (but no lamb ? Can you tell I'm excited to go? I'm quietly hoping that Baby Jenericsandwich or sausage for me - blech!).

Maybe some bran...

would help make this blog more regular.

I always have high hopes of updating twice a week. You can see how well that's worked. Maybe it's the new mom gig or the baby that doesn't take naps (but she sleeps through the night, so you know, no complaints), or the thesis writing that I'm cramming into most spare moments. Whatever the reason, knitting has been slow and blog posts have been scattered. Here's an abbreviated, photograph-free update.

1. Na Craga. I'm a mere 10 rows away from completing the back. I estimate this will be complete next Monday, during knit-night. Maybe I can work up the front in less time?
2. Hat & scarf set. Did you know about this? I'm knitting these in exchange for an illustration. The scarf is nearing completion and the hat has been started, but is currently mired in fears of sizing and pattern choice.
3. Sweater for Baby Jeneric. Yarn purchased, pattern chosen. No knitting, not even a swatch.

See? Boring all around these parts. I can guarantee a bit of excitement in the not-too-distant future. The Wily Jeneric family will be taking a week to vacation in Florida (oooo - tanned knitting time!) and will, in early May, be traversing the east coast to the wilds of Maryland for the annual Sheep & Wool festival (can you say yarn binge??).

Veni, Vidi, Blogged

I am compulsive about avoiding lines, so Priscilla and I caught a 3:30 train to NYC and arrived in time to see the Yarn Harlot's slide show. Twice.

There were a lot of people - the auditorium holds about 800 and it was darn near full.

Ooh, there she is, in all her knitted glory. The photo is crummy, but perhaps you can make out her speech, camera and sock. She didn't knit as she spoke, but she did whip out the sock during the Q & A portion.

Just after she took this photo, she took the time to thank the many people who helped make her a success. As she wrapped up her acknowledgements, she began to share the story of how her mother-in-law had come to NYC this afternoon as a surprise. She hadn't gotten two sentences into the story when she looked over and saw Joe, her husband, who was supposed to be in Montreal. Sad to say, I didn't get her reaction on film, but it was clearly true love. Aww.


The Yarn Harlot does not disappoint. She is an amazing speaker, full of wit and humour. I really wanted to take her home with me, to show her off to all my friends and family, to have her explain to them this knitting thing. This particular speech was brushed with inspiration, not just about knitting, but about standing up, being who you are (a knitter, a mom, etc) and, most importantly, not letting others tell you who you are or should be. Brava to Stephanie, may her words whisper among us all and continue to change the world for good.

Excitement

In late January, we broke down and purchased a Wii*. If you've played the Wii, you know there's an "Everybody Votes" channel where questions are posed nationally and internationally. A few days back, one of the questions was "Do you belong to any fan clubs?" Both Eric and I thought for a moment and then answered no, as did the majority of Americans. Late last night, as I was pondering today's schedule, Eric turned to me and said, "not in a fan club, huh?"

Yeah, I'm giddy in anticipation. I have signed copies of every one of her books, I've seen her in Maryland and Atlantic City, NJ. But I've never heard her speak. I can't wait. Knitters, it's time to represent.

*I encourage the playing of Wii. Where else can I beat up my husband without having the police show up?

Where are they now?

It seems like forever since I’ve mentioned any knitting progress. And I’m so woefully limited on photographs lately. Could it be because Baby Jeneric has her first cold? Or could it be because she thoughtfully shared that cold with Mom?
Na Craga slowly marches on. There is a scant 10 cm left to the front (doesn’t it already look long enough?). One would have thought I could finish that in short order, but alas, I have flung away the interesting knitting in favor of simple ribbing.

May I present ’42,’ a ridiculously simple scarf (k2, p2 ribbing) in a fantastic forest green with a spasm of bark brown. There will be a matching hat, where the main color will be the bark brown (due to limited quantities of the forest green).

Did I mention I was knitting socks for my husband (the other half of Wily Jeneric)? I started these last year. They are the Gentleman’s Socks from Nancy Bush’s Knitting Vintage Socks.
Needless to say, these socks haven’t progressed very far for two specific reasons:
1. I generally knit at night. Knitting black in dim lighting is difficult (for me, at least).
2. The last pair of socks I knit was during the first trimester of my pregnancy when I experienced morning sickness like nothing I’ve ever felt before (even water was too difficult to keep down). Many thanks to the makers of Zofran. Ahem. This experience has tainted sock knitting for me. My stomach still gets a little queezy when I pick up the tiny dpns. What’s a knitter to do? In my case, I now knit baby hats.

2007 Knitting Resolutions: March Update

Well, we’re two months into 2007. Let’s look at how well I’ve been keeping the promises I made to myself.

1. Knit from my stash.
Busted with the purchase of enough cotton yarn to knit Baby Jeneric a sweater. This uses my get-out-of-jail-free card. Can I make it to May and Maryland?

2. Projects in the Queue:
a. Na Craga. Baby steps, baby steps! Every day, I’m one pattern repeat (or half a repeat) closer to being done. As of today, I’m about halfway through the sweater front. My goal is do have this completed by July so I can enter it into our urban county fair.
b. Baby sweater with NZ wool. Rethinking the use of this wool for a sweater. Some knitted toys or pillows might be better.
c. Kittiwake. No progress.
d. Sunrise circle jacket. No progress.

4. Spin more. Lots more. Oh yes, I’ve been spinning! Just this past week, I tired of spinning the ‘cheap, dull’ pencil roving I’d purchased for practice. I pulled off the bobbin, set it on a shelf, and unearthed the beautiful merino/silk roving I’d purchased nearly 2 years ago at Rhinebeck. A wise spinner once said, “spin with the best you can afford.”

5. Think about knitting fair isle. Yep, about once a week, I look at Eunny’s Anemoi’s mittens (which, in my head, I call anemone).

Not too bad, eh?