Knitting in the Comics

I do not like knitting for other people because I am afraid that it always looks like this:

http://d.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/p/uc/20080430/scl080430.gif

it is from here:

http://news.yahoo.com/comics/uclickcomics/20080430/cx_cl_uc/cl20080430

Yell, Yarn.

There are definitely days when I feel like any knitting related stuff is an accomplishment. I am not sure going to a knitting night where I wound some yarn but only finished 2 rows of a scarf thing actually counts as “fiber-related”.

I am sure this will not be a huge surprise to the reading audience, but I am not very social. Now that I am old enough that my mommy does not make me go play with my friends, I do not. If I force myself to go out, I usually feel awkward and unwanted, like I am spoiling the evening for other people just by going.

When I went out this week (and it was a double-loaded week), that was most certainly the case. I was told that I should just stop knitting entirely.

For all the vaunted inclusiveness mentioned in books about there being no wrong way to knit and everyone who knits is a so-called real knitter, that does not appear to be the case. Everyone must homogenize or they will be shunned.

I could retitle my blog here, “Billie Idle’s Rebel Yarn!” but I suspect it would only be funny to me.

I am not taking comments on this post, but if you cannot resist, use the contact form, link in the right sidebar, about halfway down.

Press ‘Pause’ to continue

There has been no interesting fiber stuff this week or recently.

I exchanged a couple emails with people, but that was it in terms of social stuff for the entire month. It was an off week for knitting groups— one group meets every other week, the other meets first and third weeks— some months have very social weeks.

The previous week I was too sneezy and considerate to go out. Or embarrassed not to have any knitting to bring. Most likely both.

It would have been a good time to be working on knitting stuff but I was and am between projects.

I figured out where the squeak was coming from in my wheel, with help. A screw had come loose. It was connecting the footman assembly to the wheel axle. It was a strange intermittent noise that would get worse if I treadled slowly or with light pressure. You might imagine that diagnosing it was hard to do as a solo project. With help it took under five minutes to find and solve the problem that had been disturbing me for weeks.

I have a number of pre-drafted fiber ribbon swaths waiting to be spun up. I should probably take a picture of that because it interests me.

Still looking for good fiber sources of undyed-but-not-white fiber. There are not a lot of pre-processed sources, most of them are fleece based. I also looked into wool processing places. I do not think washing and carding a fleece is feasible in my apartment with its single sink.

Stitches West 2008

I did manage to attend the Stitches show in the afternoon today after nearly talking myself out of going and having some schedule conflicts. It was crowded enough today that I would not have wanted to go tomorrow. I found some fabulous fiber (there will be pictures later). I resisted the yarn, largely because the places with the huge sales were hugely crowded.

Most of the yarn places were selling the same things. There was much Malabrigo to be found, but it is a single ply yarn. I really do not understand why people are so enamored of single-ply yarns. A few years ago it was Manos del Uruguay… same thing, unplied singles. I think these yarns become popular with the “in-crowd” and other people jump on the bandwagon unthinkingly. But it is definitely popular. I spin better yarn than that with 3 months’ experience. So it was easy to avoid the yarn-selling booths.

And yes, getting back from Santa Clara was horrible even though I left the show at 3pm.

spinning guilt

That is not a typo.

I went to my first spinning guild meeting. I think it was a very unfortunate choice of day.

Since I have returned home, I have been becoming more and more upset by the slideshow given by Sara Lamb.

I know I did not react appropriately because I did nothing.

photos!!!!

I have photos. You may prefer to browse the photo collection directly, but I have added in thumbnails and links.

I really need a better blog-posting tool.

That is not a horse! It is a zebra.

I prefer llama and alpaca to sheep. But I might follow the herd along a bit.

1. I resolve to actually knit some every day and spin some every week.
2. I will find a photo hosting solution and implement it even if it is not the perfect solution.
3. Hopefully I will continue interacting with people instead of assuming we will not get along.