Knitting in transit

I flew to Boston last week to attend a conference, then took the train up Maine to spend the weekend with my sister. Usually trips like these provide an occasion to do lots of reading, and while I did read one book, I spent much of my travel time working on this pair of socks.

Made from Steinbach Wolle "Stapaz Cotton Effekt." My mom prefers cotton socks, and I like this yarn more than some others I've used, but I'm not thrilled with this colorway. I also think the heels would look better using the after-thought heel method.

The book was Counting Heads by David Marusek. It's the first book reviewed in the new science fiction column "Across the Universe" in the New York Times Book Review. The review wasn't glowing, but I was intrigued enough to give this a try. Densely imaginative, with nanotech, artificial intelligence, cloning, medical immortality, and a planet colonization subplot, it reminded me a bit of Neil Stephenson's Diamond Age. I liked the short story that began the novel, but I thought that later the book gets cluttered, and our emotional attention shifts too much to really care about anyone in the end (kind of like "Diamond Age," now that I think about it).

While in Maine, I stopped into Halcyon Yarn to pick up a skein for replacing the neck of my enormous green sweater. I finished this sweater in October 2004, and was fretting because it was entirely too big. This was before I started keeping the blog, so I created a "Can this sweater be saved?" webpage and asked for advice from the GLBT-Knit crowd. In exchange for a pair of fingerless gloves, a seamstress did the tailoring work to help make the sweater wearable.

As a sweater, it's still a failure, but it makes a nice, big hiking sweater. The neckline was bad though -- too low and too tight. So I decided to unpick the collar and make a turtleneck in dark gray yarn. The picture documents the wad of unraveled collar yarn, and the new charcoal yarn that will become the turtleneck.

Heel experiments

List-sib John pointed out this pattern for basic ribbed socks using the Sherman heel. I've tried the Sherman heel before; the concept appeals to me, but I've never felt like I quite "got it." I knit one trial sock to see if I liked these directions better.

Took me 6 hours, 40 minutes to knit, a little less than I expected. I think it might be faster to knit one sock at a time. It's beautiful, isn't it? The yarn is Trekking XXL, which Brenda says is like knitter's crack-cocaine. I only picked it up because my aunt said she needed brown socks, and the plain brown was just too boring to contemplate. I thought I could use this yarn for accent stripes, but it cried out to be made into a sock of its own.

The heel isn't bad, but it just didn't feel elegant to me. I decided to try it on a light, sport weight cotton so I could really study the structure and analyze the results.

Then once I started, I couldn't stop, and I kept knitting experimental short-row heels:

• Sherman heel, meticulously following directions
• Sherman heel, twisting the lifted stitches
• PGR heel, with yarn-overs
• Short-row heel with wraps
• Catch method (from the article in Interweave Knits)
• Japanese method

Mike says the picture looks like 6 condom tips.

I think the Japanese method yields the best results. It looks exactly like the PGR heel, with its clean exterior. But fiddling with all the stitch markers was a pain, and I don't see myself making a habit of that technique. I've got a few more experiments I'd like to try, but my prediction is that I'll stick with the PGR heel.

I woke up this morning thinking of a couple other experiments to try.

Sixteen hours of socks and Galactica

I made some mistakes with the stop watch -- I once let it run overnight -- but it looks like it took me about sixteen hours, fifteen minutes to knit these socks.



I find this timing thing interesting, and may try to make a habit of it. I'm wondering now if it takes more or less time to knit socks one at a time.

Most of the ribbing was knit this week while I'm taking a slacker break from work -- vacation time with no plans to go anywhere or do anything. I've had small goals: do laundry, get my car serviced, vacuum the house. My biggest goal was to watch the first season of "Battlestar Galactica." I've avoided the series so far, mostly because I'm bitter that SciFi Channel didn't pick up the option of "Firefly." Every time I see the camera effect of a rapid zoom and clumsy focus on a spaceship, I feel a small twinge of rage. And once again, there appear to be no gay people in space.

But over all, I'm liking it, which I suppose isn't a surprise. The people are all very easy on the eyes; Jamie Barber is too hot to be real, but Aaron Douglas seems more my type. (Hmm, maybe there's a slash fiction pairing of Apollo and Tyrol out there somewhere. Distraught over the whole Sharon thing, Galen turns to Lee for comfort?) The Cylons have this interesting "Blade Runner" vibe going for them. The religious themes are intriguing, as are the politics. And this is probably old news to everyone else in the world, but I think it's cool that the producer provides podcast commentary for each episode. A couple years ago I said I wish there was an easy way for talented amateurs to produce good commentary tracks for movies; podcasting seems to have given us that. I'll have to look into those further.

Sentimental Journey Hat

My friends Aubrey and Charles are up from Florida this week, an opportunity for Aubrey to return to his hometown, drop in on relatives, and reconnect with distant friends. Thursday we went on what I kept calling his "Sentimental Journey" around Marion. We visited the house where he grew up (knocked on the door, but no one was home), the comic book store where he worked after high school, his church, the old downtown theater where he performed in some high school productions. It was a marvelous day, full of synchronicity and surprise encounters. And memories: I've always been struck by how revisiting old haunts causes memories to awaken, almost as if those memories are not in your own mind but are waiting there in the places themselves.

We stopped in a big-box store at the edge of town to buy mints and a hoodie (poor Floridians were finding the above average warmth a little chilly), and Aubrey was about to buy a hat. I couldn't have that. I went to the craft section, bought some thick chenille and size 11 double points, and set off trying to finish a hat for him the car. I failed. First attempt was too tightly cast-on. The second attempt, a top-down creation, was going along fine until stitches got dropped (it was a struggle to fit the entire circumference of the hat securely on four needles).

Still, I'm determined, and at home last night, with superior tools (my 60" Addi size 10 circular), I whipped up this creation.

Mike and I are meeting Aubrey and Charles at the zoo later this morning, where I'll give him the hat. He'll have no use for it in Florida, but it was fun to try making something momentarily useful.

My favorite new memory of his visit: getting styrofoam cups from the comic book store so Aubrey and his sister could take some holy water from the church of their youth. They'll bring this water to the ingathering and water ceremonies at their Unitarian churches later this year.

Edelstein on the Oscars

At the beginning of the year, my favorite film critic David Edelstein left Slate for New York Magazine. He seems to have reigned himself in a bit there, but still worth checking out. He continues his annual Oscar chat with Lynda Obst at his new home. The site design is terrible, and the conversation is difficult to follow chronologically. Here's a list of the messages in order:

• First (Labeled page 4 of 6)
• Second (Labeled page 5)
• Third (Labeled page 2)
• Fourth (Labeled page 3)
• Fifth (Labeled page 6)
• Sixth (Labeled page 1)

The discussion over at Slate between Bryan Curtis, Troy Patterson, and Dana Stevens is worth reading even if Edelstein isn't there.

Mike and I probably won't stay up for it all. Gone are the days when we used to have a party and invite people over. Now it's like the Tonys: something we have on in the background while we do Sudoku puzzles.

Nine hours to the cuff

I'm 9 hours into the "timed sock," and I've just set up the ribbing for the cuff. Progress will be slower from this point on, as K2P2 ribbing just takes longer for me.

I still did the heels one-at-a-time on these socks, but I didn't move them to separate sets of needles -- just let one sock flop there while I worked on the other one. Didn't care for it. It wasn't excessively awkward, but it puts too much weight on the working sock, stretching the stitches where the heel joins at the ankle even more than usual.

Modern, Cool Nerd

I followed the link from Mel's blog and took The Nerd? Geek? or Dork? Test, which rated me...

Modern, Cool Nerd

65 % Nerd, 69% Geek, 34% Dork

For The Record:

A Nerd is someone who is passionate about learning/being smart/academia.
A Geek is someone who is passionate about some particular area or subject, often an obscure or difficult one.
A Dork is someone who has difficulty with common social expectations/interactions.
You scored better than half in Nerd and Geek, earning you the title of: Modern, Cool Nerd.

Nerds didn't use to be cool, but in the 90's that all changed. It used to be that, if you were a computer expert, you had to wear plaid or a pocket protector or suspenders or something that announced to the world that you couldn't quite fit in. Not anymore. Now, the intelligent and geeky have eked out for themselves a modicum of respect at the very least, and 'geek is chic.' The Modern, Cool Nerd is intelligent, knowledgable and always the person to call in a crisis (needing computer advice/an arcane bit of trivia knowledge). They are the one you want as your lifeline in Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (or the one up there, winning the million bucks)!

I also did one Muppets Personality Test that, no matter how I tweaked my answers, I was Miss Piggy. I think it's rigged. So I did another one, and also came out Miss Piggy. It must be a conspiracy. (Although with a little answer tweaking, I came out Scooter, who seems like a Modern, Cool Nerd to me).

Hiya.

Time trials

I didn't join the Knitting Olympics (Go Team Wales!), preferring mild, stress-relieving projects at this particular point in my life. But oddly enough, I started knitting with a stopwatch at my side this week. This is because a stranger asked how long it takes me to knit a pair of socks, and I realized I have no idea. "A couple weeks," I said, "depending on how much time I have to work on them." But it got me thinking: how long does it take me to knit a pair of socks?

While I'm at it, I thought I'd work on some updates to my preferred sock pattern. I could use some new pictures.

I began with a Turkish cast-on, but onto one circular needle (40 inch, size US3). I tied one end of my yarn (Mountain Colors Bearfoot "Indian Corn") to the flexible cable, held the needle next to the cable, and looped my yarn behind, up over, and around 12 times. Then I tied the second strand on to the bottom cable and made 12 more loops.

Trying to keep the tension tight, I knit across these stitches. When I turn to do the other side, I first dropped the temporary knot off the needle, pulled it tight and held it back out of the way, and knit across the other side of the cast-on loops.

I'm increasing for the banded toes this way:

K1, YO, K up to the last stitch on this sock, YO, K1. Repeat around.

On the next round, you'll twist the yarn-overs so they don't leave holes. Knit the first yarn-over through the back loop. You can do the same to the yarn-over at the other end of the sock, or you can twist it the other way to make mirrored increases. (I find it easiest to drop the yarn-over off the left needle, pick it up again from back to front, then twist the stitch by knitting through the front). This has the same effect as lifted increases, but it's easier to do because the stitches aren't pulled so tight.

It took me about an hour and half to make the toes. Here's a picture of the socks after nearly two hours knitting time.

Librarian 2.0

Yesterday, I drove two and a half hours so that my balding, talking head could be digitized for a library e-learning module about MPOW. Five hours in a car requires an audiobook. I've been wanting to listen to Sarah Vowell's "Assassination Vacation," but no store had it in stock and no library had it available. Not being in the mood to fight the digital rights management battles required to download audiobooks from the library (it's totally not worth it), I was going to settle for what I could find on the local library shelves. Then I remembered that iTunes sells audiobooks. In seconds, I found Assassination Vacation on iTunes, bought it, and downloaded it to my computer and Nano.

The book comes in three parts, each part 2.5 hours long, exactly the time it took to drive from my apartment to the regional library system studio where I was taping. It's like it was Meant To Be.

If I ran a library, I would be looking to see what I could do with this. Not just following the Shifted Librarian's suggestion to buy some iPod shuffles to circulate. How about a public iTunes download station? Let library users set up their 'pods on the station and download a title or two to their own devices? The library could even rip their own CD's to the public iTunes station. Look, you know that iPod owners check out the CD's and rip them to their devices; why don't we just save them the trouble? This isn't total anarchy -- we're librarians: we'll find some way to impose rules.

So it was a "good librarian" day for me. I helped create training for new library workers, I was able to explore new media consumption and imagine how it can be brought into the library environment, and I got to wear my new "Don't make me shush your ass" t-shirt out in public.

Starting Socks

(I long to be an ebullient blogger, freely sharing my ample wit with an adoring public. I wish I were more like Franklin or Marilyn, but I'm just not. Instead, the best I can do is boring shit like this. But to the few who faithfully check back hoping I'll say something interesting, bless you).

I've been thinking a lot (too much?) about the toes of my toe-up socks. My usual method has some drawbacks -- not the fact that I don't really do both socks at once (I complete one toe, set it aside, complete the second, then start working both together). No, the problem is that the short-row method creates a line of loops on the inside. I can feel them with my toes.



Despite my fondness for the Patricia Gibson-Roberts yarn-over method of short rows, I admit that the more traditional "wrapping" of a stitch makes a tighter, cleaner result. I seem only last week to have overcome my learning disability with picking up the wraps correctly.



There are still loops on the inside, but they're smaller.




The breakthrough? It wasn't the Short Row How-To Guide published in the Winter 2004 Interweave Knits. It was the Shortrow Spiral afghan square I contributed to the blanket my list siblings made for Charles.

Show off

"I hear you knit socks," someone said to me before a meeting yesterday. Now there's a conversation starter I can't resist. Kinda brings out the show-off in me too, and yesterday I was prepared: when she went on to say,"Have you seen the new Nancy Bush book?" I pulled out the pair of "Gentleman's Fancy Socks" that I'm working on.



In Mountain Colors Bearfoot, adapted to my preferred toe-up, two at once, Magic Loop method. I love the texture of this stitch with its little, staggered bricks. Simple too: 8 rounds of K2P2 rib, 2 rounds plain knit, 8 rounds of P2K2, and then 2 more plain knit rounds.

Moebius obsession

The second issue of MenKnit is out, and the "Cha Ching Moebius Scarf" was one of those patterns that sent me immediately to the stash to start working on. I was pulled up short when I discovered the pattern doesn't actually explain how to do the Moebius Cast-On unvented by Cat Bohrdi. I've knit moebii before, following instructions like these, but I found it hard to get started and disliked the ridge running through the middle of the scarf. Bohrdi's method is superior: a reviewer at Amazon pretty aptly describes it as "the invisible cast on worked with the circular needle's coil serving as the waste 'yarn.'"

Searching for the yarn that the designer recommends -- Reynold's Odyssey -- I hit six LYS's in two days (central Ohio is a knitter's paradise). No Odyssey to be found, but lots of other yummy substitute possibilities. At the last store, I broke down and bought the Manos that I'd been eyeing everywhere else.



In no time at all, I had 200 stitches cast onto my 60" size 9, and I was off, guided by the toss of six coins (a la I Ching) on this Moebius adventure.



Not bad, but I wasn't completely satisfied. I went ahead and ordered some of the recommended Odyssey on-line, so that's on its way. But too impatient to wait for it, I bought some Mountain Colors Twizzle, a beautiful and soft blend of merino and silk.



No I Ching guidance for this one; just 4 rounds knit, 4 rounds purl, repeated three times. Mike is happy -- he'd been clamoring for a soft purple scarf, and this fits the bill nicely. And it wasn't nearly as boring as the plain garter stitch scarf I thought I'd wind up making him.

I'm kind of in a scarf rut now, with three lingering scarves-in-progress, more moebii planned, and a felted chainmail scarf creation still lurking in the wings. I've also got three pair of socks started and an unfinished sweater: more WIPs than I've ever had.

First FO of the New Year

My first finished objects of the new year are, of course, a pair of socks.



From Bearfoot, on size two. The twisted ribbing pattern is an adaptation of the "Conwy" pattern from Nancy Bush's Knitting on the Road (suggested to me by knitting sib DianeinChicoCA).

Wild Thing, I think you're groovy

As I said earlier this month, I wanted to try making a felted King of the Wild Things crown, but I was having trouble getting the recommended pattern gauge. But I decided to just wing it. I used Lopi, which is bulkier than called for, but I liked the colors best. And I'm thrilled with how it turned out.



It's more snug than I expected -- I thought it would be bigger, but after two trips through the washer, it felted down to the recommended horizontal gauge. A bit too tight for Logan, so I've been trying to make a bigger one, with mixed success.



On the right is a "medium" sized crown, knit with Heilo from Dalegarn. I tried to make longer points, with dubious success. Anyway, this felted down very small. On the left is another try, this time with Cascade 220, knitting the "extra large" size. Better circumference -- I think this one might actually fit! -- although you can really see that my vertical gauge is off.

Tagging

It was on a visit to Chicago in 1988 that I first saw the spiky signatures scrawled across the wall. They were beautiful and mysterious, like some powerful message in a language I could almost understand. A few years later tagging finally made it to Columbus, and I had to show an i.d. to buy a big black marker. I developed a brief academic interest in these intersections of crime and art, and they sparked my imagination as well. I would see the tags on signs and buildings, and I thought of them as runes, their makers writing spells of influence on the city. I even entertained a story idea that germinated in my head: a teenage boy doodling in a notebook, trying to design his own tag, manages to write a glyph that he has a magical link to.

I am thinking about tags this week for a couple reasons. Primarily, it is because of this story in the Houston Press about crafty knitting taggers. But also because Santa is on his way to our house with an iPod Shuffle for Mike. How will we know which is his and which is mine? I think a little graffiti tag of my own might look quite nice on the bare white plastic Shuffle.

Dan Savage on 'The Commitment'

Dan Savage on 'The Commitment'

One day way back in November, while listening to NPR's "All Things Considered" during my drive home from work, I heard a teaser for an interview that would be broadcast the next morning: Dan Savage talking about the realization that his 7-year-old son DJ was hearing his fathers' relationship discussed as "a threat to all things decent and good." I didn't hear the interview, and for the next few days some glitch at NPR.org kept me from hearing the story online. Knowing the problem would be fixed eventually, I stuck the link in a blog post, saved it as a draft, and promptly forgot about it.

This morning I ran across the unposted draft, and finally followed the working link to listen to the story. The highlight for me was Savage saying, "All kids understand a promise," and DJ coming to realize that marriage is a promise people make to stay related. Which is why when DJ is picking the rings Dan and Terry will use in their marriage ceremony, he chooses rings with skulls on them, saying, "Dad, don't you understand you're going to get married? That means you have to stay together till you die."

(If listening doesn't work for you, the transcript is available in EBSCOhost Newspaper Source. Search for "dan savage" and enter "morning edition" as the newspaper name).

Insanity (updated)

OK, I freely admit this is insane. But I couldn't resist trying the "Magic Loop" circular knitting technique to make the joining loops in a knitted chain.



I will say this: the flexible cord of the circular needles is very easy to pull through the knitted chain links as you move the links around ahead of your working stitches. But all in all, I think doing this with short, double-pointed needles is easiest of all.

It's possible that this insanity will extend to partnering with my fabulous friend Mary to make knitted versions of her beautiful chainmail creations.

---

Update December 17:

The chain felted up very nicely. It's about 6 feet long, and while it probably won't be very functional as a neck warmer, it looks pretty sharp as a decorative accessory.



In the end, I kept up with the Magic Loop experiment; it got easier as I went along.

Quick hat

Going to visit my friend Beth for the first time since she had her baby this fall, and it suddenly occurred to me that knitters are not allowed to meet new babies without bringing a hat.



Hope it fits. I have so much trouble getting baby clothes to fit right. 

Adventures in Felting

Last week, my mom sent me the link for a felted crown inspired by Where the Wild Things Are. I couldn't wait to get started, but all the yarns I've tried have failed to give me the correct gauge. See all these rectangles?



They're supposed to be squares. The pattern designer has been great though, even willing to customize the instructions for whatever gauge I'm getting. I think I'm just going to wing it, however, recognizing that I will need to make my crown a little bigger around and a little shorter than the instructions call for.

But seeking some mindless knitting -- you know, something I don't have to make fit? -- I tried the "Marley's Ghost" felted chain pattern in the latest issue of Knitty. Now this is some fun.

Heel replacement

I was up late on Xmas Eve last year finishing some festive socks for my mom.



But this morning I noticed that the heel was unraveling on one of them.



Supposedly, the big advantage of the short-row heel is how easy it is to replace. We'll see.

I was pleased with these socks. They're not identical: the stripe patterns are reversed. From the toe on one (and the cuff on the other) they follow the striping pattern I created based on the Copenhagen cathedral chimes.

A Sock Yarn Spree

I spent last week in Maine, and it seems I couldn't leave a yarn store without picking up some sock yarn.



Most purchases were from Quiltessentials in Auburn, a quilt store with a small but stellar inventory of yarns. Because I couldn't wait until I got home, I went back to the store the next day to pick up some extra needles and get this skein wound into a ball:



This is Done Roving, and I love it. It's not obvious from the picture, but the colors are really unusual: shades of turquoise and red clay (the colorway is called "Southwestern"). And what do you know...these socks I'm knitting up are sized to fit me.

Gift Season

[Updated December 18]
Miss Manners has always disdained wish lists. That's nice in theory, but when you've got a birthday in December, it's just rude not to help out the people who want to get you something.

I've kept an Amazon.com Wish List since they first started offering them, and that has been great. But if someone doesn't want to buy me books or media, it's hard to let them know what I want.

Last year, I created a Froogle Wish List. Not quite as convenient as Amazon, but it does have a wider range.

This year, I'm discovering that I want stuff from Cafe Press. I haven't had much luck getting Cafe Press stuff to appear on a Froogle list, so here's my Cafe Press wish list:

• Guerrilla Stitcher hoodie. (Although I wear a large shirt, the hoodie should probably be extra large).
• Spiral Pi t-shirt.
• "wtfwjd?"mug.
  

I'll add more as things catch my eye.

Hybrid

A survey by Harris Interactive found that GLBTQ people are more likely than heterosexuals to buy a hybrid car. So I fit the profile. But they also found that gay men are more likely than straight men to have satellite radios (don't have that), and that we prefer luxury cars to economy cars.

I'm eager for the day when having a hybrid isn't a "statement." See, I think there are Rules of Taste for messages on the back of cars: the tasteful driver can have one message and one parking sticker. If you have to have two parking stickers, then you sacrifice a message, but you can't put on two bumper stickers just because you lack a parking sticker. A message can be a license plate frame, an alumni window sticker, a bumper sticker, or a magnet. Vanity plates can, on occasion, be given exemptions on a case-by-case basis, but they usually constitute a message.

Currently, I have no extra message: no HRC icon or rainbow flag, no Darwin fish or Brights emblem, no political messages. The indication that my Civic is a hybrid seems to constitute a message all its own.

[From Wired's Autopia blog]

A new character for Unshelved

A new character has been introduced to the library-themed comic strip "Unshelved": a cataloger. As our hero Dewey descends into the basement (of course) with a stack of graphic novels for recataloging, he encounters the new character, who is knitting.

Kids' Hats

My hands still seemed to want to play with the Peace Fleece, so I whipped up something from a hat pattern I like, the Ireland Mists Hat. (The pattern used to be free on the web, but I get a "Forbidden" message when I go there now. It's still available from the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine.

I had in mind my friend Beth's new baby Faith when I started the hat, but it's too big.



The pumpkin hat is for David, the boy my friends Will and Tiffany adopted last month. I'll give it to them tonight at Game Night.

Wrist Warmers

My mom recently made a poncho for my sister, using a pattern she'd first used in the 70's. She had a few skeins of Peace Fleece left over, and gave them to me. There wasn't enough for a kitty bed (those take a surprising amount of yarn), but I thought that maybe some wrist warmers to match the poncho might be nice. I've just started the second, but here's the first of the pair.



This was loosely adapted from the cable pattern on the poncho. I used two patterns -- Jo Ellyn Wheeler's "Cabled Wristers" from the Fall 2004 (4:3) Twists and Turns and Bonne Marie Burns's "Voodoo Wrist Warmers" from Winter 2002 Knitty -- for inspiration.

Cast 40 stitches onto two size 7 circular needles, joining into round. First round: *k1, p2, k9, p2, k1, p5; repeat once from *.

Beginning with round 2 of the four round pattern below, knit until piece measures about 7 inches. The pattern repeats once each round.

1. K1, p2, k9, p2, k1, p1, k3tog, p1, k3tog, p1
2. K1, p2, k9, p2, k1, p5
3. K1, p2, cross 4 right (instructions below), k1, cross 4 left, p2, k1, p1, increase 3 (k1, p1, k1 in same stitch), p1, increase 3, p1
4. K1, p2, k9, p2, k1, p9

To make thumb hole:

• K1, p2, k1, bind off 7 stitches, continue in pattern to end (round 4)
• K1, p2, k1, cast on 7 stitches, continue in pattern to end (round 1)

Continue knitting until the piece is 9 inches or desired length. Bind off.

I'm generally pleased with the result. I actually think a thumb gusset would be desirable, but I don't really have the gumption to figure that out.

Crossing instructions are from http://www.knitting-crochet.com/terms.html

Cross 4 Left: Slip next st onto cable needle and leave at front of work, knit next 3 sts from left-hand needle then knit st from cable needle.

Cross 4 Right: Slip next 3 sts onto cable needle and leave at back of work, knit next st from left-hand needle then knit sts from cable needle.

Here is my attempt to chart the pattern. Click on the picture to see a larger version.

Sudoku obsession could ruin my life

I'd been hearing about the wild popularity of Sudoku, the number placement puzzle. I finally tried it this week, and suddenly I'm obsessed. Web Sudoku is a good place to try it, because the "How am I doing?" button lets you know when you've made a mistake.

It reminds me a bit of Minesweeper; the logic involved in figuring out where a number must go because of where it can't go appeals to me. As my eyes scan over the grid hunting for certain numbers, I'm reminded of those Mah Jongg tile solitaire games like Shanghai.

The trouble? Sudoku takes attention. Unlike knitting, I can't do Sudoku and watch TV, carry on a conversation, or read. I obviously can't do Sudoku and knit. And if I keep trying to do Sudoku puzzles while Mike wants to play along with Lingo or What's My Line, then my relationship will be on the rocks.

My only hope is to get him hooked too.

A happy ending

You know, I really don't want this blog to be filled with stupid pictures of the cat, but Mike snapped this photo today, and I couldn't resist.



At last, Dodger seems to have abandoned the plastic bag and taken to the felted cat bed.

Larger bottle cozy

So here's a cozy I whipped up for a liter-size bottle.



And as promised, a pattern (of sorts)

I used Sugar 'n' Cream cotton, knitting in the round on two 24 inch size US5 (3.75 mm) needles. But the pattern is adaptable to your preferred yarn and needles.

• Cast on 8 stitches. Join and knit one round.
• (YO, K1) around
• Knit
  
• (YO, K2) around
• Knit
• (YO, K3) around
• Knit

Keep increasing (8 yarnovers every other row) until your disk is the size of the bottom of your preferred bottle. In the picture above, I increased until I reached 48 stitches around.

Knit plain for 8 rounds or so (about an inch, or as long as looks good to you).

The "body" of the bottle cozy can be any stitch pattern you want. I've been experimenting with lacy stitches. Above, I used:

1. (YO, K2tog) around
2. Knit
3. (K2tog, YO) around
4. Knit

Nice effect, but not snug enough for my bottle. Next time, I'll decrease by 8 stitches or so before beginning the lace. Because the lace was too big, I went back to knitting plain rounds and added some ribbing. The moral? Experiment.

End with an inch or so of ribbing and bind off loosely.

Bottle cozies

A few years before I learned to knit, I went through a "waxed linen jewelry" phase, making little charm pouches and pen basket necklaces out of waxed linen. Around that time, my mom began freezing bottles of water to take to work. I used the same looping technique for the charm pouch to make a cotton pouch for the water bottle. I made a couple of these, stopped doing it because it was tedious, learned to knit for real, and forgot about it all.

My sister called this weekend to say her water bottle cozies have now fallen apart. She wants new ones. So I thought I might see what I could do with knitting needles. These are the fruits of my experiments over the past couple days.



Both of these are from worsted weight Sugar 'N' Cream cotton. I made the one on the right first, following this Water Bottle Tote pattern. The one on the left is my attempt at pattern refinements: a flatter bottom and less annoying stitch pattern (using Turkish Stitch instead of Purse Stitch). Both of them are a bit too small; they won't fit around a liter-sized bottle, but they'll work for smaller bottles.



I want to try again, then I'll post my own pattern here.

Let there be natural selection

I remember in 4th grade, learning about how stars and planets form out of nebulae; I was the kid who said, "But I thought God made the earth." My teacher muttered about this happening every year, and said, "Sure, but scientists are just trying to figure out how He did it." OK, so at the age of 10 I was taught science with an intelligent design slant. I still wound up an atheist.

The New York Times today reports on the survey results from the Pew Research Center, highlighting that 64% of respondents say that Creationism should be taught in schools.

I guess I could get behind this if it made the whole thing go away. "Class, the 'theory' of Intelligent Design is that God or the aliens made life happen on earth by magic. This will not be on the test. What will be on the test is how adaptation and competition for resources within ecological niches have helped shape the evolution of species over millions and millions of years. You'll also be called upon to properly define a 'theory.'"

Where is the intellectually rigorous religious thought? Aren't there Deists anymore? I could respect someone who said, "A creator set up the forces of physics that define and shape the observable universe." On the first day, God created math.

Leftovers Again

I still had some leftover Lamb's Pride and thought it might work with a fuzzy pink accent yarn. I'm not overjoyed with the result, but it's OK.

Hallowig

A fun little project for the weekend.



Mom asked me to knit one of these hallowigs for someone she works with (something about a "Lollipop Guild" routine). Frankly, I think this looks more like Oompa Loompa hair, or like something out of anime. I wonder if one of the Elvis wigs might be more appropriate?

Leftover Pi

Despite Dodger's indifference, I started another cat bed, this one out of leftover Lamb's Pride. (I have lots of this stuff, due to past obsessions with felted clogs and jester's hats). The color scheme isn't great, but heck...it's a cat bed. Whoever gets it can put it in the basement or something.



As a benefit, knitting this thing destroyed my size 13 circular needle.



Seriously, it's a benefit. I love Addi's, but the connecting tubes on the larger sizes are horrid: the yarn sticks to them rather than sliding smoothly (the cause of the breakage, I'm sure). Still, they're so expensive that I couldn't really justify replacing it with something better until it broke. I was thrilled to see that now the size 13's have the normal thin Addi connector.

Imaginary playmate named principal

My mom called yesterday with this news item: my imaginary playmate has been named principal of Danville High School. "Roxie" was, in real life, a friend of my aunt.

I wonder if the students at Danville know that once upon a time their principal was invisible and lived inside a red vinyl Beatles change purse?

Yes, my imaginary playmate was named "Roxie." Further evidence that sexual orientation (or at least fabulousness) is something you're born with.

Three reading recommendations

In the past week, I've finished three books I can recommend. Arthur Phillips' The Egyptologist is a great summer read. Told in journals, letters and cables, it is the story of a man, Ralph Trilipush, who is trying to excavate a tomb at the same time Howard Carter is uncovering the tomb of Tutankhamen. Interposed are the letters, written decades later, from a private detective who is on a case that leads him on a collision with Trilipush. I thought the story got a little bogged down in the middle, but the unreliable narrators give this novel unexpected energy and humor.

One of my favorite books this year is Kenneth Oppel's Airborn. Engaging (if uncomplicated) characters, swash-buckling situations (with pirates even), glorious settings beautifully described. The plot hinges maybe a bit too much on coincidence, but this story of an airship cabin boy and the granddaughter of an explorer who find a new species (sort of a flying panther) cries out to be made into a movie. I could see something that uses the same film-making techniques as Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. (Hint to anyone writing a book report on this: discuss the multiple meanings of "airborn/airborne" in the novel).

And finally, check out Jeff Parker's The Interman, a graphic novel with echoes of The Bourne Identity and The Pretender. Van Meach is the product of a Cold War experiment that makes him almost endlessly adaptable, able to grow gills underwater, to shrug off poisons, and survive temperature extremes. OK, so I'm easily charmed by stories of men who can breath under water.

I told you he'd ignore it

Despite my suspicion that he wouldn't care, I went ahead and knitted Dodger a Kitty Pi this weekend. How could I not? This is where he was sleeping while it was in the washer being felted.



Maybe when it gets a little cooler, he'll care. But for the time being he seems to prefer the comfort of a plastic bag.

Dodger inspects

Dodger walked into the frame just as I was snapping this picture. I made these one at a time, "magic loop" style on a single circular needle (rather than both at the same time on two circs, my usual preference). I also tried out a tighter gauge; these are made on size 1 (2.25 mm) instead of 2 (2.5 mm).

Thankfully, Dodger doesn't often show an interest in my knitting. The only work-in-progress he's ever taken out of the basket and played with was a cashmere scarf I was knitting in the Matthew Shepard pattern. I think he likes yarn with goat hair. I've contemplated making him one of the felted kitty beds, but I suspect he'd just ignore it.

When do I get to vote for this man?

Senator Obama was the "Not My Job" guest this week on Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me. Smart, funny, charismatic. I can't wait to vote for him someday.

I never listen to the radio outside my car, but it has become a weekend ritual for me to listen to shows from the "Wait Wait" archive and knit.

Obey the Intarsia Giant

I couldn't resist this scarf from Knitty, even though I hate intarsia. And when my work looked like this...



...I was doubting how much I really wanted to go on. Nevertheless, I had 19 hours of Sweet Valley Hogwarts to listen to, so I went ahead and made two intarsia face panels.



I wasn't happy with them -- they were sloppy, even after blocking. Then I remembered a discussion on GLB-Knit about doing the Peace Blanket in double knitting: one side would be a negative, mirror image of the other. Something new to learn! After a few false starts, I got that going, and I'm much happier with the results. Here's the reverse:



Now it's just plain, boring circular knitting for 4 feet or so, then the "OBEY" panel.

Koigu, part two.

I finished those "Vine Lace Socks" in Koigu.



It was a nice change of pace, but I don't think I need to go out of my way to get this yarn. And I'll probably never make a habit of lacy socks, top-down construction, or this type of heel.

What do software patents have to do with knitting?

Not much activity here. My blogging energy has been spent
elsewhere.

I'm sure Randall Stross's article in today's New York Times will get plenty of play in tech blogs, but the knitters probably don't care. But knitters have an understanding of copyright that supports Stross's point. He argues in Why Bill Gates Wants 3,000 New Patents (registration required) that software patents should be abolished, and software makers should be protected by copyright alone. Microsoft should only be able to copyright Word and Excel; they should never be given patents on word processing or spreadsheets. (Simplistic example, obviously, but analogous to some of the concepts Microsoft has filed patents for this summer).

As knitters, we enjoy a great deal of design freedom because an individual cannot copyright a technique or method: only the words describing the method. Imagine if someone filed for and was given a patent for a technique: no one else would be able to use that concept in their own patterns. Obviously, no patent is ever going to be granted for knitting concepts (cabling, ribbing, intarsia) or techniques (picking, throwing) -- even for innovations like "magic loop."

Knitting: the Open Source Craft.