Are YOU ready for Sock Wars 2006?

My freshman year in college, guys in my dorm played a game they called "Killer." (Or maybe it was "Assassin?") Participants were given a target they had to get before they themselves were gotten -- shot with a squirt gun, poisoned by sugar or salt in a drink, throats slashed/marked with a marker, etc. Points were awarded for creativity, deducted for getting caught. I was the cause of deducted points -- an innocent bystander hit by the shrapnel of a water balloon grenade.

I wasn't interested in playing, but I am interested in Yarn Monkey's Sock Wars. Sign up before September 8, and on September 22 you'll be mailed a sock pattern and information about your target. You win by completing and mailing socks to your victim, but all the while you are someone else's target. You now take up your victim's mission, with her work in progress as your next weapon. A month later, the last one standing gets swag; everyone else gets the pair of socks that took them out of the game.

I have a knitted gift project that could interfere with my participation, but still, this sounds like a fun distraction. If I'm the one assigned to knit socks for Mel's size 13 feet, then gauge rules be damned: I'm using thick yarn.

Halfdome, Topdown

I finished the crown on my top-down version of the halfdome cap.

And I've learned something: increases do not look the same as decreases. This was probably always perfectly obvious to everyone else, but my reading of Barbara Walker's Knitting from the Top led me to believe otherwise. I can see where it sort of looks raglan-ish, but it's just not as attractive as the bottom-up version. Still, the advantages of not running out of color before finishing the top outweigh the beauty of the raglan decreases, if you ask me.

Apartment renovation update:
Molding is complete in the bathroom. Kitchen ceiling has been painted and the broken plastic light panels have been replaced. I'm sure my designated knitting contractor is correct and the whole thing needs more major repair, but it's an apartment, and up to the property managers and owners to decide how much work to do.

I can live with this

My fears of a patchwork bathroom were mounting. I mean, look at the linoleum around the sink


But the floor was put down today, and while all the pieces are indeed utterly dissimilar, there's a general neutrality to it all. I can cope.

There are a few small bits left to finish (moulding isn't complete all around the floor), and the kitchen ceiling is still damp, which is suspicious, since we haven't taken a shower here all week. I mean, that was the problem that started us off on this little renovation adventure. Hopefully soon, we can put all this behind us, and my blog can return to more details of what I'm knitting and more complaints about identity politics.

Shower Construction, Day Three

Progress on Wednesday: the linoleum is gone from the floor and repairs have started on the wood beneath. Some marble panels have been installed in the shower.

I'm starting to worry about a patchwork bathroom, with shower, sink, wall tile, paint, and floor all failing to match in any recognizable way. I'll get over it. It's just a bathroom. The marble panels in the shower really do look nice.

However, I seem to be missing a tube of Elidel cream. I can't imagine why the workers would take it, but it's not where I left it the night before.

After snapping the above photos, I took off for XY Night at the Merc. Mine were the only Y chromosomes to make an appearance however. Still, good conversation with the Y-deprived, I finished off the cap, and started some seaman-style neck-ribbing on the Obey Giant scarf.

Shower Construction, Day Two

Significant progress on our bathroom repairs Monday afternoon, when workmen ripped out the tile and replaced the mildewed wallboard behind it. They had just finished when I arrived home.

I overhead one of them say, "I'm going to call in sick tomorrow; stay out of the heat." Sure enough, nothing seemed to happen Tuesday. Mike and I are showering in a vacant unit elsewhere in the complex, which is inconvenient but a fun little adventure. Reminds me of dorm life, as I walk over to the other apartment, wearing my flip-flops and carrying a shower bucket and a towel. Mike lacks this nostalgic memory; I don't think he's finding the same enjoyment I am. (There's a weird feeling of doing something almost illicit -- slipping into another apartment and doing something as intimate as bathing).

More updates as events warrant.

What's that smell?

This is turning out to be the summer of disagreeable odors.

About 10 days ago, Mike surprised a skunk one night when he was taking the trash out. In the darkness, he didn't notice the animal or see what it was, only that it looked like a puppy that was "moving funny." It was probably stomping in warning. He dashed off when the tail went up and he saw the white flash, but it was too late.

I'm enormously grateful for the Internet, which provided an effective recipe for musk removal. Tomato juice, all sites seem to agree, doesn't really do it; you need hydrogen peroxide, baking soda, and dishwashing liquid.

I'm still finding some lingering contamination in the house (the towels Mike used after showering, the t-shirt I wore to bed that night, the small pillows we use in place of teddy bears), but generally the musk is gone from the house. Just in time for new and different bad smells.

I'm pretty sensitive to mildew. It's quite a battle in our bathroom, because a few years ago we had a leak that the landlords didn't repair -- just sealed it over, trapping moisture behind the tile. The new landlords are putting some energy into fixing the problem, but this involves extensive repair on our kitchen ceiling and a powerful, industrial fan blowing into the bathroom plumbing access panel (which happens to be on the wall by my side of the bed). Happily, Loratadine/Claritin handles my mildew allergies as well as it does hayfever. We won't be able to use our shower next week, but the inconvenience is a small price to pay for getting this problem taken care of.

Knitting reports:

I apparently dropped a stitch at the heel join in Mom's purple fib socks. That's enough of a problem area on socks even without mistakes, so I frogged back to really fix it. That pair is completed now.



One ball wasn't enough to complete the large adult halfdome cap, which isn't a surprise, but unless I make a longer contrasting brim, one ball isn't enough for me to make the regular adult size either. I finished off the top of the large cap with the black yarn I used for the brim (pictured below in green; the hat is weirdly shaped because it's too big for me, but it should fit Aubrey). I'll buy more of the blue to finish the last few rounds of the regular cap, and maybe knit a second one from the top down so it won't matter when I run out of color.



Nice picture of my bald spot, huh?

Fibonnaci again

When the socks I intended for Joe were too small, I wanted to get working on another pair quickly. Joe is a retired engineer, so I figured he might like the Finonacci sequence design. I picked up some New England Highland wool in oatmeal and teak. Working from actual measurements, I created these socks:


One pair of socks finished, four more in progress (which shows a profound lack of imagination and ambition, if you ask me). Meanwhile, I set sock work aside to begin working on some Halfdome caps in the latest issue of Knitty. These are cool, although I don't understand why the instructions have you knit them flat then sew the seam. I'm knitting them in the round by casting on two less stitches than the pattern calls for, then subtracting those stitches from the count at the beginning and end of the marker placements and decrease rounds. I've got one cap in progress to replace the lame one I made for Aubrey this spring, and when I ran out of yarn to complete the crown, I started another.

Mission: get all these socks and hats completed before the next XY Knit-In at the Merc next week.

Hat for LC2

The head hugger hat I talked about a few weeks ago did not shrink down to size. So I decided to try again.

Working with some Debbie Bliss SoHo that I bought near SoHo (at The Point in Greenwich Village), I went down a needle size and tried the alternate directions for a six-section (instead of a 12-section) crown. One section in, I decided:

1. I didn't like how the chevron brim pattern looked with variegated yarn, and...
2. I didn't like knitting the wraps visibly on the top

So I started again, this time knitting a plain, garter-stitch body for the hat, and working the wraps to the inside of the cap.

The result is a smaller cap that should fit Linda much better than the previous attempt. It's blocking now (turns out that the core to my old Donvier ice cream freezer is the perfect size and shape for blocking pill-box hats),


In case you're interested, here are my instructions for the six-section crown without knitting the wraps visibly. (For the rest of the pattern, buy a copy from Danny).

 Row 17    K3, kw, swt
 Row 19    K4, kw, kw, swt
 Row 21    K6, kw, kw, swt
 Row 23    K8, kw, kw, swt
 Row 25    K10, kw, k1, kw, swt
 Row 27    K13, kw, k1, kw, swt
 Row 1     K16, kw, k1, kw, k2

Forever free to censure the government

Last week, when I read the New York Times' report on the government's use of financial communication data to track terrorist activity, I said to Mike, "Look, the Times has just earned their Pulitzer this year." I like the theory one of Andrew Sullivan's readers proposed: the story makes the Bush administration look great. They wanted it published so they could trumpet what a brilliant job they're doing and villify the press, which always plays well to the conservative base.

Today, NY Times editor Bill Keller and LA Times editor Dean Baquet have published a reminder that telling us what our government is doing is not only the right guaranteed the press in the First Amendment, but also its primary responsibility in a democracy:

Thirty-five years ago yesterday, in the Supreme Court ruling that stopped the government from suppressing the secret Vietnam War history called the Pentagon Papers, Justice Hugo Black wrote: "The government's power to censor the press was abolished so that the press would remain forever free to censure the government. The press was protected so that it could bare the secrets of the government and inform the people."

Censor/Censure...nicely done.

But I wanted to be Wonder Woman

Your results:
You are Superman

You are mild-mannered, good, strong and you love to help others.

Superman		55%
Spider-Man		55%
Robin		54%
Green Lantern		50%
Supergirl		47%
Catwoman		45%
Batman		45%
Hulk		45%
The Flash		35%
Wonder Woman		32%
Iron Man		25%

Click here to take the Superhero Personality Quiz

(In point of fact, it's a tie between Superman and Spider-Man. I took the test again to see if I could get my Wonder Woman score up -- or at least my Green Lantern score -- and ended up 70% Superman. Must be the cape).

Fibonnaci Socks

As Jerry mentioned, I started a pair of socks for my mom at XY Knitting last week. She'd asked for socks with contrasting toes and heels. So I bought some Plymouth Encore to make purple socks with yellow toes.

The socks were proceeding nicely, but they just looked so boring. So I decided to copy Hugh Mannity's idea and add some accent stripes at fibonacci-inspired intervals.

I'm generally pleased. I've mostly hidden the color jogs on the accent stripes (if you expand the picture, you might be able to spot them). Those accents look a little wonky when the ribbing starts, but not bad enough to frog back.

PRAM

Mike and his former roommate coined the term PRAM -- perfectly responsive audience member. They used it pejoratively for someone who laughed at stupid, obvious jokes, got choked up over manipulative sentiment, cheered for unearned victories, etc.

But I think it's important to be a PRAM. Performances require good audiences. The energy of appreciation provides fuel to the live performer. I've seen professional productions of the musical The Mystery of Edwin Drood fall flat because the audience was too passive, while an amateur production came together brilliantly through the willingness of the audience. But it's not just about audience-participation shows like Drood or even live performances of any kind: books and movies are better when you put yourself in the spot of the intended reader or viewer. That role may not be to your taste; I'm not interested in being the intended audience for the latest Adam Sandler movie, but if I were forced to see it, I would certainly hate it less if I met it on its own terms.

Today I'm celebrating Gay Pride by being a good parade watcher. I've thought about being in the parade (I'd love to get a group of librarians together to do a Book Cart Drill Team routine). But I get a bigger kick out of cheering. I'll meet family and friends downtown later this morning. We'll try to stake out the front window of Barley's, drink lots of good beer, and then go outside and watch the parade. Despite the heat, Mary will have her rainbow boa (yesterday she referred to it as a "down jacket, inside out") and I will have my bubble machines. And if I can find some at the drug store, I want to bring little bottles of sunscreen to give to the go-go boys and topless lesbians.

---

Post-Parade Update, 3:30 pm

No problem getting the front table at Barley's. (We've had trouble with this in past, since the restaurant doesn't take reservations, but staff members have reserved the table some years). Some of the bubble guns wouldn't blow, but the Turbo Bubble Generator I bought last year was a huge hit (as was my "I'm a librarian. Don't make me shush your ass" shirt). I ended up giving the bubble machine away. There were people with air horns following the homophobic Christian protestors, blowing the horns every time the protestors got on their bull horns. I gave them the bubble machine in exchange for the promise to keep blowing bubbles on the fundies until they left. (Reviews of these types of machines suggest that they don't last long anyway).

I didn't find sample-sized sunblock, but I did buy some of the new Coppertone aerosol, which is a great product. (Yes, I'm keenly aware of the irony that the reason we all need to wear sunscreen all the time is because we've depleted the ozone layer by using aerosols). I couldn't get close enough to the people who needed it, however. Next year, we need samples to throw out to people (I'm surprised companies haven't thought of this already). And many more bubble machines.

Father's Day

I love how the stories of science can sound like myth. DarkSyde writes in Daily Kos (it's worth quoting extensively):

A billion years ago our home planet was unrecognizable. On land there was virtually nothing but barren rock, scoured by howling wind and pelting rain. The air was a poisonous yellow-orange haze of nitrogen and carbon compounds with only the barest presence of free oxygen. But the oceans bloomed colorfully with swarms of single-celled critters. It was the golden age the of Proterozoic Eon, a world ruled by microscopic creatures of dazzling diversity.

Some zipped around like tiny jet aircraft, powered through the viscous media by rows of cilia or a single whip-like flagella. Others lazily poured themselves into one advancing pseudopodia after another, moving and engulfing their prey like the blob. A few found safety in numbers and grouped in bulky mats, preserved to this day as stromatolites. And here and there, perhaps a handful had organized into groups of burgeoning specialized cells--the first metazoans. But there's an even more exciting change in the works and it will become all the rage: We're talking 'bout sex!

It goes on to talk about the evolution of sexual reproduction and the creation of dads. Like a Walt Whitman poem, the essay takes us from the dawn of life on the planet to the life of DarkSyde's own dad.

I miss my dad. It's been nearly 25 years since he died of a heart attack while fighting a fire. I've lived more of my life without him than with him, and yet, I can't write these sentences without being overtaken by sadness. I was glad to read that the volunteer fire department he gave his life to has a strong leader and hope for the future, but that news, on this weekend of this particular year, makes it hard for me to stay ahead of the grief I've spent most of my life trying to outrun.

Head Hugger Hat

A friend recently told me she no longer has to fix her hair, having lost it to chemotherapy. We're not close, but I care about her a lot, and wanted to make her a hat. One of my favorite patterns is Danny Oulette's Easy Head-Hugger Hat.


This is a bit too big, but I think it can be washed and blocked to a smaller size.

Despite the name "easy," the pattern has some tricky elements. I never have mastered the technique of grafting it together at the end, so there is a seam.

The pillbox/fez shape isn't to everyone's taste, but I think it will suit her. I hope she likes it. She's an amazing woman, and she's beat cancer before. I'm confident she can do it again.

Martha's Vineyard Socks

Last fall, Sarah and Joe brought me some yarn they picked up on their vacation on Martha's Vineyard. It was locally produced, and came with no label. I liked it, but I've had a lot of trouble making it into something. I first tried a Matt Shepard scarf but it felt too stiff. Then I tried iPod mittens, but I had trouble controlling the gauge.

Yes, it shows a severe lack of imagination, but of course, in the end, the yarn became socks.


Plain, thick, brown, wool socks. Knit toe-up with a star toe and PGR heel. Circumference is 42 stitches, so that took a bit of thought on the heel (I don't usually work heels on an odd number) and on the ribbing, since 42 isn't divisible by 4. The ribbing is K2, P1, K2, P2. Neat effect.

The socks were intended for Joe, but I incorrectly guessed that his feet were the same size as mine, and these will be too small for him. If I pick out and reknit the toe, I can make the sock shorter to fit Sarah. Or I could keep them for myself. These ~are~ kind of a cruel gift: socks that have to be hand-washed and laid flat to dry.

Mindfulness

A couple years ago when stuff was stressing me out, I ran across the notion of "mindfulness meditation" as stress-reliever. Mike and I signed up for a 6 week course at WiseWays, and I did some reading about mindfulness, meditation, and Buddhism.

I like meditation, but I don't regularly practice. I like that, at the core, nothing is really required but attention to the present. Our teacher would spread a cloth and lay out an altar with a stone, a candle, a small dish of water, and some sage. Nice props which appealed to my inner Wiccan, but mindfulness meditation doesn't need them. It doesn't need fancy postures, special pillows, mantras, or mandalas. It doesn't need faith, scripture, dogma, clergy, the divine feminine, or the crucified Lord. All that is required is attention to the breath and to the present moment, which is by its nature manifested here and now.

So of course, I did like Stephen Batchelor's Buddhism Without Beliefs. Since reading Franklin's post about how Buddhist practice has been subtly enriching his everyday life, I've been thinking I should set aside some time to breath, and maybe re-read Batchelor's book. I periodically look around to see if he's written anything else, and I'm happy to have discovered that Stephen Batchelor now has a blog. In his initial post, he says, "The view of reality disclosed through the natural sciences evokes feelings of awe incomparably greater than anything religious or mystical writings of any tradition can inspire." I can dig it.

Brown but pretty

My aunt had requested brown socks, a chore I wasn't looking forward to. I had thought about using some Trekking XXL for accent stripes, but it was too beautiful and became a separate pair. So...what to do with the plain brown Regia?


It's the "Child's First Sock in shell pattern" from the amazing Knitting Vintage Socks. A lot more work than a simple, toe-up sock with 2x2 rib on the cuff, but I'm pleased with the effect. See how the angle of the light brings out different aspects of the lace pattern? It's been a while since I followed an actual pattern, or knit a top-down sock (let alone with a heel flap and gusset); kind of a nice change of pace. But now I have second sock syndrome.

Knit in Public...Columbus too?

This is pretty much a public message to Caterwauler, Knitting Brow, and other central Ohians: what do you think? Is it worth asking Franklin for a customized Columbus Knit In Public Day design?

Which came first: insomnia or inspiration?

Yesterday on Men Who Knit, Hugh Mannity (note pun) wrote that he wanted to make a pair of Fibonacci socks, but he wanted the series to start at the heel and work outwards in both directions.

Yarmando is intrigued. A strange construction method and design-by-math?

I was lying awake at 3:00 a.m. thinking what ways could be used to start socks at the heel. When Dodger had his usual midnight snot attack (Wouldn't it be great if cats could just blow their nose? Or if you could just give them Sudafed?) I got up and tried a couple of the ideas out. I think I see how it can be done.

One way is to do your favorite tubular cast-on (mine is Turkish), knit your favorite short-row heel, and then begin knitting your tube. On the first round, knit half a round in waste yarn. You then either knit up towards the ankle or down towards the toe. When you're finished, remove the waste yarn, pick up the freed stitches, and knit the other half of your sock.

Another method that works but is significantly more cumbersome and confusing (particularly at 4:00 a.m. and with the "magic loop" method -- better to do it with double points I think) is this one: after knitting your heel, put aside half your stitches on a string holder. With your working yarn and a strand of waste yarn, work a provisional cast-on (alternative directions) for the required number of stitches -- at least half of your circumference, more if you want a roomier instep. Connect back up with the live stitches on the opposite side from where you started the provisional cast-on, and then continue knitting either down the foot or up the ankle, reducing any extra instep stitches you added.

Yeah, this is all too much trouble and offers no advantages over other sock construction methods. But it was an interesting experiment to work through when I couldn't sleep.

Sock Leftovers Scarf

I started this scarf in January, 2005, and it was one of the first things I wrote about when I started this blog. It sits untouched for months at a time, and now I really want to buckle down, finish it, and get it out of my life.

To that end, I've moved it up into the study, where I intend it to be the "official" project for that room. While I sit at the computer and listen to my favorite podcasts, or catch up on the television shows that I missed and have to download (yes, I recognize I'm stepping into a gray area of copyright ethics), this is the project I intend to work on.

Of course, I have to remember that knitted things must be picked up after I've taken pictures of them. This morning, Dodger decided that the scarf was another cat bed.