Now Norma Knits

We're Not Worthy

Stunning. Absolutely stunning. 

Bloody Blinkin' Blogoversary Button and Other Narcissistic Goings-On

After I don't know how many years, all of a sudden something went wrong with the Blogoversary counter on my sidebar. I noticed it was saying (every day) that there were...I don't know...something like 214 days till my blogoversary, which I prefer to spell "blogiversary," because the construction should match "anniversary" and there ain't no "o" in "-iversary."

Seems logical to me.

So anyway, apparently the blogoversary factory has been closed or something. I'm not very good at the maths, but I'm quite sure there are not 214 days between now and March 6, which is my blog's birthday. I went in and re-entered the date, generated a new code, and then I put it in my sidebar again and it was blank. So either I'm doing something wrong, or they are, or Typepad is not recognizing it, or whatever. So I took it down. But wait. I took it down, but it's STILL THERE. (Or is it?)  As of late last night, the number had inexplicably changed to 213. A quick Google search tells me that I'm not alone, so perhaps the site has gone defunct.

There is some sort of mischief afoot.

Funny enough, I searched for "blogoversary widget," and Google asked me, "Do you mean 'blogiversary widget'?"  

Why, YES, as a matter of fact! Yes, I do!  

But it took me to a site that didn't seem to create anything that was useful for me. So (I will admit, without putting a whole hell of a lot of effort into it) I gave up.

Now I will have to remember all on my own that my blogiversary is March 6. But I think after six years I can do that, hm? 

Can ju believe it's been SIX YEARS?! I can't. Man, this year I might even do one of those deep and meaningful posts full of thank yous and reminiscences and all that stuff. Or I might not. We shall just see. 

Here's an old photo of almost three years ago from the archives that I played around with (maybe a little too much?) last night on my new Picnik Premium account.  

and

Even after spending wayyyy too much time, I did not get it to be exactly like I wanted it, which is to make me look eggZACKly like Angelina Jolie. Ah well. 

Wanna see the original? 

Imagine how good it could be if the original was not all grainy and stuff. Uh-oh, this could be fun. 

So This is the End

I made soup stock last Friday using the last bulb of garlic and the last few onions from Garden 2009.

May we have a moment of silence, please?

All the other put-away vegetables and fruits are gone except four pint jars of tomatoes and two jars of the white rose petal jam that looks like an unmentionable body fluid, and BONUS! one jar of two-years-ago's elderberry cement that I found in the back of the refrigerator. It's still good, though. (Cement keeps fresh for a long time.) 

This is the time at which, if we were homesteaders, we would begin to starve to death and die from consumption, unless (or maybe even if) we had some meat, milk, and eggs -- though the hens would probably have stopped laying and would likely end up in the stew pot, and the cow's (or goat's) udders would be frozen and she'd have stopped giving milk. So I guess we might have some wormy flour that we could make into some wormy biscuits, if the rodents had not eaten it all or pooped in it. That's assuming we had any sort of fuel for heating and cooking, I guess.

*sigh*

Is it spring yet? 

Not by a long shot.

(This is the plow guy, stuck on our driveway for the second time yesterday, with more of the heavy wet frozen stuff falling. The snow was just too deep and heavy - mostly heavy - for his truck to take care of. I, the tough and inveterate Vermonter, still got stuck in the driveway when I arrived home. When I got out of the car I slipped on the icy snow, re-sprained my elbow, and filled my boots with snow. Good times. We shall not discuss this incident again. I love Vermont. I love Vermont. I love Vermont.) 

But a gardener can dream, can't she?

Seeds are in.

 

ExCUUUUUUUUSE Me!

I fielded some complaints from certain readership, including, ahem, Ms. Abigail, that Terrier Tuesday yesterday did not include a photo of the canine unit. And last night after I came home from class, and was seated on the La-Z-Boy with the laptop watching LOST*, he registered his own complaint.

"ExCUSE me, what is that thing doing on my your lap?!"

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*Which, in our humble opinions, is total merde this season. Such a shame. This series started off so beautifully. It was so addictive and so interesting. Somewhere along the way it got completely derailed. And this last season is almost painful to watch, it's so stupid. The dialogues are so bad, there are horrible long pointless monologues, and the acting is sickeningly awful. Clearly even the actors don't believe what they're doing. John Locke used to be such a great character and now he's half asleep, delivering a long monologue that means nothing. And I cannot look at Hurley or tolerate his constant utterance of "dude" for one.more.second. Other than that, though, it's just great. 

Glad it's ending.

Terrier Tuesday -- Hooked On Phonics

Dear Readers,

A.Alpha and David say I'm BARKIN' BRILLIANT! And, well, I don't really know why that's NEWS, but anyway. Glad they're finally on board.

Why, just the other morning, they were talking at breakfast, and I was, you know, being a good guy by bringing David a toy and trying to get him to play tug of war. 

David said, "Yes, I know. You want to be included in the conversation. You just can't STAND it that you're not in the middle of things."

A. Alpha reached for another cinnamon roll (KIDDING! She's on a low-carb diet! Stop it!) and responded, "Yep. Just like a toddler," turned away from me and slurped her coffee.

David said, "Greedy! You're so greedy. Can you spell greedy?" and put the coffee cup up to his mouth.

I tugged on the toy and started to sound it out: "Guh -- errrrrrr"...........

Alpha nodded approvingly. "See? He's spelling."

Then there was a big damn mess to be cleaned up, 'coz David's coffee was sprayed all across the kitchen.

Love and kisses, 

Mr. Jefferies

Progress Notes on the Blue Calmer Sweater

I am quite pleased at the way this is turning out. My plan is to add a finishing detail at the neck edge -- perhaps a knitted-on i-cord edge, which should firm it up so it won't sag and pull all out of shape. This yarn has elasticity in it, so it probably won't sag anyway. I secretly wish that that nicely defining ridge extended all the way around, but I lacked the technical knowledge to accomplish that, and I'll be damned if I'm going back to that now. I think I like it well enough as it is.

I tried it on and it fits so well I'm thinking of turning it into a tank instead of doing sleeves. But I know that sleeves will make it more practical and wearable for me, so I expect I'll soldier on.

I'm not convinced that it's the best color for me, though. The color seems to turn dead when I have it on me. But we shall see. I have to next finish the back (it's completed up to the armholes), and then make the decision about sleeves. 

And perhaps all it will need to look great is a nifty outfit with lots of browns in it, and a fabulous new accessory, like, oh I don't know, perhaps this incredible new bag that Elaine C. sent me with the note, "I couldn't let all that lovely paisley fabric go to waste."  (Please note, the same blue is in the paisley lining.)

Thanks a million AGAIN, Elaine!

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P.S.  I'd like to draw your attention to some new buttons at the bottoms of my posts -- "favorite," "reblog," "Tweet this."  I think you prolly know what to do with those buttons. I especially like "favorite," which will give me feedback that you liked the post, as well as (I am told -- I have not tried it yet) giving you the chance to "collect" posts that you might want to look back at at some future time.    

Stolen From Abigail: "The Best XKCD Cartoon Ever is the Best XKCD Cartoon Ever" -- AND Actual Knitting Content (No Joke!)

 From here.

P.S. If the full cartoon is cut off, you can either click it to make it bigger (thereby making it bigger, haha) or click the link for the cartoon at the original site. (I was having some problems with the formatting and in my previews it seems to be cut off on the right side.)

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Finally the tendinitis has eased enough (of course, because I have a P.T. appointment at oh-dark-thirty tomorrow morning) that I have been able to do some knitting. I've done a teeny bit on my mother's Shetland sweater, but that's still a bit painful, so I've gone more for the softer and easier option -- the Calmer sweater -- and great progress has been made.

I'm about at the place where I need to figure out what to do with the v-neck. 

I've even done some swatching. Please note, you are on the RIGHT BLOG -- yes indeed, the anti-swatcher has actually swatched. Mark your calendar.

This is the second attempt, and though I have not yet figured out exactly what I want to do with that damn V, I have learned what NOT to do, so that's something.

I also reminded myself of something else really important:  I love Lion Brand Fishermen's Wool yarn. I discovered this years ago, and panicked when the rumor was that they were going to discontinue it. I bought up enough (more than enough) for making a sweater at that time, literally for a song (and if you've ever heard me sing, you know how CHEAP that is!), when it was on sale at JoAnn. 

It has sat untouched, in a plastic bag, all this time. I pulled it out the other day to swatch that basketweave scarf sample, and picked it up to continue to try to figure out this v-neck. Yarn snobs, cover your eyes: That is NICE yarn, and so cheap. I wonder if it pills something awful, but I don't care. I'm determined to make a sweater out of it. It knits up soooo nicely, and flows over the fingers like butter. Once we become yarn snobs, we forget these things. And sometimes the snobby super-expensive yarn turns out to be nothing but expensive, saggy, stretched out, pilly crap that did nothing but eat a hole in your retirement account. (Right, Sandy?)

There is even an Aran sweater pattern on the damn ball band, and it looks like a nice one (though it takes a high-power microscope to read it). I'm going to make it. Screw the snobs!

The Studhorse Man, a Postmodern Review*

When I posted the cover of the book I was reading the other day, several people wanted a book report. I'm sure Abigail will be mad at me for this (because she likes the genre), but I'm not gonna lie: Except in rare instances, postmodern literature is very, well, postmodern. This book is no exception. And that's all I'm gonna say about that. 

How's that for an in-depth [and very postmodern, not to mention tautologically tautological] literary review? Then again, if I wanted to be truly postmodern, I could perhaps give an anti-literary review of an entirely different book, or three others, plus the mail that arrived in my mailbox, and while I'm at it, throw in what I think of CFL lightbulbs, my cholesterol report, AND the instructions on the back of my new hair dye box, all at the same time, written backwards, and in no particular sequence. (Hey, I think I just figured out Sarah Palin! Damn, I didn't realize! She's brilliant after all! See what good comes of this everyday blogging exercise?)(Or have I simply lost my mind?)

And you thought I was just copping out because I didn't understand the genre. FOOLED YA! 

But the postmodern Olympic gold medal winner I can appreciate: Shaun White, just following his win, to the press: "I don't feel like talking right now, guys." (subtext: "Fuck off.") And then, when he did give an interview, he used the word "gosh" more than once. I could not control my mirth. A snowboarder saying "gosh"? 

Dude. I.don't.THINK.so. It felt somehow dirty.

But then he showed up on Oprah the next day! Hahahaha. Oh, how I love it. LOVE!

And the postmodern TV commercial, I can get into that, too. This thing has gone viral, I know. Even though I've pretty much been hibernating from the internet this week, and I did not watch the Super Bowl, I've seen this tweeted and retweeted repeatedly, and I saw that Ariana Huffington posted it. I even saw it on the actual teevee the other night during the Olympics. But in case you have been living under a rock, or even just for the sheer joy of seeing it again, here it is, (and WHAT a coincidence!) a (somewhat) different kind of studhorse man.

 

*OMG, I shudder to think of the poor Googlers who are looking for a serious review. LOL. Ah, the postmodern blogger.

Basketweave Scarf -- The Secrets Revealed

Several people have asked me to write down the pattern for the basketweave scarves I made for the Red Scarf Project, and specifically to clarify how I did the edges.  

Because I did it the way I often do things -- that is, just DO it, without thinking about it -- I could not remember, when pressed, exactly how I had made that nice edge. So I had to sit down and start another one, writing down every step so that I could convey it clearly. 

Here it is.

BASKETWEAVE SCARF WITH SELVEDGE EDGE

Soft worsted-weight yarn, about 360 yards (I used Cascade 220, and I'm only estimating at the yardage, but this pattern is very economical with the yarn. It took less than two skeins of 220 to get a 6-inch by 64-inch scarf.)

Size US8 needles

Cast on 30 stitches to make a scarf approximately 6 inches wide. (Make the scarf wider or narrower by increasing or reducing in multiples of 4. Always add 2 stitches to your number for the selvedge edge. The blocks of stitches on either end are composed of 5 stitches; the others are composed of 4.)

Row 1:  With yarn in front, slip 1st stitch as if to purl; put yarn in BACK.

K4.  P4 K4 across until you reach last stitch. K1

Row 2: Hold yarn in FRONT. Slip 1st stitch as if to purl. Keep yarn in front. 

P4. K4 P4 across until you reach last stitch. Put yarn in BACK, K1.

Row 3: Repeat Row 1

Row 4: Repeat Row 2

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Row 5:  (You are switching here from a knit block to a purl block first, to begin the change which will result in the basketweave pattern.)  Repeat Row 2

Row 6: Repeat Row 1

Row 7: Repeat Row 2

Row 8: Repeat Row 1

And then start the sequence all over again.

Easy!

This pattern is a super-easy, super-fast knit, which results in a fabric that is the same on both sides. I maintain that it grows faster than many other scarf patterns, because the fabric it creates is so flat, but maybe that's just me. You've done a 60-inch scarf that is unisex and lovely and soft and highly suitable for the Red Scarf Project in no time at all! 

This pattern greatly benefits from a light steam blocking.

Solitude On Aldis Hill

Yesterday I took a hike

I had the hill all to myself

Not another living soul 

And not a sound to be heard

Except the crunch of my boots and the rush of my breath

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5th Year Bloggiversary CONTEST at JessaLu's!  Tell her I sent you!