Best Quote I Heard All Day

I have a total irreverence for anything connected with society, except that which makes the road safer, the beer stronger, the old men and women warmer in the winter and happier in the summer—Brendan Behan

Haven’t really had much in the way of writin’ words in my brain this week. It happens. Perhaps I need to look into Behan’s approach. As he said, “Actually, I’m a drinker with writing problems.”

I’d rather write nothing than just toss up three lines or so. Perhaps it’s time for a blog vacation. Although I do need to do Part Deux of Finishing.

The few days I had off last week were spent mostly in the water, along with some knitting, a social event that included unbelievably good seafood cakes sans filler, and otherwise torpid behavior.

Blue Diamonds
Waiting for the Cotton Glace for Jenn’s Campanula made me itchy. Socks on the needles but no interest. Finished a piece for a surprise gift for a friend. And then I remembered: I have a bunch of Sharon Miller’s patterns and some Kidsilk Haze for one of them, Blue Diamonds.

Except that this is Magenta Diamonds. No blue. So here’s the start of it. As of this writing, I now have six motifs across.

Despite this appearing to be a fairly simple design, this is not for a beginning lace enthusiast. For one thing, you must have a solid handle on lace stitch formation when using a mohair blend such as Kidsilk. The self-edging is 16 rows, the diamond motif 14, so you need to keep careful track of where you are.

And because you work three of the edging points first before picking up along their edge to start the body, there’s a bit of fadoodling to start. If you look closely, you can see a slightly heavier ridge at the beginning of the body that is the picked-up edge.

As with all of Sharon’s directions, this one is wonderfully notated. However, for those of you who absolutely won’t or can’t use charts, you’re shit out of luck, even though she does give you the first 14 rows of the shawl body written out. You still need the chart, trust me.

Open Mic Thursday
I had another topic already written up but while I was working on the Magenta Diamonds tonight, half-listening to the TV, I thought of another one I liked a bit better.

It seems to me that the men who have meant anything to me in my life had their own passion for a particular interest. Indeed, if they have passion for an interest, they generally had passion for me too. Passion being what it is. It's the mutual understanding of each other's interest that I have found particularly important in a relationship.

Let's face it--one of the first things a guy notices about me, other than my tits and perhaps my winning smile, is that I am passionate about what I do, be it writing or fiberwork. If he has his own passionate interests, then he generally gets me. So here we go with this week's topic:

How important is it for you to have a significant other who has passion for their own interests?

And please, let it not be a justification for spending more money on yarn, eh?

Upcoming Events
I keep thinking about Fibrefest North, where I’ll be doing some impromptu finishing and spinning clinics, Rhinebeck and, yes, possibly Stitches East.

Graylagran posed this question in the Comments (note that I didn’t edit it):

let's say, that stitches east was just a few miles down the road from you (and you had hours of freetime, and lots of money burning a hole in your pocket) ... would yo go to the market (inspite of how you feel about the xrx "design team")?

Sure I’d go to the Market. What has that got to do with the XRX Design Team? OK, so I put $7 in the X-men’s pocket. I bought the Spring issue of Knitter’s, so I gave them some bucks for that too.

The reason I have not gone to SE the past two years is because I had no interest in going to Baltimore at that time and because I really felt more like spending money at Rhinebeck. The Market had gotten to be a bit stale, in my opinion. Tons of shops with booths selling the same crap. However, it is an excellent place to look at books you haven’t seen, and there are a few vendors who have wonderful wares.

So this year, I may in fact take a jaunt down I95 to B’more. I can do it in a day and if I want to stay overnight, I can find somewhere away from Inner Harbor.

Of course, in order not to be recognized, I may have to wear some fugly sweater and carry that damned Shaun hot-water bottle holder that my sister gave me for my birthday. That way, I’ll be most rare and handy in my incognito attire.