Best Quote I Heard All Day
Time is what keeps everything from happening at once.

And my clock is ticking...5 days til surgery.

Sock Hop
I'm crunching away, trying to get at least one redesigned Leaves of Grass sock finished and photographed for the Freebie page before my arm gets splinted. I find most greens, with the exception of emerald green, depressing shades to work with, and this green that I'm using is no exception.

But given my mood the past few days, almost anything bums me out. What fresh hell is this? I ask myself repeatedly.

However, the pattern for the L of G is one that looks like overlapping leaves...a very easy 8-round repeat but with some interestingly executed mirrored decreases and strategically placed yo's that keeps me intrigued. And it wouldn't have looked very leafy if I'd done it in cerise. Let the punishment fit the crime. But I really do dislike this shade of green...

Stitches East
I think the only reason I am forcing my child to drive me to Valley Forge next Sunday, a scant 3 days after surgery, is that I need a bunch of stuff and I don't want to mail order it and pay shipping. My shopping list? Another yarn bracelet, some sock yarn for Achim because I want to make him some blue socks with "red dots" as a surprise, more O-ring markers, extra sets of #0 and #1 bamboo dps because you can never have too many sets, and perhaps some more Koigu. And whatever else knocks my handknitted socks off.

I think I may take a trip to the LYS today and order the Jamieson yarn for the Sandness Fair Isle pullover. I'm ever optimistic that I will be knitting up a storm sooner than I think.

KnitBlog Bopping
I was reading Annie Modesitt's blog, Modeknit Musings, last night, in an effort to play catch-up with everyone's scribblings, and thoroughly enjoyed her Life with Martha comments. As I had always suspected, The Girl From N.U.T.L.E.Y. is a stone bitch. How rare! May Martha grow large and blubbery on the fine starch-laden cuisine of the NY Upstate Women's Correctional Facility.

Then I moved on to my friend Jen Tocker of Yarnaholic Confessions fame. I think Jen hit the nail on the head with her observations of the knitting magazines and their underwhelming effort to attract "The New Knitter." How The New Knitter will improve their skills through these magazines and get past "New" is beyond me. As I commented on Jen's blog, if I had not had access to Mon Tricot when I was 22 and through that magazine, realized that there was more to knitting than stockinette, I would have never been challenged to increase my skills. And being the Teutonic Twit that I am, I always try to learn everything and be the best at whatever I do.

I fear that the knit mags are incubating a whole new breed of KnitDweebs, knitting pod people who emerge from their cocoons that hang above the yarn section in every Michael's across the land and who will descend upon the knitting multi-verse like flies on shit. Egad.

How handy! How obtuse! And yes...how rare!

And what a rainy, crummy day it is too...but I get to leave work at noon for my pre-op tests. So that's a good thing.

1. What size shoe do you wear?
Oh, I have dem big foots. Size 10.

2. How many pairs of shoes do you own?
I have no idea--20, maybe?

3. What type of shoe do you prefer (boots, sneakers, pumps, etc.)?
I love boots and heels...my preference depends upon what I'm wearing. If I'm at work, I like heels. If I'm hanging out, boots or Birks. I do wear sneakers (am wearing my old beat-up Nikes as I type this) and I have a new pair of NB cross-trainers for my work-outs but they're not my favorite footwear.

4. Describe your favorite pair of shoes. Why are they your favorite?
I guess my favorite pair are my lace-up boots because they look good with either jeans or a funky skirt. But I'm really liking the new pair of 3" heeled boot-shoes that I just bought.

5. What's the most you've spent on one pair of shoes?
Probably $125. But that was years ago. Now I haunt PayLess and Marty's. But I will only buy the real Birkenstocks, not the knock-offs. So I'm due for a new pair shortly and that'll be about $95.

Best Quote I Heard All Day
Sure, God created man before woman...
but then you always make a rough draft before The Final Masterpiece.

As we all know too well...don't we?

Martha Incartha-rated
If any of you were on the KnitList in 1997, when it was on the U of MN server (O, those were the days!), you may remember that I did a series of posts razzing Martha Stewart and proclaiming myself the Anti-Martha. Of course, there were the Martha devotees that sent me incredibly ill-written incendiary e-mails, which I ignored. But by and large, Martha was (and continues to be) an irritant in many serious craftspeople's collective eyes.

If I had a staff as large as she does, I too could perhaps have my own multi-billion-dollar empire. After all, when Martha wants to knit, she sends for Melanie Falick, places all the Stewartian nephews and nieces at her feet, and lets Melanie do the talking and knitting.

Remember that segment? Like Martha knits. Sure she does.

I admit to watching her sporadically. I adore watching people on TV tell me that I can whip up a bouillabaise for company and serve it my Limoges tureen.

And in my dreams...and perhaps t'will soon become reality...I see Martha up before the judge, who metes out the appropriate punishment for Martha's, um, slightly Byzantine stock selling antics. I see Martha settling into her suite at the NY Upstate Correctional Center for Women, straightening out the pale yellow-green gingham sheets on her bunk, while Yolanda above her reads Biker Babes magazine. I see Martha getting time off for good behavior because she's taught all the homegirls how to make simple but elegant chamberpots for their "rooms" by decoupaging milk cartons with left-over candy wrappers.

Martha will have a tough time setting 1500 places without fine Sheffield knives...but I'm sure that she'll be able to get enough tie-dyed napkins cranked out in time for Christmas 2015.

I can't wait.

How rare!