Best Quote I Heard All Day
I never travel without my diary. One should always have something sensational to read in the train. --Oscar Wilde

These days, Oscar would be holed up at JFK airport, writing on his laptop, and waiting for JetBlue to get their shit together.

I am avoiding the airport and hitting the road at 9:30 tomorrow morning in the trusty Elantra. Hopefully making it to Herndon ahead of the crap weather that's supposed to hit NJ tomorrow night. Supposedly 4-7 inches of snow.

What Every Knitter Must Take On The Road
Or, at least, what I need to take. Besides the suitcase crammed with enough clothes for five days.

A trait that I have passed along to my children is the fear of leaving for a trip and forgetting the one stupid item that suddenly you discover you can't live without. As a child, Corinne would pack all 22 of her Barbies, or it seemed that way.

In my backpack, I shoved my needle kit, my tubes of double-pointed needles, four balls of sock yarn, the three balls of Julia that Kristen gave me, the BBF Red Light merino lace shawl, my tool kit, the new Rowan magazine, sets of directions for two sock designs and a Fair Isle pillbox hat that I did in between writing for work this week, and my calculator.

Am I ready? You'd think I was going to knitting camp rather than going on a business trip. I appreciate readers' suggestions on yarn shopping possibilities but I won't be able to go anywhere other than Reston, where the company's headquarters is located.

A prisoner of corporate America. Feh.

However, I will be posting next week, most likely. The pictures will come from my cellphone camera but hey, WTF do you want?

Rowan Magazine Spring Issue
I went down to Montclair today to see Mumsy and we went over to Modern Yarn so I could pick up the Rowan mag. Whoa. Even better than what I saw online. Sharon Miller's shawl is lovely, Kaffe's stuff looks much nicer up close and personal, although I'd never make an intarsia afghan. A number of things done in Kidsilk Haze, which I love.

Even if you don't actually like the garment, Rowan photographs everything so lushly that you're riveted to the picture. That, and the colors, which were vibrant and enticing. I mean, am I ever going to knit deck chair seats or buntings? Nope, but the photos were so great, I was intrigued, even though the concepts are totally ridiculous.

American magazines, take note.

I imagined my fat can lowered into a knitted cotton deck chair seat. Given the stretch factor combined with the weight factor, ya gotta laugh. Basic physics, people.

The ass hits the ground unceremoniously.

Widderhood
I was gratified to see some of my sistah widders commenting on the last entry. They know I feel their pain and that I'm always here for support.

Time, time, time. That's the mantra. It takes time to reconnect your life. I've had more than five years to do so. Jimmy and I always knew that one would go before the other and that it would most likely be him. We discused it on several occasions. He urged me to find someone else because he did not want me to be alone. He understood, as do I, that everyone has room in their hearts for others. My finding a new love does not diminish what Jim and I had together or make it any less than it was. Nor is this Jimmy redux. This guy is his own man and that's the way it should be. And the way I want it.

I believe I honor Jim's memory by doing what I'm doing. In fact, I think he'd be pretty amazed at how far I've come. Sometimes, I'm amazed. Like driving to Virginia on my own. Never would have done that when Jim was alive. I'm not such a chicken-shit these days.

So, kids, I'll be checking in later in the week. And if you're on the road this week too, don't forget to take at least half of your stash with you.

You never know when a rare and handy opportunity to knit will rear its head.

Best Quote I Heard All Day
Soul meets soul on lovers' lips--Percy Bysshe Shelley

I know, that quote is a week late. I had my Valentine's Day this past Monday night.

In life, you are lucky if you have even one great love. And love can sometimes wend its way in strange directions and hit barriers that seem impossible to overcome.

There are two of us who have finally broken through it all. Because he loves me. And I love him. Deeply.

So now I have peace and happiness, at last.

The Kindness of Strangers
If I were an actress, I think I would want to play Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire. Because that's one of my favorite lines.

So, today, I had one of the nicest mornings (and evenings, but I'm not going there) that I've had for quite a while.

Kristin Nicholas came over for coffee.

As you know, there aren't a lot of designers whose work I rave about. Kristin is one, and has been for many years. The funny thing is, Kristin found my blog because someone told her I had written that Classic Elite went down the toilet when she left. So she checked me out. And we've e-mailed back and forth.

Kristin was down from Massachusetts visiting her mother, who lives in the town next to mine. Two Jersey girls sitting in my Wharton living room, just having coffee and talking about knitting, our lives in the business back in the '80s, when I was editing knitting magazines and she got her start at CE, and just stuff in general. I wish she could have stayed longer.

This is no diva. She's funny, outgoing, and the minute I opened the door, it was like an old friend had come to visit. What's surprising is that we've never run into each other, although we know a lot of the same people. No pretension here.

I honored Kristin's plea not to take a picture of her. I can dig it. I hate having my picture taken too. But she gifted me with three balls of her Julia yarn from Nashua Handknits, named after her daughter. Wonderfully soft mix of 50% wool, 25% mohair and 25% alpaca. And the color range is comprised of the colors Kristin uses in her design work.



After whining here about not being motivated to knit and needing bright colors, I got an instant jolt when she handed these balls to me. They're the perfect antidote to a February day. I see a Fair Isle hat here. Have to remember to load Knit Visualizer on the work laptop so that when I go to Virginia on Sunday, I can keep myself occupied in the evenings. I don't know what else there is to do in a hotel in Herndon, but I'm sure someone will tell me otherwise.

So Kristin, the coffeepot's always on whenever you get down to Dover. And if I did a good enough sales job on Rhinebeck, maybe you'll get off the farm and join us next October, eh?

The Tiny Diva ain't having coffee in my living room, that's for shit sure. But then, it's tough being her.

And easy being me. Usually.


Tasty Read
I read incessantly but don't often discuss the books on the blog. Carol and Joe do a much better job of that than I. But Ted, my brother-in-needles, sent me an early (very) birthday present the other week--Ruth Reichl's book, Garlic and Sapphires, her memoir of her days as a restaurant critic. Reichl wrote for the New York Times back in the '90s and I read her column religiously, as I did Craig Claiborne before her. She was and is a wonderful writer and her book is exceptional.

My problem? I love food too much. And it's almost sacrilegious to read this book while eating a cream cheese and strawberry jam sandwich, which I admit to doing. Hell, it was on whole wheat bread.

I'm no foodie. I love a good hot dog, especially those found at Hot Dog Johnny's on Rte. 46 in Buttsville, NJ, of all places. However, the book has wonderful recipes scattered throughout. Perhaps it's time to get back into the kitchen and get cooking. The hell with the weight. I'll exercise my fat ass off.

Boy, could I ever tell some tales about the knitting world. Someday I'll have to write about my short-lived tenure at McCall's Needlework & Crafts. The girl from Jersey thrown to the New York publishing wolves. I was out of my league, for sure.

But it did lead to more successful gigs.

Scenic I-95
Sunday I hit the road at 9:30 a.m. with an expected arrival in VA around 3 or so. In a way, I'm looking forward to meeting the people I work with. In another way, I hate to leave home. But it's only for five days and I will have the laptop with me, so I won't be out of touch, at least not in the evenings.

So I may or may not post on Sunday night. I will certainly try to do so during the week, if time allows. After all, having an indoor pool and Jacuzzi at my disposal is a rare and handy thing.

I wonder if yarn floats. I do. And I can swim underwater quite well.

Best Quote I Heard All Day

The young always have the same problem - how to rebel and conform at the same time. They have now solved this by defying their parents and copying one another. --Quentin Crisp

Did that knock your eyeballs outta your head? Well, I'm quite fond of it, given that it is a Liz creation (Grammy kibbitzed while this was being made). I see knit design possibilities here.

For some very strange reason, Liz and her doppelganger, Miss Daniella, seem to think that if I put a picture of them up on my blog, they will achieve instant stardom. Because people read my blog and only their closest associates read their MySpaces, I suppose.

So being the doting Grammy that I am, and because both Liz and Daniella think I'm kewl, I'll give in to the "Oh pleeeaaasse Gram" and publish this totally goofy picture of the two gangstas wearing Burger King crowns.

Note the charmingly tinted braces on my granddaughter's teeth. Liz has gone from dyeing her hair blue, purple, pink or what-have-you to decorating the choppers.

On the other hand, Britney's bald. Must have been that one day in rehab.

OK, girls. You've had your 15 nanoseconds of fame, such as it may be. Now you owe me. Big time. It ain't easy being 14 but it's tougher being almost 57. So Liz, maybe you might empty those boxes of books on the landing, like I asked you to do three months ago?

I loves my Liz because we're more alike than either of us would dare admit.

(And to the Wolverinas, Liz would love to come along on our next get-together, preferably at the Stockton Inn. Because she thinks my friends are kewl.)

Knitting ZZZZZZZZZZZ
Damn, I'm bored with my knitting. Loopy and I both feel relegated to simple shit, like knitting socks. Even Ma is knitting a scarf, although she's also working an Aran. Jeez. I can't even bring myself to do that.

I've been knitting on the BBF Red Light but even lace is making me yawn. I looked through IK and Vague and saw nothing at all that appealed, although I generally don't find squat that I like in Spring issues. I suspect it's some kind of SAD deal here. The yen for bright colors is growing.

On top of which, I'll be going down to Virginia on the 25th for five days on business, which means staying in a nice hotel, complete with indoor pool and Jacuzzi. And the potential for quality evening knitting time. Except that I have nothing right now that's exciting.

This too shall pass.

Cameo Appearance
Other than working my ass off this week, my first week, trying to pull together a configuration manual for a very complex application, I did have a piece of good news. On Tuesday, I'm getting together with a very well-known knit designer, someone who I've admired for many years. I'm not going to spray her name all over the blog, at least not today. Suffice it to say that I'm looking forward to meeting her, very much.

No, it's not the Tiny Diva.

Gone But Not Forgotten
But perhaps they should be. While fiddling around on Google the other day, it occurred to me that some of the yarn brands of my youth have seemingly bit the dust. Columbia-Minerva, Spinnerin, Melrose gone. Bernat, Pingouin, Chat Botte, Scheepjeswol--no longer players, if indeed any of them really still exist in retail, besides Bernat.

Sad to say, Anny Blatt seems to be making a comeback, of sorts. I used to finish garments made with that crap and even just seaming with it gave me psychosomatic hives. Same with most of Melrose's stuff, although Cravenella was about the best yarn with which to knit skirts. The Crav mix, 70% wool, 30% rayon, was made by various companies, Sunray being one of them. Sunray is also history.

All in all, despite the whacked-out fashion yarns that have been littering the retail shops for the past few years, I think that the overall quality has really gone up. More colors, more fiber blends, more possibilities.

Sometimes it's good that the past is past.

This Coming Week
I rather expect that the work pace will continue. Makes no difference whether I'm working from home or in an office, I still have a lot to do, especially learning this suite of applications that ride on top of Microsoft SharePoint, a collaborative platform that gives companies an out-of-the-box intranet/workplace. Courtesy of my employer, I now have a laptop loaded with Office 2007 but gratefully, not with Vista. They're waiting on that one, for which I don't blame them.

The jury's still out on Office 2007. I've been using Word 2007 and I'm still not sure if I like it or not, having been a dedicated Word 2003 power user.

Change management, kids. That's what it's all about. In corporatespeak. In my speak, I'm getting tired of learning new tricks, but what can you do?

Go to bed, that's what. Because staying up until 12:30 on a Saturday night is really not all that rare and handy.