France, we have progress!
Well, I couldn’t very well say, “Houston, we have a problem,” now could I? First of all, I’m not in Houston right now, which leads to secondly, there is no problem! Yes, many of my problems can be solved by just leaving Houston, it seems. I’ve suspected this all along and I’m glad to get some confirmation.
Anyway …
So while I sat on the plane from Houston - George Bush to Paris - Charles De Gaulle, I fiddled with my yarn and new needles and cast on the pattern I had quickly printed before leaving as an alternative to the toe-up @#%$ards that I’d tried before. I will return to those some day, I really will. Just not until I’m sitting next to Adelle and she can tell me exactly what it is that I’m doing wrong with these socks.
Lo and behold, it worked. I knit knit knit for a few hours, only slightly troubled by the messy yarn cake that I wound out of this lovely yarn. It will definitely be re-wound once I’m home and before it goes out to my sock sister for completion. I knit and knit and knit … and finally fell asleep for several hours. This was momentous, because I never sleep on international flights. I guess the glass of champagne, little airplane bottle of wine, and two Excedrin PM finally worked. (Don’t start … for some reason medications and alcohol don’t affect me at all the same way as they do on the ground. They simply DON’T work on me. Last time I had prescription sleeping pills and was still wide awake for the entire flight!)
The pattern is fun, it is easy to memorize, and you just fly right through it. The cameraphone doesn’t show the colors well, but they are some pretty blues, greens, and greys. It’s more Blackwatch than what I’d think of as Lagoon, but oh well. :)
So my Sock Sister, if she’s figured out who I am, can rest assured that she will actually get a sock from me! I promise not to leave this one on the airplane.
Socks & Erin … mutually exclusive?
If anyone has been looking for evidence that my brain has ceased functioning properly, look no further.
My Hurricane Sock Sister’s yarn got here and I wound it up (although I might need to re-wind it … that ball is a little messy on bottom) and got all set to start knitting the pattern I’d picked.
Well, the toe-up socks … they defeat me. I cannot grasp the toe-up cast-on. Apparently it is something beyond my feeble knitting powers. I work and work and work at the cast-on. Dell even shoots a little video to show me how to do it, and I still end up with sloppiness that looks nothing like the toe of a sock. I check my needles and see a 2.0 on them. “A-ha!” I think. “I’m knitting with the wrong needles! I was supposed to be using size 0s, and I have clearly picked up the size 2s.”
(Knitters, I know. Just wait.)
So I put the sock down and search fruitlessly for the size 0s Dell had just sent me from New York. Because, you know, that’s easier than driving all the way across Houston to find a yarn store. Seriously, Houston. Could you PLEASE get a decent yarn store in the Clear Lake area? I know I’m totally spoiled by Woolie Ewe in Dallas, but can’t you come up with something that doesn’t involve half a tank of gas and a day’s field trip for me to get to?
Anyway, I search and I search and I search, and they are nowhere to be found. I do find some wonderful blue and white, stretchy Elann … umm … what’s it called? Esprit Print, I think. You know — the sock one like Cascade Fixation. “A-ha!” I think. “Cotton will be much more comfortable than wool for my poor Southern, hurricane-suffering sock sister.” I find another pattern, I cast on — even checking to find a good, stretchy cast-on instead of just winging it. I thought I’d be extra careful since these are for someone else. I’ve dug up some DPNs even though I hate knitting with DPNs, all because my size 4 circs are in my second Thuja. I check my needles with my needle sizer and they are yea, verily, size 4. Handy needle sizer thing, what?
(Yes, I know. Hold on to that needle sizer bit.)
And then, when I’m rechecking the pattern for the cuff, I realize this is supposed to be on size 3s. “No problem,” I think. “I’m only two rows in, I can switch back to my friendly size 3 bamboo circs.” Except not, because bamboo needles + this yarn = hell.
Completely frustrated, I go wandering around the apartment again, searching for needles. I go through the stash basket and the UFO basket and the notions/stash/random crap basket in the living room. Still no needles. I sigh and begin packing for France, thinking that I have completely let down my sock sister, and I have no idea what I’ll do next. I resolve to just find another pattern for the original yarn and the size 2 needles, and I stuff it in my carry-on tote.
And then I look at the needles.
And I notice that the size on them is, in fact, 2.0 … millimeters.
And I pull out the needle sizer, and yea, verily, these are the size 0 needles I have spent DAYS searching for.
And I call myself a dumbass.
And I begin searching the internet for an alternate pattern to include with my original pattern, because surely in 15 hours of traveling to Toulouse, France, I will get SOMETHING done for my sock sister.
ahem.
I would like the yarn for my Hurricane Sock Sister to get here so I can get busy.
That is all.
Oh, except to say that I’ve signed up to blog for Blogathon! I’ll be blogging for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, Lone Star Chapter. Sponsor me by clicking below, or read more here!
Hurray!
