Etherknitter

Head in the clouds, nose to the knitting grindstone

The dining room table is creaking from the weight of patterns.  Six looseleaf notebooks consolidate pages of knitting instructions in page-protectors.  Spread them out, sort them, stack them, insert them, file them.

Scarves and shawls.  Baby and home knits.  Sweaters/tops.  Gloves/mittens/hats.  Socks.  There is even a notebook for "socks I will probably never knit but which looked good at the time I printed the pattern out from the Web".  That notebook will probably have a short existence.  (I can hear the Knitigator telling me to dump that NOW.)

The evolution of my knitting tastes is evident from this exercise in organization.  I've been saving my special yarns, waiting for the right pattern for cashmere, or quviut, or Foxfire yarn.  Precious knitting and spinning time is burned going through stitch dictionaries, Ravelry queues and pattern searches, while holding the Jade Sapphire cashmere in mind (color, gauge, fuzzy factors). 

It is a stymied approach.  It is also a short-sighted approach.  Mr. Etherknitter will be left figuring out what to do with my best fibers after he eulogizes me some day in the (hopefully) far future.

I stumbled upon Paula's Corrugator pattern in the piles.  Lights flashed, bells rang.  Foxfire Farm, cormo/silk/alpaca in Northwoods colorway has been sitting in limbo for several months.  I swatched several stitch patterns, and immediately frogged them as unsuitable.  I didn't want to put the yarn back in the stash, but I also didn't want to cast its purls before swine.  (Marcia may forgive me for this blatant knitting plagiarism.) 

The colors are perfect in this pattern.  It will make good mindless airplane knitting, car knitting, knitting when fatigued beyond reason.  Serendipity marks a new plan for stashbusting:  sorting through patterns until I find something that asks nicely to be knitted, and THEN figure out which yarn will please such a polite pattern. 

I have become a convert to cloud computing.  Hating Micros0ft is fashionable.  But handcuffing the user to programs on a specific desktop has been obsolete for some duration.   Virtual leashes were clipped with gmail, then with Google documents.  I know I'm not an early adopter, but I haven't been left behind, either.  (My Gourmet magazines sit around for weeks to months before I read them, but my Wired magazines are read immediately.  I probably should have saved that fact for a '10 Random Things You Don't Know About Me' post.)  All my stash lists are accessible from any computer in any location. 

Next up:  more stashbusting, and a scarf for Mr. Etherknitter in the FO pile.

Muscle fatigue, ego fatigue

Last year, my reassessment goal was to organize.  I had several venues in mind:  the fiber stash, the yarn stash, the sock yarn stash, the needles, and the wine stash.  Decluttering was on the list, with file folders becoming complete and invisible by December 31st.

I did really really well.  Except I ran out of steam on July 31st.

This year, I vowed that organization would happen.  Realistic as always, I set a deadline.  July 31st. 

That means losing 10 pounds, exercising every day, organizing, AND getting the other pieces of life done.

I'm doing it.  But I'm getting more and more scattered.  Each day sees progress.  The focus is starting to get blurred, like the view of the woods from the Inn last weekend.  (This was from our window, to where the XC ski trails start.  I skied myself into the ground and it was good.)

I hadn't said anything to Mr. E.  When he opened up a casual discussion about a topic a colleague had mentioned, a lightning bolt split through my emotional fatigue.  I think I understand now.

Our good friends, the psychologists, have studied this.  Our inability to keep our resolutions is explained perfectly.  

Exercise of self-control, which requires conscious effort, uses up energy.  This makes continued self-control much harder to accomplish.  It is called ego depletion.  Imagine running two emotional 10K races, one after another.  Or three.  Or four.  The best performance happens during the first race.  The runner struggles in all the races after the first one.  

Reading the titles in Wiki's reference section gives you an idea of concept.  Or you can read Dr. Baumeister's article here.  The first two pages are quite interesting.

The Dillon Beach Pullover in Simply Shetland 4, Tomales Bay has been the subject of an ongoing swatch.  I loved the Blackberry Ridge yarn that I used in the Bosnian stranded mitten project.  After knitting a cabled repeat in leftover yarn, I did not like the lack of cohesion in the fabric.  The yarn didn't hug itself.  (Yes, I had initially swatched st st to find the right needle size.)  So I switched to Jamieson 2 ply Spindrift, doubled.  You can see the blue at the top, and it might be the winning candidate.  The swatch needs to grow bigger and stronger before votes are counted.

 

Encoding, storage, retrieval

My birthday last week was poignantly marked by a series of  "Oops!  Forgot!"  The good news is that I wasn't the only one with conspicuous lack of memory.

I ordered a 2002 white burgundy:  excellent producer, excellent year, really good vineyard site.  The sommelier came back up from the cellar with wine list in hand.  That wine was not available.

I ordered a 1999 white burgundy.  Same producer, same vineyard, slightly less exalted year.  The sommelier came back up from the cellar with wine list in hand.  That wine was not available, either.  He handed me the list.  "This list now has a half-price sale just for you."

Holy tannins, Batgirl.  I asked him if he was serious about this.  Yes.  I was a bad, bad good girl.  I ordered Grand Cru white burgundy. 

What does the finishing of a sock look like when the knitter has forgotten to bring a Chibi?  Like this.

What footwear does a determined Etherknitter wear to the exercise room, in a determined attempt to keep to her exercise goals?

She forgot her sneakers.

And what happens when Mr. Etherknitter brings the wrong boots for the right skis?

We go home early Sunday morning via Patternworks. 

Never ever, dead in a ditch, ain't gonna happen, have I ever kept a New Year's resolution for longer than two weeks.

I nodded my head along with Terry and Marcia, who had sage thoughts and ideas on how to approach this turning of the solar calendar.  My actions started a week or so before the New Year's celebration.  That seemed to provide focus for me.  I felt more legitimacy to the goals than if they fell into the triviality of becoming resolutions.

I called it reassessment. 

At a certain point in one's life, glimpses of genetic destiny start to reveal themselves.  The lucky ones see the hints at more advanced ages.  The rest of us see the accumulations of whispers earlier in our lives.  I hear the whispers earlier because of what I do, and what I have seen professionally.  It is truly time for me to listen to what they are telling me.

1.  Lose ten pounds.  My BMI is fine.  But I fit into 10% of my clothes.  Losing the weight will allow me to fit into 100% of my clothes.  Losing ten pounds now means it won't be having to lose 25 next year.  Just because the rest of America is gaining weight doesn't mean I have to join the party. 

2.  Exercise EVERY SINGLE DAY for at least 20 minutes.  This is vanity, disease prevention, lifestyle improvement and the fountain of youth all rolled into one.  I could bore you for two more posts on this one, but I won't.  Exercise, alas, has three parts:  aerobic work, weight training, and flexibility.  You ignore any part of the three-legged stool at your peril. 

3.  Knit from stash.  Only buy for known and planned projects that are going to be WIPs immediately.  Exception:  sale yarn that I have planned for specific patterns.  (That's how the Beaverslide came into my life.  I have no regrets on that one.)

4.  Live with intention.  We never know how much time we have, or what might impede our ability to appreciate what we have.  The universe is 15 billion years old.  Our lifespan is smaller than a dust-mote in comparison.  Each moment is wonderful and precious.  I intend to remember that more often.

None of this is new.  I've been approaching it for awhile now.  The weight and exercise goals have been percolating into my life for several months. 

I do have some knitting goals:  two sweaters this year, and learning toe-up socks technique.  Modest, attainable, useful. 

I forced you to read this demonstration of public self-involvement.  The reward, of course, is my latest FO.  The Birdsfoot scarf is done, and blocked.  I blocked it mercilessly and measured.  75".  I have rarely taken it off my shoulders since.

The final assessment was given by my demented Auntie.  When allowed to talk stream of consciousness, there still is quite a bit left in her.  She has a 60 second memory.  That meant she reached over,  again and again,  fingering my scarf eight or ten times during the visit.  "That's nice!  You could send me the pattern.  It's light, but it's warm.  It has everything you want in a scarf."