Etherknitter

"An ounce of prevention is a ton of work."

Laurel and Hardy.  Cheech and Chong, Lennon and McCartney.  Diet and exercise.

Sorry about that.  Some pairings are more appealing than others.  The diet post has to be followed by the exercise post.  The human body forgives slacking on diet more readily than it forgives no exercise.

The data is compelling.  Prevention of breast cancer and colon cancer can be linked to physical activity.  Decreasing one's risk of Alzheimer's disease can be linked to exercise.  Improvements in memory via new connections AND new brain cells can be found in studies of the benefits of exercise.   Science that correlates exercise with decreases in Type II diabetes, and prevention of heart disease, is old news.

Wear it out or rust it out?  Exercise-related wear and tear was covered in a landmark article in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1998.  Across a wide range of age groups, the period of disability was shorter before death in those who exercise.  The study was published with its oldest participants at age 75. 

Why don't we just get up off our sedentary butts and do it?  Twenty minutes, half an hour a day?  It is a small investment for feeling better the other 16 hours of awake time.

We humans are gamblers.  We are also incredibly short-sighted.  Our brains are not wired for predicting outcomes that are concepts.  We are very good at predicting simple, concrete outcomes.  The farther off in the future that the reward exists, the less likely we are to pursue it.  Would you choose to go the the gym, sweat for half an hour on the treadmill, and hope that you will prevent cancer/diabetes/heart disease/Alzheimer's?  Balance that with knowing that you will sweat and huff and puff for sure as soon as you get to the gym.  We gamble.  We bargain.  Missing exercise THIS ONCE probably won't kill me.  Missing exercise this week won't have much long term consequence, right?

Thus we never exercise.  We lose muscle mass.  Our tendons and ligaments lose elasticity, stiffen.  We don't move as well as we used to, and injury is easier, and more likely.  The body forgives less and less.  Quality of life decreases. It starts with a vengeance after age 40. 

The other bad news, of course, is that exercise is a three-legged stool.  All three parts need to be addressed.  Aerobic work, resistance (weights) work, and flexibility need to be included.

I'm not here to tell you that it is easy.  I do it.  I don't particularly like it.  I don't get those famous endorphin highs from any of it.  I feel so much better after the exercise is done, mostly because I know it is done for another day.  But over short periods of time, the rewards are wonderful.  Clothes fit better even without weight loss.  (Muscle takes up less room than fat.)  Daily tasks are easier with some muscle, some aerobic endurance, and a modest amount of flexibility.  The prevention of disease stuff is reassuring.

Everyone calculates their own gambling odds with daily decisions about whether or not to exercise.  I've lived both sides and prefer how I feel with exercise.   Even if you silently mutter that you feel just fine without daily torment, go back to the studies.  Do you really want to rely on luck and genetics to protect you? I can tell you from two decades in medicine that statistics are against you on that one.

I'm gamboling with my fiber stash.  The new Clemes&Clemes handcards had a workout with one ounce of 75% Gotland/25% Shetland washed locks from Morro.  This will be spun woolen for no particular purpose other than to introduce my hands to another sheep breed.

The fiber season can't start soon enough.  I can't wait to smell sheepy fleeces, spend time with the fiberfolk, revel in spring sunshine with our people. 

Winter into spring

The Welcoming Committee couldn't have been more gracious.  Margene even wore her Jadis, to show me what is possible with beautiful yarn and pattern.  The four of us commemorated the occasion with several Wasatch Brewing Company Devastator Double Bock ales.  I will confess:  Margene and Smith had to catch up with us.  I think the count evened out towards the end of the evening.

Our last ski week of the season threw weather at us.  Sunday's bluebird day did not warn of Monday.    Snow.  Wind.  Horizontal snow.  Bitterly cold wind.  New tracks on each run, 2 inches of snowfall per hour by midafternoon.  It was glorious.

The remaining days were cold, crisp, clear, blue.  The landscapes had more than a foot of fresh cover.  Perfect.

Park City finally has a yarn store.  Located in the back of Fawn, it is an outpost of Soul Spun Yarn from Salt Lake City.  A quick inspection before dinner showed Malabrigo, Manos, Crystal Palace needles,  Berroco Ultra Fine Alpaca, and other soft skeins arranged by color.  Debbie Bliss pattern books and Ella Rae patterns crooked their fingers at the surprised knitter who wandered through.   

My week was marked more by reading than by knitting.  I finished The Siege of Isfahan by Jean-Christophe Rufin (excellent, but read The Abyssinian first, which is even better).  Then I whipped through a Jodi Picoult novel (good), and Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer.  Yes, I'm probably the last person on the planet to read it.  Could not put it down, and spent the time in the plane's economy class sardine box suffering frostbite and hypoxia along with the climbers.

I finished #1 sock of AppleLaine (merino 65%, mohair 20%, silk 5%, nylon 10%).  It is lush, soft, lovely.  My Foxfire merino/alpaca/silk scarf is closer to being done.  I started Maelstrom socks in Dye Dreams LusterSox (BFL).  I discovered Stephanie and Mona at CTS&W last year.  They did not remain a secret for long, since their yarns and colors are so good.  

I brought everything I needed to start the Snowdrift scarf.  I have two skeins of Jade Sapphire cashmere/silk in Sterling.  The gauge is finer than the stole calls for, so it will be smaller.   I'm good with that, since the yarn is so very clearly calling for that pattern.

It was not cast on during the week.  Soon.

Knitting while traveling seems to be a series of stitches in between interruptions.  I've settled on an easy way to tell whether I'm on a decrease row or a knit row when working a gusset or a toe.  If the next row is to be a knit row, I weave the free needle through the center of the sock.  (No splitting of stitches allowed here.)  And if the next row is to be a decrease row, I weave the needle through the row of decreases.  This turns out to be easier than squinting at the stitches to see what I have just done.

I came home to blooming snowdrops.  All the early spring suspects have begun their journeys toward the sun.  I left a socked-in winter landscape, and came home to patches of sodden lawn, wet gardens, deer damage, and signs of renewed life. 

It is time for spring.

A weekend in the life of the Etherknitters

FOs are not a dime a dozen around the Etherknitter household.  How could I have forgotten to post the latest knitting-bauble?

The Barbara Walker pattern called this DewDrop lace.  I grimaced when he chose this. 

"I can't post that pattern name!  This strips you of street cred", whined the knitter.

"Okay." (He solves most such knitting dilemmas with surgical precision.)  "Call it Chainmail."

And so it is.  Unintentionally, the wrong side is just as good as the right side.

 Pattern:  Barbara Walker Dew Drop Lace Chainmail
Needle:  #6 Golding walnut straights
Yarn:  Blue Sky alpaca, from Purlsoho, 2006ish

No modeled shots.  He has been cranky.

SPA was wonderful.  I can't claim camnesia.  The fannypack camera followed me to all activities.  I changed the batteries before setting out that morning.  The new batteries clearly weren't.  Did they suffer from the months clanging around in my handbag?  Did I put old ones in the handbag with the intention of recycling them, then forgot they were old?  Just know that others were either similarly camnestic, or have posted pictures of succulent vendor booths, tempting swag, and irresistible fiber offerings. 

The necessary accessory at SPA was a custom-designed, custom-machined cupholder for your spinning wheel.  No more spilled tea or other beverages because the wheels are packed tightly in a circle, and surrounded by bags, fiber, and spinning equipment.  You lift your feet high off the floor to avoid the obstacles.  Inevitably, balance is tested and lost, then apologies and mopping up follows. 

Kelly is the genius behind this.  She was set to make one for the Schacht Matchless, but that happened after SPA.  Mine is on the way.

Mr. Etherknitter saw the Paypal receipt.  He emailed me:  "A cupholder?  What about the matching candy dish?" 

He acquiesced to my enthusiasm.  I pantomimed the high-stepping-picking-one's-way-through-the-wheel-forest.  He had been working all night, with the free flow of thought that sleep deprivation fosters.

"She should call it a Spin-toon."

There were a few purchases.  MadelineTosh sock yarn, Black Currant and Fjord colorways, from Purl Diva in Brunswick, ME.  Ellen is our dream LYS owner.  She does mail order.

Friends Folly Farm roving, colorway unnamed: browns, rose, rust.  This purchase prompted one of my former friends to say, "Where is Etherknitter and what have you DONE WITH HER?"

Ball and Skein wool laceweight, 600 yards x 2 for Sivia Harding's Moonshadow stole.

And Springtide Farms 2 ply cashmere, colorway Oceana.   

I have no pictures (yet) of Kim's luscious yarn.  Her website will have to serve for now.  Just know that the Maplewing shawl is the next viral WIP.