Bad Morning

Waking up to sub-zero (Farenheit) temperatures is not my idea of fun.

It Gets Worse
After five hours sleep, I woke up tired and cold, and I had to get ready quickly so I could stop to get gas. My tank was close to empty.

Carefully wrapped in my gay pride scarf (a gift from James last year), I scraped frost off my windshield, and made my way to the only gas station near my hotel. Inserting a credit card, pressing the "regular" octane button and lifting the nozzle, I tried to pump gas, but nothing came out. I try again. Again, nothing.

I move to a different pump...same result. I go inside the little gas-mart, and ask if there are problems. She tells me that she's restarted my pump, but the pumps often don't work when it's cold.

Uh...hello???...it's fucking Albany, NY...don't you think it might be a good idea getting gas tanks that work when it's cold? (I thought this, but didn't say it.)

On fumes, I made it to another gas station. But, of course, I had to deal with unbelievably bad drivers.

Given my reaction to the events of the morning, I realized I was just destined for a bad day, and it probably had more to do with my mood than the actual events.

Knit Meet-Up
I got a chance to sit and chat with Selma (the axe murderess) last evening at the local Starbucks. It is always great to see her.

We pored over the latest Interweave Knits magazine.



Overall, it wasn't very good, and I don't think that I'll buy this issue, although some of you may want to own this issue for one or two of the women's designs.

The two really great designs were both kimono-like jackets. Both had excellent shaping and used great colors. The best of the two had a pleat in the back that was very nice looking. There was also a short-row hat by Veronik Avery that was quite cute (it went along with an extensive article on short-row techniques).

I got a chance to show Selma the "faintly fecal" colored kid alpaca blanket, and one of the Brooks Farms scarves that I did using the Koigu Cross Stitch pattern. Since she is going to be making a similar scarf, I thought I'd show her how to do the stitch, since it's much easier to do than it is to understand from the pattern.

Readers' Comments/Questions
Thank you all for your comments/suggestions on the self-striping yarn I'm trying to spin.

Marilyn says, "I would definitely let the plyed yarn sit for a few days. That might help, although I'm not hopeful."

This is exactly my thoughts about it. I am considering trying to just steam the yarn a little (while trying not to ruin the bobbin) to see if just a little bit more humidity will help the join hold, just so I can get it off the bobbin in one piece. For the next time I attempt them kind of plying, I'm thinking I might run a binding thread along with the colors to have a continuous fiber that will hopefully keep the joins together.

I also like what Carol said. "Sometimes you learn more from that, actually seeing why it doesn't work, than just abandoning the idea."