The New Dark Side

 

So.  The Dark Side.  The new Dark Side.  I know you've spent the last forty-eight hours in breathless anticipation of the revelation of (b).*

Yep. That's what you think it is. And the boots in the lower left are a legwarmer pattern. A SCARY legwarmer pattern. (Fiona has given me a TRANSLATION.)

Stop that laughing.  You'll do yourself an injury.**  Yes, I am wondering when I'm going to fit frelling knitting in.***  I have fantasies of spending more time on the sofa† watching the eight hundred and thirty-seven operas I've recorded off Sky over the last, uh, probably several years†† . . . but if I had time to watch them I'd be watching them.  Sigh. . . .

            I have known that my days were numbered, about knitting.  I had too many friends who read Yarn Harlot before I started the blog . . . which is when I discovered there seems to be some kind of genetic bond between reading McKinley and knitting.  And I've twice had a brief stab (so to speak) at knitting before this.  I like yarn.  I already have the Petting Reflex.  And I used to do hand sewing.  I enjoyed it.  I used to embroider pillowcases while I listened to Live at the Met when I was young. 

           And I've been shown the basics of knitting before.  But I permitted myself to be distracted.  To drift away from my knitting needles.††† That was also before the internet, let alone the blog, and while I've always had friends who knitted, they didn't run in packs.  Third time is the charm, right?  Or possibly the curse.

            But I didn't know it was going to happen now, when PEG II is driving me so mental that I've pretty well stopped composing and only play Drink to Me Only With Thine Eyes and There Is A Tavern in the Town on my poor piano but I'm about to start voice lessons again, and I have a fancy new camera I still haven't spent any real time figuring out, and in another month it'll be rose-planting season‡—and there's the Octopus and the Chandelier get through, uh . . . February sometime.  I'm trying not to think about it.  But rehearsals hit the frenzy level next Sunday, which is an ominous sign.  Also I have hellhounds.  And a blog.  And I ring several kinds of bells. ‡‡  And read in the bath.  Occasionally I sleep.  Or make brownies.

            What happened is that I was hanging out on a thread I sometimes hang out on when PEG II has driven me out beyond the Wall and slammed the gates shut ‡‡‡ and I don't feel like sweeping the floor or taking hellhounds for an early hurtle. §  And blondviolinist made a disparaging comment about yarnbombing.  Yarnbombing? I said innocently.  And she sent me this link:  http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/2kSMb8/www.buzzfeed.com/melismashable/25-amazing-yarn-bombs  In hindsight I've decided that this was all a nefarious plan.  Clearly yarnbombing would amuse me.  And (in hindsight) I don't believe blondviolinist isn't amused by yarnbombing.  I was set up!  I was set up!

            And I fell, splat, like a rather small muskrat into a tiger pit.  I said, I think it looks like fun.  And then I may have said something about Wolfgang . . . or pianos . . . or rosebushes . . . or swords.  But I added, fatally, but someone would have to teach me how to knit.

            And they were all over me like wolves on a stray lamb:  chiefly the evil Jodi Meadows and the fiendish blondviolinist.  Don't ever cross these women.§§  Your life will not be worth living. 

            The funny thing is that . . . I thought I'd get away with it.  I'd said something indiscreet about knitting a few months ago and the roof didn't fall in, nor did the Spanish Inquisition show up with the comfy cushion.§§§  Jodi and blondviolinist must have been at a knitting convention or something, and off line.  Anyway.  I compounded my idiocy by admitting that Fiona knits—and she was coming on Friday.  I think I may still have been resisting at this point, but then Jodi, the Evil Queen, sent me this link:  http://www.etsy.com/listing/34687662/pink-rose-bamboo-knitting-needles-fr3e  . . . at which point I knew I was lost.#

            Fiona showed up Friday morning expecting to work.  Yes, yes, I said, thrusting copies of PEGASUS and mailing envelopes at her, hurry up, there's a yarn shop in Mauncester.  A yarn shop? she said.##  Yes, I said.  I've decided that my life will not be complete till I've knitted myself some legwarmers.###

Mmmmmmm. Yarn. I was saying I still haven't figured out my new camera? One of the things I haven't figured out is shooting in indoor light without the flash. That flecked pink is a true pink, and the plain one is deepest, vividest rose. The blue and lavender tweedy one, while perfectly nice, is mainly because it's the right size for the frelling pattern. Fiona pointed out that a thicker-gauge yarn would knit up FASTER.

            Now all I have to do is learn to cast on.~ 

* * * 

* Any sad, confused, about-to-go-somewhere-else person just happening on this blog for the first time:  http://robinmckinleysblog.com/2011/01/22/more-adventures/

 ** At a guess, what do you suppose is the percentage of knitters in the readers of this blog?  No, that's too difficult.  The percentage of forum members.  I'd say about 87.5% . . . maybe more.  Or maybe they're just noisy. 

*** Forgot to tell you the other night . . . during the break, after I'd bought my album and had my pee^, and there was nothing else to do^^, I pulled Pooka out and had a fast blast of the 3-4 to bob major.

^ This particular venue is noteworthy for two things:  that the queue outside the men's is longer than outside the women's, which has never before happened in the history of architecture and gender-specific loos, and was the cause of much comment on both sides of the divide;  and the most appallingly poor design, so that as soon as there's more than one person involved, no one can get in or out any of the doors.  And did I mention the queues?

^^ One of the disadvantages of the front row is that you may find yourself sitting next to Not The Good Kind of Really Enthusiastic Fan.  Protective colouration may be necessary. 

† Of course with hellhounds.  There is no such thing as Sofa Without Hellhounds, unless there are an unseemly number of live handbellers involved.  I keep the puppy gate—now permanently nailed into the wall—to the kitchen closed on handbell evenings, or there would be hellhounds.  I didn't tell them about the cat the other night, and fortunately they don't read the blog. 

†† If they haven't been eaten by invisible gremlins.  If you have something on DVD, you have it.  I'm not at all sure what happens inside Sky's black box.  And sometimes, late at night, there are these small giggling voices. . . . 

††† I found the yarn I'd brought over from Maine in the back of a closet when we moved out of the old house.  It went to Oxfam. 

‡ For those of us who didn't get it done in the autumn 

‡‡ Niall was not at Sunday service ring this morning.  EEEEEEP.  He is not allowed to do this to me without warning.  No wonder I've been dazed and inclined to jump at small noises^ all the rest of today. 

^ Including giggling from the satellite TV box 

‡‡‡ Yes, they get shut in Part Two. 

§ Ha ha ha.  Or like learning the trebles to Cambridge minor. 

§§ Or carelessly say 'knitting' to them 

§§§ Of course you know this.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSe38dzJYkY 

# Yes.  I ordered them yesterday.  But it gets worse.  I was looking for the link to post here and found this:

http://www.etsy.com/listing/65917807/rose-quartz-handmade-knitting-needles-us

AAAAAAAAUGH.

            I could try to be positive about this.  I don't have to knit anything.  I can just have a lot of really nice yarn and some fabulously pretty knitting needles. 

See? Rose coloured.

## Note that Fiona came out of the yarn shop with more yarn than I did.

 ### This is part of the whole awfulness of the situation.  I want some legwarmers.  My old ones disintegrated years ago and until Britain entered the New Ice Age last winter I rarely gave legwarmers a thought.  I thought about them a lot this past November-December.  And even I ought to be able to knit a short fat scarf and sew it up the back.  Oughtn't I?

 ~Yes I know about http://www.knittinghelp.com/  Blondviolinist told me.