Monday, November 01, 2010

Remarkably little to report.

The Amedro shawl has nice chained edges, like many a thing from which stitches will later be picked up. Knit the last st of every row, slip the first one purl-wise. I plunged into the picking-up without a moment’s thought, knitting up the links of the chain. But soon grasped that since there are 188 rows or so in the centre of the shawl, there are only going to be 94 links in the chain. That is not enough to produce 177 sts.

After a certain amount of ripping out and starting again, I think I’m on the right track. I put it down altogether last night to watch the first episode of the new series of “Getting On”. It’s funny. I hope for better news today, knitting-wise.

Comments

Marilyn, I do like your idea of turning Franklin’s design into a clutch bag – or not, if one adds a handle. I am totally incapable of setting in a zipper neatly, but could always give it one more try. Or add an extra flap, and close with a snap?

I am glad to find I am not alone in my enthusiasm for Bill Gates. I like the fact that his vast wealth is founded on his own wits – as I understand it, he and his pal wrote MS-DOS and licensed rather than sold it to IBM for the first IBM PC. Followed immediately by a great wave of other PC’s, all running MS-DOS.

If I had that sort of money, I might spend it at Herculaneum to speed up the excavation of Piso’s villa. Herculaneum was buried in lava rather than ash as at Pompeii; that makes the going harder. Piso was Julius Caesar’s father-in-law. There are grounds for hope that his library might contain substantial amounts of lost Latin literature. The Dark Ages were darker in western Europe than in the east, and much more of ancient Latin has been lost than ancient Greek.

The Renaissance was correspondingly more wonderful in the west.

But Gates’ own choices for spending his money are doing a good deal more for humanity.

Shandy, I am grateful to you for re-connecting me to Jared. I had lost touch when he migrated to the new site. The new yarn looks wonderful. I am now going back to the bookshelves to re-acquaint myself with the difference between woollen and worsted. The colours are terrific, too. My sister is coming in the spring. I haven’t used her to carry yarn for a long time…

2 comments:

  1. I don't know whether it is the names Jared has given these yarns, but they do sound irresistible. What I find surprising is the concept of using the same yarn for such different purposes; some yarns are just not good against the skin.

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  2. I am trying to resist Jared's yarns. Hill Country Weavers in Austin is one of the few shops in the US that carries it, and I keep debating if it is worth the 140 mile round trip to go and pet the yarn. (The shop itself is outstanding- massive and carries everything it seems... somewhat surprising in Texas.)

    I am still in plain sock mode. I think this semester has turned out to be so much work that all I have brain space for are plain socks. I finished one today on the plane from Atlanta. I was a little afraid that the airport security check would be an exercise in annoyance given the whole printer-cartridge plot that went down on Friday, but at Atlanta at least, I sailed through security without any trouble. They were very efficient and quick.

    having socks to knit make airplane rides so much more pleasant, which is good because there is little about traveling by air that is pleasant these days.

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