Sarah's Ramblings

Spoiler: No Country wins

2008-02-24T23:30:00.003-05:00

Lead Actor. Man, Helen Mirren's gorgeous. I just wonder what would happen if Day-Lewis lost. Riots in the streets, I'd guess.
Depp's clip is great but it sure does stand out from the rest.
Tommy Lee Jones sure is showing his age. Maybe it's just cause I'll always remember him circa The Fugitive / Men in Black.
Mirren barely had to open the envelope before she said Daniel Day-Lewis. Hells yeah.

Commercial break. Let's see how I'm doing. I'm 5 for 10.

Right: Actor, Original Screenplay, Adapted Screenplay, Supporting Actor
Wrong: Supporting Actress, Actress, Costume Design, Song, Foreign Film

They're going through the Best Director montage. I think I've written more here tonight than I did in the last year.

Best Director!!! Ooh, I love that this can still give me butterflies.
The Coens won! Finally, some love for the men who created the Dude.

Best Picture: No Country. I guess I should probably see it now, eh?

Fin.

Don't trust Workopolis, it killed Tom Baker

2008-02-24T22:58:00.004-05:00

Do any other Whovians think of Logopolis when they see ads for Workopolis?

Cameron Diaz presents Cinematography, and can barely pronounce it. I can hear the facepalms of cinematographers 'round the world. There Will Be Blood for the mothaluvin' win!!! It sure as hell deserves it.

Hilary Swank introduces the In Memoriam reel.

Bud Ekins died? He was Steve McQueen's famous stuntman - he did the jump in The Great Escape.
Seeing Heath Ledger hit me again. I didn't even know him, why do I get so worked up?

Straight to commercial, because who could tell jokes after that? I'm typing this on my laptop and I feel like I'm getting a fever, the heat this thing is generating on my legs over a few hours. And I'm getting a mad headache from watching both my TV and my computer screen. Whine whine moan moan.

Amy Adams presents Score. Atonement wins.

The Pajiba consensus seems to be that Carell did indeed say "shit."

A bunch of soldiers from Iraq present the Documentary Short Subject. Thats a really lovely idea, totally non-partisan from my POV. Smart move.

Documentary Feature. I have no idea what's going on, I'm reading the comments at Pajiba still.

Harrison Ford: "Movies are made of ideas. And pictures. And words." He's presenting an award to writers and this was the best they could come up with? Best Original Screenplay, btw.
Diablo Cody wins! She deserves it completely. I really don't understand the vehemence of the backlash against Juno. You don't like it, fine, but to hate it so and to smear everyone who does like it?

The Pajibans point out that Brad Renfro was left out of the In Memoriam montage. Huh.

There aren't many, or any, words that rhyme with Oscar

2008-02-24T22:28:00.004-05:00

Renee Zellweger, presenting Editing, says that some of the most important parts of your life have won Oscars. Okay. Hokey, but okay. But then the examples are the car chase in Bullitt, the fights in Rocky . . . I have an unhealthy love for Bullitt, but watching it was not the most important part of my life. It wouldn't crack the top 100.
Oh yeah, Bourne wins again. Roderick Jaynes, nominated for No Country? Yeah, that's Joel & Ethan Coen. I wonder whose picture that was that they showed for his nomination. Man, do they do everything? "Cathering by Joel & Ethan Coen." "Transportation by Joel & Ethan Coen." "Assistant to the Directors: Joel & Ethan Coen."

The honorary Oscar recipient has had an amazing career. Robert F. Boyle. He designed productions, or is it production-designed, for Hitchcock, yo! That's cred. I hope I look so good at 98.

Please, please, please let Wanted be good.

Macbeth can't get you through everything, my good lad.

Penelope Cruz's dress is great, except for the beaded apron/shawl thing around her waist. Know when to say when. She's presenting Best Foreign Feature. The Counterfeiter wins. I'd said 12. I'm 3 for 7, dammit!

Patrick Dempsey is nominated as "talented and handsome." A, we know. B, it's a little reducing, especially when he's introducing his own film. I think that isn't Amy Adams dancing, but they aren't cutting close enough to tell.
Now that I've seen all the songs, the one from Once is undoubtedly the best, but "That's How You Know" works so well in its own context.
Nope, not Amy Adams. That's kinda disappointing.

John Travolta dances on as the dancers leave the stage. I might like that better if I liked him better. He's presenting Best Song. Menken's gotta win, come on! Nope, Once wins. It is a great song. Wow, they weren't kidding when they said their relationship borders on the criminal. She didn't look as young as she does here in the trailers.
Aww, the poor girl didn't get to say her speech. They started playing, she stopped talking, they stopped playing but she was already walking away.

They're keeping the ad breaks relatively short, but frequent. I still don't think they'll finish at 11:30 as the guide on my TV says. It's 10:54 and they've 8 more awards to give out.

Oh my, they've brought Marketa Irglova out to let her say her thanks. Awwwwww.

One and a half hours in

2008-02-24T22:00:00.002-05:00

Seth Rogen and Jonah Hill just riffing as they present Best Sound Editing. TWBB better win a Sound if they can't win Score (because not all the score was written for the film expressly). Nope, Bourne Ultimatum wins.

You know, you could probably save a good 5 minutes if you took all the big names out of the front row - I'm looking at you, Nicholson - and moved everyone up a row so the technical winners wouldn't have to bring a sherpa on their way to the podium.

Rogen and Hill present sound mixing. They're being very funny but I'm just trying to keep up here. Who knew Transformers was nominated for so many Oscars? Bourne wins again. Hey, why didn't Paddy Considine get nominated for Best Supporting? Paddy Considine rules!

I just went to IMDB to find Considine's name and DAMN they are updating that one fast.

Wow, Lead Actress! They're getting to that one soon. Wow! Marion Cotillard wins. I like it when they show all five nominees at once. Cate Blanchett let out a sort of big gasp, sort of happy, and then started clapping. Wow, that was moving watching her speech.

I totally forgot my guesses. Let's see, I'm now 3 for 6. I got Best Supporting Actor, Adapted Screenplay and Animated Feature. I missed Best Actress, Best Supporting Actress and Costume Design.

Colin Farrell presents "Falling Slowly" from Once. Why have I not seen this movie yet?!?!? The guy looks a lot like Damian Lewis (except, not in the picture in his profile. Clean-shaven).

I noticed when they had the clips for Best Actress that they aren't showing the clips in wide-screen; Alison Janney was just this disembodied nose in Juno. But now they've got a Best Picture montage and the sides of that are getting cut off as well. Are they presenting the whole show in widescreen and anyone who's not got a widescreen TV is just screwed?
I like that they aren't giving into the impulse to include famous lines in the clips, it's just silent save for the orchestra. Refreshing.

Oscar, oscar, oscar

2008-02-24T21:33:00.003-05:00

"Peter and the Wolf" wins best animated short. It's got to be something to beat the Disney version.

Alan Arkin presenting Best Supporting Actress. He says the Golden Age of Hollywood is still around. There's hyperbole and then there's no fooling anyone. Tilda Swinton wins! I'm surprised. She says she's giving her Oscar to her agent. Um, wow? If I won an Oscar sure, I'd dedicate it, but give it away? Oh my god, she says Clooney wears the Batsuit under his clothes and hangs upside down. There is apparently no one on earth who dislikes that man.
I wish I had more to say about Swinton - I feel like I should hand in my feminist and film geek badges for not knowing more about smaller female roles - but I don't.

Alba hosted the Scientific & Technical Awards. Didn't she host those last year too?

James McAvoy and James Brolin reciting some very lame catchphrases, but they make it work, I think. They're presenting Best Adapted Screenplay. They have obviously staged clips of each nominee typing, which is also rather lame. The Coens win! Apparently their other Oscar is also for writing (Fargo). And I can't not put in my aunt's boyfriend's line about the guy who adapted Diving Bell and the Butterfly: "He had an unfair advantage! He has fingers!"
The Coens are very obviously shy. What with them and Katherine Heigl just about fainting from nervousness earlier, this is adding up to a very shy, rather brief awards show so far.

The Academy's president is explaining how the voting works. This is nice, I was just explaining it to my cousin earlier.

I wonder why Kristin Chenoweth is singing Amy Adams' role in "That's How You Know." The obvious answer is that Adams doesn't sound that good in real life, but that's disappointing. Plus, she already sang. I don't mind Chenoweth, but why'd they dress her in a dress the exact same colour - beige, for cripe's sake! - as the background?

Stop-Loss with Ryan Phillippe may not be a great movie, but their ads - especially the theatrical trailer:

is amazing.

Actual Oscars part 2

2008-02-24T21:00:00.002-05:00

God, that was great. It does suffer without the woodland creatures, but given the backstage look at the "That's How You Know" dancers, I guess they blew their budget on that one. Amy Adams is stylish as ever, in the sort of dress that shows off her curves without being obscene about it, you know? I'd never think that song could work with a calf-length '30s-ish dress, but I was wrong.

I like the flashbacks to previous winners. Say what you will, Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones are pretty cute together.

Jon says they make catty remarks about what we're wearing at home during the commercial breaks. This makes me feel a tiny bit less guilty about my previous remarks.

Achievement in Visual Effects. Golden Compass wins. I got nothing. I think I'm going get some ice cream and pause for a few minutes. Cookie dough ice cream > blogging, every time.

Cate Blanchett presents Art Direction. Sweeney Todd.

Supporting, presented by Jennifer Hudson. Javier Bardem wins. Knew it! 2/3. Awwww, he brought his mom and he spoke to her in Spanish. And the way he smiled when they said his name. Awwww.

"Oscar's Salute to Binoculars and Periscopes" may well be the funniest guldarn thing I've ever seen at the Oscars. It is easily as good as, if not better than, the Will Ferrell song. (I can't embed it.)

They're doing a song from August Rush. It seems like cheating to have Keri Russell introduce it. Gorgeous song and presentation, totally beating Amy Adams right now.

It still seems a little strange to hear the phrase "Academy Award nominee Owen Wilson." He's introducing short live-action. I worry about that boy. My cousin just asked what happened to his nose, so I'm checking Wikipedia. Wikipedia is mute. What do we keep it around for, anyway?

Short bit about bees in movies by Jerry Seinfeld, which would have been funnier if Bee Movie had been bigger. Or I'd seen it.

Okay, now I'm onto the real thing

2008-02-24T20:28:00.003-05:00

It hasn't yet. I really hope Jon Stewart's good. The man's talented as all get-out but 1) he tends to mug and 2) he has to temper his comedy. Same with Chris Rock. You have to ask, if they're going to neuter them what's the point?

There was a neat opening montage with Ahnuld driving a truck through Hollywood, but it had a weird double-vision thing going on. Couldn't tell what the hell was going on.

Uh, why is Jon singling out specific performances? That's a really bad idea, y'all.

Wait, he just said that Norbit blew. "It's not often that the Academy notices films that are, you know, bad." OK, I kinda love him.

Aaaaaand he's back to singling out individuals. Dude, wtf? And he's resorting to the stripper name joke.

He's talking about politics and immediately he's stronger. Which is great. But why, why, why? It's the Oscars. When I want to watch The Daily Show, I watch The Daily Show.

\m/ Joke about black Presidents meaning an asteroid is about to hit the Statue of Liberty. \m/

Costume design is first. I've got to admit, I like it best when they have a Supporting Oscar first. Elizabeth: The Golden Age wins. I'm 0 for 1. The winner gives a very nice, very short speech. Very classy.

First commercial break of the night.

Ad for The Other Boleyn Girl. I thought they weren't allowed to show ads for movies. Maybe the rules are different b/c I'm in Canada.

George Clooney presenting. Rawr. He's presenting an sequence about the history of the show. George Clooney, films, history, excess . . . it's pretty safe to say I love it.

A new media joke, which might have been pertinent in 1999, but they combined it with a Lawrence of Arabia cinematography joke. So - okay. You get away with it. THIS TIME.

Steve Carell may have said "shoot", but it sounded a lot like "shit" coming out of my TV. They're presenting Best Animated Feature. Ratatouille wins! Yayyyyyy! Go Brad Bird, but also, I'm 1 for 2.

La Vie en Rose wins for best makeup. I'm just kinda disappointed that we can't refer to Academy-Award winner Norbit.

"Happy Working Song." I'm just going to watch it.

Oscar blogathon part what?

2008-02-24T20:01:00.002-05:00

Philbin's hosting. Why? At least Seacrest can take the piss out of himself. He's just told Clooney that everyone used to want to be Cary Grant, and now everyone used to want to be Clooney. Clooney responds that that's because Cary Grant is dead. I don't have to mention that I totally would, right ladies?

I am simultaneously blogging, checking my email and chatting with my friend on MSN. And watching the show. I don't know how real bloggers do this - it's crazy trying to keep up.

Holy shiitake mushrooms, Mickey Rooney's still alive?

I don't want to slam Daniel Day-Lewis's wife's dress, because this isn't a part of her job or anything, but it's really pretty unfortunate. Brooches 8 inches across and that sort of thing.

Speaking to Amy Adams: the interviewer mentions that she's performing this year (three times, I'd assume). I wonder how they're going to do "That's How You Know," since it's such a big sweeping, hundreds of people sort of song in the movie.

Now Regis is talking to a lady who's been to every red carpet since 1986. Awwwww.

Now they're showing the inside of the theatre filling up with guests milling around. I love it when they show background stuff like thhis, stuff that you wouldn't normally get to see. There's a really great book I read about backstage at the Oscars: Big Show: High Times and Dirty Dealings Backstage at the Academy Awards by Steve Pond. I'd recommend it.

Hey, they showed the PriceWaterhouseCooper guys! I love it when they do that. They always have these great big goofy smiles on their faces.

Oooh, less than 3 minutes left. I've got butterflies. I complain, I whine, I bitch, but god, I love the Oscars. As Brenda put it, they're our Super Bowl.

Oscar blogathon, part 4

2008-02-24T19:46:00.003-05:00

The skybox is going over clothing. They've called Miley's (who it turns out is only 15) dress age-appropriate. NO WAI.

And they like Marion Cotillard's dress. It's white and covered in a fish-scale detail, starting small at the top and getting larger at the bottom. It might grow on me, but right now it feels too novelty for me, like it should be made out of vinyl. Hey, I liked Bjork's swan dress, who am I to talk.

I don't know if I like Ellen Page's dress. It's very simple: long, black, slightly blousy and gathered at the waist, with spaghetti straps. It's the sort of thing that shows off her natural beauty, but at the same time, come on! She's young, she doesn't need to be in widow's weeds.

Katherine Heigl: omgwtf. She's wearing a one-strap dress, fitted at the waist, extremely long and flowy, cherry red, with her hair short and curly and kinda bobbed . . . There's no words. WOW. She's absolutely gorgeous. We called my aunt's boyfriend down, and he always cracks jokes, but even he thought she was stunning. Red, red lipstick.

Back over to BW. My cousin is hiding under the blanket so she won't have to see Harrison Ford in all his [checks wikipedia] holy crap, 66-year-old self. I kinda have to agree.

Seacrest just offered Heigl a plate with his own face on it. Honestly, I have nothing to add.

Oooh, they're about to - no, no they aren't. Seacrest's show ended, and the paper said the show would start at 8, but no it's just another half-hour of pre-show.

Oscar blogathon, part 3

2008-02-24T19:19:00.002-05:00

Jonah Hill and Seth Rogen are like adorable curly bespectacled twins.

Keri Russell is scary skinny. She's making me worried. She's wearing this insane grey dress, with a long, full train and a fitted bodice and crazy diamonds around her neck that suit the dress, rather than just looking extraneous. Oh, and her hair - this updo that looks a bit stiff but nice and big. Gorgeous, but a little frightening. Nathan Fillion needs to feed that girl some pie, stat.

Gad, stop blathering up in the "skybox." Flipping over to E!Talk Canada.

Gah, they're on Miley Cyrus again.

I like to think I've been dulled by BBC to tolerate all sorts of production qualities, but flipping from E (screw it, I'm not punctuating that anymore) to E Canada really emphasizes how much less money E has to work with. Much less rich in colour, poorer sound.

And now it's on the Barbara Walters special, going over Ellen Page's filmography. I can handle it when Americans are ignorant of Canadian film. I can't when they're openly disgusted by the fact that Canadian film exists. SARAH SMASH.

I'm only 17 (16 in non-leap years) days younger than Ellen Page! I don't know whether this is awesome, or makes me depressed. Let's not mention that Seacrest said by the time Miley Cyrus is 18 she'll be a billionaire.

My aunt's boyfriend just said that Walters doesn't like Page because she's independent and not sucking up to her. He's telling me to put in his theory that Walters actually died 10 years ago, and that's Gary Busey in a wig. So, I did.

I just saw an ad for Leatherheads (which I'm rather excited for). The studios aren't allowed to advertise during the actual awards, so why don't more of them advertise movies during the pre-show? The most frequent ad I've seen is for Grey Goose, which admittedly makes it look absolutely delicious.

Apparently Saoirse or whatever is pronounced "Sersha."

Quarter to, time to post!

Oscar blogathon, post 2

2008-02-24T19:00:00.003-05:00

Seacrest is talking about eavesdropping on Carell in the grocery store. He says how inappropriate it would have been for him to approach him at the time and say he was eavesdropping. He tells this story on international TV. I don't even have to try to make the jokes here.

Amy Adams' dress looks a lot like her dress at the end of Enchanted, except it's a sort of very dark green-black rather than purple, and it's a lot more swirly around the calves. I normally hate that kind of bodice, where there's a dip between the breasts, but it still looks great on her.

John Travolta's hair looks like he bought it off a 2 AM hair commercial and he sprayed it on. Ken dolls have more realistic hair.

I'm tempted to say that Miley Cyrus's dress's colour (cherry red) is too old for her. Yes, it sounds very Grandmere from The Princess Diaries, but it's kinda true. The cut is perfect -

James McAvoy and his lovely wife are on. Me can't brain now -

Okay, it's off him now. Gosh, he's pretty. Seacrest is talking to Amy Adams about her Enchanted doll, same as he did for Patrick Dempsey. What, were they short of "Boy, you were really good in your movie. Who are you wearing? You sure were good." And Seacrest's correspondent just said, "It's like the less you're prepared, the better." You can't make this shit up.

Jessica Alba always makes best-dressed lists. Last year they talked more about her than some of the actual winners, even though she hadn't actually been in anything for a while, nor did she have anything coming up soon. She was well-dressed:

But it made me wonder if 10 years from now they'll just have models walking the red carpet so they don't have to talk about the boring ole movies all the time. Anyway, despite having a lovely pregnancy glow, Alba's dress this year just looks marred. It's this deep copper/bronze strapless empire waist, but it's got this big feathery boa just glued onto the bust.

Someone please get Jennifer Garner a sandwich.

Oscar blogathon post, 1 of hopefully many

2008-02-24T18:51:00.002-05:00

Thanks to Sarah for inspiring me to get back bloggin' again. Thus begins my Oscar liveblog.

Anne Hathaway on Steve Carell: "He's just a very shy, bitter man . . ." Have I mentioned how much I love her? Shame about her dress. She's absolutely gorgeous, and she's got a ponytail and a dress that's cutting her horizontally in exactly the wrong way.

Saoirse Ronan is just about the cutest the cutest thing ever. She's got this gorgeous green dress that would be too Irish-cliche if it weren't for her stunning eyes.

James McAvoy arrived. He is very, very pretty. That is all.

What's with Seacrest's jacket? It's got this paler bit around the neck that makes him look like he's wearing a priest's miter.

I'm going to try to post every quarter or half hour. Punching the button now . . .

Been a long time

2008-02-23T15:51:00.003-05:00

Yeah, yeah, I know. But I've been procrastinating, and I saw Penny Karma's Oscar challenge. I think I'm going to try to liveblog the Oscars as well. Here are my predictions for the majors, and my rationale:

Best Picture: No Country for Old Men

Best Director: Joel Coen & Ethan Coen (No Country for Old Men)

The Coens have never won Best Director - no, not even for The Grand Lebowski! I know! I think this is their year. Michael Clayton was lucky to get nominated. Juno is a comedy. Not enough people saw Atonement. That leaves No Country and There Will Be Blood for Best Picture. There Will Be Blood is the perfect example of an auteurist flick; it never could have been what it is without Day-Lewis and Anderson working together. So I think if they don't give the Oscar to Anderson for directing, he won't get it for Best Picture.

Best Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis (There Will Be Blood)

This one's already engraved on the statuette. I saw this movie last night, and he's everything you've heard and more. He will, in fact, drink the other nominees' milkshakes.

Best Actress: Julie Christie (Away From Her)

Big ups for the Canadian film, woot woot! I would've said Page but I think she's too young to win.

Best Supporting Actor: Javier Bardem (No Country for Old Men)

Haven't seen it, but this is another lock.

Best Supporting Actress: Saoirse Ronan (Atonement)

I predict this will be the "big upset" category. Ryan and Swinton are supposedly great, but I think more people saw Atonement. I'm thinking of when Anna Paquin won for The Piano here.

Costume Design: Atonement

That green dress is a character all by itself. I just hope they don't repeat the presentation of the costume nominees in the same way this year, with models in a tableau. It just looked awkward.

Original Song: "That’s How You Know" - Enchanted

I love this song. I love Amy Adams singing it. I love Patrick Dempsey's reaction. I love this movie. That is my only explanation.

Foreign Language Film: 12

Just guessing here. This is the first year in a while I haven't heard of any of these. I know: shaaaame, shaaaaame. I'm surprised Four Months, Three Weeks, 2 Days isn't here, unless it didn't actually get released in 2007.

Adapted Screenplay: No Country for Old Men

Apparently it's EXACTLY like the book, and the Academy's a sucker for that sort of thing. I love the book Atonement, but by its very nature they would have had to cut out about 75% of it.

Original Screenplay: Juno

There's no way Juno isn't going to win something. But both Page and Reitman are too young, and Diablo Cody's making a real name for herself. It's the first time I've seen so
much attention paid to a screenwriter.

Finally, Penny Karma's been having a bit of trouble getting people to respond because most people haven't seen many of the nominated films. I'm no better. So here's my completely subjective list of best of '07.

Best Picture: There Will Be Blood.

I didn't enjoy it, but I do like it a hell of a lot.

Best Director: Jason Reitman, Juno.

He took what could have been Napoleon Dynamite and turned it into a gem. The guy is obviously one of the most talented comedic director out there - Thank You For Smoking makes me laugh every time. If I had seen Away From Her - yes, shaaaaaaame, shaaaaaaame - I would have picked Sarah Polley. I've been a Sarah Polley fan since before I could read. That's fan cred, right there. And I have seen her direct before, so I know of what I speak.

Honourable mention to Adrienne Shelley for Waitress.

Best Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis, There Will Be Blood

Duh. The only one who might have given him a run for his money is Cillian Murphy in Sunshine.

Best Actress: Keri Russell, Waitress.

I've already talked everyone's ear off about this movie. Basically, it's kinda perfect.

Honorable mention: Nikki Blonsky in Hairspray.

Best Supporting Actor: Paul Dano, There Will Be Blood.

How the hey-nonny-nonny did he not even get nominated? Folks, have you seen what Day-Lewis does to him during the movie? And he plays two parts, the larger of which he had to replace the original actor in after 2 weeks of shooting. It's Paul motherloving Dano!

Honorable mention: the kid who plays H.W., De Niro in Stardust.

Best Supporting Actress: Cripes, I'm having a hard time trying to think of one here. All my favourite supporting characters this year appear to be men. Hmmm; I'm going to have to go with Amanda Bynes in Hairspray. Not so much for the performance - she probably wouldn't make it onto a top 5 list of my favourite performances in that movie - but for proving that good roles for young female comedians/comic actresses do exist. I'm looking at you, Sarah Silverman.

Costume Design: I have no idea, but whoever dressed James McAvoy for Becoming Jane should get a negative Oscar. Ooooh, he's just a wee little leprechaun in a green velvet coat, thrashing aboot the forest looking for his luck charms!

Original Song: "That’s How You Know" - Enchanted

Yes, still the same. I think they should institute a category where films can be nominated for a non-original song. My example here is "Come What May" from Moulin Rouge! It was ineligible for the Oscar because it was originally written for Romeo + Juliet, even though it was never used. I mean, just because "Sea of Love" wasn't originally written for Juno, it should still be eligible for some award. You can't tell me there's no artistry involved there at all.

Foreign Language Film: No idea again.

Adapted Screenplay: I don't know - Hairspray? Sweeney Todd?

Original Screenplay: Hot Fuzz

This movie is a slice of fried gold, and I defy anyone to tell me otherwise. Simon Pegg, Edgar Wright, Nick Frost and Jessica Stevenson/Hynes could beat up a puppy in front of me and I would still think they were just about perfect. If Juno can be nominated, there's no reason Hot Fuzz can't be. Hell, The Full Monty was nominated for Best Picture!

Also, how did the hell did TWBB not get nominated for Best Score?

A quiz

2007-12-12T22:46:00.000-05:00

I am tired. And upset. And angry. And I just found out Terry Pratchett has Alzheimer's.

I just . . .

It's not fair.

Something distracting: a meme from Behold My Brilliance.

Elaborate on your default icon:
It's one of the pictures from when I finished my Black Sea hat. I think they make me look kinda chipmunk-cute with my huge cheeks. Plus I love the hat.

What’s your current relationship status?
So, so lonely.

Ever have a near-death experience?
No. I hurt my back badly when I was in grade 9 or so, which was the closest thing to it. I banged my tailbone on the concrete ledge of a pool as I was swinging on a Tarzan rope, and it hurt so bad that I didn't move when I dropped into the water. I yelled when my back hit the edge, so people knew something had happened and a stranger came and scooped me up, thank goodness. The water was only about 5 or 6 feet deep but I was in shock, I think, and I wasn't moving at all.

Name an obvious quality you have:
It's very easy to make me laugh.

What’s the name of the song that’s stuck in your head right now?
S (s, s, s, s) A (a, a, a, a) F (f, f, f, f) E (e, e, e, e) T (t, t, t, t) Y (y, y, y, y). SAFETY. DANCE.

doo doo doo da doo doo da doo doo . . .

Any celeb you would marry?
Hugh Laurie because I think he's a genuinely fascinating, smart, funny, talented man. I'm certain the age difference thing would really bother me though. Perhaps Justin Trudeau.

Who will cut and paste this first?
Somebody who's bored.

Has anyone ever said you look like a celebrity?
Yes. My mum used to insist on Nelly Furtado (pre-hoification). I had a friend in high school say Gillian Anderson once, which I don't really see but I will remember forever because who wants to turn that some of comparison down?

Do you wear a watch?
No, I've always got my iPod or phone.

Do you have anything pierced?
Ears. I used to have two holes in each but the second ones grew over.

Do you have any tattoos?
No, but I know what I want. A simple infinity symbol in either blue or black right on the inside of my left wrist. I'm waiting for the right time.

Do you like pain?
No. It is pain.

Do you like to shop?
Depends. My year of no yarn has changed the way I shop for yarn, and then gradually other things. Basically, if it's books or DVDs, I'm there forever. I love the possibility inherent. Anything else, even craft supplies, wears rather quickly.

What was the last thing you paid for with cash?
My disgusting lunch at the coffee shop in the school library. The coffee was fine but they must have dumped an entire can of olives into my wrap.

What was the last thing you paid for with your credit card?
No credit cards - I get into enough trouble with my debit card.

Who was the last person you spoke to on the phone?
My brother.

What is on your desktop background?
A picture of David Tennant holding a kitten, because I am predictable as fuck. (But it's so cute!!!)

What is the background on your cell phone?
A daisy picture that came with the phone. I don't really get into the whole photos and ringtones on your cell thing.

Do you like redheads?
I daily curse my chromosomes that I am brunette rather than redhead. I have every other aspect, especially complexion.

Do you know any twins?
Two of my best friends growing up. Another girl I knew growing up had a twin brother. Two of my cousins are twins.

Do you have any weird relatives?
Sometimes I think I'm the weird relative. Really, the baseline in my family for normalcy is set rather low. In my immediate family I may be it, which is truly frightening.

What is the last movie you saw?
James and the Giant Peach. I hadn't seen it in ages. It's wonderful!

What was the last book you read?
A trashy novel which I am too much of a snob to reveal.

Is there such a thing as love at first sight, or it is more likely to be lust at first sight?
Lust. The few people I truly love I've known for ages. The shortest relationship we're talking about here is about a year and a half.

What’s your favorite book?
It depends on how I feel at the moment.
Childlike: A Little Princess, by Frances Hodgson Burnett
Smart: House of Leaves, by Mark Z. Danielewski, or anything from Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next series
Pensive: Fall on Your Knees, by Ann-Marie Macdonald (Atonement by Ian McEwan is possibly tied)
Funny: anything by Pratchett, especially involving the Watch. Guards! Guards!, Men at Arms, The Fifth Elephant, Jingo, all greats.
Spiritual (this agnostic doesn't feel "religious"): Lamb by Christopher Moore and Small Gods by Pratchett.
Inspired: anything by Neil Gaiman, or Seventy-Nine Short Essays About Design by Michael Bierut.

I've left a ton out. Do Hamlet or Much Ado About Nothing count as books?

When was the last time you googled your own name?
At least six months. It's rather boring. I'm apparently a very good swimmer, and someone with a name very similar to mine was painted by Picasso.

What was / is your favorite subject at school?
All through school, history, because it was always just reading comprehension. Now it's film studies. I wish I'd put more work into my English classes though.

What was / is your least favorite subject at school?
Science. I stopped taking science as soon as humanly possible. I never had really good teachers and at least in gym class we'd get to do soccer every year.

Do you like having your photograph taken?
I used to. Not really any more, unless I'm in complete control.

What time were you born?
Too late, that's all I know.

Ever seriously questioned your sanity?
Maybe a little bit during first year of university. I just heard on RadioLab that being alone is just as likely to kill you as smoking. I really enjoy being solitary but I've learned since that talking to people is sometimes hard but occasionally worth it.

How many phone numbers do you have remembered and can say off the top of your head?
Perhaps 10-20, and I know at least 3 of those are old ones that are useless.

Can you Limbo?
Never really saw the need to try.

Have you ever killed your own dinner?
If you count unrooting carrots as killing them, then yes, yes I have.

How long have you been living at your current residence?
It depends on your definition of residence. Anywhere from 10 years to 2-1/2 years to 4 months.

What phobias do you have?
Rodents and vampires.

What’s your ideal breakfast?
Something homemade warm from the oven or pan.

Where are you right now?
At my desk.

Why do you blog?
If you look at my blog, it's pretty clear that I don't.

What would you call your autobiography?
I'd take the easy way out and just make it self-titled. Easy to find no matter how it's filed.

What’s the longest time you’ve stayed out of the country / where?
10 days in China. Probably still the best vacation ever.

Do you use ICQ, AIM, etc..?
MSN.

Do you have nightmares frequently?
I had a dream last night that was a nightmare in retrospect. Let's just say I don't like confrontation, and when you wake up thinking it's over, and then realize it has yet to be resolved: nightmare. I don't remember my dreams enough to really know whether I have nightmares often.

If you were another person, would you be friends with you?
Probably not. I found my doppelganger once and I haven't spoken to her since.

Which TV character could you be friends with?
Willow and Xander from Buffy, the Doctor from Doctor Who, Rory and Lorelai (and hopefully Kirk) from Gilmore Girls, Claire from Coronation Street, Wilson from House. I could think of more but clearly I watch too much TV.

What’s on your mouse pad?
I don't have one. I so have an increasingly shiny smooth patch of desk.

What is your ring tone?
Peer Gynt. Again, one of those default ring tones. If you don't know what it is, picture an ad for Ricola or St. Ives or anything else that uses more footage of the Alps than The Sound of Music. That's the tune.

What did you watch on TV last night?
Gilmore Girls on DVD. Only one episode left in the entire series!

Scary movies or happy endings?
Happy endings, because I am turning into a softie.

Mostly dead, not all dead

2007-08-16T02:56:00.000-04:00

Just a quick note to say hi to anyone who might be stopping by from Yarnival. Hi! I haven't updated this site recently - I can't believe how it's been over a month - but I plan to get right back in the saddle as soon as I find my knitting mojo. I've been missing writing Weekly Movies too. Just so you know I'm not dead. Ta!

PS. Go see Stardust. Do it!

Like I didn't know this already

2007-07-04T16:55:00.000-04:00

32%

Mingle² - Free Online Dating

The things I do for you people

2007-06-30T22:18:00.001-04:00

The funniest five seconds on the internet:

DRAMATIC CHIPMUNK!!!!

Weekly Movies, June 10-16

2007-06-30T18:57:00.000-04:00

Yeah, this is late. I saved this as a draft, then left on vacation the next day. So here for your enjoyment, and also for your lols, Weekly Movies June 10-16. I'm playing catch-up right now, but you try working in a liquor store come Canada Day.

Last Night: OMGWTFBBQ. This movie landed like a pop bottle full of marbles into my brain and refuses to leave.

Listen, I knew this was going to be a good movie. It's written, directed and starring Don McKellar, who to be fair I've seen very little of, but like what I've seen. Moreover, one of my closest friends in Ottawa (hi, Becky!) adores Don McKellar, and I trust her opinion. Furthermore, my friend Sam considers this movie his favourite Canadian movie of all time, and since my favourite Canadian movie is New Waterford Girl, possibly a perfect movie, I have to consider this as high praise indeed.

And I was still blown away.

Briefly, Last Night concerns the lives of a few different people living in Toronto, starting at 6:00 PM the day the world is going to end. (They never say why, but I think it's made pretty clear that the sun's going supernova.) The people have all chosen to spend their last precious hours in different ways. Craig (Callum Keith Rennie, oh that only sweetens the deal) is having sex in as many different ways with as many different people as possible. Patrick (McKellar) is spending a fake Christmas dinner with his family, then going to watch it all end by himself. Jenny (Sarah Polley, one of my heroes) is going to end it at a giant party with her boyfriend. Duncan (David effin' Cronenberg) is a workaholic. And Sandra (the perfect Sandra Oh) just wants to get home to her husband so they can kill each other before the world kills them.

All of these people are connected, but to relate how they are connected reduces them to a blank sheet of facts. The movie is honest, heart-breaking, really funny (listen to the newscast in the background in Duncan's house) and refreshing. I've just finished reading Katherine's Monk's astonishingly good book Weird Sex and Snowshoes, about Canadian film. I don't want to rehash what she's written about McKellar and Last Night, but I think having the background on why he made this film, in a time when movies like Armageddon and Deep Impact were being made across the border is interesting. It feels like more than anything what the end of the world would really be like. Once again, I don't want to reveal too many details of the plot, because I always find I enjoy films most the less I know of their stories. Just, see this movie.

Shadow of the Vampire: One of the reasons I appreciated Dead Again so much was that it took an interesting premise (discovery of past lives through the use of hypnosis) and made a good movie out of it. It only makes me more frustrated when movies like Shadow of the Vampire are made. After all, this movie had an amazing premise: what if the actor who played Nosferatu wasn't really acting? What if he really was a vampire?

And the reason I appreciate movies like Dead Again is because so few movies manage to live up to their premise. Shadow had good actors (Willem Dafoe, John Malkovich, Cary Elwes who will always be given slack no matter how much crap he does because of Westley, Eddie Izzard), a delightful design and some really goddamn scary scenes. But the story just meanders and wanders. I think it would have been nice to acknowledge that not many people know the map of Eastern Europe in the '20s by heart - would it have killed them to show us where everything was? And for heaven's sake, if you're making a movie about one of the most iconic movies in history, learn from it! One of the best scenes in Shadow is the first time we meet Max Schreck (Willem Dafoe), at night on a secluded lot, and he starts "acting" instantly. Everyone on the lot is captured by the feeling of fear as he lures the young man into his abode, and it's easily the scariest scene in the movie. That's because it was taken directly from Nosferatu, duh. Yet when Max starts to go wild and feed on people, he just jumps right on them and ties on the saddlebag. What's so scary about that, huh? And what happens to the first camera operator he nearly kills, the one who gets shipped back to Berlin? Why aren't there any consequences of that?

More than anything, Shadow of the Vampire frustrated me. Partly, it's doomed to failure because it can never be as scary as Nosferatu, and partly it just failed to live up to its possibilities.

[Afterthought: 99.99% of the people who see a picture of the real Max Schreck done up as Nosferatu have no idea what Max Schreck really looked like. I don't. When I looked at Max Schreck in this movie, I could clearly see Willem Dafoe, despite the good makeup job. Perhaps part of the success of the image of Nosferatu is the fact that we can't see anything else in him - certainly not the Green Goblin or a member of Steve Zissou's crew.]

Fantastic 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer: I'm going to largely repeat what I said over in the MRFH forum, so feel free to skip this if you're from there. But first, I have to say this: I liked the first Fantastic 4 movie, OK? I did. I was excited to see it because it had Ioan Gruffudd hitting it big and he's pretty and stuff. (I have a crush on Ioan Gruffudd that, while I am nearly over, was so strong before that I feel I may never escape.)

So, I saw the first movie just because it was Ioan, and was pleasantly surprised. It's kinda funny at times, it's not too unbelievable, and the locations are beautiful (BC, baby!). I know this sounds ike faint praise but trust me, I like it. Now, a few random thoughts:

Is Marvel seriously making so many movies right now that they've run out of token bit parts for Stan Lee to play? Talk about breaking the fourth wall.

Hey, it's that guy from the 11:00 news! I get really, really excited when I recognize stuff from where I live in movies. Don't watch the original Fantastic 4 movie with me, because I point this stuff out all the time, much to the annoyance of my brother who was sitting next to me watching the movie. Also on the list: Final Destination 1, Sandlot 2, Muppet Wizard of Oz, Antitrust, Josie and the Pussycats, any episode of Battlestar Galactica . . . I just get distracted and start yelling stuff like "Hey, that's the main library building!" It's like you've waved something shiny in front of my face. I don't know how I would cope if I lived in California. (But it really is exciting, because I've been to the bar where Ben and Johnny play darts!)

I don't know what they did different with Jessica Alba's hair for this movie, but she looks really weird. I say this not in that petty girlfight way, but she quite truly looks odd. Phillip Stevens at Pajiba called it "irradiated mannequin," which only makes me wish I'd come up with it.

I can understand some leaps of logic - like, if the Silver Surfer's initial sweep knocked out the FAA's computers, why is there no repetition of that throughout the rest of the movie? Why do the Fantastic 4 travel the globe, yet we never see them traveling? But there's one thing I couldn't stand, and that was this: there is no Great Wall in south-east China. That's sort of the POINT of the Great Wall. Unless the Huns started attacking from the sea, south-east China was A-OK safe! Also, I know this gets into pedant territory, but those pictures of the Great Wall everyone sees? That's not what the majority of it looks like. The bits that tourists walk on, yes, does look like that, because the government restored them. But the rest? Imagine Roman ruins in Britain. It's about as useful as those.

Also, I realize this is an alternate universe and the world is about to end and people probably bond together in times like this, but I don't think China is exactly keen on Americans dropping into their country uninvited. They certainly wouldn't be cool for them to hang around and plan a wedding.

And oy, with the wedding! I think I missed the part of the second X chromosome where you enjoy weddings, because I wanted to SCREAM. I have been to 2 weddings - both my siblings' - and while I was happy for them and all, weddings are kinda boring. Ditto for Reed Richards and Sue Storm's. Get on with the clobberin'.

I won't even mention the Dodge. I won't I won't I won't OH GOD WHY!?!?!

The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain: Wow! There's actually some sort of narrative thread to this particular issue of Weekly Movies!

See, back when I was really interested in Ioan Gruffudd (I ask that you not use the term "obsessed," plzkthnx) I began to be interested in Wales, because that's where he's from. Wales is really a very interesting place. Its people are fiercely independent, and they actually speak Welsh day-to-day. How neat is that?!?! It's a very beautiful landscape, and no shortage of interesting people came from there. Plus, if you listen to Cast-On, you can't help but be interested in Wales. Brenda describes it with a convert's passion.

I would love to go to Wales someday. Trust me, it's high on The List. And that's part of why I was drawn to The Movie With the Stupidly Long Title That Condemns it to Sound Twee. Also, because my dad said he really liked it, and he has thus far shown excellent taste in his choice of British movies featuring adorable little villages (though I doubt I'll ever convince him to see Hot Fuzz, more's the pity). And, true to form, it is a well-done movie featuring an adorable little village all pulling together with the help of a scoundrel. More than anything, it reminded me of The Commitments, even though the two films have almost nothing in common on the surface except for the casting of Colm Meaney.

Another reason some might turn up their noses at this movies is Hugh Grant as lead, in all his stammering, shy glory. Well, I'm firmly of the belief that Hugh Grant does far better work than he ever gets credit for, so there. And I don't have a crush on him either; I simply think he got typecast more than a decade ago and he has far wider range than that (Exhibit no. 1: About a Boy).

FO: Monkey Socks

2007-06-17T02:44:00.000-04:00

Oy. I've got a monkey on my back.

But thankfully not anymore!*

Details, yes?

Pattern: Monkey by Cookie A., free at Knitty.com.
Yarn: self-dyed KnitPicks Bare fingering weight. Colourway intended: Kaylee. Colourway achieved: Drunken Neon Ibis.
Needles: 2.5 mm . . . circular?!?!
Thoughts:

This pattern really truly is as addicting as they say. It's a simple 11-row repeat which I had memorized by the second repeat, and it takes me forever to memorize these things. It's great for variegated yarn. I've never actually finished a pair of Jaywalkers (I find the fitting difficult), but I have no problem seeing these become the next Jaywalkers.

I doubt I'll order the yarn again. Although it has nylon already, I reinforced the heels and toes with sewing thread because I didn't feel confident this yarn would last. It's very soft and tends to split. It also doesn't feel like it has much of the natural elastic bounce inherent in wool, which would make me nervous about frogging.

I knit the socks on Magic Loop almost by accident, really. Near the top of the first sock, you can see where the yarn has begun to flash, where I was working with 2.25 mm dpns. I was also worried that the lack of bounce I was feeling was due to the needle size, and I couldn't find a set of 2.5 mm dpns. I knew roughly how to use Magic Loop because I'd reverted to it before on short pieces of work like the sleeves of my Glampyre boobholder, where I didn't have the right size dpns but was able to add cords to my Denise needles to make them long enough for Magic Loop. I'd never used it for a longer period, and I found I like the technique. It makes it feel like it's going faster, because naturally you work faster with less stopping at joints between needles. I'll never abandon dpns, but I like Magic Loop more than I expected.

It's already been established that Cookie A. is just a straight-out genius. The day I finished these socks, I started straight away on a new pair:

Yup, it's going to be Hedera! I've always thought these socks were a bit overlooked - unjustly since they're just plain gorgeous, and even easier than Monkeys! Plus, I'd imagine that these babies would fit more people than the Monkey pattern, since it's offered in two separate sizes and is super stretchy. I don't have any good pictures of the lace stretched out, so let's just pretend I'm drawing out the suspense until they're done.

Speaking of which, I'm leaving on vacation tomorrow (which is actually today, so I have to finish this up soon). I'll be gone on an Alaskan cruise until the 24th, and will be bringing my laptop but can't guarantee I'll have internet access. If I maintain radio silence for a while, you'll know that's why. I hope to finish off my Hederas, as well as an Unjustly Overdue Super Secret Project.

*Listen, I know you guys are quite possibly getting sick of all these photos I take in this lavender bush. But I'm just now trying to take photos according to the colour spectrum, and green and purple look good against a lot of stuff, like ^red and orange^. If you are getting sick of them, just bear in mind I'm trying to improve, and it could always be worse.

Now this is just getting embarassing

2007-06-09T22:34:00.001-04:00

Listen, I know I watch a lot of movies. More than the average bear, to say the least. But this is only the second week I've done this and . . . well, I may have to start hiding the number of movies I watch when school picks up again. Granted, that Videomatica deal has something to do with it. I generally don't go this overboard. But I'm on vacation from the 17th to the 24th, so I'm trying to get as many movies as possible in before that time.

Double Indemnity: After seeing The Lady Eve last week, I was on a serious Barbara Stanwyck hunt. I also wanted to see it because it was directed (and co-written) by Billy Wilder, who made one of the most perfect movies ever, and I'm trying to see as many of his films as possible. (No, I still haven't seen Sunset Boulevard.) I don't know what it was about Billy Wilder films that made Fred MacMurray willing to play against type, but I like it. Can't you just imagine him as the William Holden character in Sabrina, too? And Stanwyck was, of course, perfect. The movie was co-written by Raymond Chandler so it has a ton of that "the dame was as hard-boiled as the egg I'd had for breakfast" talk, which is almost hilarious after reading one too many noir Calvin & Hobbes strips. Still, the murder plan is fascinating and I loved the way both characters were clearly faking their desire for each other. My only caveat is that I'm not sure how it would hold up to repeat viewing since I wanted to keep watching in part just because I wanted to see how it all fell apart.

Metropolis: Beautiful, astonishing sets and special effects. I loved the scene where Freder is traveling across Metropolis and the movie takes time to pause and stare at every bit of scenery. Normally I am bored by this sort of thing and want to just GET ON WITH THE STORY ALREADY - that's part of why I love Children of Men so much- but the story kinda blows. I was bored halfway through and just wanted to explore this wonderful world. Why is is that a movie from 1927 holds me fascinated by its visual style far more than the millions of dollars George Lucas or Peter Jackson throws at the screen? (Except for the dinosaurs in King Kong. They were bitchin'.)

Wet Hot American Summer: Currently holds the "Most Embarassing Movie Title to Ever Bring Up in Conversation, No, it's Not Porn, I Swear" prize. I'd heard about this movie for a while - mostly while browsing Fametracker - and why has no one ever heard of it? It's hilarious! It takes place on the last day of summer camp in 1981, and has Janeane Garofalo and David Hyde Pierce and Paul Rudd and Christopher Meloni! It is rated R, but damn is it funny without being stupid / embarassing. There's a talking can of tomatoes, and much mocking of the "everything happens in one day" sub-genre, and part of SkyLab crashes to earth, and Christopher Meloni is a crazy Vietnam vet but manages to be original. It's great.

But I'm a Cheerleader: Meh. Clea DuVall was charming, but she always is. It just made me wish there was a documentary about these religious sexual reorientation camps, because this was so obviously over the top that it made me wonder what they're actually like.

An Inconvenient Truth: I put off seeing this for a very long time because I knew it would scare me . . . but it didn't, actually. It's funny and alarming and astonishingly personal, and yes it is shocking (American emission standards are lower than China's?!?!), but not at the expense of the sense of an intelligent dialogue. I expected "OMG the earth is dying kill your car," but found I wasn't being insulted or talked down to. Documentaries continue to surprise me with just how interesting they can be sometimes, like Who Killed the Electric Car?, even though cars don't interest me at all. And yes, I am a dirty Canadian hippie and even though I know if he'd been elected he'd still be too right-wing for me, it make me wish so hard that someday I'd wake up and find out Al Gore won the 2000 election. Sigh.

Waitress: I'd wanted to see this for a long time, as soon as I read Dustin Rowles's review. I mean, quirky indie featuring Captain Tightpants himself? Count me in! But going to Waitress because you want to see Malcom Reynolds is like going to see Brokeback Mountain because it would be totally hot to see Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal make out. This movie made me hurt. It made me hurt because it felt so, so real - a strange way to describe a semi-magical romantic comedy - but it's true. The sadness that goes beyond the melancoly moping most often seen on screen at the heart of Jenna's life hits you like a hammer.

And it's strange really, that a movie set in the South with magical food and quirky waitresses and grumpy old men and a surprise pregnancy can feel so original, but it did. I've never seen this movie before, in any way. I don't know what switch must have been flipped a few months ago regarding my crying at the movies, but it flipped hard. This movie had me crying more often than anything else - sometimes because I was sad, sometimes because I was happy, sometimes because this movie just hit me so hard. It stays with you, this feeling about this movie.
If you want to read another love letter to Waitress, check out Daniel Carlson's, another writer for Pajiba.

Sullivan's Travels: Another one of my "I loved The Lady Eve so much..." movies, this was also directed by Preston Sturges. It's got a neat idea behind it - director wants to make movie about how life is for the poor, so decides to go undercover with ten cents in his pocket because he's always been priveleged - but it doesn't stick to it. In the early part of his voyages, he keeps winding up back in Hollywood, which is funny and carries the theme of the movie well. Then he really does live amongst the poor in hardship - which would have been more effective if it had been covered in more than a two-minute-long montage. Finally, through a series of unfortunate events, he is considered dead by the world at large but really is in a hard labour camp and learns the importance of humour. I thought Veronica Lake was better than I expected (though to be fair, all I knew of her before was Kim Basinger in L.A. Confidential); Joel McCrea was good in the comedic parts, not so much with the drama; and while I appreciate the message I think it would have been better served by a funnier movie - aka, The Lady Eve.

Oh, and the name of the dramatic movie Sullivan (McCrea) wants to make? O Brother, Where Art Thou?

The Thin Man: Nick and Nora Charles (William Powell and Myrna Loy) are indeed better than I could ever have imagined. The rest of the movie? I could take it or leave it, except perhaps the Christmas party scene with all the sloppy drunks.

Jesus of Montreal: I'd already seen this, but it was even better than I'd remembered. The first time I saw it I didn't click that Robert Lepage was acting in it. I could go on and on about how awesome Lepage is and gush over The Andersen Project, but that would detract from Jesus. Anyway, great movie still, and the talent of Lothaire Bluteau makes me weep for English Canadian cinema. Why is it that we raise any Canadian so-and-so who makes it in Hollywood to near-mythical levels, yet ignore the talent within our own borders? Arrgh!

Jeffrey: Had also already seen this. Not as good as I remembered, sadly. The last scene does retain its charm, fortunately, but not much else does.

Dead Again: Holy CRAP was this movie good! Kenneth Branagh! Emma Thompson! Film noir in '40s Los Angeles! Unreliable narrators!!!

Ok, let's tone down the fangirl for a moment. All I really knew about this movie was that a) it was one of the movies Kenneth Branagh and Emma Thompson were in together, b) they each played two roles, parallel lovers across time, and c) it was really hard to find. BBC Canada played it a couple months ago, but they like playing all the best movies at 2 in the morning.

I can't ever give you a straight answer on whether or not I like Kenneth Branagh. He's very very smart and a good adaptor of Shakespeare, but he gives in to weird choices too often (casting Matthew Lillard in a '30s-set Love's Labour's Lost complete with song-and-dance numbers? casting a Desdemona with a thick accent? Keanu Reeves?!?!). He's really very cute sometimes, but looks like a complete moron with any sort of facial hair (which includes all five hours of Hamlet.) He married Emma Thompson, who I totally want to grow up to be, but then allegedly cheated on her. He played Hamlet and Henry V and Benedick and Iago, but isn't the best actor I've seen in any of those roles (except for Benedick).

Whether or not I like Kenneth Branagh is a question to which I clearly devote far too much energy. Nevertheless, I will still watch just about any movie he directs, especially from the early '90s - of which Dead Again definitely counts. I won't attempt to summarize the plot, because I think it's best the more of it which is left a surprise. Suffice it to say that it involves dual storylines about a murder in 1949 and current events of 1991, and uses reincarnation, hypnosis and past lives without being cheesy or stupid. Also, both Ken and Em are in American accents for most of the film, which was a bit of a surprise to say the least.

Sigh. Why couldn't those two crazy kids make it work?

It has its faults, to be sure, but I really enjoyed this movie it made me long for a parallel world where there were more twisty turny movies with excellent casts and scripts.

Bringing Up Baby: Not what I expected. Very, very silly. Other screwballs I've seen, like the muchly aforementioned The Lady Eve or the absolutely dreadful Twentieth Century, are at least grounded somewhat in realism. Even though Henry Fonda's falling all over couches, he can still be considered a straight man because he's not really in on the joke. In Bringing Up Baby, everyone is in on the joke.

This is really, really fun when it's just Katherine Hepburn and Cary Grant bouncing off each other. He's all buttoned-up and bespectacled and looking like he's waiting for someone to back him into a corner and breathe on his glasses, to quote Professor Harold Hill; meanwhile, she's the original Manic Pixie Dream Girl but she's Katherine Hepburn so we still like her. It's not so much fun when we get to the police station about an hour into the film and no one can speak. It's stupid misunderstandings that have brought them here, and I refuse to believe that "someone else is talking, so I will open and shut my mouth futilely like a guppy" is an acceptable excuse for not getting the damn point across. See, the thing is, I loved the parts with just Grant and Hepburn so much that I hated getting to the jail because other people just kept stepping over their words and doing away with what made the previous hour so damn enjoyable.

Cheer up sleepy Jean

2007-06-03T01:34:00.000-04:00

Followup from the last post: I'm not knitting anything from my completed successful Firefly colourways until they're all done. It would be neat to design a project for each, but that's a little wacka-wacka even for me. But what about the ones that bomb, like the Kaylee colourway?

Hey hey it's soon to be a pair of Monkeys!

Anyway, in the last post I mentioned that I was going to be ripping off Brenda at Moot Point. The thing is, she does a feature called Weekly Movies where she decribes the movies that she's seen every week.

Coincidentally, this week I found the MOST AMAZING VIDEO STORE EVAH. I'd known about Videomatica for a while because West 4th is one of my favourite haunts. But it was only recently that I discovered they have a Canadian movie section - that is, they carry any Canadian movies at all! This is a HUGE deal! And once I started poking around so more, I was truly gobsmacked.

I don't consider myself knowledgeable enough to be called a cinephile. I know more than the average bear, I think, but not much. But I want to know more. Two of my favourite books are Roger Ebert's The Great Movies and The Great Movies II, essays on what he consider the 200 best movies of all time. No, I don't agree with him on a lot of them, especially his deep fondness for French New Wave (which, given his level of sway, may be part of the reason French New Wave is considered such a huge freaking deal as opposed to oh, say, German Expressionism or the Canadian documentary tradition and I'm way off topic). My point was, Ebert is not perfect. He's not a great writer (the last half of the Citizen Kane essay is bullet-pointed trivia) and he has an obvious bias towards the artsy without going balls-out for the experimental.

But.

But.

He does highlight a lot of movies that I have wanted to see forever and have never been able to find. Films like The Lady Eve and the Up documentaries by Michael Apted and silent movies and Don't Look Now and for god's sake, The Seventh Seal has only one of the most iconic images of all time, would it kill people to stock it?!?!? These were films I finally found at Videomatica. I signed up on Tuesday and have already designated this the Summer of Sarah's Self-Education. I'm going to see all those movies I thought sounded interesting - interesting being the operative word. Last Year at Marienbad sounds like it should be banned under the Geneva Convention. So I'm going to try to document the movies I watch this summer. I signed up for a 20 movies for $40 deal in June, so I'm forcing my self into this thing head-first.

The Lady Eve: One of three I rented on Tuesday. Ebert's description made this my first-choice pick. Like all comedies, it lost some of its sparkle because of jokes retold in the review, but the pratfalls were genuinely funny. Barbara Stanwyck is also in another one of the flicks I rented but have yet to watch, and I hope she's as good. Peter Fonda is the male lead and darn they're cute what with the sharply written dialogue and the Edith Head costumes and the conniving surrounding a traveling cardsharp falling in love. I'm leaving on a cruise in two weeks and I strongly suspect this movie will have given me unfair expectations about the sort of people one meets. This movie was also notable for me because of the fact that it's really, really sexual. The sort of movie where a man's been "up the Amazon" for a year and he has a "pet snake" and he will have "trouble sleeping" and it's all acknowledged on screen in this very cool way that only adds to the humour. I mean, The Philadelphia Story is sort of the apex of the romantic comedies of this time, and yet you could swear all the characters were neutered. Not to dis The Philadelphia Story, of course.

The Third Man: I took a history of Russia class this past year, and I hated it with a burning, self-loathing hatred that burrows deep in the stomach. I don't find the history of the eastern bloc particularly interesting either. But something about this movie's setting grabbed me by the collar and shook me. It's set in a divided Vienna after WWII, and it's in glorious black and white that shines the water off the cobblestones and makes tiny men's shadows forty feet tall. It's a twisting noir that I could keep track of, but didn't make me feel like an idiot. It made me want to know more about the collective psyche of that place at that time, even though it's an English movie.
Oh, and by the way: Orson Welles is technically the star of this movie, and he doesn't show up for more than an hour. It's worth it. It's so worth it. You know those moments where a movie completely sweeps you away, like the reveal of Barbossa at the end of Pirates 2 or the first time the Imperial March plays in the Star Wars sequels, and you're left smiling like an idiot saying, "That. Was. So. Cool!" to your friends because you don't have any other words for it? I was always a little worried I was feeling that way purely because of cinematic bombast. Not so. I got the exact same feeling in the first shot of Orson Welles in The Third Man, watching it at night on my little 13" TV in my bedroom.
The last shot of the movie, by the way, is perfect.

The Seventh Seal: C'mon, I had to rent it. It's Swedish! It's Ingmar Bergman! This is the "playing chess with Death" movie, but it's really about the silence of God and wondering why there's so much pain on Earth.

Antonius Block: I want knowledge! Not faith, not assumptions, but knowledge. I want God to stretch out His hand, uncover His face and speak to me.
Death: But He remains silent.
Antonius Block: I call out to Him in the darkness. But it's as if no one was there.
Death: Perhaps there isn't anyone.

The wondrous part is that Bergman also talks about why it's good to be alive.

"I shall remember this moment: the silence, the twilight, the bowl of strawberries, the bowl of milk. Your faces in the evening light. Mikael asleep, Jof with his lyre. I shall try to remember our talk. I shall carry this memory carefully in my hands as if it were a bowl brimful of fresh milk. It will be a sign to me, and a great sufficiency. "

The thing is, I feel like none of the themes in the movie are really new. Yes, it's hard to believe, especially when everything is going to pieces and you feel like the world just might be ending. Yes, God is silent. Maybe this is because I'm an agnostic. Even though I can't be defined by an either/or equation - faith or lack of faith - my agnosticism is a part of me. Like it or not, it affects how I view things. This was a huge realization to me; actually, I think it was brought on by seeing Pan's Labyrinth. And coming to terms with the fact that I'm neither - well, I guess a Christian - nor an atheist meant that I was dealing with those questions. The Seventh Seal is a remarkably well-made and articulated piece of art exploring those questions, I will more than grant it that. And I like the fact that it isn't nihilistic either.

About two-thirds of the way through the movie, the knight comes across a woman who's due to be burned alive. The people think she's a witch, responsible for bringing the Plague to them. The knight begs her what it is like to know the Devil, because at least the Devil knows God. But, as convinced as she is that the Devil is beside her always, she comes across as just another person searching for any guarantee that there's a greater world than us.

Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!

2007-06-01T20:17:00.000-04:00

First, thank you thank you thank you for all the lovely comments everyone left on my previous post, here and on Craftster and on the Knittyboard. I'm so close to this thing that I'm really proud of it, but it will take a while (perhaps never, who knows) before I can step back and see it as a whole. Right now I see it in pieces: the afternoon I spent on my bedroom floor frantically knitting and reknitting the soldier while listening to AccuRadio Broadway, and the hours spent watching Elizabeth while I worked out the short rows, and my frantic visits to different archives to try to find the archival materials.

Meanwhile, I've been working on my Firefly yarn project! The first one I tried was Book, and I think I can say he is a success:

This is how I originally described my idea for the Book colourway: Perhaps tawny deerskin with very small splashes of red, like confetti or tweed.

The first picture has - at least on my monitor - the most accurate colours; the second is just a tad washed-out.

I love, love, love this colourway. It's KnitPicks Bare sockweight, 75% superwash wool, 25% nylon. It was dyed over a long period of time for me, dyeing-wise: 2 or 3 episodes of Gilmore Girls. I've dyed yarn before lots of times, but always in the microwave with KoolAid, using the directions from Stitch n Bitch. But when I was ramping up for this dyeing adventure I decided I might as well as least try some of the other methods, especially considering the handpainted, more subtle variations I wanted in these yarns. Working from this Knitty article, I've so far dyed all the yarns this time on the stovetop. And I have to say, it's much preferable. You get way, way more control this way.

I'm not going to be cataloguing the exact recipe I used for these colourways, mostly because I myself don't keep track and don't really care so much. But I do like thinking about different ingredients for different colours, mostly because it's incredibly freeing to break out of the KoolAid box (or rather, tiny paper envelope). The shades of brown I made with tea. I used a lot of teabags - probably around 16 to 2o, just tea we had lying around and were never going to drink. As an aside, ginger tea sounds delicious, but is actually pretty disgusting.

The red is - well, I'm growing to appreciate the red. I kept the brown around for a week or so, appreciating its beautiosity and appropriatosity for a character named Book, with its tanned tones like old pages. I just KNEW I was going to screw up the red somehow. When it came time, I was worried that dipping the yarn into red dye would allow it to spread too far and become more than tweed or confetti. So I put the yarn on a cookie tray in the sink and put red food dye on it in spots. After waiting patiently for a whole 30 seconds or so, I washed it out. OOOOOPS.

Things to remember: heat sets dye, which is of course one of the cardinal rules of the damn Knitty article. The dye ran. Just a little bit, a controllable amount. It's not tweed, but then it also kinda loooks like someone bled on it - which also works. Like I said, growing to appreciate it.

Next came Kaylee. Sweet little Kaylee. Kaylee conjures up engines and space, but she also makes people think of cupcake frosting and parasols and pink dresses. (Man, Kaylee is one of my favourite characters ever in a world filled with amazing characters.)

This was how I originally described the Kaylee colourway: different shades of pink for her tiered dress in "Shindig," with shades of beige and pale brown blending in for her connection to Serenity.

And this is what I actually made:

OK, it isn't actually that fluorescent. But I like this picture because it shouts SHAME! SHAME! This isn't Kaylee! This actually reminds me of these birds they have at the Vancouver Aquarium:

I think it might be some sort of emu? I forget. Anyway, not cute! Not Kaylee!

Fine, you want a more accurate depiction of colour? Here:

And finally, Simon. This was the yarn I said I was going to do first, so of course I did it third. I chose Simon because I had only ordered 3 skeins of yarn from KnitPicks. I'd never worked with it, and who knows if I'd gotten bored or whatever partway through. Plus, I'm not made of money. So I wanted to pick a colourway that would be easier, so I wouldn't screw the pooch quite so royally as I did with Kaylee, and so I could at least partly restore my faith in my dyeing abilities.

This was how I originally described Simon's colourway: cold and clinical. Two by two, hands of blue. Like the hospital in "Ariel" . . . ice, ice blue and white.

Consider mojo restored.

Coming soon: monkey addiction, I rip off Moot Point, and you get to endure my further blathers about movies no one's ever seen.

Homefront meets battlefront

2007-05-16T17:17:00.000-04:00

I've been chugging away on my Firefly yarn colourways - Book is almost done and Kaylee is presoaking downstairs. I found the secret to brown dye, by the way. I was thinking ice tea mix, but unlike Kool-Aid that already has the sugar mixed in and I didn't want sticky yarn. Somewhere - probably Craftster - someone mentioned coffee or tea. So I've been using up all the weird teas we'll never drink.

I figured I'd take this opportunity, now that I've finally remembered how to log in to Blogger (hush, you) to talk about that mysterious school project I mentioned a while back. Warning: a lot of rambling follows, which you will likely find dead boring if you are not interested in various ways of telling one story, or World War I. Skip to the pictures if you just want the knitty bits.

As I think most of you know, I'm studying history at university. I've just finished my second year, which was probably the crappiest scholastic year of my life, but for two bright spots: Canadian Cinema class, which had a huge impact on me as shown by my blathering in this here blog about movies no one's ever seen, and Historian's Craft, which is a required class where we learned about different ways of portraying history. For instance, in one section we read a biography of Frida Kahlo, watched Frida and a documentary, and saw a one-woman play about her. That way we learned about benefits and disadvantages of different media, etc. It was a lot more interesting than it sounds. Anyway, for the final project, we had two choices: critique a movie or documentary or something based in history, or create a representation of history in "the new media", which essentially described non-book representations. This was why we were looking at the internet and museums and such in that section.

The possibility of creating something new was really really interesting - not to mention the fact that I had a bunch of essays due at the end of the semester and wasn't looking forward to researching the many intricate details of 300 or Schindler's List. This idea popped into my head, I got it approved by my prof (who was, to my view of things, ridiculously excited by it), and I promptly . . . panicked.

See, for the first project in Historian's Craft that year, we had to transcribe and explain an old hand-written document. I'd found a letter written by a soldier in 1917. I could go on for ages why I find WWI more interesting than WWII, but let's leave that for another day. I'd explained the letter in the context of propaganda, because it contained details I was surprised to find in a letter home, speaking of the horrors of war in cowboys-and-Indians terms. Ack, I'm moving into my paper-writing voice! Anyway, the point was that propaganda's bloodlust didn't just hit people back home - it also affected soldiers. I found this really interesting because even though discussions of homefronts are relatively recent, rarely is it strongly linked to the battlefront. This was a direct connection.

The other genesis of the project was knitting, duh. I've only recently gotten back into doing Craftster swaps after lying dormant for nearly a year (see above re: crappy school year). And they teach you to use your skills in new ways, to adapt what you know into the format of, say, BlackAdder or renfair or a 5" by 5" square. So I knew if I had the opportunity to do something creative I wanted to knit it. I've got other crafty skills but knitting is far and away the medium I'm most comfortable in.

And what's the connection between knitting and history? Well, a lot of historical knitting references are rooted in war. There's those old "knit socks for the troops!" posters and such that are scattered through books like Nancy Bush's.

So, because I was interested in the connection between homefront and battlefront, and because I know how to knit, I made a project that depicted the battlefront in homefront terms. And that's why it's called Homefront Meets Battlefront. And hence ends (most) of the ramblings.

This is what the outside looks like. It's got hinges on the sides and the latch really works. The doors don't lie completely flat though - they bulge out slightly because of the stuff inside. The wood's just some plain wood my aunt's boyfriend had around. We tried particle board first, because I love the way particle board feels (so smooth!) and it was a decent price and going to be painted anyway. But because it's just sawdust and glue it was really hard to cut decently, so in came the real wood. I like it better in the end, I think. It's more noticeable, certainly, but in a way that works. The paint's just some incredibly cheap stuff I picked up at Michaels that worked surprisingly well. So you can get a size of scale, it's roughly 14" wide by 26" tall.

And here's what it looks like inside!

Behold the completely non-religious-message-bearing triptych! I'm really proud of this project, looking at it again. Let's dissect it, shall we?

Central panel first, because it's what grabs everyone's attention:

This is the basis for the whole dealie, the first part I thought of, the hardest section, and the part I'm most proud of. It was knit for the bottom up, all in one piece.
The first part is supposed to be the - well, I guess they're the Allied trenches. They're one side's trenches, anyway. It's all one long strip that gets mitered at certain points and then you sew it together and it fits like magic! I got the pattern - well, "pattern" - it's more like a recipe or guideline - from Debbie New's fantasmo book Unexpected Knitting. It was surprisingly easy, too - it probably only took me three hours or so, from creating the pattern to binding off.
I made a second labyrinth too. It was meant to be joined to the left side of the first one, and had more "unique" colours. It was, in a word, shite. But it literally took no time at all - I designed and knitted and finished it completely while watching The Graduate.

The next section is probably familiar to anyone who's ever looked with longing at Lizard Ridge. I wanted to have some sort of sense of perspective in this thing, which meant I couldn't really do another labyrinth to represent the other trenches. I tried a couple ways with freeform knitting, which failed miserably. (I originally wanted the whole thing to be freeform. Ha! I say, ha!) It was just ugly and didn't have any sort of cohesive picture. So I decided to go for short rows. I don't remember know how many repeats I did lengthwise; I think it was 2. It was way more than I thought I could squeeze in, anyway.

I picked up stitches from the top of the seamed labyrinth, and did two repeats lengthwise of Lizard Ridge in brown variegated Lopi. This is the original Lopi, the thick stuff. Then I knit three rows of Fair Isle, alternating one stitch brown Lopi, one stitch green variegated Lopi. I didn't actually line the colours up. They're really in a checkerboard pattern. But the variegation fools the eye and lined up the palest shades of each yarn on top of each other. The green in meant to represent far-off rolling fields, by the way. I did one repeat of Lizard Ridge in the green. This section probably took the longest to come together for me. But once it did, it only took me about half of Elizabeth, the miniseries with Helen Mirren. (This is how I remember how long it took for me to do projects.)

Oh, and those of you who see a face in there? That was by accident. I was a very, very grumpy Sarah when I saw that, and bit off the heads of anyone who mentioned it. Sorry, guys!

Finally we get near the top. The four large chunks are freeform knitting and meant to represent the far-off landscape. The grey is lite Lopi in seed stitch, the brown is variegated green alpaca and brown Paton's Classic Merino, the black is cotton and the brown unfortunately nipple-like part is the thick Lopi from below. Don't ask me how I remember the details of this section so well, it frankly baffles me. These parts are weird combos of short-rowing, decreasing, picking up stitches willy-nilly and forgetting how I did it all. I liked doing it though - it was probably the most relaxing section. The sky above was picked up from across the freeform sections and short-rowed in a vague attempt to get a smooth line at the top, which clearly failed. But I like it like this and only wanted a very small section of sky, so this works.

The last part I did was the guy. He was pretty simple, really. I ripped him out repeatedly because I had tons of trouble getting his proportions right, but in the end it's pretty much what I envisioned. I knit him top-down in the round with peach, green and brown Jawoll sock yarn. His severed leg was knit separately, but was still technically attached. See, when I bound off his thigh I cast on the rest of his leg without breaking the yarn. Underneath the embroidered blood (Lorna's Laces in "Flames", and no I did not buy it just for that) the thigh and leg are still attached by one thin green thread.

When I finished knitting him, he had roughly 1,289 ends hanging off him. Instead of weaving them in, he's sewn into the trenches with them. I love that part. No weaving, no hiding seams! And then the blood and his hair were embroidered on. I just wish I'd remembered to embroider him a belt. I think there were very few soldiers wearing jumpsuits in the trenches.

Left panel:

A sock in progress. This was supposed to be an example of the kind of socks the women back home would knit for soldiers. I left it unfinished on purpose. I swear. It's part of the effect. *rolls eyes, whistles innocently* I told my prof this was an example of the socks of the time because there's a purled "seam stitch" down the back of the leg. I think it's because of Nancy Bush that I feel this isn't as authentic as it could be, and am feeling slightly guilty now. But on the other hand, the ability to knit socks itself off the top of your head is really a sort of antique ability nowadays. It's not completely perfect, but it's good enough.

Right panel:

This is a juxtaposition of old "knit for the boys!" posters I found online and the letter that sparked my interest in this idea. It's a sort of illustration of homefront (propaganda) and battlefront (letters). The two side section don't really stand on their own - they were meant to complement the centre section.

So that's "Homefront Meets Battlefront." It was completely different than anything I've done in university so far, and I loved it. At the same time, it sometimes felt wrong, like I was bending the rules to get to do something I liked so much. I think that was more of a reaction to the fact that I was actually enjoying a school project, and it felt so weird I had to explain myself.

At any rate, I like this thing a lot, undoubtedly quite a bit because I did well on it. I was worried when we were doing show & tell of the creative projects in class, because other people had done things like design museum exhibitions. Duh, museum exhibitions! The very thing we'd been talking about for the last month! How could I have screwed up so royally? But my prof's initial reaction was apparently not so misguided because I got an A+ on it! It was surprising to see non-knitters so into a very different, niche kind of knitting, a reaction I didn't predict at all.

Inspiration!

2007-04-26T09:47:00.000-04:00

I've always admired people who set projects for themselves in their knitting. Like people who resolves to knit all of Nancy Bush's sock patterns, or knit a Norwegian sweater in 16 days. That sort of thing. But I don't ever have enough patience for that sort of thing.

Then inspiration struck!

I'm not much of a dyer, but I was just listening to Lime & Violet and they were describing the gorgeous colours of several hand-dyed sock yarns. And I thought: why can't I make my own project in dyeing? I'd learn new colours and how to blend and I'd have nine gorgeous yarns at the end!

Why nine?

Because I've always lusted after Sweet Georgia's yarns named after the Whedonverse: Slayer, Firefly, Angel, Willow and so on. So . . . I'm going to make NINE different colourways, each for a character in Firefly.

From left to right: Jayne, Kaylee, Book, Simon, Inara, Mal, Zoe, Wash and River.

Are you crazy?
Probably. I've never dyed yarn with a specific goal in mind before, and my variegated were all shockingly contrasted - cool in the skein, ugly knit up. I think I'll start with just trying to get a gentle handpainted effect with one colour, and move up to variegation. So it would make sense to start with Simon (ice, ice blue and white) and move my way up to River (schizo!).

Doesn't this go against your rules about not buying yarn?
This'll be sock yarn (that way I can dye small amounts and not have stupidly small amounts of yarn about), and that doesn't count.

Won't the yarn for nine pairs of socks plus testing cost a lot?
Yes. But it's not like I'm going to be working on Lorna's Laces here. There's a nice (German?) sock yarn at my LYS that's $3.99 for 50 gm, and KnitPicks looks like it has good prices for what I want too. Plus, I'm not looking at this like stash exhancement. It's going to be a new craft (dyeing), with yarn that I'll likely swap or gift away. Plus, how much does KoolAid cost? And maybe I'll only do 50 gms of some yarn and just make it into socks with contrasting heels and cuffs and so on.

Ideas?
Jayne: Warm, earthy tones. Dark teal, brown, maroon. Jayne's always touching things, always eating; something hearty.
Kaylee: different shades of pink for her tiered dress in "Shindig," with shades of beige and pale brown blending in for her connection to Serenity.
Book: Perhaps tawny deerskin with very small splashes of red, like confetti or tweed.
Simon: cold and clinical. Two by two, hands of blue. Like the hospital in "Ariel." (Don't get the impression I don't like Simon from this - I do.)
Inara: Rich, luxurious, colours. Deep purple and red, like her shuttle, and champagne for wealth and her dress in "Shindig."

Let me pause now and say, I AM SUCH A NERD. Thank you. Let's continue.

Mal: Brown (duh). But a gentle, changing brown, like Simon's changing shades of blue.
Zoe: This is the same problem as Book. We just don't know enough about Zoe. I'm leaning towards (surprise!) brown, with hints of pink and red. Essentially the same colours as Kaylee, but the balance is inverted.
Wash: Hawaiian shirt time! This will come at the very very end. I was in Chapters yesterday reading vol. 1 of the official guide to Firefly, and Alan Tudyk noted that he was essentially Xander (he's from Buffy - keep up, now) in space. So how cool is it that Bezzie just finished her Xander sweater?
Note: there are a few Firefly eps that feature handknits. One is the ever-famous Jayne Cobb hat in "The Message," which has been duplicated lots of times (it's on my list, I assure you). You'll notice I didn't mention it in my thoughts for Jayne's colours. That's because while it's cool and all, I don't think of orange, yellow and red representing Jayne very well. Same thing for Wash. He wears a very intricate Aran in "Out of Gas," and while it's gorgeous and all, what's the point of dyeing yarn for an Aran sock?
River: Ohhhhh, it's schizo yarn time. Rainbow without being rainbow (you know what I mean? Lots of colours that blend into each other without necessarily being Roy G. Biv). And then, splashes of red!

I don't think KoolAid has a brown colour. Ooops.

LUUUUUUCY-US!

2007-04-22T00:57:00.000-04:00

I was chatting with my friend Steve tonight about the great HBO/BBC show Rome. I just finished watching the first season (spoiler - Caesar gets murdered!) and am a little sad that they only made one more season. In case you haven't seen it, it features two centurions, Lucius Vorenus and Titus Pullo, through a period of history beginning at Julius Caesar's conquest of Gaul and return to Rome. It's very good, and focuses a lot on the famous players as well (Brutus, Mark Antony, Cicero, Octavian), but some of the most touching moments come from Lucius and Pullo, who are essentially the buddy cops of the pic.
Lucius is the uptight, follow-the-rules one with the wife back home that he hasn't seen in the 8 years he's been in Gaul. Pullo is - well, he's Pullo. Imagine Jayne from Firefly. On HBO. Now crank it up a notch. A leeetle more.

Anyway, we were discussing Rome on MSN, and I thought this needed to be documented. If they can make a movie from a painting (Girl With a Pearl Earring doesn't count), I think this is development gold.

Stephen says:
Yeah, lucius is never going to be the same after that

Stephen says:
you might like the new lucius

Sarah says:
It was kinda funny there for a while though, the way he keeps saying he's not going to be a soldier and keeps getting dragged back. He's got a new job every ep. Today he's a merchant! Today he's an assassin! Today he's a senator! He just needs to wiggle his eyebrows some more and sit around and suddenly Rome would be a sitcom: The Wacky Adventures of Lucius and His Crrrrrazy Neighbour Titus Pullo.

Stephen says:
lmao, that is hilarious

Sarah says:
"Oh, Pullo, what have you gotten us into THIS time?"
"Well, Lucius, I thought we could go to the brothels!"
"But I have to go see Marc Antony in two hours."
"No reason we can't do both."
"But we can't be in two places at once!"
Then, sub in any episode of Three's Company, but with more beheadings and prostitutes.

I'm a little punchy right now

2007-04-17T22:08:00.000-04:00

I haven't had a full night's sleep in . . . too long. I've had 5 caffeine drinks today, 2 creme eggs, one Reese's and two 'meals'. I am not in a good place. I have two exams tomorrow, one of which I think I can eke.

I'm not happy.

What do you do with a B.A. in English,
What is my life going to be?
Four years of college and plenty of knowledge,
Have earned me this useless degree.

I can't pay the bills yet,
'Cause I have no skills yet,
The world is a big scary place.

...

It sucks to be me!

Six Weird Things About Me

2007-04-17T02:31:00.000-04:00

I love movies. Love, love, love them. I have to admit my favourites tend to skew towards the Shakespeare/costume drama/musical arena. So what is my biggest guilty pleasure in movies? TV movies for kids. If it's on the Family Channel, I will watch it, but switch over to the Daily Show when someone comes into the room. (I can sing along to High School Musical.)
I read while I walk, even (some might say especially) along streets. I've done it ever since I was little. I used to walk & read all the way to my elementary school. I also read when I eat - generally when I'm eating alone, but also when I go out for dinner with my mom. I can't go to sleep unless I read first, even if it's only for 3 minutes. Keep in mind, my reading has gone way done ever since I started knitting.
I don't like mushrooms.
I hate warm weather. Hate hate hate it. I don't function well in it, and I get heatstroke fast. I'm all for sun, but another reason I love Vancouver is that 32 degrees (that's Celsius, kids) is considered broiling. Also, I sweat profusely and my cheeks look like cherry tomatoes. It's not a good look for me. Plus, you can't wear jeans.
In my opinion, I only have one irrational fear. Rodents don't count, because due to my cats I think I've seen more rodents in my life than an exterminator. But my irrational fear is (drumroll, plzkthnx) vampires. I get worried that they're right behind me, when I'm alone in a house at night. It's like a Nosferatu-boogeyman fear.
There is a photo in my grade 12 yearbook of me. I'm holding up a sign that reads, "HAMLET IS A BABE."

The seventh skein

2007-03-18T16:45:00.000-04:00

What's this? I'm posting? Are the planets aligned? Is there a lunar eclipse? Have the Four ~~Motorcyclists~~ Horsemen emerged? What's more, with knit content? Perish the thought! Or better yet, blame toggle. She posted this neat list, wherein you try to do a new thing for each day of the month and letter of the alphabet. This inspired me to think of my own, sad l'il blog.

Progress on knitting projects is slow. I feel the urge to work on a school project instead - yes, I convinced a prof to let me knit my final project for my Historian's Craft class. I'm still wondering how I managed that too. I'm stuck right now though - I've got this great idea in my head, but I messed up part of the piece. Naturally, this means that instead of taking out that bit, which is completely feasible and only took me about 2 hours, I've stopped working on it all together. Sigh.

When I do knit, I've been trying to stay loyal to big projects. My Vortex Street Pullover is in the final stretches. It's constructed in flat pieces, then joined to form a traditional Norwegian yoke shaping (sans colourwork). I'd just gotten to the joining, when my Denise interchangeable needle point SNAPPED. Well, not the point, but the CABLE. The points have holes that the cables fit into (snicker snicker), and it was at this point on the cable that it snapped, right near the end. I know the Denises have a lifetime guarantee, but I can't knit anymore on the sweater until I get my replacement piece. I'd show you a pic, but it just looks like a big pile of blue, to tell you the truth.

The cable panel is pretty cool, though not as clearly defined as I could have hoped for. This is understandable, given that the book's version is in cotton, which is obviousment INSANE.

I've also started redoing the Mo Jacket.

I have one front and the back done. Have I mentioned how much I lurrve 7mm needles?

And yes, I'm going to try toggle's idea. Here goes nothing.

A is for athleticism - swimming more often. I was going three times a week before reading week, but have only swam once since then. April 1 is a Sunday, which means I can't go swimming, but maybe I'll try to run.
B is for baking more bread.
C is for commitment, and working hard on my finals.

I'll post more as I get ideas / follow through. I don't want 26 promises tailing me for a week if I give up by April 5.

consider my mind BLOWN

2007-03-02T10:48:00.000-05:00

You know that there’s probably a doppelganger of you somewhere in the world. But it’s pretty odd to find them sitting next to you in film class. Today we were discussing the movie 32 Short Films About Glenn Gould, which is incidentally one of my favourite Canadian movies EVAR. If you don’t like the movie, or even Colm Feore in it, or even the music, you’re dead to me.

Anyway, Glenn Gould the person – not the character – is thought posthumously to have had Asperger Syndrome, which likely accounted for his numerous…eccentricities. And this fact is very interesting to me, for reasons that are soon to be revealed.

Previously, I’d made the point that the majority of males in Canadian cinema seem to be suffering from autism, which would really explain quite a lot. So I raised my hand today and said: “I don’t want to seem like a conspiracy theorist, but Gould’s thought to posthumously have been diagnosed with Asperger's…” and then blathered on about him and connections to other protagonists. Then a bit later a girl further along in my row raised her hand. She was about average height, with medium-long brown hair and glasses.

Her: “I just wanted to talk about what Sarah said, because I thought it was kind of interesting. I’m a Sarah too…”
Prof: “Well, we all think what Sarah says is 'special'.” [emphasis my own]
Her: “Well, I thought what she said about Asperger's was interesting, because my brother has Asperger's-”
Me: “Hey, mine too!”
Her: “Is his name Ian?”
Me: “No [giggling], it’s Liam!”
Entire class: “WTF, mate?”
Prof: [mock panic] “OK, let’s all go home now.”

Three movies, two theatres, one bad choice

2007-02-20T19:23:00.000-05:00

Aaaaaaaand I've rejoined civilization. Four essays were passed in last week, and I'm on my Reading Week from school. Theoretically, this week is spent reading in preparation for writing and midterm tests right after the week. However, all my classes are year-long, and three out of five classes decided they'd rather have a break. I don't know how people manage to go on vacation during this time, though - I'm just content to decompress.

So, I hadn't been to see a movie at the theatre since Christmas vacation. Not that I hadn't had the time, of course - I procrastinated beyond the bitter end. I just didn't want to admit to myself that I was leaving home and not going to work on my papers. Much easier to watch Buffy DVDs at home, in comfortable self-loathing. On Saturday I finished my final paper and my aunt's gentleman friend took us all out to see Casino Royale, which I enjoyed just as much the second time. This is really weird for me, as I have something to admit: Action bores me. I could have slept through The Two Towers. Die Hard is, admittedly, one of my favourite movies, but that's only because John McClane keeps wisecracking the whole way through (see also: Indiana Jones, Malcolm Reynolds).

Wait, what was I talking about? Oh yeah, Casino Royale. Just as good the second time through, though I noticed a nitpick about the timeline, which I have ranted about in other places but will probably save for another post here. Also, Daniel Craig's biceps are literally larger than his head. It's frightening.

But - to get back to the point - I hadn't made the decision and said, "Hey, I'm going to go see that!" for a couple months, which is especially strange considering I used to go to the movies about once a week. So I was on vacation, and I decided to go to the movies. I noticed The Rules of the Game, a French film from 1939 by Jean Renoir, was playing at the Bytowne, and Tuesday [this was all happening yesterday] would really be my last chance to see it.

And then I thought, well, heck, why not make a day of it?

And then I noticed one theatre started playing movies around 10, rather than most places' noon.

Eventually, the plan was for three: Music & Lyrics (yes, I watch romantic comedies. be quiet), Pan's Labyrinth, and then across town to the one place that was still playing Children of Men. Yes, The Rules of the Game was notably missing. It was either that, or Children of Men, which I'd wanted to see for FOREVER, and hadn't heard a single bad thing about, and had some of my favourite actors, and was directed by Alfonso Cuaron! And I wanted to see it on the big screen. So there.

I rolled out of bed ridiculously early, and headed out to see Music & Lyrics, the first one. Now, I'm not planning to do any reviews here. Just let me say, not as good as I expected. I like Hugh Grant, okay? From everything I read, he's far more intelligent than he gets credit for, and he does have range. And I certainly don't hate Drew Barrymore. But looking back, kind of a disappointment (this may be when compared to the other two films, of course). Rarely have I ever seen a rom com that does the comedy better than the romance. So I laughed, but I didn't care about the characters.
I did, however, care about Drew Barrymore's wardrobe. Except for an early shorts-over-leggings faux pas, I want every single item of clothing she wears in this movie.

Then, Pan's Labyrinth. Okay, people. This is not a movie about Pan's Labyrinth. This is a movie about a kid in war. I have now given you the warning I did not receive. Not that I thought it was a kid's movie, but geez. I guess I was expecting more like Mirrormask, which is beautiful and gothic and weird. For instance, this guy:

In all the stills I saw before the movie of this guy, I thought it was really beautiful. Now I'm just creepified as all get-out. Terrifying.
Mostly as I was watching the movie, my thoughts leaned towards "Guillermo del Toro, you sick fuck." As creepy as Hand-Eyes there is, nothing is worse than what the people do to each other in this movie.

Near the end of the movie, my bladder was full and I was worried about making my bus. So, sadly, I have to say that I wasn't paying my full attention to the screen (while still watching, though). I rushed out at the end, and checked my print-outs for getting to the CoM theatre. I realized I was going to make it and slowed down, and that's when it hit me.

I felt dizzy. My eyes were stinging and I literally couldn't walk straight. It was a raw wave of emotion just hitting me now. When I got to the stop I pulled out my knitting, but my hands were shaking.

This is where I stop and tell you a little bit about how I react to movies. I cry at the drop of a hat about really insignificant real-life stuff. But it takes a lot to make me cry about a movie or TV or a book. I can only remember ever crying over three books - Harry Potters 5 and 6 made me extremely upset, and Lucy the Giant, which will make you completely lose your shit in a serious, body-racking, Beth-March-is-dead-but-even-that-didn't-make-me-cry-this-hard way.

I can't remember ever crying about a TV show, unless you count the first time I watched the end of North & South, when I was considering the possibility that it might not work out and I think something got caught in my eye. There may have been sniffles.

Then, movies. I can only ever remember crying in a movie theatre twice: at Million Dollar Baby (last ten minutes) and then before that was Flubber (goddammit, the robot died). Yes, I'm serious. I don't cry in movie theatres. I can only ever remember two other times I've really cried at movies: In America, as soon as the older sister says "I've been carrying this family on my back for the last year" - oh, here I go again - and Schindler's List, which surely I don't need to explain.

And then I'm sitting in Children of Men, feeling more than slightly zombified by Pan's Labyrinth (Guillermo del Toro, you sick fuck. It needed to be said again.) I'll just say this: Children of Men deserves every piece of praise it gets and more. And at the end . . . I lost it. I started full-out sobbing. Loud.

The movie ended, and I went to the washroom. I splashed some water on my face. I tried to stop crying.
I left the theatre and started walking to the bus stop. I tried to stop crying.
I feel like a husk. This stuff is powerful. It's not so much that I feel depressed. They're just both very, very overwhelming movies. And Children of Men is one of the best I've seen in a long, long time. Just don't do what I did, and watch them together.
I bought 28 Days Later yesterday. I think I'll wait a bit to watch it.

Knitting content coming soon, when I have natural light for photos. I'm halfway through my second Anastasia sock in the Socks That Rock that my SP sent me, and they're absolutely gorgeous. And I'm surprisingly close to joining the yoke on my Knitting Nature sweater.

Silent poetry reading

2007-02-02T19:04:00.000-05:00

Today is apparently the Bloger Silent Poetry Reading. I heard about this originally from Cara at january one, and I am all over that angle like ugly on a moose. If I had been born five or six decades earlier or so, I like to think I would have been a finger-snapping beatnik. Of course, I probably would have been born in Winnipeg and been married at 17. Not everyone can be Cleopatra.

"somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond"
by e e cummings

somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skilfully,mysteriously) her first rose

or if your wish be to close me,i and
my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility: whose texture
compels me with the color of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens; only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain, has such small hands

And I know I haven't been posting regularly for some time. I'm trying to work on that, though I can't guarantee anything, especially not until the 16th is past.

I just joined Facebook

2007-01-24T20:32:00.000-05:00

Yes, I drank the Kool-Aid.

So get this. In Facebook, you HAVE to sign up see anything. And then you have to be friends with people to see their pages. It's like MSN except more secure (i.e. you can still see people's Spaces even if you're not contacts).

And my list of email/MSN contacts is fairly small. So I'm scrolling through my friend Tim's list of contacts to see who's there, to add them. Tim only moved to my hometown from Calgary in grade 9, but he knows EVERYONE. There are 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon, but only 5 of Tim.

Speaking of which . . . I came across Tim's friend Bob [unique last name] from Calgary. I say to myself, I say "Self, could this possibly be the same Bob YOU know that, at last knowledge, hailed from Calgary?"

Yes, yes it was. I knew Bob (kind of hard not calling him Bobby) ever since I was 4 or something ridiculous like that. I think I last saw his family on a trip to Alberta in the summer of 1997.

1997! He went to the same middle school as Tim!

If you ever lose a valuable or pet goldfish, ask Tim. He'll have it.

Just call me Blanche . . .

2007-01-05T13:35:00.000-05:00

I was sitting in bed the other day, thinking about the state of the world, resolving the Mideast conflict in my head, just the ordinary sort of things. My thoughts, naturally, turned to Christmas gift cards. I received a couple Chapters ones and had been able to put them onto one card. I thought, well hey, if I have a gift card, I might be able to buy online! (I don't have credit cards, or a Paypal account. Every now and again I re-consider, but it's not the best idea.)

So I checked out my Chapters wish list, and after much agonizing, I picked Blackadder III - the regency one! Stephen Fry + Rowan Atkinson + very young Hugh Laurie + historical jokes = me, very happy.

I arranged it to be sent to Ottawa (yes, I'm coming to a point soon . . .), because I was going to be leaving Vancouver in a day or two. So I was rather surprised, especially considering holiday shipping times, to see a Chapters box waiting for me upon my arrival. I opened it, and found . . . something giftwrapped? Curiouser and curiouser.

Knitting Nature, by Norah Gaughan!!! And it was from my Winter Cheer SP angel! I got flaked on by my first partner, so my angel stepped in. Thank you, angel!

I have only wanted this book since forever. I love Norah Gaughan's designs, and her style. I love the way everything in this book is photographed - which actually isn't that much a surprise, once it was on my bookshelf and I noticed that it, Handknit Holidays and Loop-d-Loop are all published by Stewart, Tabori & Chang, and I think they were all edited (or written by) Melanie Falick.

Up in the left-hand corner of the photo, you might have noticed some knitting. That was because I was still on Vancouver time, so I stayed up until 2:30 the next morning watching Gilmore Girls and knitting. What was I knitting, you ask?

The Vortex Street Pullover, from the chapter on Waves. Patons Classic Merino in New Denim. The sweater is yoked, so you work sleeves, fronts (yes, plural) and back separately and flat, then join them together and do traditional yoked decreases. The cable-and-rib panel in worked spearately, from the top down, then seamed into place. You probably can't see from that picture, but the sleeves are just long rectangles with no shaping whatsoever. Mmmm, cozy.

Then today, I woke 2 hours late because I forgot to set my alarm, at 8:25. That would be ten minutes before my first class starts. So I took a quick shower and managed to make it to my second class on time (but without my notepad). That one always runs over, so I was late to my third class. Then on the bus ride home, I snubbed a friend, because I am a shy and very insecure hermit. Totally castigating myself on the way home for that. Oh, and the night before, Chapters emailed me to say that Blackadder III was out of stock temporarily. Then why didn't you tell me that when I ordered?!?

I was sitting at the computer, my spirits temporarily heightened by reading this wiki*, when my aunt came home. She had two - 2! - packages for me from the mailbox. The top one was from Chapters, and held - you guessed it - Blackadder! I shall ignore their confusing emails, because now I have 6 episodes' worth of cunning plans!

The second box was BIG. And it was from my Winter Cheer SP.

I am dumbfounded. This person's generosity is bewildering. Thank you, Winter Cheer SP. Thank you so much. I just feel . . . confused. Thank you!

Now c'mon, onto the goodies.

The card reads in part:
"Christmas may be over but winter is still here
So I hope this box brings you lots of winter cheer!"

The (old-school! perfection!) Minnie and Mickey ornaments are gorgeous - she noted that they could hang on my Christmas tree next year, but fat chance that I'm waiting that long! So now they stand alongside Jane Austen, an owl, Jack Sparrow, Shakespeare, my evil twin Mickey Mouses and another Jack Sparrow figurine. (I have eclectic action figure choices. I can't wait 'til they bring out a Louis Riel action figure.)

American Hershey's! That stuff is revered in my family! And yes, the Almond & Toffee bar is a half pound. My first thought, naturally, was that someone could be bludgeoned rather efficiently with that. Which of course would be death by chocolate! Ha! I crack me up.

And now to the yarn. Heh heh heh. I don't have the mad yarn pr0n skillz of some I could mention, but rest assured this stuff's purty. Malabrigo! Not quite as electric blue IRL, but still so saturated you wouldn't believe it. Two skeins of "azul bolita", which apparently translates to "blue pellet". Whatever it means, it's BLUE! I loves blue. And it's not steel blue! If you looked at my stash, you would assume I was slowly going colourblind, with steel blue being the only colour I could still recognize. (To back myself up, I would recommend investigating the colour of my Vortex Street Pullover.) Also, if you have never felt Malabrigo, it's not like Manos, which was what I expected. It's SOFT! I sense a chunky earflap hat in my future - maybe with some embroidery? That bag enspires me.

The bag feels silky - I think I'm going to use it to keep socks-in-progress & yarn safe from the vagaries of the insides of my various hard-wearing bags. Once more, check out that embroidery!

And more yarn! There's Trekking, which I have never seen before IRL. It's more of a deep teal colour. I've seen the slow colour changes of this yarn on blogs and feel inspired to try something like the Hello Yarn cable socks (pdf).

The laceweight merino in the middle is actually more black than blue. Black laceweight - it brings out my inner Burton fan and starts me envisioning cobwebs and dressing like Sally (same name, obsession with Jack Skellington and handcrafts . . . ). At 1100 yards in 60 grams, it is without a doubt the lightest yarn I have ever had. That's like 1/4 the width of your average worsted. And it's a 3-ply! Surely this is evidence of alien life, because no human could create something so fine and perfect.

Finally, the front-and-centre yarn: Socks that Rock lightweight! The colour is called Nodding Violet. Nodding Violet. Mmmmm. I actually almost didn't catch this yarn, because it was at the bottom of the box and I was astounded already by what had come before.

Thank you, SP! This was exceptional, particularly because of my vow for the Year of the Stash (see the button on the sidebar? More about that later). Thank you, thank you, thank you SP!

*It was linked to on Fark, and the thread was absolutely, positively, 100% positive. Do you know how rare that is? Lore Sjoberg once memorably said you're more likely to get a straight answer from Mary Poppins than Fark, yet such an outpouring of love for Mr. Rogers.

To it and at it, and at it and to it

2006-12-26T10:03:00.000-05:00

So, I'm home, in Vancouver. I finished my finals (I like 20th century literature. However, I'm sure the Russian people are a fine and noble people, but I kind of hate their history right now). And I had Christmas with my family.

My family doesn't have the big holiday traditions some families seem to - perhaps because until recent years our family who lived nearby wasn't huge. So Christmas Eve and such we mostly sit back and try to relax, such as walking traditional holiday fare like Thank You For Smoking (funny!) and Bon Cop, Bad Cop (SEE THIS MOVIE).

So, after watching Bon Cop, Bad Cop, I was naturally thinking about Canadian movies. This is an inevitability; if you don't, then I'm not sure we were watching the same movie. And I asked my parents if they'd ever seen a movie called Goin' Down the Road.

This movie is really good; not exactly a laugh-fest (duh, it's Canadian - joking, joking, I swear), but very interesting. A large part of it revolves around the theme common in Canadian cinema that life is 'elsewhere', which is particularly intriguing because -

Wait, why am I jabbering on when there's an excellent SCTV parody of Goin' Down the Road? Even if you've never seen the movie, this is hilarious.

Part 1

Part 2

Marry Christmas.

I'm studying

2006-12-13T09:18:00.000-05:00

Entertain yourselves.

Christmas knitting, and Montreal

2006-12-10T08:46:00.000-05:00

Christmas knitting update! You may remember this insane list from some time ago. We have little more than two weeks to go, people! So I've narrowed it down to this, far more sane list:

One pair of plain-Jane socks. Status: down to the toe decreases on the second sock.
One pair of Fixation socks. Status: mid-way through the leg on the second sock, but may have to re-do the toe on the first one because it's too long. It's OK, they're on US size 3.
One pair of Fibre Trends felted slippers. Status: Almost done. Sadly, have to redo them entirely because I changed my mind on who they were for, so I have to change the size. So, actually not done at all.
Mu Shu blanket. Status: awaiting blocking! Here's the most recent photo I have:

One pair of Pomatomus socks. Status: have to rip back to the leg ribbing on the first one. These may not get made.
An Icarus shawl, in DK-weight. Status: speeding along. I love the simple elegance of this pattern. (I also love the fact that using DK-weight means I can knit a shawl in time for Christmas.)

This may seem like a lot (and I feel certain I'm forgetting something), but remember I have/had 2 weeks between the end of classes and my first exam (which I should probably start studying for soon). So I've been watching a lot of Battlestar Galactica and West Wing on DVD. These shows are fantastic. It's the first time I've ever seen Battlestar - I know I'm late to the boat here - and it is very very very good. And I would just like to state for the record that I knew Jamie Bamber was cool before he was a buffed-up space pilot, back when he was just a consumptive sailor. I considered naming my fish after him!
Also, I totally want to be C.J. when I grow up (even though I am probably more like Toby).

But it wasn't all attempted presidential assassinations and . . . attempted presidential coups. No, I went to Montreal last Wednesday! I'd never been, and ever since I heard that you could do it in a day trip the idea's been niggling at me. I took the bus - it was only around $40 and 2 hrs, and they had the best times. It was a grey day.

I know the picture's blurry, but I think the colours in this landscape would make a great Fair Isle, or traditional quilt.

I got off the bus in Montreal and was promptly lost. I knew I wanted to get to rue Ste.-Catherine, but I didn't know how. So I consulted the map in Fodor's three or four times, and set off in the opposite direction of Ste.-Catherine, something I discovered two or three slushy blocks later.
(Getting lost is a constant in this story. Actually, it's not so much getting lost as having the uncanny ability to read maps backwards. Every single time - and I'm not joking here, every single time - I thought I knew where I was going, I turned the wrong way first. Luckily I got used to it after a while and would ask directions or turn around within a block. But I'm telling you, every single time!)
Fortunately, even though the sidewalk was slushy my eyes were entertained. I seemed to have stumbled upon a street of small, independent hotels.

They were painfully beautiful, almost so much so as to be cute.

I don't know anything about architecture. Actually, that's one of my main dislikes of Fodor's guide books. "Walk 18 blocks north-east, and you'll find the original Royal Bank building. It was designed by ____, in 18__" . . . Yeah, but it's just an old bank building! But I love tiny details, like all the faces on Parliament Hill, and the old-fashioned signs on these hotels.

After I turned back around, I eventually caved and went into a bookstore. All along this trip I was remembering high school French I thought I'd forgotten. But looking at this place's windows, I remembered that bandes dessinees (sorry, I don't have the accents on this keyboard) were comic books, and a librairie was a book store, not a library. So I went in and puttered for a bit, then I gathered up my courage and said my best French (of the whole day, it turned out): "Bonjour. Avez-vous une carte de Montreal?" ("Do you have a map of Montreal?") I even remembered to use the vous form and everything! Vous is the plural form of you, but it's also the more polite form. The sales girl said oui, and led me over to the rack of maps, where she (shock of shocks!) proceeded to speak French to me, none of which I understood. I sort of bowed my head and said merci a lot, and thankfully she went away. I studied the maps and bought the more expensive laminated map, which would turn out to be a good thing. (The guy who rang up my purchase also spoke French at me. Thank goodness I'd practiced my numbers on the bus.)

So I was off! I only had two real plans for the day. After scouring 3 different guidebooks (no joke) in preparation, the only thing that had really jumped out at me was the Notre-Dame Basilica. And naturally, I had prepared a short list of yarn stores. If it had been a nice day, I probably would have gone up Mont-Royal, but it was so grey there was no point to it. Some other time. Anyways, my first stop was the basilica. I walked and walked and walked, and walked and walked and walked, for maybe half an hour. I was worried I was going the wrong way, but I checked my map at just about every intersection (and managed to drop it nearly every time), and I was going the right way. I was a bit worried I was in a not-so-nice part of town, what with all the broken glass and hand-written signs offering 2-for-1 tattoos (I am very disappointed I didn't take a photo of this, but you can understand my hesitation).

I did get a photo of this place. That rocket ship actually is attached to the side of the building.

But eventually I was there, walking past the Place d'Armes Metro stop. Wait - you mean I could have taken the metro here! Blast!

On the other hand, then I wouldn't have gotten that great deal on my two new tattoos.

More hotel gorgeousity: Hotel Place d'Armes.

Notre-Dame is HUGE. I couldn't take any photos that captured how large it is, even standing at the far edge of the square in front of it. There's a photo of it at the Wikipedia site, but even that doesn't give the scale. There was a note out front, saying that only people wearing appropriate clothes would be allowed in. I was worried that my jeans wouldn't be kosher (... I actually didn't mean that joke), but the woman at the front desk assured me the sign was only because of women coming in the summer wearing bikini tops. (!)
I paid my entry fee (only tourists pay to get in. Worshippers get in free) and went in very slowly. I could see the place was big, but I wanted to take my time. I walked over to this statue, which is right behind the ticket booth.

I believe this is a statue of Ste. Marguerite Bourgeoys. (Apologies for flash.)

I was taking my time, going around very slowly. (I'd never been in a Catholic church before. There was a lot to soak up.) Then I turned around and saw the front of the basilica.

This is a photo from the official Notre-Dame website; none of mine really turned out. Even this doesn't prepare you for the real thing. It's pretty unbelievable. As you can see, it's three stories tall. When it was built it could hold 12,000 people. Twelve thousand!
I took a bunch of photos but none of them really turned out. (Turns out it was dark in there!) I would really recommend anyone visiting Montreal to see the place for themselves.

OK, cats and kittens, that's all for part 1. This post is already really long, so I'll continue it later.

Christmas wishlist

2006-12-08T10:45:00.000-05:00

Hello, all. I know that the majority of people who read this aren't related to me, and were under the impression they didn't have to give me a Christmas present. Well, you don't. My mom asks me to do this each year so it's easy for her and others to know what I want, especially since I'm living so far away now. The second reason is because I'm so into knitting, and therefore most of the items below are kind of specialized. Thanks in advance!

Anything from my Chapters wishlist. It won't give me a direct link, but just go to the wishlist site and type in my email address (newsfromtheunderground at hotmail dot com) and you'll find it.
This shirt, or this one, or this one, or especially this one . . . (I'm obsessed with t-shirts. Men's size M please!)
12 balls of Knitpicks Sierra, to make Starsky
While we're at Knitpicks, I'd love to make this sweater (largest size). Steeks!
I don't really need any needles, but if you feel the need, I like Boye needles best. The only place I've been able to find them reliably is Wal-Mart. They're different colours. Either that or the Boye Needlemaster kit, at Michaels. It's an interchangeable needle kit like my Denises. It's kind of expensive so for heaven's sake wait for a 40% or 50% coupon to buy it.
I've got a ton of projects in my head for Patons Soy Wool Stripes. I want to make at least an afghan, a sweater and a pair of felted slippers out of it. So I would appreciate any balls at all of the stuff. Natural Geranium is my favourite colour, but I like all the others too. I estimate needing about 15 balls for the sweater and 2-3 for the slippers. The afghan is going to be Lizard Ridge, so I can work that one square at a time. Basically this is a roundabout way of saying I like this yarn, and any amount would be useful. Michaels has the best price on it.
Any sock yarn. Plain, variegated, striping, anything. Just go to a yarn store and ask where their sock yarn is. You'd have to go to a real yarn store to find sock yarn.
A swift and ball winder. There's a pattern for a swift you can make yourself here (pdf). A swift is more important than a ball winder.
A surprise! Surprises and experiences are always the best.

I sat on the roof, and kicked off the moss

2006-11-27T16:18:00.000-05:00

Ever put something off for a really long time? Like a really, really, really, really, really ridiculously long time? Then when you actually get down to - let's use the entirely hypothetical situation of writing said essay - you discover that it's painfully easy? Man, I should have taken art history. Apparently in that study you are also allowed to just say "X is Y and that means Z." And you don't even need any sources to prove it! How awesome is that?

Also good: when you have to describe a source, then in the next section explain why everything you just described is significant. Yes, you are being told to repeat yourself!

And to think that I took 5 books out of the library on this topic.

Also, you may have noticed the title of this post. "Your Song": great song, or greatest song?

PS. Happy birthday, little brother!

Go sell crazy somewhere else, we're all stocked up here.

2006-11-27T00:02:00.000-05:00

Crazy essay week tally: 1 down, 2 to go. Ernest Hemingway, you can take your delicately crafted objectivity and . . . I don't know what he should do with it. But I know what I did with it: wrote a bitchin' essay (on "Hills Like White Elephants", if you're interested).

Just kidding. I like Hemingway. As a writer. I probably would have shot him myself if I'd known him in person.

Now all I have to do is take what I did to Hemingway, and apply it to American neutrality 1933-1940 and . . . oh crap, I don't know what I'm writing my film paper on. *whistles innocently*

Can someone please tell me why I'm not an English student? They get to take aforementioned 3-page stories and pull theses out of their asses about them, without having to prove a damn thing! Whereas hardworking history students (or, you know, me) have stacks of books like this sitting on their desks. Mocking them.

Please note, the Hugh Laurie book doesn't count. I just put it up there to make me feel better. It's a panacea.

Edited to add on Monday morning: my friends who go to UBC have a snow day today. A snow day! In Vancouver! It hasn't snowed ONCE yet this year here!

88 rows about 44 yarns

2006-11-24T23:25:00.000-05:00

It's exam and essay season, and you know what that means: lots of blog posting while I avoid writing/studying! Yay! [waves arms about in a generally ridiculous and Kermit-esque way]

So, what have I been doing with myself? Well, there's this:

Excuse my lamentable photography. You and I both know she looks better than that. Less blurry, too.

1. The travelling sock. Fleece Artist, and it makes me yearn for Fleece Artist sock yarn so bad. Preferably in a pair of Pomatomi or those ripple weave socks from VK. Can you tell I've been thinking about this?

2. Mitres, and lots of em. I was finishing the last square that day. I wanted to see if I could finish the last square with only this much yarn.
I was wrong.
Anyway, it basically looks the same now, except for a very thin (5 garter ridges) on either of the long edges in "Tree Bark Mix", a colour they don't have up on the Patons site yet. And it's only taken me about 10 hours, no joke. Seeing yet why it's going to be a thin border?

3. The wedding shawl. I touched it. It's beyond words.

4. The beaded socks. You know, looking at this setup, my yarn-covered desk doesn't feel quite so wrong.

Stephanie was absolutely delightful. Funny, and talented, and very smart. We (by which I mean the migrating, ever-changing group hanging around the table) even got into a tiny religion discussion and everything was good. She's very, very funny, and had never seen Patons SWS before. She was right excited.

So, other than that excitement, what's going on here? Well, what do you think? Lots of yarn flyin' about. I finished this:

That's one plain ole sock in Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock, in Argyle. 72 stitches on 2 mm needles. And no, it's not self-striping. You can see it's variegated in that big pool of red in the gusset. The red parts spiraled so it striped. I really, really wish it hadn't - I bought variegated yarn for reason - but I'm very laissez-faire about this sort of thing. But I really do like Alison's socks in this colourway.

Pictured with Tab, nectar of the gods ("it's not Red Bull, so it's OK!").

Expected time that the 2nd sock will be done? Oh, only about 3 years or so. Did I mention the 72 sts? I am also currently knitting the plain jane sock to the right. It's Fortissima Colori. And, to demonstrate just how true it is that my mind doesn't work so well late and on energy drinks? Right now I think it would be the funniest thing if someone did a version of Hello, Dolly!, except it would be Hello, Kitty! Yeah, I know, I think I should copyright that RIGHT NOW too!

This is Danica, knit out of that Fleece Artist Kid Aran I knit a lacy wrap out of this summer. I didn't like how it turned out, but more importantly, I couldn't see where I would wear it, or who I could give it to. So it's turning into entrelac, but only really when I'm so bored by everything else I'm knitting that I feel like it. Which isn't very likely when I'm knitting this:

Oooh. Ahhh. A striped scarf. My, you daredevil, etc.

Wait for it . . .

So. Damn. Cool.

Lest we forget

2006-11-11T09:08:00.001-05:00

I try to think of myself as so far behind the times that I'm ahead

2006-11-10T11:40:00.000-05:00

Saw Stephanie Pearl-McPhee yesterday, and she was fantastic, even better than in Seattle because there was a much smaller crowd than in Seattle. Too spent (man, that word makes me feel like a brittle dowager) to write about it now, but I promise I will, unlike before.

So now a meme.

48 things

1. FIRST NAME? Sarah

2. WERE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE? No, my parents just thought it suited me. I like it. My middle name is a family name, though. I've grown to like that one better in the last few years.

3. WHEN DID YOU LAST CRY? Oh, probably just a few days ago.

4. DO YOU LIKE YOUR HANDWRITING? Print is tolerable. Cursive is dreadful, and it'll never get better because I do it so few & far between that sometimes I forget how to make letters.

5. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LUNCHMEAT? If I'm making the sammich, turkey. If it's in a deli, Montreal smoked meat.

6. IF YOU WERE ANOTHER PERSON WOULD YOU BE FRIENDS WITH YOU? Ooooh, not a good time to ask. Possibly. My mom and I are a lot alike and we get along most of the time.

7. DO YOU HAVE A JOURNAL? Depends, what are you reading right now?

8. DO YOU STILL HAVE YOUR TONSILS? Yes

9. WOULD YOU BUNGEE JUMP? Maybe. In Mexico I did that thing - I forget the term - where it's like hang-glidingbut you're attached to the back of a motor boat.

10. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE CEREAL? The limited edition Pirates of the Carribean cereal. It's chocolate and marshmallows. I've had Halloweens with less sugar than there is in a single bowl of that stuff.

11. DO YOU UNTIE YOUR SHOES WHEN YOU TAKE THEM OFF? No, I believe in efficiency (read: laziness).

12. DO YOU THINK YOU ARE STRONG? I am fairly strong when it comes to lifting and hauling. Nice side-effect of working in a liquor store; there's always lots of heavy boxes. As for emotionally - maybe not so much, but I have Opinions on emotional strength, so we won't go down that road.

13. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE ICE CREAM FLAVOR? I'm not much of an ice cream person, but I bear an unnatural affection for anything Ben & Jerry's, especially if it has cookie dough in it.

14. SHOE SIZE? US 10

15. RED OR PINK? Pink right now. I think I skipped over the whole pink stage when I was little and have recently reverted fiercely.

16. WHAT IS THE LEAST FAVORITE THING ABOUT YOURSELF? Right now, my procras(note to self: finish this part later)

17. WHO DO YOU MISS THE MOST? The whole community effect you get with living in a small town. You don't even realize it was there until you leave. It wasn't some hotspot of Southern-style hospitality, but when you've lived, gone to school and worked in a town for nearly ten years, you are bound to recognize someone at Starbucks.

18. WHAT FOOD WILL GET YOU OUT OF BED IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT? Chocolate.

19. WHAT COLOUR TROUSERS, SHIRT AND SHOES ARE YOU WEARING? Jeans, "The Monkey Represents Sharing" t-shirt, and my last pair of clean socks. They're yellow.

20. LAST THING YOU ATE? Starbucks gingerbread latte. Did you know they changed the Cranberry Bliss Bar? It used to have a delicious, moist, spicy gingerbread base and they changed it to bloody shortbread! I'm pissed.

21. WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW? "Jack's Obsession", from the Nightmare Before Christmas.

22. IF YOU WERE A CRAYON, WHAT COLOR WOULD YOU BE? Bronze. That was always the coolest crayon. The gold one was crap.

23. FAVORITE SMELL? Right now, chocolate-covered ginger.

24. WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO ON THE PHONE? My aunt.

25. THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE? I have no idea. Probably different things on different people. Let's politick and say their strongest distinguishing feature.

26. DO YOU LIKE THE PERSON YOU STOLE THIS FROM? Yes, though I've never met her

27. FAVOURITE DRINK? Right now, Irish hot chocolate.

28. FAVOURITE SPORT? This would presume any interest in sports. Fine, hiking.

29. EYE COLOUR? Blue.

30. HAT SIZE? I have a 22-3/4" head. I wish I knew the old hat sizes. People really should go back to wearing hats. I enjoy hats.

31. DO YOU WEAR CONTACTS? Only when I'm feeling like it.

32. FAVORITE FOOD? Thin-crust spinach pizza. I may have, hypothetically, once eaten a whole one.

33. SCARY MOVIES OR HAPPY ENDINGS? Happy, I admit it.

35. SUMMER OR WINTER? Yuck. Spring or fall. T-shirt and jeans weather.

36. HUGS OR KISSES? Both. Don't be a hater.

37. FAVOURITE DESSERT? Rhubarb pie.

38. WHAT SIDE OF THE BED DO YOU SLEEP ON AND WHY? Dead centre. It's my bed; I'll spread out if I want.

39. IF YOU DIDN'T MAKE THE DECISION TO GET MARRIED AND HAVE A FAMILY, WHAT WOULD YOU BE DOING TODAY? What? What??? I have Issues with this question. Watch out, they may soon become Opinions. Oops, too late.

40. WHAT BOOKS ARE YOU READING? At Knit's End, by Stephanie Pearl-McPhee; In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote; a travel guide to Montreal; I, Robot, by Isaac Asimov; A Most Uncommon Degree of Popularity, by Kathleen Gilles Seidel; and a biography of Frida Kahlo.

41. WHAT'S ON YOUR MOUSE PAD? Optical mouse, don't need one.

42. WHAT DID YOU WATCH LAST NIGHT ON TV? Celebrity Jeopardy and Grey's Anatomy.

43. FAVORITE SOUNDS? Right now it's quiet.

44. ROLLING STONES OR BEATLES? Both. I've always loved the Beatles, but am now getting into the Stones. Gimme Shelter and Ruby Tuesday are on a first-half-of-Abbey Road kind of brilliance. I have yet to find anything close to matching the second half of that album anywhere in music.

45. THE FURTHEST YOU'VE BEEN FROM HOME? Xian, China.

46. WHAT'S YOUR SPECIAL TALENT? Knitting. And boring people to tears with historical facts I find very interesting.

47. WHERE WERE YOU BORN? Halifax, Nove Scotia. Did you know that Handmaiden (or it could be Fleece Artist) makes a yarn called Scotian Silk? They also have one named Ottawa. Both are unbelievable.

48. WHO SENT THIS TO YOU? Stolen from Jen.

It's like Blonde on Blonde, but woolier

2006-11-08T16:34:00.000-05:00

The Mu Shu blanket is proceeding rapidly.

I apologize for the darkness - it's been raining today so I wouldn't have been able to get enough light even if I took the photo outside. I experimented with some different levels of light, though. There's a slightly lighter, though more inaccurate (the blue is too bright and the red is too orange) pic here, and a downright fluorescent one here.

As you can see, I decided not to go with 6 x 8, and am going with 6 x 9 squares. Incidentally, if I'd just done 6 by 8, I probably could have done the whole thing with just 5 balls of Patons Classic Merino. Miraculous things, mitres. The Berocco pattern uses 4 by 5 squares, but by my eye they seem to be only slightly smaller than your average newborn Clydesdale. *haughty yarn snob sniff* Mine are BETTER.

OK, right around square 43 or so I started thinking about large gauge. How Cara had the patience for a sockweight log cabin I have no idea. (Maybe because it's give-up-your-firstborn beautiful?)

Anyway, so photos are all well and good, but unless you know the gauge of the linoleum in my kitchen it's not very useful. How does it fare up against the granny blanket?

Wool squares, on granny squares, on linoleum squares.

Previous scale demonstration seen here. I'd say we're good. It's not as wide, but I think that's OK. See, in my opinion, a lot of baby blankets and afghans are way too short and wide. Me, I like being cocooned. Why do I need a lot of fabric on my left and right if my feet are cold?

Looking at the above photo, I just realized I only have 5 squares left to do. HOLY COW. I have, once again, been unwittingly monogamous. I liked this project so much. Mitres are total zen. Particulerly patchwork ones where you get to use a lot of colours. (I plan to make a dent in those 5 tonight. Celebrity Jeopardy (the real one, not SNL) starts tonight at 7:30, and I'm starting to watch Bones, which is at 8. Bones is really fun - like CSI, before CSI totally sucked.)

Now, after those squares are done, I need to put on a border. I briefly considered picking up all 'round and doing a hyoooge border in a zillion stitchezzzzzz . . . Yeah, not so much. I thought a little bit about log cabin knitting, because I'm doing a charity acrylic log cabin afghan right now in fits and starts. I think log cabin and mitres are perfectly suited. And I came up with the pattern at the left.

Excuse the Paint. I know it's hideous. But it describes my point. Now, imagine the blue is full of mitres. Then I pick up the sides and work the black sections back and forth, individually, for 30 rows. Then I pick up the sides of those and knit grey 31-st mitres in the corners.

Concerns about this plan: What if the black bind-off is too tight? I like that right now the blanket is stretchy in every way. And, more importantly, what about the colours? I've only chosen black because, well, it's basic black. I like the grey corners, because it's a colour from the mitres. I don't want to do the black sections in another colour from the mitres because - Say I chose red. There are red squares on the outside of the blanket. Then the colour would be touching. The horror, the horror. It doesn't bear thinking.

Does anyone have any better ideas?

PS. Harlot tomorrow at Yarn Forward?

"Don't question why she needs to be so free...

2006-11-02T15:00:00.000-05:00

She'll tell you it's the only way to be." - The Rolling Stones, "Ruby Tuesday"

That sums up my relationship with knitting more than anything else. It's not because I love it, or because I like it, or because I have vast amounts of disposable income. It's not because I get bored on the bus or need warm sweaters or need something to do with my hands while I watch TV.

Philosopher's Wool Co. postcard

It's because I can't see myself not doing it. Not because I can't see myself doing anything else, because I read and write and sew and bind books and decoupage and am probably only a few years away from sending away for taxidermy school by mail. But knitting is part of my life, it's what I do.

Men's shirts, short skirts

2006-11-01T17:00:00.000-05:00

I dyed my hair! It certainly took me long enough - I've been thinking of dying it this colour only for about six months. Here's the pic:

Excuse the expression, but it was better than the second-best picture, where I look like a puppy who's just been kicked. The notable thing about this set of photos I took (about nine, because I couldn't get anything I liked) is that - at least on my computer - it looks exactly like me. The colours are exact. So if you've only ever seen me in the photos on this here blog, here's proof that I don't actually have jaundice and/or anemia. (Though I am truly delightfully pale; an Irish redhead in all but [natural] haircolour.)

The hair colour's just what I wanted, too. Clearly dyed, but still pretty red, i.e. I don't look like some sort of Crayola industrial accident. Just call me Belle Watling. (I just realized the colour matches my lens frames. If I had realized this before dying my hair would have turned green, I swear.)

As for the craft frontier, I'm not knitting right now. I wandered into a thrift store today, ostensibly to search for wool seaters to pirate for yarn, and I somehow fell into the record section. It's not that I'm some sort of music buff (that would be my brother), but that I pirate records as well as sweaters. I melt the records into bowls and turn the covers into books - I feel certain I've posted pics of these before, but I can't find them. Anyway, the haul today was un-be-lievable. Gorgeous covers in excellent condition, and a bunch of recognizable titles, which always sell better. A few covers can be seen on the right; I don't know who the Three Suns were but I love them. I had to put back more than half of what I wanted because it was just getting ridiculous.
I haggled, too. Managed to knock 50 cents off the Grease soundtrack and 25 cents off the Sound of Music soundtrack. I had to harangue three clerks to get it, but I saved a whole 75 cents! My Scottish ancestors would be proud.

This is all for a juried (that means I have to apply to get in) craft sale I want to be in, and the application date is Friday. I know I can make better, more professional goods this year, and I want to focus on the books and bowls. They're easier, faster, and cheaper to make than anything else, and they sell better too. I tried knitted stuff last year and all I managed to do was hurt my wrists by knitting 10 hours a day beforehand. Not to mention I had to slash my already just-paying-for-yarn prices by half just to move the stuff. But hey, can't complain: it was mostly stuff I had knitted that was just sitting around anyway. Even if I didn't make a profit, at least I got some return.

Well, off to the sweatshop!

Once I had a dream I stood beneath an orange sky

2006-10-28T14:46:00.000-04:00

The December exam schedule came out yesterday. I only have two bloody exams - two! - and when are they? The 16th and the 21st.
So I'm pretty upset. School starts up again on January 3rd. Why do they do this? I know there isn't anything to be done, and there are even those who have exams on December 22nd. It's just not faaaaaair.

Yeah, I'm in a pretty deep funk, more than I'd expect. I love being here, I really do. I'm working harder at school and I have a job and for the last two nights I've been out with people from school, which is the biggest accomplishment of all, really.

But sometimes things just feel empty. There's a wonderful essay in Sarah Vowell's The Partly Cloudy Patriot where she talks about first discovering the fact that you could feel empty, that this happens at all. Then something like this comes along and pushes.

Growing up sucks.

You know, I'm going to blame James Joyce for this. We did "Araby" in English class on Monday. Yeah, I think I'll blame him.

Sorry to be so depressing. As I said above, life hasn't been all staring out rain-streaked windows and moping. I went to the Inspirations Needlecraft show yesterday. It was OK, though not as focussed on knitting as I expected. I mean, I knew it was lots of different stuff, but there was far more quilting than I expected. I quilt, but haven't felt much in the mood lately. So I just concentrated on fibre - not simply yarn. ;)

Fleece Artist Blue Face Leicester roving. Gorgeous, eh? It was in a neat braid when I bought it - this is after me playing with it. No (siiiiigh), I'm not going to spin it. I still don't know how to spin. This is going to turn into thrummed mittens. It was $7.50 - I don't know much about the cost of fibre, but it's less than I'd pay for a hank of Fleece Artist yarn, so I think it's not so bad. I got it from the Yarn Forward stall - so I could have got it at my LYS any day, but I got it at the show. So there.

Natural-coloured laceweight wool, from a yarn store about 5 hours outside Ottawa. Each 50 gm hank has ~400m, so I have ~800 m here. Wanna know how much it was? G'wan now, guess!
Less than $9. Boo-ya. It's not the absolute softest yarn ever, but it's softer than Lopi and I'm thinking it'll soften up with washing. I'm thinking of possibly dying it with Kool-Aid. I have a ton of packets of blue and green; I'm going for a gentle handpainted look without variegation.

And you'll note the fact that these photos are taken at home. Yes . . . I didn't bring my camera to the show. I'm disappointed in me, too. I saw some really cool stuff, but the absolute best was the Philosophers Wool stand. They had complex Fair Isle sweaters strewn about like it was nothing at all. My favourite was this one. Sadly the kits were at least double my allotted budget, so it was a no-go. But! One of the top reasons, I swear, to pay the entry fee on these types of shows is to see the people first-hand*. And you can have them show you two-handed Fair Isle, like Eugene (the co-founder) did! How cool was that! Pick with left, throw with right, pick with left, throw with right...

As for knits that are not just yarn in real life, sweaters in my mind, I feel like I've been making real progress with the mitered afghan. I've talked about it before, but never posted a photo yet. Here goes nothing:

Jack Skellington for scale.

I think it's beautiful. It's Patons Classic Merino in burgundy, grey mix, dark grey mix, sage green and new denim. I have 10 balls to play with, 2 in each colour, and I still haven't cracked the 2nd ball in any of the colours. Miters (mitres?) take way less yarn than you'd expect! I love it.

I'd like to say the blanket is based on Berocco's Mu Shu afghan, but it really isn't. It's exactly the same. I mean, it's a blanket! Sure I changed the yarn, and thus the size, but it's not like that really required complex calculations or anything. I love the 41-st miters - when I started I tried a 71-st miter that just crashed and burned. Three hours later I was still knitting the damn thing.

It moves at a decent clip, too. Generally it's my TV watching knit, because I can't haul it around anymore. I mean, look! That's the 35th square I'm working on, right now! Despite that, it's sooo small. Here, look at it as compared to the blanket my granny crocheted for me when I was little:

Tiny!

It feels so big when it's on my lap that it's a real ego crush to see it like that. I keep calling it a blanket because I can't in good conscience call it an afghan at this size. The problem is that it's supposed to be an afghan! It's going to be a Christmas present, and not for a child.
Sigh.
As I said, I've been working on it just about continuously since I got it. My receipt says I bought the yarn September 18, so for just over a month it's not so bad. My original plan was to have it 6 squares by 8 squares, and then I'm going to do a border with mini-miters in the corners. So I'll go to 6 x 8, and see how it looks then. I'm sure not going to run out of yarn at this rate.**

Seeing as it's Halloween soon, I'll leave you with this image of unspeakable horror and pain. Knitters with weak stomachs may choose to look away.

35 yarn ends to weave in. And counting.

* Speaking of which, the Yarn Harlot is going to be at Yarn Forward (both locations) on November 9! Eeeeee!
** FAMOUS LAST WORDS.

Things I've noticed lately

2006-10-23T14:36:00.000-04:00

Alfred paper was done and duly handed in. I've been prepping for another paper, and working at Quizno's (sandwich artiste, thank you) and saving my pennies for the Inspirations Needlecraft show. I don't really feel like a full post, but I thought I'd record a few things that I've noticed lately:

A license plate that said "NOSPOON". This was even better when I walked past the car and noticed that it was . . . anyone? . . . a Toyota Matrix.

A poster for a show featuring a band named "Even Hitler Had a Girlfriend". Oh yeah, way to get people to come out and see you, boys. I think I'm going to go weep into my eyeliner. (OK, fine, I do think it's kinda funny too.)

A tag on my Joe Boxers that, under the washing instructions, reads (I kid you not) "CHANGE DAILY." Of course! That was the part I was forgetting. No wonder it was hard to fit them into the washing machine. Even better than that? They've trademarked that saying.

Inside a Hershey bar wrapper: "Candy is a treat. Please consume in moderation." Oh crap, if only they'd written it on the outside . . . [falls over in diabetic coma]

In which Sarah makes fun of a document that's worth more than her life

2006-10-17T13:21:00.000-04:00

Crazy busy writing paper on Alfred the Great right now, and still sick. I promise to have real content soon, particularly photos of my new jacket and the story of the total deal I got on it, as well as this beautiful mitred-square afghan I'm working on. But I had to share this.

See, there was this bishop named Asser (snicker snicker) who wrote a biography of Alfred. And I was really pissed because I finally managed to find a copy of this book in the library and yesterday I crack it open, flip past the 60-odd pages of intro, only to find that it's written in the original Latin. Whiskey tango foxtrot! Luckily I managed to find one online in English, and the translation is positively saucy! Take this part, for instance. King Ethelwulf is Alfred's father, and the two of them went to Rome on a pilgrimage when Alfred was 7, staying there for a year. Emphasis is my own.

"In the meantime, however, whilst king Ethelwulf was residing beyond the sea, a base deed was done, repugnant to the morals of all Christians, in the western part of Selwood. For king Ethelwald [son of king Ethelwulf] and Ealstan, bishop of the church of Sherborne, with Eanwulf, earl of the district of Somerton, are said to have made a conspiracy together, that king Ethelwulf, on his return from Rome, should never again be received into his kingdom. This crime, unheard-of in all previous ages, is ascribed by many to the bishop and earl alone, as resulting from their counsels. Many also ascribe it solely to the insolence of the king, because that king was pertinacious in this matter . . .
For as he was returning from Rome, his son aforesaid, with all his counsellors, or, as I ought to say, his conspirators . . ."

Meow.

I said almost worth it.

2006-10-15T08:48:00.000-04:00

First, thank you to everyone for your very kind comments on my Black Sea Hat! I really recommend this pattern.

Now I have to make another hat, and sometime in the next decade I need to make a pair of mittens or two. Maybe if I go wild I'll actually use my Latvian Mittens book that's been sitting on my shelf for the past year because I'm too chicken, even though lately I've been crazy for colourwork. There just aren't enough hours in the day! Gosh.

Today I'm planning to buy a mid-season coat (those things are expensive!), and I have to go to work, and the next week is going to be pretty much non-stop schoolwork. And (would I like some cheese to go with my whine?) I have a cold.

Sigh.

It'd almost be worth the crippling poverty, not being a person, and dying of consumption at the age of 35 to live back in the day when a girl could knit all day and be paid for it.

FO: Black Sea hat

2006-10-13T17:46:00.000-04:00

Warning: bathroom photos ahead. Suspiciously cheerful emo bathroom photos ahead. Don't say I didn't warn you. It's been particularly dark & rainy lately, and I haven't had a chance to take a nice outdoors photo.

So! Black Sea!

Ahhh! It's Puck! Flee her fearful chipmunk cheeks!

Seriously, what a cool knit. Close up on the beads:
Neat, eh? Also, I swear on all that is holy, my eyes are NOT brown. Or green. These photos LIE. They are BLUE. Thank you. (There must be some yellow glow, because in real life I don't look like I have jaundice either.)

Deets!
Pattern: Black Sea Hat, by Grumperina.
Yarn: Scheepjes Donna (50% wool, 50% microfibre), in colour 601 chocolate.
Yardage: Just under one ball, about 95-105 m.
Yarn Source: Stash, baby, stash! Originally bought from Yarn Forward (linked above).
Needles: Boye US 4 (3.5 mm) DPNs, Denise US 5 (3.75 mm) 16" circular

Thoughts:
Knitting with beads is kind of like . . . well how can I explain it. Stringing the beads was very frustrating. It just goes on and on and on. I kept the beads in groups of 10 so they'd be easier to count. It got easier to push them down the string as I went on as I knew how much leeway to give. The only really annoying time was casting on.

Other than that, the knitting was delightful. Just enough changes to keep it interesting. It is so weird to knit a bead in - you have to experience it to get it. Very fun. I love the way the ribbing works with the waves. Grumperina is a total genius. Good thing, too, as my cousin has asked me to make her one!

I had only two concerns: yarn and size. I had less yardage, because the yarn was thicker - a DK rather than sport. So I used smaller needles than I normally would (I still could have gone a size smaller if I wanted a really firm fabric), and I made the small size. It fits just right, possibly stretching a slight bit larger than desired as I've been wearing it basically every day for the last two weeks.

You may have also noticed that I don't have the ruched top with the hole. This would be because I didn't want that, so I just didn't print off the top instructions. Well, it turns out mine are basically exactly the same, except my decreases don't swirl (note to self: left-leaning decreases need to keep decreasing to the left to swirl), and I did one more decrease so I didn't have a hole.

I'm pensive! Yay! And (sigh), my hair flips like that naturally.

Altogether, a rather fun knit. Considering how fast & loose I played with gauge, it fits rather well, and I love the colours. My only complaint is that it isn't warm enough for this wicked wind we've been having lately. Time to break out the alpaca!

Nice turtleneck.

2006-10-02T22:30:00.000-04:00

The blog was down for a while there, and so I was fiddling. I don't know what happened - my best guess is that it's back up because Blogger replaced the hamster on a wheel that powers this thing. So yeah, I changed the template, and I think this one's going to stick. Not sure though. If you change the template it wipes out all your customizations, so that's why there's essentially nothing on the sidebar. If I decide I like this I'll put all the old stuff up.

Anyway, I alluded a while back I was going to talk about my classes now that school is underway. My friend Juli who goes to UBC does a semi-annual thing at the end of each term, but all my classes are full-year! Oh, woe is me. So here we go.

Oh yes, and for those who don't know, I'm a second-year undergrad at Carleton U in Ottawa, Canada, majoring in history with a minor in film studies.

England in the Middle Ages: A professor emeritus teaches this one. He's English and looks like he could have witnessed everything first-hand. But he's hilarious - just sits at the front of the room and tells us stories for three hours a week. Occasionally he'll get sidetracked and tell us things like how much better professional wrestling was in the '60s before everything was fake. No, I'm not kidding. He's awesome, and very approachable. I suspect, however, that he didn't get to be a professor emeritus by telling funny stories, because I have a paper due in a couple weeks that's supposed to be longer than one I had four months to write for a class last year. We'll see how much I like him after that, but so far, not too bad for an 8:30 AM class.

History of Russia: Another professor emeritus, not so much fun. This guy talks FAST, and asked us in the first lecture to not ask questions during the lectures. This goes against my preferred back-and-forth type of learning, but he's still an interesting teacher. It's just a tough act to follow my Middle Ages prof.

Historian's Craft: This is the course that's mandatory for all history majors in their second year, where we learn to use archives and read old handwriting and talk about interpretations of history and all that rot. This course is taught by two profs, who both showed up for the first class but apparently work one on, one off for the following classes. So I haven't had as much time to get to know these profs as I have with other classes, but in the first day I was reminded very strongly of two of my favourite English teachers from school (Mr. M. and Mrs. K., for those who went to high school with me). These are very good signs. Also, this is my only class with a female prof. Am I just in the wrong courses? I'm not saying I prefer female profs, but it seems odd that in the 14 profs and TAs I've had so far at university, only 4 have been women. I'm in arts - what up with that?

20th Century Literature: A first year English course. There's a digital cable channel that shows specific Carleton courses as a sort of correspondence school-type-thingy, and last year I kept catching bits of this. What really grabbed me was the lecture I saw on Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead, which is if not my favourite play of all time (and I've seen a few plays) is way up there. Also the prof was really good. So I signed up this year, and I got a different prof who didn't have R & G as one of the readings. Booooo. But I just got home from this course, and the prof talked for more than 45 minutes about an Ezra Pound poem that is a whopping 2 lines long, and I was fascinated. So it's a winner.
PS. I have to put this note in. We read 6 poems for today's class - Yeats, Pound, and Eliot. One of the Yeats poems was "Leda and the Swan", which, as I was reading it, I was hoping against hope it wasn't what I thought it was about. Well, the prof elaborated on it. I feel sick. Blech.
If you don't know your Greek mythology, do yourself a favour and read a Wikipedia article or something, because the poem is - yeah. Imagery is a tool that must be used for good and not evil, Yeats!

Canadian Cinema: Fantastic, amazing, super-fun course. I know, I know - those of you who didn't think I was insane up til now are know assured of the fact. The prof is very good; he strangely reminds me of Kenneth Branagh but without all the bits that make me hate Branagh. Fascinating stuff, freely allowing us to make fun of the cliches of Canadian movies, and good people in the class. Film classes are ALWAYS the best, I have discovered, for making new friends. Perhaps all the funnest weirdoes major in film.

Oh yeah, that reminds me: Go see Bon Cop, Bad Cop. One of the best movies I've ever seen. Hilarious! And a really good cop movie too. Just a ginormously fantastic movie all round that happens to be Canadian. I'm not really into hockey, so apparently I missed a bunch of the NHL-related humour, and I was still laughing the whole way through. Go see it!

Catharsis

2006-09-30T08:21:00.000-04:00

These are the WIPs I have on the go right now, from oldest to youngest:

Fleece Artist Goldilocks Shawl - maybe two or three more rows, and that is IT. I declare it to be done. It's my oldest WIP - probably around 2-1/2 yrs.
Picovoli - it just needs to be blocked
Mariah - I just ripped out the nearly-finished fronts and back, so basically all I have is a sleeve.
A pair of plain old socks in a yarn that I've forgotten the name of. I'm sure the ball band's around here somewhere.
Print o' the Wave Stole in Jaggerspun Zephyr
Two pairs of Fuzzyfeet that just need to be felted & embellished
A pair of Fuzzyfeet in variegated Patons Classic
Mu Shu afghan, heavily sedated! Again, in Patons Classic
A pair of plain old 48-st socks in Cascade Fixation

What I've got in mind to make for Christmas:

One, maybe two stockings. Christmas stockings, that is, not crazy Nancy Bush-style. Sheesh.
A fingering-weight shawl - maybe Kiri, or Leaf Lace, or Flower Basket. Something simple.
Another Goldilocks Shawl
A lacy scarf in Hempathy
The aforementioned afghan
The aforementioned Fuzzyfeet, with maybe another pair (that makes four pairs in total)
Anywhere from one to three pairs of socks
Two pairs of felted clogs
The aforementioned Fixation socks
Maybe a sweater

I know, I know, I'm insane. Just the afghan is going to take me until midnight on December 24. (I like big blankets and I cannot lie.) But I didn't knit hardly ANYTHING for Christmas last year because of self-confidence issues. So this year - ha! You'll get yarny goodness, and you'll like it! Mwa ha ha!

FO: Swallowtail Shawl

2006-09-29T13:30:00.000-04:00

Finally! Please note: these photos were the first time I've ever used the self-timer on my cam, so excuse the less-flattering-than-I-normally-aim-for photos. Also, this is my first real lace project, so there are a ton of photos.

Pattern: Swallowtail Shawl, by Evelyn A. Clark, in Interweave Knits Fall 2006
Yarn: Lorna's Lace's Shepherd Sport, in colour Navy
Yardage: Just over 2 skeins, at 200 yards each. The recommended yarn comes in a 437 yd skein, and I imagine you'd use every last bit of that. As it was, I started the third skein on the next-to-last yarn, so if I'd used a size smaller needle I probably could have made it with just two skeins.
Yarn Source: Bought at Three Bags Full on opening day. Visit this store; it's fantastic!
Needles: Denise Interchangeables, 5mm (US size 8).

Pre-second blocking. Note the wavy top edge.

Thoughts: This is a great pattern. For my first ever shawl, it was pretty hazard-free. By this I don't mean it was slow as a garter-stitch scarf; rather quite the opposite. There's three patterns, really: the budding lace that makes up the majority of the body, the deadly lily of the valley section (more about that below), and the adorable peaked edging. So there's a nice blend of comfort and change - you've got just enough time to memorize a pattern (it takes me FOREVER to memorize lace, incidentally) and then you're swept up into something new. I like this, incidentally.

The yarn is cute, though I regret the colour. Everything I own is in this steely-blue colour, not to mention knit - I have two sweaters' worth of yarn in this blue, not to mention my Picovoli which I finally finished seaming last night. (More about that in a couple days.) That's four different projects right there (including the shawl), and oh yeah, it's all different yarns! I don't even realize this stuff in the store, then I get out and say, "Hey, don't I already have this yarn?" Le sigh.

Anyway, this was the first time I've ever knit with Lorna's Laces, and I see why people love and loathe it so. Breathtaking colours (I have two skeins of sock weight in the Argyle colourway waiting impatiently in the wings) and super soft. On the other hand, superwash; I'm finding that superwash anywhere than on my feet - and sometimes even then - feels kinda funny. Also, I'm afraid it may be starting to pill - yes, already - but it may have just been stray yarn fluff. This might surprise, but there's a lot of stray yarn fluff in my room.

The needles felt fine, but that wasn't a big surprise as I love my Denises passionately. The big issue was the sizing, and I think I picked the right size with the 5mm points. I wouldn't ever go bigger in proper lace: there's a reason it's traditionally done with itty-bitty thread. A few days ago I tried a Kiri Shawl in Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool, and it was just a sad gigantic thing.

This pattern is fantastic, and I really enjoyed it - bravo to IK staff on the lack of errors (as far as I could tell). The only part I didn't like was in the damnable lily of the valley pattern, with its p5togs. Grrrrrrrr. Purl five together? Who does that? Craziness, I tell you! It's just damn fiddly. I eventually wound up p5tog-ing when I could, and improvising my Lazy Purl Decrease(tm) when I couldn't. Basically, just slip two or three of the stitches to be decreased purl-wise, purl the two or three sts still on the left needle together, then pass the slipped stitches over one by one. I couldn't tell the difference between the two methods, because as far as I know they still move the stitches the same way.

So would I make this pattern again? Possibly. It moves fast (excluding the blocking saga, I knit this in 6 days), and my aunt has asked for me to make her one. Plus shawls are just so pretty! I really recommend this pattern.

My "international woman of mystery" pose.

testing

2006-09-29T06:56:00.000-04:00

is this here?

Don't make me send a telegram to Rooster, he'll shoot ya

2006-09-14T21:18:00.000-04:00

Yes, Swallowtail's finished blocking. No, I don't have any photos yet. It was finished three days ago, and I still haven't taken photos. It's because I think I'm going to (gasp!) have to re-block it. I just pinned it out at the corners and centre back, then pinned in between there, then inbetween those pins, and so on . . . Well, I hadn't read Stephanie's elegant method, and the top is all scalloped. It's very beautiful otherwise, but I'm not convinced all those 208 nupps were worth it.

Anyway, for your entertainment, I present the following little list, tentatively titled "Things You Do Not Want to Hear Your Bus Driver Say, Never Ever Ever." I had some details before, but I think it works better it you get about the same information I had.

"Oh, shit!"
"Think, man, think!"
"Don't look! No, seriously, don't look!"

For bonus points when you're on the bus, read a biography wherein the protagonist is crippled for her lifetime in a gruesome bus crash. There were . . . vivid details.

bang bang boom

2006-09-10T11:55:00.000-04:00

During a hot date with Hugh Laurie last night, I cast off Swallowtail. Then I put my yarn and needles away and lay down and watched the rest of the DVD.

And now I still haven't touched the shawl. I wonder why. Maybe it's because I'm nervous. Maybe it's because I was accidentally monogamous to this project. Normally I'm picking up and discarding projects so quickly that passersby are in quite serious danger of getting a dpn to the eyeball, but I didn't even think of not working on Swallowtail.

Well, screw this. I know it's going to look great. Once more unto the T-pins and all that.

In the land of otters

2006-09-09T15:09:00.000-04:00

Here I am in Ottawa! Yesterday was the first day of school, but I'll talk more about that later. The flight was okay - I caught a red eye and wound up here yesterday just after 9:00 AM EST. It was so foggy here that the flight before us had to be rerouted back to Toronto (or T'ranna, as everyone pronounced it). This led to some hilarious mixups, including one of my suitcases (that would be the one with all my YARN in it*) getting lost along the way. However, considering this was the eleventh flight I've taken this year (for reals), the odds were coming up and everyone at Westjet did an awesome job, and got my suitcase to me by 10:00 or so Thursday night.

Now for slightly more fun matters. As previously mentioned, I'd brought two things to work on during the car ride to Seattle to see Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, my It's a Wrap! in Fleece Artist, and some Lorna's Lace Shepherd Sport to start the Swallowtail Shawl. Well, I finished It's A Wrap! (would it kill them to give this thing a name's that's just a plain ole noun?) in the queue at the border crossing while I taught my mom to knit a mitered square. Yes, it's completely awesome that she wants to knit. I'm so pwoud. I've already got her onto the Noro.

I started on the Swallowtail Shawl right away - fortunately (and uncharacteristically!) I'd thought to wind a hank of Lorna's Laces into a ball beforehand. I screwed up once or twice with the beginning, and I still don't like how it looks. You make a tiny garter-stitch square of two stitches by six rows, then pick up stitches from the side and beginning to wind up with 7 stitches, which you use to begin the pattern. Maybe it would have look better if I'd just woven in the end in the garter-stitch square rather than the lace. I've talked before about how I weave in my ends, and I did it in the lace rather than the garter stitch because I thought it would make working with the tiny piece of garter stitch even more awkward and make it harder to pick up stitches. Let's just hope it works out in the blocking.

Note: I took the below photos in my aunt's backyard here. It is cooler here than in BC, which I am totally digging. But it was so grey out as I was taking these that I even I went "Huh." Fifteen minutes later, rain and thunder and lightning! It was awesome.

Check out that flaring bind off. Attractive, no?

I bound off really loosely. Here's hoping blocking fixes it. Speaking of blocking, the lace pattern is basically invisible on the right side. It's as bouncy and stretchy as all get out thought, so I have no doubt blocking's going to make this as loose and airy as . . . something very light and airy. I was going to say a silk scarf, but my mind just won't allow that because they wouldn't ever be the same. But it would be as much like a silk scarf as it is possible for an aran mohair-wool yarn to be, I suppose.
Anyway, ym point was that while the lace pattern is invisible now, I hope I don't lose the lovely simple knit-purl pattern on the back after blocking.

Top: Right side. Bottom: wrong side.

Now for my particular love o' the moment, Swallowtail**. I knew I was making it bigger than in IK, but . . . this is going to be big. It's big right now and I haven't even finished, yet alone blocked it. On the other hand, it's moving along fast. Not "finished it in four days" fast, but fast. Here it is on Tuesday:

The camera always adds 25% more wrinkliness to unblocked lace.

And here it is yesterday, one row into the final chart:

Of course, I would pick the one photo that shows plenty of the beginning, but zero of the actual progress made.

I simply adore the individual patterns, from the simple flower buds in the body to the 'nupps' in the lily of the valley edging. Why it's called lily of the valley is a mystery to me, but I guess that's why I'm not Evelyn A. Clark. I sincerely hope the nupps even up and open out in blocking - maybe they look more like lilies then, rather than clumpy fake eyelashes.

Well, Jim, it would appear that Sarah's managed to infiltrate a community of wild nupps. What a fscinating discovery this is, Jim. As we all know, the nupps are born when a (k1, yo, k1, yo, k1) in 1 st breeds with a p5tog on the next row, and a complicated birth it is. I wouldn't be surprised if Sarah's hands were cramping quite badly after all that! It's a rather large community, too: 208 nupps! Beautiful, Jim, just beautiful.

Uh . . . yeah. After all that, basically all I can say is that it seems like I'm going to have to wind an entire third ball for essentially the last two rows. Fun. At least I'm going to be done today, not that I'm eager to get this thing off the needles. It's so pretty, and no stupid mistakes yet (except for this one time when I couldn't tell the different between the numbers 3 and 4, but we won't talk about that).

*Just kidding. You and I both know for all my yarn to fit in one suitcase, that suitcase would have to be only slightly smaller than your average bungalow.
**Don't worry, Mariah, Mommy loves all her . . . well, okay, she doesn't love all her babies the same, but she loves you as much as she loves Swallowtail. She just can't summon up the fortitude to attack your second sleeve right now.

And here we go

2006-09-03T11:26:00.000-04:00

I think I've got all the makings for a great road trip, don't you?

I've got my nearly-finished work in progress...

By the way, these chairs I keep posing things on? My dad built 'em. Beautiful, eh?

This is It's a Wrap!, a free pattern from the Garter Belt. I'm making a variation on Take 2 by Elizabeth. Hers was a light worsted linen/cotton, while mine's the aran-weight wool-mohair by Fleece Artist I wrote about here (and therefore a lot smaller than hers - 39 stitches rather than 79). This is just zooming along - I started it Tuesday night waiting in line at Bard and was more 75% done by Thursday.

I've got my upcoming project...

Three skeins of Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sport in Navy, for the Swallowtail Shawl in the latest IK. I'm thinking of using 5.5 mm needles; I'm bringing my Denises so I'll have the choice. (Also, I have so many things on the needles that I have to use the cord that It's a Wrap! is on right now.)

And I've got more Great Big Sea and Barenaked Ladies than you could shake a stick at...

I can't think of any better way to end the summer. Let's roll!

PS. I didn't realize just how freaking Canadian this post was until I finished. Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, Fleece Artist, a road trip, Great Big Sea, the 'Ladies . . . I'm really rather proud.

Fibre wench

2006-09-02T15:58:00.000-04:00

(Note to Skrabadoo or my Secret Pal-ee [if you've discovered who I am] - if you want to be surprised, do not read this post until you get your packages.)

Yeah, I know, what a total steal of a post title off La Harlot. But the thing is, it's very fitting (for more than one reason!).

Reason numero uno: I have been cheating on my yarn. (Dun dun dun!!!!) With quilts. Hopefully my fibre karma balances out because I gave these quilts away. Here are the two quilts I made recently:

This is the pink one. I made it first. I designed the pattern myself (I know, how adorable!). I made it for the 5 Senses Craftster swap, where you pick a colour (mine was green) and then your partner makes something for each sense bouncing off that colour. For instance, my partner Skrabadoo picked baby pink, so for taste I picked out pink Jelly Bellies, and for sound I made a mix CD with happy, bouncy tunes. That sort of thing. The quilt was touch, especially because most of it is flannel (only the brown and pink stripes are otherwise; they're quilting cotton).

Here's the back (it's actually a gingham print, something I wish could be seen in the photo). I like the argyle effect here, one that isn't so strong on the front. This was originally designed as a argyle pattern after all; I call it Almost Argyle because any knitter worth her dpns could point out the numerous liberties I have taken with the traditional argyle pattern.

I think the issue with this one is the choice of colours on the front - there's a much greater contrast between the flowered stripes and the flannels than there are between the different flannels, so it looks more like boxes than argyles. Plus, the flannel is so much fuzzier, especially after washing, that I think you wouldn't get much definition to begin with. It's like knitting intarsia in mohair (pause to capture breath, cease fearful tears) - the fuzziness would overwhelm all your hard work.

Still, I really like the whole quilt. This is only the fourth quilt I've ever finished, and the first one that wasn't only squares. I also was a bit more adventurous with the quilting, creating that lovely effect on the back. I took some pictures of this quilt while it was in progress, so I hope to have a tutorial up here soon on how to make this quilt.

Here's the second quilt:

I would just like to say this now: I love this quilt. Love it. It was hard to give this baby away. It is the prettiest quilt I have ever made (and I'm humble, too). It's so pretty, let's see anyother photo:

Pretty!

See the changes that happen with different colours and fabrics? (No, I'm not sure when this turned into me teaching a quilting lesson either.) It's the same pattern as above, just that it's all cotton now, and obviously different quilting. Here's the back, to give you a more detailed idea of the quilting:
Oh, I loves it so. It's the most adventurous quilting I've ever done, and it worked! Both of these quilts are the same size, just a nice lap quilt to curl up under whilst knitting in the winter. This was part of the final package for the Secret Pal 8 exchange. And her "reveal" package is in the mail now, so I going to let the cat out of the bag . . . it was the lovely and (uber, uber!) talented Lara of Spinny Bunt Knits. Feel free to go over and check her out, but shhh! At least until she gets her reveal.

(My reveal is on its way. I am SO freaking excited.)

Oh, and reason number two why I'm a fibre wench?

My mom and I are going to see Ms. Stephanie Pearl-McPhee herself in Seattle tomorrow. Vibrating with joy right here. Yes, there will be pictures.

I'm not dead

2006-08-28T21:17:00.000-04:00

Yo.

Nope, not dead.

Sorry for the complete lack of postosity lately. In August I went on two vacations (one camping with friends, one housesitting with family) and I've been working a lot, trying to store up money for when I have to quit my job and move back out east for school. I'm flying out September 6.

That's really soon.

Gah.

Also, Blogger? Could you please work on the whole photos thing? I swear I've got eighteen posts in my head, but you won't let me put any pictures in!

You can't miss a place you've never been

2006-07-29T12:26:00.000-04:00

Have you ever had an image so securely fixed in your head that despite all the technicalities, you were damn well not going to change your mind about how to go about it? Because then it just wouldn't be right, and what's the point, and you people just don't understand me?!?!

It's been like that with Saffron. Sigh.

What is Saffron, you ask? Saffron's a character from Firefly, a con artist who marries Mal or does she blah blah blah anyway she wears a really pretty shawl. Very, very hole-y, most likely crocheted, a shade of (surprise!) saffron with fringe all over.

Ever since I first saw the ubiquitous shawl in the episode "Our Mrs. Reynolds", I've wanted to make it. I thought and thought and requested all the stitch dictionaries in the entire world, and eventually decided on cell stitch. I've used it before, it's pretty easy, and creates the large holes and pictureless lace I wanted to mimic the crochet. (I have the entire series on DVD, so someday I should get around to getting a screen grab of the shawl itself.)

Now to get started. Ruh roh. Apparently, it is impossible to find the pattern for cell stitch anywhere. Now, I learned how to knit out of Debbie Bliss's book How to Knit, and the nice thing about that book is that it has mini-stitch libraries accompanying each chapter. That's where I get most of my patterns, especially if I don't feel like waiting for the library to get something in. And that's where I first got cell stitch the first time. I left How to Knit in Ottawa for the summer. Accordingly, I have ten knitting books out of the library. Four are specifically lace books. Four are by the venerable St. Barbara G. Walker, Our Lady of Perpetual Swatches. Plus my own books, and oh yeah the internets. And no one has yet revealed the mystery of cell stitch to me. I could of course request HtK from the library, but I'm going on vacation soon, and as Homer says, "I don't know how much longer I can keep on complaining!"

(Note: I am going to skip over all the construction details since that would take three times as much time to explain that than all of the above. Perhaps just read Eunny Jang's Majoring in Lace, look at all the methods of triangular shawl construction, try to think up five different variations, and then you'd be where I was.)

So this morning I was reading through Barbara Walker's Second Treasury, trying to find something that would work, and I saw something that made me forget everything.

This is Chinese Lace. I really hope that picture shows the lace properly, because it is gorgeous. I was just awestruck. It looks to me very very wintery, like the trails left in the snow by skiiers and the way snow sits on the branches of evergreens.

I have abandoned Saffron's shawl. I must make a Chinese Lace stole, with mitered lace border. This is going to be a work of art. I just hope the yarn I have for it works, a gorgeous handpainted blue-purple Fleece Artist aran kid-wool blend. Please please please work. I'll sacrifice a skein of virgin alpaca to the knitting gods. Whatever it takes.

Muh-muh-muh my Mariah

2006-07-25T11:40:00.000-04:00

I'm sick. Again.

Blech.

Fortunately, I think I'm now in the recovery stages, but yesterday was pretty hairy. The ironic part is, we're (that would be my family and I, not the royal we) pretty sure I had food poisoning. From spinach dip I ordered from the place where I work. Oh, the hilarity. And oh, I don't know how many years it will be until I can look at spinach dip again, let alone eat it.

Well, now that I've disgusted you all away, let's see some pretty pictures!

I'm making some steady progress on Mariah, not that it felt like that until I saw the first pictures I took of the sleeve. For my size I have to repeat the arm shaping 17 times, and right now I'm around the 14th repeat. I love the way this central cable pattern looks, and how the arm increases are incorporated into cables. Here's a photo that shows the shaping better, though the edges are still pretty curly.

Ha - I originally typed 'surly'. And yes, that pale, shapeless lump in the photo actually is my normal-human-shaped arm. Anyway, Jodi Green is a straight-out genius.

I haven't been knitting much lately, mostly because we're in the middle of a disgusting heat wave. I live in Vancouver, folks. It's not supposed to reah 35 degrees here! (Americans: no, it isn't that cold here. Think 92 or so.) But I did dye some yarn for lace.
It's Scheepjes Invicta again, the same yarn I used for my gorgeous, beauteous Laura doily. All the other times I dyed yarn, I used Kool-Aid, but this time I used Easter egg dye, "Dudley's Dazzling Dye" to be specific. Tip: go to Zeller's a few days after Easter and get a box for 96 cents. It came with 5 packets of colour: purple, red, blue, green and yellow. I planned to dye the yarn as I always had before, despite the change in colourant, but came away with interestingly different results.

First, I wound the yarn into a hank and soaked it in hot water for 30 minutes. Then I squeezed the water out of the yarn (the bonus to dyeing superwash yarn is you can be as rough with it as you like). Next I prepared the dye, which was where things went differently. I diluted the packet of purple dye in about a cup and a half of hot water (I like to start off with less than the total amount of water and add more or less as suits the colour) and it was really pale. I mean, really really pale. I added more water nonetheless, because there wasn't enough water to dye the yarn even if it had been dark enough. I decided to pour the dye onto the yarn to see what happened. Where the dye hit the yarn, the change was perceptible but much paler than I had envisioned. I succumbed to the inevitable and ran upstairs for the red and blue dyes.

When I added the red to the water in the measuring cup, the water turned pale pink; at least tonally all these colours were going to be the same. But then I added the blue and freaked. The water turned a lovely royal blue, even with the red already there. I added a bit more water and poured the dye onto the yarn. Fortunately, the blue purple mixed with the "did someone spill some lavender water?" purple. And, as I always forget, the yarn is always paler than the dye. (At least when dying white yarn, in my experience.)

In the end I'm rather pleased. It's mucho different than what you get with Kool-Aid, and I'm going to kieep that in mind for next time. Photography note: I took these photos on a very bright, sunny day: that's why Mariah looks more Crayola red than cabernet red. I was afraid by shooting the Invicta in such bright light you wouldn't be able to see any colour at all. But - here my most rudimentary of rudimentary of colour circle skills are put to the test - I think by putting it among the green of the grape plant, the purple is complemented rather than washed out. Woohoo!

As a final note, a photo I took while shopping downtown last week or so. This shop clearly caters to the fiber snob in us all:

This sums up both of us perfectly, really

2006-07-14T14:16:00.000-04:00

My brother L. and I went out into town yesterday to run some errands.

Me: Hey, did you know "Magic Bus" is being used in an ad for minivans?

L: No, so what?

Me: Well, doesn't that go against everything the song represents?

L: [quoting from this Onion article] "Coke and Pepsi are now in a bidding war for the rights to Johnny Thunders' 'Chinese Rocks'."

[pause]

L: You know what Chinese rocks are, right?

Me: [sigh] Yes, L., I know what Chinese rocks are. I'm a history nerd, remember? Haven't you ever heard of the Opium Wars?

[pause]

L: Oh, why did they have to send those young opiums to the front lines? They died for nothing!

There are few who deny it, what I do I am the best, for my talents are reknowned far and wide...

2006-07-11T01:10:00.000-04:00

Someone knitted Jack Skellington. And posted the pattern.

:o :o :o

There are no words.

I love, love, love Jack. (It's my Hamlet syndrome kicking in.) I don't normally make knitted toys and such, but let loose with this pattern I may become one of those crazy cat ladies on the 6:00 news with piles of 25-year-old newspapers reaching the ceiling. Except, you know, they'll be Jacks.

PS. I particularly like her suggestion of the Jack "mirror dice" near the end of the pattern.

Lace rehabilitation

2006-07-05T14:51:00.000-04:00

(Note: Blogger's photo loading is being tres lame. I'm just going to link to the photos, and I'll put them into this entry when Blogger starts to behave itself.)

Remember way back when (when you were blogging regularly, you mean? oh hush), when the Cobweb Doily broke my heart with its fiendish, crochet cotton ways? Well, SUCK ON IT, COBWEB! I publicly declared my love of the pretty lace, especially a particular German doily. And then I went and MADE IT. That's right, I finished a whole knitting project. Cower at my knitterly skillz, foo.

An artsy shot, perched on my dad's grapevine.

A head-on shot spread out on the grass. Yeah, that bit of string on the side there? That's because I haven't woven in the end yet. Shame, shame.

I made it out of less than half a 50g ball of Scheepjes Invicta Extra (75% wool, 25% nylon) - as you may have guessed, it's a plain Jane sock yarn. But put it onto some 4.5 mm dpns and you've got magic! [spirit fingers]
I really am very enamoured of this doily. It's slightly oval because I blocked it on an ironing board, so I had more room to stretch it in one direction than another. But I don't mind. The keen-eyed among you may notice that the edging on my doily is similar to the edging in the pattern illustration, the same way a duck is similar to a nuclear submarine. Basically, the original edging was crocheted, and I don't crochet. So I looked through every pattern book I have and online and did complicated math-y calculations, and eventually gave up and did a picot bind-off. I experimented until I found one I liked, which was *cast on 3, bind off 6*. There were 182 sts in the final round, so I wound up with 91 picots, which I pinned individually. Oh yeah. I went there.

In other sock-yarn news, I finally bit the bullet and learned how to make a toe-up sock. That's Knitpicks Sock Garden in Daffodil, a colour that looks way better knit up than on the ball. I made the figure-8 toe from this Knitty article. It is, as the author states, a bit finicky (it took me three tries before I got going knitting), but I like it because you don't need a crochet chain and waste yarn like the others. You can just go!
The rest of the sock is the larger size from this standard vanilla toe-up pattern. I've always wanted to make a short-row heel, but I feel dissatisfied with this one. I don't like picking up wraps and knitting them together with the stitch anyway, but this pattern has you picking up two wraps, then k3tog. I found it dang hard. Am I doing this right?
Oh, and see that huge ball of yarn to the right of the sock? That's the rest of the ball of yarn. I've already knit a women's size 10 US foot! That yardage is unbelievable.

Oh, and I'm making another sweater. I've loved Mariah ever since she first came out, and now I'm finally making her! I'm so excited, and really enjoying it so far. Here's what I have of the sleeve so far. Gorgeous, eh? That's Cascade 220, and the sleeve colour is completely off; it's more like the colour of the ball in the shade.

The astute among you may have noticed the supremely adorable Secret Pal 8 button over on the sidebar. (Seriously, click on that and look at the choice of buttons I had - it was a dilemma worthy of King Solomon.) Anyway, I got my first package from my secret pal yesterday! I'd been thinking about taking spinning classes at one of my LYSes in Ottawa, but left before I could get around to it. And then my SP told me she would teach me to spin! Isn't that just marvelous!!! Oh, I am so excited. And then I opened up the box and what should I find but a veritable glory of riches.

There was this red linen. It's so lovely and summer-y feeling. I feel like making something with lace out of it, but I have no idea quite what. Any ideas? And then there was this handpainted wool, which is actually more vibrant than it appears in that photo. I think it's going to become that modular zig-zag scarf from Handknit Holidays. Then, of course, there were the spinning supplies.

My spindle. I'm not sure if you can see, but it has flowers painted on the top. So pretty.
And the roving. Potential yarn posed with potential tomatoes. Kinda poetic, don'tcha think? Thank you so much, SP! Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some yarn to make.

I said don't look back, just keep on walking

2006-07-05T14:11:00.000-04:00

Howdy.

[peers around]

Boy, it sure is [koff] dusty around here!

Yup, I guess that is what happens when you don't clean up a place every once in a while.

Awful quiet here, too.

Hmm.

I think some changes are coming here. And a couple photo-filled entries.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

In conversation, she spoke just like a baroness

2006-06-15T15:47:00.000-04:00

Blech. I am gross and sick and stuffed-up. I honestly wanted to do a proper entry, but . . . no. SO! Here are some links that always make me laugh:

Free to a Good Home. A guy on craigslist trying to get rid of a cat. No matter how many times I read this, I always always laugh out loud, so be warned.

George Lucas in Love. Think Shakespeare in Love, only with George Lucas instead. Video and sound.

How to Write Screenplays. Badly. Just plain hilarious, and they update fairly regularly.

Wordplay. Ever heard of the screenwriting team Ted Elliot & Terry Rossio? No? How about those little-seen art house flicks Aladdin, Shrek and Pirates of the Carribean? This is their site.

Mows, an adorable and eerily accurate webcomic about 3 cats.

White Ninja Comics. See, there's this white ninja, and he . . . Well, just read it. Also, he looks just like my little brother. I'm serious. "That's cuz HOCKEY RULES!"

Uh . . . what else . . . right now I really like the songs "Hips Don't Lie" (Shakira ft. Wycleaf Jean), "Black Horse & Cherry Tree" (KT Tunstall), "Woman King" (Iron & Wine), and "Zephyr Song" (the Red Hot Chili Peppers).

OK, fine, here's a cute picture of my cat Marlowe.

Awww.

Edited to add: check out this here video of my friends! How to describe it? Well . . . there's these four guys, and they lipsync to "Tunak Tunak Tun". There's wigs, and a car, and a gap in continuity (how long ago did you guys shoot this?), and awesome editing. According to Stefan, it's part of a larger whole - the near-mythic Aufbau.

Some people juggle geese!

2006-06-09T14:12:00.000-04:00

Wednesday night I spent cavorting with my friends until the wee hours.

Last night I was working until 11:30 at the store. Every weekday we get a delivery in, normally before noon. It didn't come until 6:30 last night, and it was a big one - three and a half skids. I just realized this may be a regional thing. A skid is a also known as a pallette - think of those big wooden things that the merchandise sits on at Costco. Oy vey, my back.

Tonight I'm going to see Cabaret at the Stanley with my mom.

And I have 15 new messages in my inbox.

See what happens when I get a life? My internet time has gone way down. Tsk, tsk.

Oh, knitting? I've about halfway through the instep shaping on my mom's Aloe Vera socks. Oh my gosh - Vera. (Terrible link, but it gives you the info you need. And Mom'll get a giggle out of it.) She wanted the stripes to match up on the socks. I have never done this before, basically because I am lazy, but it's neat because this way I don't have to measure anything. I just know to start the heel at the end of the yellow stripe, and so on. So I didn't bother taking a new picture, but here is an artist's recreation:

Opening doors and pulling some strings

2006-06-04T09:41:00.000-04:00

I'm making a pair of socks for my mom out of the infamous Austermann Step (colourway 01), the sock yarn with aloe vera and jojoba oil. And yes, you can definitely feel it. My hands just feel as smooth as buttah when I work with this. I don't know yet how it'll hold up during washing but it's just deelish right now. Here's the first one in all its soft stripey glory:

I knit it on my 2.75 mm dpns, but I stopped after I finished the first sock and started the heart-breaking Cobweb Doily. Well, the jig is up. It's time to face facts, and finish this pair of socks. Note: this is not second sock syndrome. I have never had second sock syndrome, except for the first time I knit socks, out of plain blue Patons Kroy. I learned my lesson - I don't knit plain fingering-weight socks anymore. Problem solved.

Wait, what was I talking about again? Oh yeah, needing the needles out of the doily.

Because it's not a knitting blog without a cat, I had a supervisor in case I screwed up. Excuse the blur. That's Nico, our kitten.

Here it is, in all its puffy glory.

After performing the (sob) extraction. Look at it! It coulda been a contender. Even with the mistakes and the unevenness (blocking blocking blocking, that's my mantra), so adorable!

The obligatory low-angle artsy shot.

So, it's off to make another sock. Not that I'm complaining. But I still hear the siren call of lace. So much so that I feel the need to make another doily. Yes, a DOILY. I know I've never been hip, but still. My desire to make doilies is so strong it's a little embarassing. But can I help it if they're really pretty? And fun to make? And apparently there's lots of old free patterns online? I mean sheesh, everybody loves vintage patterns, but I would like to know just what the girls with busts bigger than 36" MADE in olden days. Perhaps they just had to go cardigan-less and be mocked. My point is, doilies don't care about your gauge. They love you no matter what size you need.

So I was muchly delighted when I discovered the caches of doilies at both Yarn Over and Knitting Pattern Central. Even more so when I discovered that Yarn Over has a section dedicated to German patterns from the 1920s. The history geek in me let out a girlish squeal at this discovery. Germany! The 1920s! Inflation! Appeasement! Weimar! Doilies! The metaphor practically writes itself. I am particularly fond of Laura (seen at right). Swirly.

For something more modern, how are those ballerina slippers felting?

Apparently the answer to that is "Not well." But I've made felted objects before that ended up thicker than the fabric is here. I can keep felting. I'm just disappointed because this is so unlike all the other felted projects I've made with Paton's Classic and my parents' washing machine. I think it's the garter stitch that's gumming up the works. Better felted too little than too much, I suppose.

This Bud's for me.

2006-06-02T03:00:00.000-04:00

Summertime and the livin' is easy . . .

I have not been writing much lately! This was really brought to my attention the other day when my "friend" that I will not name here except maybe I will give her a pseudonym and that pseudonym is MELISSA told me I was pretty much a non-blogger. I must concur. But I have an excuse. Or two.

See, I started a new job about two weeks ago. I don't want to talk about it much, partly for fear of being dooced, but also basically because of privacy and safety issues. I'm now a clerk at a liquor store, and just the other night another liquor store in town was robbed and the clerk was beaten up. So you may see why I want to play this one close to the chest. Also, apparently I am a good worker (or they are really hard up), because this part-time, just for the summer job has me working 47 hours this week.

So you can see why I may be having a bit of trouble writing. Partly because of security, partly because a lot of my energy is focussed on one thing that most people probably wouldn't find interesting, and partly because I'm working more than either of my parents.

But a benefit to not posting for a long time is that there is knitting that just sneaks right up on you!

I'm not sure if I've blogged about my mom's Christmas slippers yet. Oh well, if I have, too sad. I made my mom a pair of Fuzzyfeet for Christmas this past year, and she liked them so much she walked right through the soles in a few months. I've learned that socks are a great thing to knit for my mom. She crafts a lot - she makes the most beautiful quilts you've ever seen - so even though she doesn't knit, she understands the work that goes into them. (These Broadripple s were her Mother's Day present. Yes, I did make them and save them, I just blogged them ahead of time. I didn't wear them until the day before and then give them to her off my stinky feet!)

So anyway, I made Mom slippers, she liked them a lot, she now has no slippers. Clearly the situation must be rectified. I found a really cute Fiber Trends pattern in my Ottawa LYS for felted ballerina slippers. How cute? Cute enough that I had to make a tester pair.

I call these my Tim Burton slippers because of the colours.

Beside my foot for scale. Check out my toenail colour, the striping on the bottom of the slipper, and my mom and dad's fab-u-lous new flooring for the kitchen and family room. And yes, these have not been felted yet.

Now, I knit a lot, and I've been knitting for a while, and I like to think of myself as a decent knitter. Now, there's a TON I haven't done. I am not a Knitter. I know all the basics, and I firmly believe that once you know the knit and purl stitches, there is nothing - nothing - that is truly hard. There are quite a few complex pieces of knitting. But that's it. Knit, purl, and variations thereof. (Actually, that sounds like an awesome title banner.) So why haven't I lived up to my claims yet and knit real lace?

Here it is! The Cobweb Doily from A Gathering of Lace. Looking very non-lacey, and more like a jellyfish. Excuse the flash - the photo with natural light was blurry. Not that it would really change what you could see of the doily anyway.

A profile shot! I didn't notice until I was uploading this photo that there are three cat toys in the background. That's sort of my house at a glance.

I'm just making it in Opera crochet cotton. Cotton on metal dpns . . . sigh . . . smart move, eh? The way the doily is set up, most of it is done in a pattern that looks like little leaves or diamonds surrounded by eyelets. There are seven repeats of this pattern, separated by borders of eyelets and ssk's, so that the borders curve as the doily grows. The edging is scalloped leaves. You knit the first chart once all the way through, then only part of it again, then the edging chart. Except . . . this is where my "not hard, complex" theory is proven. Boy did I prove it. See the thing is, I completely misread the instructions. Instead of doing lines A to Z in the first chart, then K to R before moving on to the second chart, I more like did K to Z. Z!!!

Smooth. I guess other part of knitting is knowing how to freakin' read. Do I sound a little upset?

So now I guess I have to frog this. Did I mention the cotton thread? Bye-bye, cobweb doily.

This calls for something more relaxing. How about mohair?

I know, I know. But it's basically the easiest cardigan ever known to knitterkind.

It's the Mo Jacket by Fleece Artist. It goes incredibly fast because it uses 7 mm needles. I love 7 mm needles. Such a useful size. Because the mohair is so light and airy though, it doesn't feel like a chunky-weight sweater. For those Browncoats out there, I've always wanted to make the sweater River wears in the episode "Safe", but have had to content myself with the fact that I would probably not look good in an oversized tunic-length assymetric ragged hot pink mohair pullover. (Be quiet. It's science fiction.) Well, this is no longer the Mo Jacket. It is now my River cardigan, because it's as close as I'm ever going to get to that hot-pink mohair pullover.

There ya go. Three projects in one post. If you average it out, I'm quite verbose.

Grey day

2006-05-19T14:23:00.000-04:00

Just kicking around today. I had a really full day yesterday - expect a total photodump of a blog entry soon. Just for a teaser, here's my new desktop wallpaper (feel free to steal if you so wish):

So I'm just cleaning up my room in my pyjamas listening to the radio at a much louder volume than is truly sensible. It is so choice. If you have the means, I highly recommend spending a day like this.

Oh, and there has been so so much undocumented knitting you wouldn't believe it. Even - oh yes - a doily.

Well, I thought it would help...

2006-05-15T17:31:00.000-04:00

Your Career Type: Artistic

You are expressive, original, and independent.
Your talents lie in your artistic abilities: creative writing, drama, crafts, music, or art.

You would make an excellent:

Actor - Art Teacher - Book Editor
Clothes Designer - Comedian - Composer
Dancer - DJ - Graphic Designer
Illustrator - Musician - Sculptor

The worst career options for your are conventional careers, like bank teller or secretary.

What's Your Ideal Career?

Ehhhh, not so much. See, the thing is, I think I am fairly creative. But I also like having a certain order to things. It's my compulsive-obsessive side coming out.* I think that's why I prefer knitting to sewing. Knitting is so much more orderly, so tidier! Some may complain about the length of time *cough* not me! never! *cough*, but I think I mostly find it soothing to watch your own two hands making fabric with nothing but two twigs and some string and the same movements over and over again. Plus, you can't really bring a cutting mat onto the bus with you.

I've got a secret! I've been hiding! Under my skin!

2006-05-11T20:20:00.000-04:00

Spoiler warning if you don't want to know what happens at the end of this season of CSI.

I was bored today surfing around, so I got the idea into my head to check out the CBS website for details on the final eps of CSI this season. I've been getting really frustrated with CSI lately - I think it's just fallen prey to its own reputation. "We are a wild and crazy show! Yay! Look at us! Pretty actors! We got sex and lotsa violent crime and drugs and lookit more sex and vampires and werewolves and pr0n (that means sex!) and wheeeeeeeee!" [falls off edge of stage] Also, the Mengele episode. Shudder. I can handle a lot, but not that. But I got back into watching the reruns on Spike, and it really can be good escapist fluff.

ANYWAY.
So I was on CBS's CSI website, and they have this promotion to search for clues as to what happens in the season finale. You look around in a photo with a magnifying glass and discover exciting things. Also, some parts change when you look at them with the magnifying glass. Here's my screen cap, but you really need to look at the original to get it all.

Yes, it's tiny. Click for bigger.

Here's what I have so far, roughly from left to right (some stuff from various googling):

There's a mark on Nick's neck. It looks like a cut. Also, when did George Eads's face become composed entirely out of tanned hide?

When you pan over Sara's face, she turns her head to the right. It's slightly creepy but also kind of pretty in a Madonna of the Rocks sort of way. Yes, I did just read The Da Vinci Code last week, why do you ask?

Panning over the backwards neon PLAY sign turns it into a backwards neon DEAD sign.

Warrick's prominently-displayed left hand is ringless. We found out he got married in the first episode of this season, and there's been conflicts between him and his wife - I think she was upset about his long hours (my, how original. On a show about law-enforcement officials, no less), and he was upset about her spending time with a male colleague. That's is just off the top of my head, though.

Can't see anything significant about Greg or Doc Robbins. Yes, the good doctor is holding a scalpel, but he is a coroner. Unless he and Nick were in a rumble and he wanted to teach that pretty boy a lesson.

Now we come to the big one, the part of the picture that's screaming "LOOK AT ME! MY GOODNESS, WHAT COULD POSSIBLY HAPPEN?!?!?!": the slumped-over body with the bullet wound. My first thought, even before I noticed the "clues", was that it had to be Brass because he was the only one not pictured. Also, the police badge just falling out of his pocket. Brass is going to die? How sad, and also stupid on the part of the producers/writers/etc.

On the stool (ha ha, you said stool) next to Brass's body, something's written in the dust. First off, dust? On a diner stool? Sigh. Anyway, at first I thought it said "UGx?", but I think I was wrong and it's actually "GG + ?" GG is obviously Gil Grissom. I suppose we're fortunate whoever made this stopped just short of encircling this clue with a heart.

Catherine is dressed unbelievably inappropriately for her job. Oh wait, that's not significant at all because that's what she always does. Next!

There is something in the window of the door between Catherine and Grissom. I can't make it out at all. One forum I found whilst googling suggested it was a couple, but I think I only see that once the idea's in my head.

When you scroll over Grissom's face, his head turns to the left. Now Sara and Grissom are looking at each other. Awwww. I'm not normally a 'shipper, but I really liked the end of last week's episode, and I wouldn't mind someone on this team having a halfway happy life every once in a while. That's why Nick's always the one being stalked and kidnapped and buried alive - he's the only normally-functioning human being who works there.

I'm not sure if this merits an individual mention, but whatever's in the door window changes when Grissom's head moves. I'm pretty sure that's not a lightsabre, but who knows . . .

I just noticed this one! When you pan over Grissom's hand, it changes from being relatively flat against his leg to being extended out - like he's offering me a handshake. You could intrepret all kinds of things from this, but it seems jarring to interpret a hand position as "Well, he's clearly moving from being a private, solitary person to one who is extending out into the world" when the picture shouts, "There's a BODY with a GUN WOUND with a BADGE!"*

Has anyone else noticed anything? Mention it in the comments. Apparently the picture keeps changing, with new details being added - some have mentioned something about Catherine's holster being empty, when I can't see any holster. Point out something new for a cookie! Everybody likes cookies!

*That would be the body that has the badge. Not the gun wound.

Secret Pal 8 info

2006-05-02T16:58:00.000-04:00

I was so disappointed today! I kept checking my email but I didn't get my SP8 (I pronounce it "spate"!) info. Then I checked and saw that while signups closed April 30, partner info may not be sent out until May 15.

Well, I feel sheepish.

Sheep!

Anyway, info!

1. What is/are your favorite yarn/s to knit with? What fibers do you absolutely *not* like?
I love wool, especially merino. I also like alpaca, wool blends and some acrylics - Bernat Satin and Caron Simply Soft come to mind. I don't like knitting with cheap, rough acrylic or dishcloth-style cotton.

2. What do you use to store your needles/hooks in?
I store my Denises in their kit, my straights in a needle case and my dpns in a drawer.

3. How long have you been knitting? Would you consider your skill level to be beginner, intermediate or advanced?
2-1/2 years. I would consider myself to be intermediate - I can handle a lot of different techniques and am just dipping my toe into the serious design pool.

4. Do you have an Amazon or other online wish list?
No.

5. What's your favorite scent? (for candles, bath products etc.)
Cinnamon, mango and pear are all good.

6. Do you have a sweet tooth? Favorite candy?
HECK YEAH I got a sweet tooth. I like American Hershery bars, plain and with almonds, and Canadian Hershey toffee & almond bars. I also love love love Phillipine brand dried mango, and basically any type of really good milk or dark chocolate.

7. What other crafts or Do-It-Yourself things do you like to do? Do you spin?
I also make notebooks out of old hardcovers and record albums. I quilt and sew a bit. I'm thinking of learning how to crochet. I do basic crafty stuff like decoupage. I really want to learn to spin - hopefully I'm going to take classes this autumn.

8. What kind of music do you like? Can your computer/stereo play MP3s? (if your buddy wants to make you a CD)
I guess the best classification is classic rock. There's a list of the bands I like in my profile. But my brother is into music like I'm into knitting, so he's always pushing music on me. So I've got kinda diverse taste. My computer can play mp3s.

9. What's your favorite color? Or--do you have a color family/season/palette you prefer? Any colors you just can't stand?
My favourite colours are green and blue. I generally like colours that are deep - jewel-y tones, though not necessarily shiny. I don't like pastels or anything that's too much of a "crayon" colour.

10. What is your family situation? Do you have any pets?
This summer I'm living with my mom, dad and younger brother in Vancouver. The rest of the year I live with my aunt and cousin in Ottawa, where I go to school. The Vancouver house has 3 cats.

11. Do you wear scarves, hats, mittens or ponchos?
Yes, yes, yes and no.

12. What is/are your favorite item/s to knit?
I love socks, and I'm trying to knit more garments now, like sweaters.

13. What are you knitting right now?
I'm doing the finishing on my Picovoli and Boobholder, have two pairs of socks on the needles (one for me, one for my mom), one sweater for me, and I'm swatching for a gift sweater. Normally it's less than this, but I've been to the yarn store lately.

14. Do you like to receive handmade gifts?
Yes.

15. Do you prefer straight or circular needles? Bamboo, aluminum, plastic?
I have a Denise set which I love, but I'm also trying out more straights. I'm never really used any bamboo, but I prefer aluminum over plastic.

16. Do you own a yarn winder and/or swift?
My dad and I are planning on making a swift this summer, but I don't have a yarn winder.

17. How did you learn to knit?
I taught myself Labour Day 2004, out of Debbie Bliss's How to Knit.

18. How old is your oldest UFO?
As far as UFO and not "waiting for the frog pond", probably a triangular garter stitch shawl for my mom. It's got to be at least a year and a half old. I know, bad daughter.

19. What is your favorite holiday?
Christmas.

20. Is there anything that you collect?
Does yarn count? ;) No, I try not to.

21. Any books, yarns, needles or patterns out there you are dying to get your hands on? What knitting magazine subscriptions do you have?
Always! My latest book-lust obsessions are Big Girl Knits and Knitting Rules. I also like almost all of Stephanie Japel's patterns, but I don't have any way to buy online (which is probably a good thing). I don't have any magazine subscriptions.

22. Are there any new techniques you'd like to learn?
I'd like to try more Fair Isle, and I've got a real hankering for lace but haven't been able to find any laceweight.

23. Are you a sock knitter? What are your foot measurements?
I am a sock knitter! All hail the mighty sock! Uh . . . yeah. My foot is 10" long, and both my leg and foot are 9-1/2" around.

24. When is your birthday? (mm/dd)
03/09.

Thank you, SP! I can't wait until I get my partner's info.

Between the devil and the deep blue sea

2006-05-01T07:17:00.000-04:00

I know, I know, it's been a long time since I've posted. Whoda thunk it - taking exams and spending time with friends and family takes away from time spent chronicling my eventless life on the interwebs!

Anyway, there has been quite a bit of knitting. Remember Tubey?

I'm going to quote myself here: "But I know eventually I'll finish it. Could you frog 55" of hard-fought St st?"

Apparently you could.

It was just getting very, very boring. Plus, once I finished the shrug, there was going to be 13" of straight ribbing. Gaggity gag gag gag. There's a reason I never made Tempting. So into ze land of frogs she went.

I began Teva Durham's Dreamcatcher Medallion Cardigan. You can see gorgeous versions here and here. Has anyone else noticed that in Loop-d-Loop, the sizes get larger the further you go into the book? I mean, the Ballet T's size large is 28", and some of the Fair Isle stuff is up into the 50" range, I believe. It's really a sign that I wasn't even knitting the largest size, but the next one down. I know, I know. But I like my cardigans to not have much ease. I wear them open most of the time. I liked learning in Stitch & Bitch Nation about ease, but I think it really is more useful to measure the fit of the sweaters you like.

Ooops, did I say that I was knitting a specific size? Not that I am? Yeah, about that.

Isn't she cute? Lookit that big ole hole! Look at all that careful pattern-reading! Look at those carefully made and attractive bust darts! And what's all this I hear about making buttonholes as you go along?

Yeah. About that. No, it's not crumpled. That's how it looks.

Essentially, you make buttonholes every 12 rows. But I misread the pattern and did them every 11 rows. When I realized my error, I was on the last buttonhole. Oh, how the mighty fall. It just shows what happens when you get cocky. I remembered to do the really cool bust darts (which, incidentally, has got to be the most painful-sounding term in clothing), and I followed the decreases for the dreamcatcher so carefully! And it's the counting of rows that kicks my ass.

So I began to worry. Those 6 rows or so could make quite a bit of difference, I thought. And it's not exactly like I could just add in length when I realized my error because of the shaping of the medallion opening. So I decided I was going to drop down the 3 or so stitches involved, and rework the buttonholes one row later on each.

I'm not going to go into why this was a particularly bad idea. It was. Suffice it to say that I should have remembered that buttonholin' makes new stitches and gets rid of old ones and oh it's just messy and I don't like looking at it.

So I know now how to fix it - I'd drop down all the buttonhole ribbing and rework it all. Easier on everyone. But now I can't stand to look at the thing. And I'd gotten so far . . . and it was going so fast . . . [silent weeping].

But, just like the best way to get over someone is to get under someone, I am a knitting ho and unable to even conceive of waiting until the body's cold. I need someone new. Someone with more than 25% natural fibre, baby. Maybe some . . . merino? And cables, that's right.

My own design. Let me say it again: my own design!!! It's just a raglan from the bottom up, but I did the cable swatch and blocked it and everything. I'm much further along now, but it's just eactly the same as seen there, only longer. 248 stitches per row. Ay ay ay. Twenty cables. I think the sleeves are just going to be plain reverse stockinette with a single cable running up the centre.

This sweater was another reason I didn't post for a while (yes, that's adult, blame the sweater). No, really. I was considering writing it up and submitting it to Knitty or something, but the thing is, the sizing wouldn't work. I'm making mine 40", then I added on the buttonhole edging so it'll be a bit bigger. To make it smaller, you'd have to remove one cable from each cardigan front and two from the back. That would make an 8" difference in sizes. Eight inches! Have you seen many successful patterns that go 32" (40", 48", 56")? I don't think so. The alternative would be to add or remove stitches between the cables to give different gauges for different sizes, but since I'm already using Teva Durham's way of making buttonholes, I'm not going to rip off her Cabled Riding Jacket in the very same garment.

So I'm just going to write up the 40" size when I'm finished. It'll be a free pattern here. I know, you're quivering with anticipation. Me too - but that may be because I'm going to a yarn store and a Hershey factory today. Yay!

Support your local library

2006-04-15T21:21:00.000-04:00

...Because it took me 4 days, from requesting to receiving, the entirety of Fawlty Towers on DVD from my library. I could have gotten it yesterday, but it was closed - I'll refrain from any remarks on the subject as I'm a bit averse to being struck by lightning. Anyway, the point is, go to your local library and be nice to the librarians. Oh, and whatever you do, don't mention the war. I mentioned it once, but I think I got away with it.

Running in Reykjavik

2006-04-12T12:43:00.000-04:00

I know I haven't written for a while, but things have been hectic* lately. Just wanted to pump for a good cause. My mom asked me to mention here (to all of my eight readers) a really great thing her coworker Waleah is doing. Waleah, in addition to being quite a nice person, is running a full marathon to fight diabetes along with her SO, Michael. You can read the full 'origin story' here. It's going to be held in Reykjavik, Iceland this August (not June. My bad)!

Iceland!

Anyway, they need $12,000 in donations together. So if you can spare it - every little bit helps. C'mon, people! Diabetes! You can follow them on their blog, and/or make a direct donation right here.

(If you don't get the fascination with Iceland, you need to read more Princess Diaries books.)

*Where 'hectic' is the variable, let 'hectic' equal any of the following: exams, back pain, money, work, scholarships, parents, and falling off the Use What You Have wagon. Hard.

Procrastination is useful

2006-04-04T08:50:00.001-04:00

After all, if you're knitting, you can't be writing!

Note the Niagara Falls of ends hanging out. That was . . . yeah, that was sad. You should really check your knitting carefully to discern between those ends that need to be trimmed after being woven in, and those that are attached to your working yarn.

Yeah.

I may have said a few unladylike words.

So close!

This was yesterday after my mid-day break. I've bound off the bottom now and just have the sleeves. Expect to finish today.

They come running just as fast as they can

2006-04-02T08:46:00.000-04:00

I'm loving making my Minisweater. I keep imagining wearing it over a light tank in the summertime when I get back home. Behold, after starting yesterday afternoon, here was the progress last night:

And yes, the colour is so off I cannot believe it. It's really not blue at all - more like the green seen here. I love it. And I think this is just the right project for this yarn. It's about a million different plies that come apart at the ends, so it's a good thing this is a) seamless and b) that I'm weaving in all the ends as I go. The texture is hard to describe. If you've ever knit with Red Heart Supersaver (unclean! unclean!), you may have noticed that this single plastic ply is a bit irregular in width and feels roughly textured. Well, Frederika (I just realized I hadn't mentioned the name of the yarn!) is similar. Except it's not irregular in width, it just has the same some of bumpy texture as it slides through your fingers. In a nice way, like going with the grain on corduroy feels.

Yeah, my descriptions suck.

The fabric has a chenille-y look to it. I love this, because it's got that rich depth of colour without having to knit with chenille! Yay!

So, I suppose the pertinent question is, which button to close it with? Well, you know what any smart girl would do. She would knit up the sweater, after making a careful gauge swatch. Then, after blocking and allowing the sweater to dry, she would bring the knitted item to the store to pick out one single, incredibly appropriate button, that would both blend in and stand out.

I am not a smart girl.

I did not swatch. (Somehow I am still getting Stephanie Japel's gauge. This astounds and astonishes me.) I had not started the sweater. I didn't even bring any yarn to the store with me. Did that stop me from buying lots of buttons? Come on now, I am my mother's daughter. Of course I bought buttons!
The big ole green one is for the boobholder. (Oh, come on now. I know my dad is probably freaking out a little bit here. But when you have the choice between minisweater and boobholder, which would you choose? And minisweater connotes cropping to me. Eeeeek! Cropped sweaters!) The pewter ones are for my cardigan of my design. Adorable, aren't they? Yeah, I have no idea whether they'll fit. But they're adorable, and I'm saving the receipt, and also they look like you could transfer the design into a really bitchin' circular lace shawl.

In other news, I've joined Use What You Have Month (via Emmie). I buy way too many craft supplies. So even though I bought the above buttons yesterday (April 1) I am now officially buying no craft supplies this month! Go me!

Besides, I only have two more days of classes. Then EXAMS. so scared. But luckily crafts help keep me sane (when they're going well, that is. Like now. With the boobholder. tee hee). This was really a case of "shopping the stash" and I have to do that more often now!

So, I guess I'd better stop procrastinating and actually do some schoolwork. Au revoir!

Secret Pal 8

2006-04-01T16:44:00.000-05:00

I'm so excited - I just signed up for Secret Pal 8! I've never done something like this before: Sockapaloooza and the Knitty SPs frankly seemed a bit daunting. But heaven knows I've done enough Craftster swaps, and I heard about SP8 on the latest episode of Cast-On* and thought, to heck with it: I'm going to bite the bullet. Wheeee!

Oh, and I finally decided what I'm going to do with that green yarn I bought. It's going to be doubled and become a Minisweater. I didn't think I could wear stuff like that, but after seeing how great Emmie's turned out (and since we're the same size), how could I resist?!?!?

And I'm nearly finished with the waist decreases on my Picovoli. It looks terrific so far - a little loose, but I'm hoping that'll clear up in ~~machine washing and drying~~ blocking.

*Mom, have you listened yet?

More than a river in Egypt

2006-03-30T22:05:00.000-05:00

A quick note: today at Yarn Forward's weekly Sit & Knit, I was browsing through the newly discovered lace patterns binder, highly overexcited at the abundance of lovely Fiber Arts shawls and the like. When what should I stumble across but the very sheep shawl pattern mentioned by the Harlot herself! (I really recommend the book, by the way. So excited for her new one.) In the book it was only mentioned as having been purchased at an Ottawa yarn store, and big ole nerd that I am, I had considered emailing her to find out which one it was, precisely. My nerd quotient, 'tis through the roof at my excitement over this discovery.

Onward and upward, in the parade of ghosts of FOs past!

Pattern: Broadripple socks, by Rob Matyska in Knitty Summer 03
Yarn: Cascade Fixation, colour 2406
Yardage: Just less than two balls
Yarn Source: Wool-Tyme Kingston
Needles: Susan Bates (I think) 3.25 mm dpns

I really like this pattern - simple enough to memorize very quickly, yet still interesting. My only regret is that I fear the feet are too long. The pattern calls for knitting the foot until it is 1.5-2" shorter than desired, then starting the toe. I did 1.5" and still fear the toe may be too long. Oh well - the heel slides up comfortably, and it's not like the toes are flopping around like clown shoes.

I bought this yarn on my recent trip to Kngston to visit my aunt and uncle. I have an unfortunate history with Fixation, but I'll give you the Coles Notes version:

With so many patterns flying around recommending this yarn (darn you, Stitch and Bitch Nation! As an aside, why does a book written by the editor of a feminist magazine include patterns that only go up to 38"?), I was convinced that I must have it! Not to mention the fact that cotton-spandex blends are not exactly plentiful; I can sub Paton's Classic Merino for Lamb's Pride Worsted or Cascade 200, and Lana Grossa Meillenweit or Kroy for Opal or Lorna's Laces - you get the picture. But naught for Fixation.

So I finally tracked down this yarn at a stall at a fibre exhibition. However, this same stall had included a Knitty pattern in its kits. I recognized the pattern immediately for what it was, and knew that this was at the least unethical and probably illegal. I finally got up the gall to confront the stall owner and was told that because she was not selling the pattern by itself, she had done nothing wrong. My delicate teenage pride wounded by her tone, I marched away angry and upset, but eventually skulked back because I really wanted that yarn. I bought four balls of a deep royal purple.

Much to my alarm, this wasn't similar to the acrylics or wools or even dishcloth cotton I'd used before. No, this stuff was (suprisingly enough) really, really stretchy. How did one hold it? Did you stretch it out or let it hang? What about its disturbing propensity to fall off the needles in the early stages (not that I ever progressed beyond)? And howsabout that stitch definition, eh?

Certain that I was a Just Not Good Enough for the seemingly exalted and likely cursed Fixation, I ended up RAKing my precious, long-sought stash of it all away. Karma is, as they say, a bitch. This yarn just had bad vibes and wasn't going to quit for me.

Then this February, I visited my relatives who live in Kingston - Ontario, not Jamaica. (As a sidenote, I know some people would highly disagree, but I really enjoyed Kingston. It's quite pretty.) Somehow I managed to wrangle in a trip to a yarn store [innocent whistle]. I promised to be quick, only to be told by my uncle that he in fact used to knit, and did all the household sewing as well. I was a bit shocked (I know, how sexist of me) but really pleased as punch. I whipped around the store in a mad rush, exercising a disturbing lack of restraint. And what should I find but Cascade Fixation.

It was during this trip (wow, some Coles Notes version, eh?) that I was working on my Olympic socks. I'd been knitting socks for a while now and was willing to give it another go. Plus, you know. No bad vibes!

So I found this pattern, and set forth. The leg is 6-3/4" rather than the 7" recommended. I tried to be good this time, really I did, but still was eager to get to the "good part". I'm not sure using a solid colourway was the best idea. On the other hand, people rarely complain about their socks being too sober, and when on the leg it looks like a rather nice lacey pattern with the row of eyelets cascading (ha) down the leg and foot.

And may I just say, I love the dpns I used. I think they're Susan Bates - I got them at Wal-Mart. They're a shiny deep plum colour. More needle companies should think of making their needles pretty colours. I have a pair of plastic Japanese 7mm needles a friend gave me for Christmas a few years back that I love for their endearing shade of pink (along with being Japanese and 7mm and a gift from a friend).

It has begun to get warm here very quickly - it is supposed to be 17 degrees tomorrow! (That's Celsius. Canada is not that crazy.) Today I was overly warm wearing pinstripes and a cotton cardi. You know what that means:

Yes, that is a sticker of mad scientist Yzma on my computer.

Denial! I wore wool socks twice this week and paid for it. So of course the sensible thing to do is start another pair. By the way, what is up with the jacquard sections of this sock? They don't line up prettily like they do on my pink socks, which is just another colourway. Same needles, too. Bah.

By the way, I call these my animated socks because the colours remind me of old children's illustrations, for which I a huge sucker.

In non-Egyptian news, I have been working on a season-appropriate garment!

(...you got it? gosh, we are a sad crew. now let's move on)

I'm sure it goes without saying that the colour is completely off. It's much more of a dark, steely blue.

It's Grumperina's Picovoli! I'm doing it in Amazon Cotton DK. I wasn't able, no matter how hard I tried, to get 5.5 spi, even though I went down a needle size and machine washed and dried my swatch, trying to make it shrink. No such luck. Still only getting 5 spi. So I did my math and figured I could just go down a pattern size. Yay!

I'll leave you with this:

Yes, these are the sort of things my brain comes up with late at night.

Thuja thockth

2006-03-29T14:22:00.000-05:00

As part of my ongoing attempt to document all of my FOs, I present my Thujas, only a few weeks after they were finished!

Pattern: Thuja socks, by Bobby Ziegler, in Knitty Winter 05
Yarn: Cascade Quatro, colour number 9437 (purple tweed). 100% Peruvian highland wool.
Yardage: Less than one hank (220 yards).
Yarn Source: bought from Wool N' Things, as part of my birthday present from my parents.
Needles: Aero 4mm dpns.

Obviously I used a different yarn than was recommended. I was quite relieved when I found out you could use any worsted-weight for this pattern. I really liked this yarn - it was actually four strands, each a different shade of purple. I would use it again as it's soft and comfy, and would probably give a great subtlely-mottled appearance to a pair of Fuzzy feet. It was bought as part of my birthday present from my parents - thanks, Mom and Dad!

I'm glad I made the cuffs 2" shorter than in the pattern. I generally do this because I am just plain impatient and overeager to get to the interesting part (another reason I have to learn how to do toe-up socks). But with my long (women's US size 10) feet, I'm not sure I could have gotten the full 6" cuffs without running out of yarn in the toes.

I am planning on just using these as house slippers, and have been great so far. The only issue I have is how they have stretched out. With my other handknit socks I've noticed this too, but after a run through the wash they're snug as can be again. Obviously I can't do that with these, but it's not like they're falling down or anything. Perhaps next time I would move down to US 5 needles, since they are only .25 mm smaller and would be likely to keep a snug cuff.

In other making news:

Standard lunch since I've been on this new plan. Whole wheat bread, mayo-like substance, cheddar cheese and deli turkey, with nectarine as a side. Double plus yummy. Though today for lunch I had mussels, cheese and crackers while reading Folk Socks. Felt quite the bohemian.

Not part of the plan:

I have dinner at my aunt and uncle's every week, and felt like I should bring at least something. The ubiquitous, never-fail Neiman Marcus recipe. Halve it, leave out the Hershey bar, make the cookies reasonably small and you get 49 48 47 a lot of cookies.

(And please to excuse the blurry food photos. The ones with flash looked hideously unappetizing.)

"Fifty lashes, and then, you walk the plank."

2006-03-24T14:23:00.000-05:00

The above quote, by the way, is one of my favourites - spoken by no other than the inimitable Sam the Eagle in Muppet Treasure Island (truly a cinematic masterpiece - what other film features Muppets, a singing Tim Curry, and pirates?!?!?).

But it relates to my actual gist - I have not been writing much actual content lately. Apologies. School has lightened up for about a week or so, and I spent nearly all last weekend watching the entirety of Firefly on DVD. (Captain Tightpants!) But true to form, I am sure I will be struck by the muse or some other such nonsense next week when I will have work to hand in.

So, to distract you, some random stuff.

I'd always been interested when people talked about what search queries and such lead viewers to their site, and I never knew how to find that out. So I asked in the blog section of the Knittyboard and of course got a number of great responses. I've wound up using RetroStats, which so far is quite satisfactory. Plus, you know. Cute little buttons and all that.

It's quite intriguing seeing the referring sites. I have NO idea how RetroStats claims people get from certain sites to mine (nothing naughty, just blogs without similar content or links). But it is a rush to find out when people link to you: for instance, I'm listed here on The 8 Track Knitting Diva's site as someone who's made Kate (scroll waaaay down to see her). And on Auntie Amanda's blog, because I helped her out with making project status bars. (Anyone interested? I still have the text; I'd be willing to post a tutorial.) And also from Melissa's MSN Space. Seriously, I have no comment. Her blog is basically her. Also, to get sappy for a moment, I can't wait until I get home this summer, because I miss you, Moe!

The majority of my visitors are from "Unknown" - how cool is that! I see this as either the infinite blackness of space, or, you know, a fortified island bunker in the Pacific. But I also have people stumbling in from as far away as the UK, Australia and the Phillippines! And the majority speak English, but apparently those who speak Lithuanian, Dutch, Swedish and German have stopped by. (Those languages must be fairly related; perhaps shaxophile resembles a word from one of those languages?)

Of course, the stuff everyone's interested in: search queries. (And, by the way, people actually use MSN search? Colour me shocked.)

isaac mizrahi fairweather ads and isaac mizrahi fairweather model - Uh, Fairweather? You sure? And, actually, how did you get directed here? Wait, I just did a Google search. It was because I mentioned how much I loathed watching Mizrahi before the Oscars and had used a Fairweather shirt for a craft. I am actually eighth in the list for this search! And as a a bonus, "shaxophile" actually shows up in a Google search - it hasn't before. But still, Isaac Mizrahi did Fairweather clothes?

example of buble sort animation - I'm guessing they mean animation of bubbles. Though a kid's TV show with Michael Buble has the possibility of being hi-larious.

must have cardigan - It's right here, darling. Lovely, isn't it? I'm doing it in Paton's Classic in a dark faded denim colour. If you told me a few months ago I'd willingly be making a free Berocco pattern, and being calling it classic and everything, you could have knocked me over with a feather. Shows how a little Norah Gaughan can really class up a joint. And as an aside, as well as being one of my preferred designers, Norah Gaughan has got to have one of the loveliest names ever, really. (Addendum: apparently there is a real pattern called the Must Have Cardigan, designed for no other than Paton's Classic. But I still prefer Hibito.)

lovin%27 spoonful daydream myspace code - Hope you get some help with that aphasia. Really, I'm lost.

sarah needs - Some chocolate. Have started a new "I'm going to get healthy and save money and go to the gym, I mean it, for reals this time" regimen. Waaaaaaant chocolate.

Well, that's real nice.

2006-03-23T08:47:00.000-05:00

What Classic Movie Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

Governor James Douglas is my hero

2006-03-14T22:40:00.000-05:00

I know all I do lately is talk about schoolwork, but that's because that's all I'm doing lately. (Though I did try Moosehead beer today - nice.) Anyway, quick rant. I'm writing this huge (25% of our grade) essay for my Cdn. History course, and my topic is on colonial governments' sexual regulation of colonists. Sadly not as fascinating as you'd think. But anyway, there was this big conflict in BC back in the 1860s where some people were advocating mixed-race marriages, because marriage is good and it'll stop the state of fornication and children born out of wedlock, etc etc etc. Then there were those who opposed this, saying that the racial and moral divide is too large. Allowing white men and Native women to wed will only destroy the sanctity of marriage.

Do you see where I'm going with this???

But then again, it is moments like this, as much as they frustrate me, that make me love history. Because someday our generation will be history, and they will be wondering why we made such a big deal about gay marriage.

Here's hopin'.

PS. Happy birthday to my dad. No matter how cool James Douglas was, my dad will always beat him in who is my hero. It's not fun being away from my family for birthdays, but it's only a short time now until I'm home!

Le sigh

2006-03-12T17:39:00.000-05:00

Notes upon writing an essay about Johnny Depp for film studies class:

(click for clarity)

To quote Samuel L. Jackson, "ENGLISH, MOTHERFUCKER! DO YOU SPEAK IT?"

Is it just me, or does the phrase "the children have won golden tickets into Wonka's factory" sound really dirty? I even avoided using the word chocolate anywhere. Yup, I'm officially grossed out.

It's really creepy when you identify one of the key traits of the man people around the world drool over as consistently portraying childlike characters. (This is even excluding J. M. Barrie.) Think about it: Ed Wood's voice. Willy Wonka. Edward Scissorhands is just a baby, people!

If I throw in one more D'Onofrio (his Orson Welles is to die for), Wonka or Schwartzenegger, I think my spellcheck is going to commit ritual seppuku.

But it recognizes Sandra Bullock?

Oeuvre is a really really hard word to spell.

I had to watch Johnny Depp movies for this project, y'all. It was homework. I know, you're seething with jealousy. Anyway, was looking up quotes and found this:

Mike Teavee: Who wants a beard?
Willy Wonka: Well, beatniks for one, folk singers and motorbike riders. Y'know. All those hip, jazzy, super cool, neat, keen, and groovy cats. It's in the fridge, daddy-o! Are you hip to the jive? Can you dig what I'm layin' down? I knew that you could. Slide me some skin, soul brother!

Damn. That, along with the dolls at the beginning, make me weep, I swear. Oh, and the walking into the elevator. When my life stops being insane I'll have to rewatch this.

Oh! And the cannabalism joke. I quote that on an alarmingly high level.

Oh, and the flag museum. Dang.

Slip sliding away

2006-03-12T11:24:00.000-05:00

So! 'Twas my birthday on Thursday. It was perhaps not ideal (damn you, freezing rain! Damn yoooooooooooou!) but I still had some good times nonetheless. For one thing, I got a hair cut. I'm not going to post a before shot basically because a) they all look like crappy myspace photos, sans androgynous emo kid, and b) I got a haircut for a reason, duh. But after!

Hawt.

So, anyway, one of the things I did was go out to Wool N' Things in Orleans, because it's a high-end store an hour-long bus ride away so if I didn't go now I probably wouldn't ever go. It was nice but you know what? I really, really can't see myself ever buying Rowan or Debbie Bliss yarn now. It is SO goddam expensive (and this shop claimed to offer 10% off MSRP). I mean, around $7/ball is my upper limit unless it's something like socks where you only need one or two balls. And this stuff is sold in 50g balls at the most. Grrr. Anyway, I did get two nice things:

Tweedy purple Cascade Quatro, currently halfway through sock two of a pair of Thujas. Wondering what I was doing while I was balling (snicker) this hank?

New (sheep!) socks (from my aunt and uncle for my birthday) and Jon Stewart. And sock yarn. Deliriously happy much?

I also got 10 balls of this (bargain bin! $2/ball! Yay!) for a summer top. It's greener in person, almost emerald-y.

As for other stuff in my life, it's basically school school school oh god what am I going to do with this stupid degree if I ever get it because I hate this paper oh gawd teh angstzors. Maybe something more fun to discuss?

Ah yes, the topic I know the least about yet love to gab on and on about! You got it: music! All of a sudden there is a ton more music on my iPod. I lay the blame for this solely at the feet of The Royal Tenenbaums.

Damn, but that is a good movie. But I have to admit my feelings upon my first viewing could be summed up in four words: Double. You. Tee. Eff. But I've seen it two more times and like it more and more every time now, so that I'd count it among my favourite movies now. Anyway, it was the first time I'd ever heard Elliott Smith, and it really connected with me even the first time. (This time, when the guitar started up in the movie, I felt my entire body clench up, knowing what was about to happen.) Then, this time, I heard "Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard," by Paul Simon, so I went off to a completely legal source of music and dl'd it. Then that sent me off on a search for songs from The Concert in Central Park. Then that reminded me of a Willie Nelson "Bridge Over Troubled Water" cover my brother sent me. Plus that cover of "Hey Jude" from the movie. Then Travis's screen name sent me off to find "Do You Believe in Magic?". And so on and so on. So without further ado, stuff you should listen to post-haste:

"9 to 5," Dolly Parton. I have this big theory on how this song is actually a Communist declaration that someday I will write up and post here. (I also think this about A Bug's Life. I mentioned that to my film studies TA, and he suggested the same for Dinosaur.)

Anything by Deirdre Flint. Hilarious. I first heard her through Cast-On, and am particularly fond of "The Boob Fairy" and "Cheerleader", though I really wish I could find "Presidential Succession."

"Do You Believe in Magic?", The Lovin' Spoonful. C'mon now, you know you like it. At the very least, you'll have this song stuck in your head for a few days before you give in. Mwahaha.

"Fever," Michael Buble. How much do I like this song? Like much of my generation, I can't listen to this song without thinking of Edna Krabappel. Popping balloons. Oh god. Here is Sarah's easy guide to getting past this:

Close your eyes.
Are they closed? Good. You are a liar. You can't read with your eyes closed. Try that one again and I will cut choo so bad you gonna wish I didn't cut choo so bad.
OK, let's try this one: read ahead to the end, then do the instructions. We good? We good.
Close your eyes.
Think of Michael Buble.
Think of Michael Buble singing this song.
Ahhhh. There we go.

Seriously, I like this song so much I can even get past its invocation of Pocahontas and John Smith as romantic ideals. Am on the fence about several lines but like it generally as a whole. While you're at it, check out "You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby".

"Happy Together," The Turtles. Just a happy song, plus now I can't listen to it without thinking of the flowers at the end of Adaptation.

"Hungry Like the Wolf," Duran Duran. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA seriously I like it HAHAHAHAHA... I mean, honestly, I can't even say the name without giggling.

Most any song from The Concert in Central Park, particularly "Kodachrome Maybellene", "Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard", "Wake Up Little Susie" and especially "Late in the Evening"! I do my Snoopy dance when I listen to "Late in the Evening".

"Uptown Girl," by Westlife. Oh shut up. Yes, I know. Billy Joel. Covered by a Brit pop boy band. I know, okay? In my defence, the video has Ioan Griffudd and Crispin Bonham-Carter (aka Mr. Bingely) pretending to be rich a-holes, and I need something to exercise to.

"Daydream Believer," The Monkees. I DARE you to not like this song. I win.