Bats In My Belfry

Well the good news is that the "missing" yarn has arrived. I have no idea why it was sent to my MIL's house. Probably because that's the billing address for the credit card. I did think, when I ordered it, to specifically tell them to ship it to my home address. Perhaps it was a foggy day in the U.K. in more ways than one. But, I was thrilled to hear that it had arrived and that she was, kindly, dropping it by this evening.

The bad news is, I don't like it. I don't like the feel of it, I don't like how it's working up. I do like the colour. For the record it's Rowan Scottish Tweed Chunky in "Mallard". I wound them into balls and two of the three had at least 2 knots in them. One had 4.

I am so sad.
Maybe I had too high expectations but this just ain't ticklin' my fancy. I did a swatch and gave it a quick wash (will eventually felt it as that might be something I can do with this, although I doubt I have enough to do much aside from something pretty small…3 100g balls). Ah well, live and learn. For now I'm working up a scarf in it and we'll see how it ends up. I have become quite the expert at frogging things.

Grrr…there's meant to be a paragraph HERE.
I also got 2 50g balls of Rowan handknit cotton. Haven't worked with it yet but this does feel lovely. Has a nice ply and a lovely soft blue in colour.

There is also meant to be a paragraph HERE.

When my MIL was here, she asked me what "kind" of knitting I was doing. Poor Himself got stuck in the middle of the translating until we just got down to the "how" of it. She was talking about "right" and "left" stitches which made no sense to me at all. So, I cast on and did a bit of garter and a bit of stockinette and, best as I can tell, "right" is knit and "left" is purl . Of course, I may have reversed those because she then caused my head to explode showing how she knits and purls. I have never seen anything so convoluted in my life. What she was doing wasn't "Continental". I've mucked about with that enough where I know how the hands are supposed to work and this bore no resemblence at all to that. There was a lot of contorting, the "picking" was there as was the left hand holding the yarn but there was some funky stuff going on.

She then asked to see how I did it and I proceeded to demonstrate. She was about as coordinated with my methods as I am with "Continental". Not very. She did say:"I can see where if one has a lot of knitting to do that your method would be less tiring.".

No shit! I swear what she did looked like macrame with knitting needles.

My MIL is a nurse and when she heard how craptacular Himself was feeling she decided to bring over some meds (homeopathic) and took a culture and drew some blood. It is patently obvious he has a nice infection going on, although he was a bit more perky today than yesterday. We are guessing strep. Will know for sure tomorrow afternoon when the culture is done.

I will be extremely pissed off if I get strep. I suppose I should prepare to be extremely pissed off because I really don't see how I'll be avoiding it. Grrr. When I told her I'd damn near given him back to her yesterday she laughed and said something (that Himself wouldn't quite translate) but the gist was "Nope. He's all yours now.". Humpfh.

Well I think I'll go muddle along with the Rowan (cry) wool and see if I can come up with a scarf that doesn't remind me of Brillo. I swear this stuff it sticky, itchy and feels, well, like some craptacular acrylic.

Winter still has a grip on us, rain, sodden, in the lower 40s. Next time I go to the market I am going to buy flowers. I need something bright and cheery 'round here.

Lovely, the paragraphs aren't paragraphing no matter how many times I go back, edit, fix and save. I guess I'll be needing to learn enough HTML to feckin' force these things. 

Bah. 

Where in the bloody blue blazes is my yarn & tea? This is getting seriously silly. The tea, I suppose I can understand coming from the States and all but the yarn is really puzzling me. It wasn't a large order so it's not as if there's some humongous box to be dealt with. I think it was all of 400g of yarn and one pair of 8mm bamboo (love 'em) needles. 

Aside from that, not the best of days. Himself has been sick for over 2 weeks now. I think it's either strep or a sinus infection based on what I can get out of him which is little save "urgle, honk, this sucks" and "I'm never going to get well again!" (no you're likely not if you don't bloody do something about it.) He categorically refuses to go to the doctor. Yesterday I asked him if he didn't think that might be a good idea. He didn't want to bathe or do laundry (I offered to do the laundry, newp, not having that he wasn't). So he took a bunch of OTC meds. (not sure what all they were as I'm not familiar with the ingredients but one was something homeopathic and the other some sort of decongestant) along with 2 pots of herbal tea and I forced him to take ibuprofen. All well and good, he slept for about eight hours. 

And woke up grouchier than a hibernating bear being poked with sticks. Understandable feeling as poorly as he does but for the love of all things sacred, go to the doctor. I hate doctors too but there comes a time…
So we had "words". I was, again, trying to get him to be sensible and give some thought to the idea that his immune system seems to have had its ass kicked and he got defensive. Well that's nothing new, the defensive part. If I suggest something he tends to default to defensive anyway. *sigh*

So we went to an Apotheke, most confusing since they used to always be closed on Wednesday afternoons. They were all open (wonder if the sheer amount of folks running about with the plague or bird flu or whatever the hell is floating around piqued their greedy little souls enough to have longer hours?). And he came out with the equivalent of DayQuil and NyQuil. So I guess his approach is going to be to knock his ass out and hope for the best. Me? I'd've opted for Drambuie instead.
Is strep contagious? Because gawd help him if I come down with it too. If whatever he has is contagious I'm in deep shit. He has a lovely habit of standing in the middle of the kitchen, being pathetic and coughing without covering his mouth and spraying everything within a meter. This is why I think we're dealing with an infection rather than something contagious since I've not managed (touch wood) to be laid low.

Ah well, I just don't know what I can do except hope that he rallies and kicks it. No doctor. His hissy fit today made that crystal clear. He won't let me involve his mother. Hell, I thought maybe she could either get him to the doctor or give me some idea as to how to treat this because I'm not at all "up" on German medicaments. But no. Can't do that either.

So I've got a sick fellow here who is being rather irrational and hard to help. Of course, I'm just making it worse. I guess I'm meant to just let him croak and blithely ignore the lead-in.

Bugger.

On a less whingish note, Oblivion kept me up 'til 3 a.m. Got me with the "just a couple more minutes" thing. Good game. Still not sure what I'm doing but I'm having a hell of a lot of fun doing it.

Got another of the light grey squares done and I'm not thrilled with the edge. Oddly it's the same (slip 1st st. as if to knit) that I do on the dark grey squares but it's all wobbly on the light grey neccesitating me strangling that first and second st. (especially on the decrease half, k2tog, 2nd st.) in order not to have this lovely little puff thingie on the edge. Not sure why I'm being so picky about it as that'll all disappear in the joining (one of the reasons I decided to go the squares route along with figuring by the time I got something the size he wants, I'd need some sort of pulley & lever system to move it around.). Guess I'm just determined to get it right even if it won't end up showing.

So much to learn. I did get my "Knitting for Dummies" from Amazon.co.uk (I will point out that this was ordered Sunday, shipped Monday and is here Wednesday.). I laughed out loud, alarming Himself, when I read the bit about "ripping back" and the picture showed something that should have, of course, occured to me but did not. Y'know, the concept of running a needle through the row below where you need to rip back to *before* you start ripping out.

Dolt. Me. Yup.

Downside was that showed nice illustrations for doing so with stockinette. But I have no idea how to manage it in garter which is, at this point, just about the limit of my, erm, abilities (well not strictly true. I can do stockintte, it's just that I hate it, so flat, so blah and so argumentative with the curling in thing). So I forsee a swatch of garter with me valiantly poking a needle (and I did manage to realise that using a couple size smaller needle might be a good trick, not completely daft, me) in where I think it should be poked and hoping I've figured it out.

Maybe tomorrow because tonight is Oblivion and checking up on He Who Apparently Wishes To Die Of The Plague.

And maybe, just maybe I'll have tea and/or yarn tomorrow? 

I think Spring buggered off. From a high of 72f (!) the other day we're down to the upper 30s again and it's damp, dreary and, well, typically winter again. I guess it is a bit early to be getting psyched about the end of this ominpresent dreariness but even after 3 years, I still miss the more-often-than-not sunshine of Colorado. A lot.

Speaking of things I miss…my yarn order from the U.K. still isn't here and my tea order from Adagio is also missing. I have visions of folks in German customs knitting and drinking my tea. I just want to get my hands on something that isn't acrylic. I have a feeling that I'll toss this Himself-ghan into a basket and forget it whilst I wallow in wool.

And I won't care.

I just need to get it though. Literally someone could've walked it from the U.K. to here in the time it's taking.

On the plus side, we got our copies of Bethesda's "Oblivion" (Elder Scrolls series) today. His is for the Xbox and mine for the PC. Which means, of course, even less time in the same place. Not that there could actually be much less time in the same place unless we can go into the negative. Anyway…

It's really nice in a confusing sort of way. My only complaint is that I far preferred the "tutorial" lead-in from Morrowind to Oblivion. I could NOT figure out where in the hell I was supposed to be going. It was *dark*. I hadn't managed to find any torches and so I kept bumping into things, stepping on rats (who promptly chewed on me) and missing all kinds of cool stuff.

Character creation/options is awesomely complex. Really a nice job there. I still am not overly fond of the W-A-S-D movement thing but I'll get used to it. Looks like it will be another very involved, takes-3-feckin'-forevers game. That's a good thing.

Got one more light grey square done (with only one mistake which I miraculously was able to sort out…I must've been channeling an actual kitter) and I am itching to get back to working with something that's not made from squished, aged dinosaur bits. I might have to do a couple things tomorrow for flea-market sellage.

It's raining. Meh. I think I'll go play Oblivion for an hour or so before bed.

No, that's too civilised. I am having a knitting meltdown. I am, apparently, unable to feckin' knit this bleedin' square in the light grey yarn.

I. Cannot. Do. It.

This is the consistent result:

See that? That…that…mess? That's the result of tearing this bloody thing apart for the fifth time. Yes, five times. A stupid square that has kicked my arse five times now. This time I managed to screw up not once but twice in the same row. I missed one of the two strands. I tried, I tried valiantly to figure out how to get it back. I TINKed. I daintily ripped the row out to find that I couldn't suss out how to get that second (missed) strand wound right (nevermind getting the stitches back on the needle, although I did have a moment where it occured to me to use a smaller bleedin' needle). Oh and then there was the "oh let's just not bother to use the second strand on the end of row kf&b increase".

I tore the whole bloody thing out, again. There it sits. Taunting me. Reminding me that just when I think I'm getting a clue that I'm not. That my inability to rip-back is hindering me greatly and that, further, I HATE THIS PROJECT.

My witch cow hates it too.

Update: After thinking maybe this whole knitting thing was going to end up like the whole "learning German" thing, I took some really deep breaths and gave it another go. I had it in the back of my mind that I was psyching myself out and that there was absolutely no reason that this square shouldn't go as the previous ones had. I knit until I got back my rhythm. I knit until that messy pile of yarn disappeared and I had to start pulling new yarn.

Final update: (e.g. I'm gonna finally shut up about this, probably) So, from the above, comes:

And yes, it is larger. Sorry about the bandwidth business but I'm celebrating. I know, I know, it doesn't look like much. I could plead that it hasn't been blocked (true) and some other stuff that might just make it sound like I had a clue but really, I'm just bloody thankful I got past whatever mental gremlins were plaguing me.

The lovely (and monstrous) Bear guards over my triumph. Two seconds later she boogied out of there at the speed of light. Was nice to be able to get a picture of her. Normally I get tortie-blurs.

As can probably be seen I still have "gauge issues".

I don't care right now. I just don't. I finished this damn thing and I learned something whilst doing it. I learned that I can be patient even when I have the overwhelming desire to set something on fire, stomp on it, then toss it in the blender and pulverise it. This, for me, is a huge discovery. I'm not sure whether it's due to something as nice as "personal growth" or whether I am this damn determined to get knitting.

Don't know. Don't care. The very fact that I kept going is a personal best.

I'm gonna go make some tea and grin a lot. And only 40 more of these things to go.

Since I've never blogged before and I am, apparently, allergic to HTML (something which causes Himself <he who is a professional Web designer> no end of befuddlement and chagrin), I will likely have a very rough go for a bit with mad bouts of postings as I figure things out followed by stretches of nothingness whilst I wrestle with the next thing.

Just politely (please?) ignore it and hope that I finally get it all sorted and can get on to the point which actually is to keep track of things in a timely, semi-organised manner.

Right then.

Pictures…because I can.

Markdorf, old town.

This one caught our eye.

Another day of sun signifying that, maybe, just maybe the past six months of gloom, "worst winter on record", grey, dribbly, sodden weather is past?

Blue skies! Whispy clouds, warm air (61f), windows-open kind of day. This is a view from my roof window looking NW toward, well, other parts of Germany.

Here's my "nook-in-the-making". This will, ultimately, be my workroom. It will be off-limits to all save the cats (which here basically means Himself cannot set foot in here on pain of massive quantities of bitching being leveled against him). Obviously in dire need of shelving or some sort of storage because it's all in baskets. Now, I love baskets and boxes and neat containers. Love 'em. Probably obsessed with them but they're not overly good for seeing what's in them. Note the spiffy laundry hamper that I have so cleverly turned into a "desk".

Ah well, like the knitting…small steps. I, of course, want to be able to sweep into Möbelix or Ikea and madly purchase just the right things so that I can immediately furnish this room in a manner that will make me feel complete and organised.

Hah.

Send money.

Oh and here's what the neighbor's balconies look like.

They have a penchant (all the neighbors do) for lovely plants and interesting bits on their balconies. We don't have a balcony. We have a tiny, postage stamp sized patio which borders on the "neighbor who I'd most like to inflict grave injury upon with numerous knitting needles and other pointy objects". Long story and I'm in too good a mood today to go into it. Suffice it to say I'd rather have all my teeth pulled (again) than sit out there for her to bray at me in a language that I don't understand and have no way to say "shut the hell up, you nosey, overinflated, leopard-print-wearing air bag".

Be cool if I could manage that in German eh? Let's see here…

schließen Sie die Hölle, Sie nosey, über aufgeblähter,
Leopard-drucken-tragender Luftsack.

Well, she'd probably get my drift.

It has been a long winter. A long dreary, "worst winter on record" kind of winter. Dribbly, cold, damp and altogether yucky. First winter I've seen where the ground went brown and grey (usually stays green here throughout winter).

Of course I got nailed with the time change which caused much confusion this morning. I staggered downstairs to make coffee and encountered an oddity. Himself, in the kitchen, cooking. I thought I was hallucinating but no, he really was. He was making "pancakes" (the rest of the world would call these crepes but no, here they are pancakes-actually die Pfannkuchen if one is precise, which I'm often…not.). This kind of threw me for a loop since usually his presence in the kitchen means cobbling something together to snack on which leaves a trail of evidence as wide as an airport runway, say JFK.
Anyway, so I shuffle some things out of the way to make coffee and realise I've left the Tassimo refill-thingies up in the office (Hush, they're up there because we mail-ordered them and all mail-order stuff gets brought up to the office.). So I made instant. Hideous but since I had a headache and was, understandably, boggled at the presence of Himself cooking, it was my only recourse.

I made decaf. Duh.

So up to the office I stagger with the decaf (not realising this) and note the time on the 'puter. Late, I thought. Didn't think it was that late. Upon slurping some coffee I made the discovery that it was not high-test and went downstairs (remembering to bring the Tassimo thingies) to make a real cup. Glanced at the clock and saw a different time. Hmmm. Make a note that a new battery is needed for the kitchen clock.

Make coffee. Bring upstairs. Make note to buy batteries. Commence drinking coffee, do the blog rounds.

Himself wanders in to inform me that he has ordered a grill (hurrah!) and asks me if I'm aware of the time change.

Gah. Well, no. I hadn't been.

Anyway, the sun is out…I imagine the birds are singing (not that I can hear them), but I imagine they are. That is unless they have the bird flu which has arrived in our area causing me a few moments of utter terror until I did some research and was able to ratchet the terror down to "mere unease" and cancel the incipient ban of my dearly loved MIL from our house since she lives in the very town that the first unfortunately demised birds were found in.

There is hope that winter may have finally buggered off.

With that hope, I peered out the kitchen window to check on the plants in the wee little front, uhm, plant-area. Looks like the roses are still there but the wandering neighbourhood cats seem to have completely eaten the mums. Who knew cats liked mums? Little stubbles left at ground level. Bah. I feel compelled to do something about that but not having anything remotely resembling a green-thumb, I'm not sure what to do. Everyone else has riotous displays, windowboxes, gorgeous roses etc. and I have, well, dirt. I keep swearing that I'm going to put down green gravel and stick some silk flowers in there and call it a day but Himself gives me the evil-eye and I back down. Not that he would actually do something about it, no. He'll just bemoan that we're the only house in the row that looks like some sort of herbiage (probably not a word, but I like it) plague hit it. I suppose we should hire that nice fellow from last year to come, "tsk tsk" at us, send us off to the local greenhouse with orders to buy plants, come back, hand them to him and then get out of the way except for the part where we give him money.

Works for me.

Anyway, I'm trying to decide where I am going to be able to do my knitting/crocheting this summer where I can be outside. We live in what we'd call a "townhouse" back in the States. Long, narrow, windows only on the north and south exposures and bleedin', feckin' HOT in the summer (well save for the unfinished basement). This place holds heat rather well, so well that here in the office (on the top floor of 3, four if you count the basement) we never have to turn the heat on. Indeed, we actually ran an air-conditioner all winter. Nuts, huh? Well, imagine what it's like in the summer with all the computers (three), printers, monitors 4 (as Himself has 2) and lights. It is pure misery. Usually in the mid 90s (upper 30s in c.).
The back "patio" (postage stamp sized bit of concrete) is out because of the "She who wears polyester leopard prints and bitches constantly whether anyone is around or not".

There is, down the road a bit, toward the dairy farm, a tree with a bench underneath that might suit but, terminally shy me, would probably have a stroke if someone were to happen by and actually try to speak to me. Still, on a clear day, you can see the Alps from there and it's in a rather large open area where there just might be a bit of breeze.

Or, I could just say screw it and beg for another a/c for my "nook" and wish I lived somewhere where the worry about my toenails melting or fungus growing between my fingers wasn't an issue. Too, with my luck, a bird flu laden african swallow will (in an attempt to figure out its own velocity) swoop to its demise on my lap causing me to die not of bird flu but of hysterics.

The a/c sounds best.

I think I'll go knit.

/end wall o' text. :-P 

Long story (eventually will get all typed in here) but Himself wanted a new blanket (too feckin' big to be called a mere afghan) for his couch-wallowing.

Well I initially thought to do it in crochet 'til it became obvious that wouldn't be "warm enough". I did try a prototype:but decided I did not want to crochet what would end up being about 5'x6' all in one piece. So, that got frogged.

Did a sample bit in crochet afghan stitch but didn't care much for it although he liked it. Couldn't see doing it.

In the meantime, I took to knitting and one of my biggest problems is maintaining gauge. So, got to thinking that it might not be a bad idea to knit a butload of, well, essentially swatches ostensibly in the same gauge (ever hopeful, me) and then put them together and say "Look, here's your spiffy new blanket".

The first square is done: Now the yarn? Well it's a cheesy acrylic but that's what he wanted (and thank goodness given the amount that'll get used. This is double-stranded.) It looks glossier in the picture than it actually is and, after washing, it's not all that bad. I do have a feeling I am going to hate this thing by the time it's done though. Each square is 23cm x 23cm (approx. 9"x9") and he wants about 5'x6' (Update: He wants it 6'x6', that's like 2 meters by 2 meters).

Since I thought I had tons and tons of yarn, I thought I was being oh-so-clever in using it two-stranded which would both use up what I thought was "all this yarn" as well as come up with a fabric that would be warm enough (I think he's going to melt under this thing but hey, it's his call).

I am not clever. You'd think in the five decades of my life I'd've figured this out. Newp. I am especially not clever when it comes to thrashing about in areas I'm still pretty ignorant about and anything, ANYTHING, that has to do with maths.

All that is by way of saying I'm not going to have nearly enough yarn to finish this. Now I do have both the light and dark grey and I think that'll take me through all but about 8 squares (be fun…ha ha…to see how far off that estimate is when the time comes). So given my propensity for geometric designs (odd because geometry kicked my arse in school) I am working out in my head how to make this all come together and look as though it was planned. As in intentional. As in "Why yes, that's exactly how I envisioned it.".

I confess that I am having a lot of fun doing this mindless knitting, well aside from the 4 hours during which I apparently needed to screw up the first 15 or so rows of one square repeatedly. I had changed over to the light grey yarn and, having done 5 or 6 of the dark grey, thought I'd be cruising along. After noting and wondering about how the light grey was soooo much softer than the dark, I kept bollixing things up.

• Dropped a stitch. I don't, yet, grok how to fix that.

• Did some sort of funky thing with only knitting one of the two strands, not noticing until the next row and, having no idea how to tink my way back around the slipped knit 1st stitch, frogged.

• Forgot not once but twice to increase. Frogged.

• Made tea. Told myself I was being inattentive and silly and that a colour change did not mean I could start screwing something this bleedin' simple up.

• Read some blogs.

• Picked up the needles, cast on again and, despite being bleary-eyed-tired, managed to get past the point where I had continually screwed up.

• Went to bed. I know to quit when I'm ahead.

• Realised that none of these errors would ever have been noted by the recipient but that they would have bugged me eternally and so, had to go. I hope the day comes when I can be at least somewhat more "error-free", or blissfully unaware.

This brought home, depressingly, a need to find a source (that I can understand) so that I can learn to rip back without having to completely frog the whole feckin' thing (although I can wind a ball of centre pull yarn rather handily with all the practise I've been getting.). I don't get the stitch formations well enough yet to see how to get them back on the needle. I especially don't get how to do the (in this "pattern") first stitch in each row (slipped as if to knit). That stitch kind of dribbles down and off somewhere to the right and mocks me.
Which brings me to a bit of a rant. Why is it that I decided now to finally come to terms with my desire to learn to knit? The problem being that I don't speak the language here (with incipient total deafness it's a bit difficult to hear the responses, I can usually come up with something that is understandable enough to get a response, I just can't make any sense of it.) coupled with an apparent lack of interest in either knitting or crocheting (odd people here, really), lack of anything remotely resembling a LYS (okay so there is one shop in Salem that has "wool" which is to say a small shelf in a corner with some rather uninspiring sock yarn and some really hideous novelty yarn. Oh, and the grocery store in F'Hafen which does carry, happily, reasonable kitchen cotton yarn and more of the hideous novelty yarn) and no one who could mentor me even if I could speak/hear the language.

I am awash in self-pity.

So I needs must find sources. Some on the 'Net are pretty good but not good enough, apparently. I'm still trying to find something, anything that will teach me how to rip back, get the stitches back on the needles and go forward again. I suppose it's best that I just do a swatch and keep at it 'til I get it. The "lifeline concept" intrigues me but since I don't quite get where one would run the yarn through to create one (although I am on the brink of perhaps, maybe, kinda getting this) and I figure that one needs to know how to rip back, yes even in those cases where one hadn't thought to put in a lifeline (nevermind that I am so obsessive I'd likely lifeline each bloody row).

I don't even want to think about how to do this with purl.

Sun was out today and this is such a pretty old inn that I had to take a picture.

So there it is. Yeah.