Long on Reflection . . .

yet sadly short on blog.

Where have I been, you ask? Here, but not here. Yup, the great sucking black hole of reflection got to me, and I barely escaped its grasp. For the past few days I've mainly been doing three things: knitting, thinking, and moping. The frustrating thing is, I've been doing all three at the same time. Idiot knitting (stocking stitch with occasional intentional dropping of stitches - see Clapotis), thinking about knitting and quilting and life in general, and moping about cloudy days, car trouble, appliance burnout, etc.

So, this is going to be a long, rambling, and most likely boring post. I'm sorry, but that's just the way it's gonna be.

Let's start with the demise of appliances. The first to go was the command start on my car. Just to be fair, I must clarify that I love the car - it is the best car in the world (to me), and it gives me no troubles at all. The car is good. Hell, the car is great. The command start, on the other hand, sucks rocks. (Thanks DebR) It has suddenly developed its own personality, and it's an ANNOYING ONE!!! For the past week, it has been going off like crazy - not in a starting-when-I-don't-want-it-to-start-way, but in a clicking-and-flashing-the-lights-damn-near-constantly-for-no-apparent-reason way. AAARGH!

We've tried everything to stop this, including calling the help line for the command start manufacturer. Their brilliant advice on being told what was happening? "It sounds defective. Have it disconnected." Gee, thanks. Why didn't I think of that? AAARGH! Okay, so now I have to drive two hours to the nearest Toyota dealership to have the CONSTANT CLICKING AND FLICKING OF LIGHTS disconnected, which means two hours of driving with CONSTANT CLICKING AND FLICKING OF LIGHTS. You see my annoyance.

Next - our dryer has been acting up for the past few months. It no longer recognizes when the clothes are dry, so will just keep running and running and running if put on the cycle that works on moisture content. Solution? Switch to using only the timed dry cycle. Problem with this solution? Must either go through this cycle's maximum timed dry twice for a standard load of wash, or split each standard load of wash in two, drying only half at a time. Not so bad. Manageable.

But then - wait for it - something is wrong with the washer - it no longer spins. Washes, rinses, but does not spin. Thus, the clothes are COMPLETELY SODDEN when I go to put them in THE DRYER THAT DOESN'T WORK WELL ANYWAY. So, my timed dry (80 minutes) now takes either 4 cycles for half a load of laundry, or 1 cycle for three items. AAARGH! Too bad naked ain't acceptable around here - 'cause the laundry is getting REALLY STINKIN' ANNOYING! Oh, and for those of you thinking "just dry it on the line" - we've had rain for three days. Clothes don't dry in the rain. Plus, I have a thing about putting my knickers out in public.

But that's enough about appliances. And the fact that I am now in a constant state of minding the washer and dryer.

Next - knitting. Okay, I already described the idiot knitting project that I am working on, and if you scroll down you can see a bit of it in progress (the orange thing). What I didn't mention was that the yarn is a cotton / viscose / poly blend, with no give whatsoever. As such, it is hard on the hands. After about 6 or 7 hours of knitting (broken up by WAY TOO MANY trips to the dryer) my hands begin to cramp and ache. So, my solution to the aching hands is . . . switch to knitting 100% wool.

Yup. That's right. This quilting addict has suddenly had her brain replaced with that of a knitting addict. While I'm not sure how it happened, I'm having a bit of fun with it. The wool project is a felted bag, and I'm using the 4 balls of Noro Kureyon that I picked up somewhere along the way, not even realizing that is one of the best wools available for felting. I'm loving the colour, too! Check out number 154 (do click on the photo - it is so much yummier when they show more balls). This is colour shifting at its best - and I'm all about the colour shifting. Yummy. Also, I blocked for the first time ever! So, to recap:
1. Multiple projects on the go;
2. When hands too sore to continue knitting, switching to a different fiber instead of stopping knitting;
3. Both projects were started only because of the great yarns;
4. Having always said that blocking was for pansies, I now not only take that back, I'm now all about the blocking;
5. I have a huge looming deadline on another (quilt) project, yet am ignoring it in favour of the sexy yarns;
6. And blogging about it.
Yup, Yarn Harlot would be proud.

Other than the "damn my hands ache - better switch to the wool" problem, the other issue with constant and unending knitting is that it gives me lots of time to think. And surf the net. Yup, I can knit and read blogs at the same time. I've even figured out how to wrap my yarn around the mouse so that I can tug as I go to scroll down the page. Not sure if this is laziness or genius, but it works for me.

Anyway, I've read Yarn Harlot's entire archives, from blog day one onward (three days of reading, as there has been a lot of jumping up to get the dryer over and over and over and over...). Wicked wit, great attitude, and very informative. And yes, I have a few times laughed hard enough that I dropped stitches where stitches were not supposed to be dropped (but don't worry, I picked them up again - always keep the trusty crochet hook handy for just such an occurrence). Oh, and laughed hard enough that I (a) made the cat jump off my lap (b) woke the sleeping spouse, and (c) had to wipe coffee off the monitor. The Harlot is my new hero. But don't worry, fellow quilters, I'm a fickle bi#ch and will be back to quilting heros any moment now.

On the thinking thing, I've been doing tonnes of that. Yup, tonnes - I am Canadian, eh. I've come to a few conclusions, too. The one that will affect me most is one I need to think on a little more in order to properly express it. So, I will draw this extremely long and ramble-y post to a close, leaving the blogging about thinking to another day. Hopefully, the sun will come out tomorrow (break into the Annie song here, I did) so I can take photos of the incredible Noro Kureyon bag in process, and the necessary-but-not-currently-here last ball of the yarn for the Clapotis will arrive at my local Canada Post outlet. Ooooh, bad sentence. And not so sure on the spelling. Of anything, anymore.

Shut up Logan, enough already. And yes, note the time of this post. Sleeping is for pussies. Caffeine rocks. Caffeine also breaks the "i before e" rule - I think. Not so sure. Again, please note the time of this post. Aargh.