Coming undone

First of all, thanks to everyone for your comments about my first time knitting alone in public. I want to follow up with some additional thoughts about it, but today's events changed that plan.

As much as I didn't want to work all weekend, I knew it was necessary to keep on top of everything. Yesterday I had to be at the game we were taping, so today was to be writing day. I had to write up my worst films of 2006, which I've published on my film blog; the honorable mentions, a bulky list that would have taken less time if I would have been more selective; and my top ten, which I still need to write.

I hate doing these recaps because it's a good example of my writing at its worst. It's lazy and clichéd. Anything that reads like there was thought put into it was probably clipped from my old reviews. Unfortunately, I don't have reviews for everything, thus my problems thinking of comments for films like V for Vendetta. I saw it in March, don't remember what I said about it, and don't have any notes to work from.

So, even though I got a fair amount done today, there was a lot of wasted time staring at the computer with nothing coming to mind. One thing I did remember was that I also have to prep the Academy Awards preview show. Maybe I didn't get as much done as I thought.

I was in need of a break. Newly emboldened to knit in public, I decided to go to a Starbuck's where I thought I wouldn't run into any students. (I have no special loyalty to the coffee chain. There's just plenty of them around.) Since it was snowing, fewer people were out and about. I was a little disappointed. If I was going to go to the trouble of testing my mettle and knitting alone in public, the least everyone could do was make it worth my time.

I ordered a mocha and a toffee almond bar--neither of which were that great--and found a comfortable chair in the corner. Only two customers were in Starbuck's, and my spot was shielded from the baristas. It's probably just as well because I regret to tell you that the whole thing was a disaster. Not the alone in public part, the knitting part.

While I've been working on the ribbed scarf the needle has slid out of my last two stitches on a few occasions. I've saved it every other time but not this one. On the first row I was knitting, one of those loops got pulled through the stitch below it. When this has happened before, I've frogged everything. Since I've ripped out this scarf six times already and have about a foot knitted, that was not a desirable option. I improvised and pulled out a crochet hook. I pulled the loop back through where I thought it was supposed to be and purled the last two stitches. It didn't look quite right, but what else was I going to do?

I knitted 22 stitches on the next row and could see that something wasn't looking right back where I feared I had made a major mistake. I was sure I had dropped a stitch or something. I know how to undo knit stitches. It follows that you would do the reverse for purl stitches. I tried that, yet the yarn was not where it should be. I transferred the two stitches I'd just undone to the right needle, which let me move the yarn to the proper position, and put the stitches back on the left needle. Unbelievable. By accident I think I did what I needed to do.

I worked back to the trouble spot and hoped for the best. Again, it didn't look right. Maybe it's because the loops were really big, but I'm not sure. Mad at myself for a careless mistake and for what had proven to be a wasted trip, I packed my knitting and returned home.

What do I do now? I'm afraid I know the answer, although I haven't taken any rash actions this evening. On one hand, I could remove the needle, rip out a few rows, and reinsert the needle. I have zero confidence that I can do this, and even if I get the needle in without pulling out other stitches, I'm not sure I'll have the loops facing the right direction.

No, I'm afraid I'm going to have to frog this for the seventh time. On the bright side, frogging it means that I can cast on four more stitches and get the scarf closer to the width I want. (Yeah, I've been having some issues getting the desired gauge.) It's slightly crushing to start all over again, though. I'd already accepted that I was going to have to live with the scarf being narrower than I intended.

So Sunday turned out to be a bust for knitting. Forget getting the scarf done this weekend. Unless I pull out a miracle I'm back to square one again.