Dish Rag Tagged

Knitting's calming effect may have influenced me to give up the aggravation of fantasy sports, but it hasn't eliminated my competitive side. I was confident that the Dish Rag Tag box would arrive at my apartment today, so I set the foolhardy goal of getting it back in the mail the same day. I checked to see how late local post offices were open. Unless I summoned previously untapped knitting superpowers, it was doubtful I could get to the post office by three in the afternoon, but I located a nearby hardware store with a postal center open until eight on Saturday nights.

At 11 a.m. I heard a loud rap on my door. I opened it to find my team's box and went into action mode. Balls of red and white cotton were inside along with the dishcloth my team member knitted and a bag of 24 mini markers. Since I'm using red yarn for two WIPs, I opted to knit with the ivory to make the quilted diamonds dishcloth.

Everything was going well for the first hour, although the seed stitch border looked suspiciously like ribbing. Perhaps in my haste I misremembered how to do seed stitch, but the first three rows seemed fine. I was annoyed that I had messed up, but it looked OK even if it wasn't what the pattern called for.

I kept cranking away at it but took a break when I lost track of stitches and had to undo the better part of a row. I put lunch in the oven, knit a few rows, and then had something to eat. I'm guessing that this is when I lost my spot in the pattern. I didn't notice because my needles were clicking away, but a few inches later I saw that I knit a couple rows of pattern that weren't where they should have been. The mistake was compounded in that it switched the right side for the ribbed border. Ugh.

And the hits kept on coming... While binding off, both stitches on the right needle flew off. I took care of them, or so I thought, but then I noticed previously bound off stitches sticking up. I picked up and bound off again with these stitches. As I neared the final stitches I saw that there was a dangling strand of yarn, a sign that I had dropped a stitch while binding off. I didn't know how I might work back to correct it, so I covered it up when weaving in the end.

Quilted diamonds dishcloth

Yarn: Lily The Original Sugar'n Cream (100% cotton; worsted weight)
Color: Ivory
Needles: US 7s
Stitches: 46

The final product is... Embarrassing isn't the right word, but it's along those lines. The moral of the story, for me at least, is that I can knit fast or knit well, not both. I made this dishcloth in four and a half hours, so you know which option I chose. My apologies to the team member receiving this mediocre example of my abilities. I can do better than this. It might not be the worst looking FO I've knit since my practice piece, but it would be in contention.

It was something of a miracle that the box was processed for mailing. The employees of the hardware store with a United States Postal Service center didn't know what buttons to push to charge me for priority shipping and delivery confirmation. It took about fifteen minutes to check out despite there being no other customers at the counter. Here's hoping the package gets to Indiana without any delays. We have a race to win!

Did I mention that tornado sirens were wailing when I stepped out of the store? I didn't have far to go to get home, so I avoided being on the road when a brief but fierce storm passed by. I didn't see any funnel clouds, although I heard that some were spotted a few miles from here. It's probably best that I didn't see them. As a kid I was afraid of tornadoes, probably because I'd heard about the big one that hit Xenia. I still get a little on edge when I hear those sirens. Seeing a tornado, even if it's from the gods and not a front row seat, might stop my heart.

Oh, in the comedy of errors that was my day, I scribbled a short message on the side of the box. I started a word that I decided I didn't want to use. In an attempt to scratch it out I made a little blob, which I then tried to shape into the state of Ohio to cover up my mistake.

How appropriate that I saw The Boss of It All tonight. It's a comedy, although not in the knee-slapping way, not that I can recall any movie eliciting that reaction...but you know what I mean. Best and worst intentions are undermined at every turn. It helps to be able to laugh about what happens, even if you tend to take yourself too seriously.

Dishcloth!

Arkansas dishcloth

Yarn: Lily The Original Sugar'n Cream (100% cotton; worsted weight)
Color: Red
Needles: US 7s
Stitches: 38

We interrupt meme-ing for Actual Knitting Content. I've stalled on the crocheting that needs to be done on the secret projects, so I might as well add in something else to the packages going to my vacation hosts. One Arkansas dishcloth down, one to go. (The color looks better with one's eyes, not through the camera lens. My Nikon does not like red under artificial light.)

I may start another one tonight, although I run the risk of having it partially completed and needing those needles for Dish Rag Tag. Perfect justification to buy more needles, right? The box is winging its way west to me. I was preparing to skip something on Friday so I could receive the package, knit my dishcloth, and send it to the next team member in the same day, but it looks like the earliest I'll get it is Saturday.

Maybe that's just as well. I need to pick a pattern. Rendering Texas and Arkansas in cotton has been fun, but the final objects aren't big enough. (The person I'm tagging shouldn't fret that an Indiana dishcloth is forthcoming.) Rather than start another Arkansas dishcloth this evening, I'll probably flip through patterns so I'm ready to go.

My extensive vacation blogging covered a good bit of territory, but I failed to write about a charming southern custom. In my experience, parents in the south have their children address adults as Mr. or Miss First Name. For the life of me I can't remember how my parents had us kids speak to adults, but I'm pretty sure we didn't do the same. I like the formality and intimacy conveyed in the title and first name. Using Mr. Last Name would afford more respect than is necessary while saying only the first name would seem too familiar. Regardless of if the convention is used elsewhere, it strikes me as something uniquely southern. Plus, it's adorable coming from kids.

Note to Donna and Noel: sorry my Reds have had your Braves' number. I can't remember the last time they had this much success against Atlanta.

Saturday scraps

Now that team assignments have been made, hello to my Dish Rag Tag teammates and competition. I'm really looking forward to this. I know some of you regulars are playing too, so it should be fun. Assuming I didn't overlook a name or make the wrong gender assumption based on names, I'm the only male out of 210 knitters in the game.

Having decided that there wasn't a compelling reason to go to day two of the NHL entry draft--"with this pick, this team selects some guy from an exotic sounding Canadian hinterland"--I had a whole day ahead of me with nothing planned. What else was there to do than be phenomenally lazy?

One time devourer was a basic and addictive game called WordBreaker. You choose a secret word, and the computer does likewise. You alternate guesses and indicate how many letters (but not positions) are correct. Eventually I was able to beat the computer at three and four letter words. The game is elegantly simple and maddeningly challenging, especially with longer words. I didn't keep track on paper of letters that could be eliminated as possibilities, but that would help keep things straight. Also, be careful in correctly answering the computer's questions. If you mess up, it will ultimately call you out on your mistakes.

I've now lived in my new apartment for a month. It's crazy how fast time passes. I still have plenty to unpack, although the majority of it is stashed in closets. So at least the place is starting to look more settled in.

And just because it's gone unremarked upon for awhile, I finally I cast on for my second sock.

Inside out

Because confusing right side and wrong side is a tendency of mine, I should point out that the sock I'm knitting appears to be taking shape inside out. Having taken a closer look at the pictures with the pattern, I'm fairly certain that this is so. (It also explains how I start the heel flap on the right side.) The WIP is below my needles while I'm knitting, which is what I was doing when I made my second practice sock, yet the right side was on the outside for it. I don't understand why it is the way it is, but I think I know what to do.

The same thing applied to the walk I took this morning. I awoke early enough that I decided to get in my exercise before work. I've been walking or running around the park and schools just up the road from me, but I thought I could find a better extended course by venturing into the surrounding neighborhood too.

I went one street farther north than I would usually go and turned. Shortly after 8 a.m. the air was still light, although it held the promise of heat and humidity. One family was clearing their yard of the toilet paper strung like ribbon through the tree in their front yard. Several weekly suburban newspapers lay at the end of driveways. During this nice, quiet tour it dawned on me that I hadn't come out where I thought the road would lead me.

I had passed one familiar street name but didn't venture down it because I expected to arrive somewhere else. The more I walked, the more I realized that I could get seriously lost in the suburban housing development maze. I turned a few times to head in the direction I wanted to go, although by this time I had no bearings for which way I was actually going. I assumed that I would eventually make it to somewhere I recognized.

Finally I got back to the street that I knew, but I wasn't as far south on it as I anticipated being. The curves of the roads took me farther east and north than I perceived, and since the neighborhoods aren't laid out in simple grids, my path looked like something a Family Circus kid would leave in the Sunday strip.

One other knitting item... A tip o' the hat to Jennifer for drawing my attention to Dish Rag Tag. I'm signed up and ready to knit dishcloths. As if I needed any excuse to do so.