The FO

My knitting achievement lately is a pair of socks that's taken two years to complete. I've been carrying them with me and doing a little bit here and there for a long time, including a trip to India and back. I finally got tired of looking at them half-completed, so I made them my full-time project for a while and just cranked them out. Gauge was 12spi, on size 1 bamboo DPNs, using the first pattern from Lucy Neatby's book "Cool Socks, Warm Feet". I made the feet too long before tapering to the toes, so they've come out kind of square at the ends (ran out of yarn. 50g isn't quite enough yarn for a decent-size sock when you wear men's size 11 shoes.) Sure, I could have ripped back for a better toe, but hello, 12spi. Nobody will see the toes, anyway.

The yarn was Brown Sheep's Wildefoote sock yarn, in the Desert Grass colorway. It's a four-ply yarn, with each ply a different shade from tan to olive (camouflage colors, I guess.) Sort of an overall tweed effect when knitted up. Sufficiently manly for most men, at least. The yarn was not easy to work with. It liked to split, and seemed to have a twist issue -- as I worked with it the yarn would develop more and more twist between the work and the skein, until finally I had to hand the work from the skein and let it untwist. Maybe it had something to do with how I knit, but I've never seen the issue to such an extent in my other knitting.

Needles

Both of my current projects are happening on the new Knit Picks Options needles. I'm liking the set a lot. I've had a set of the Denise interchangeable needles for some time now, and have really appreciated the flexibility of being able to construct just the right size and length needle I wanted.

Comparing the two, the Knit Picks set offers less flexibility on needle length because they offer fewer cable lengths, they don't offer shorter cables, and you can't combine multiple cables to make a longer cable. But the cables are much more supple than the Denise's plastic tubes, and the joins are slimmer, which is nice when you're down to the smaller needle sizes. Doing that hemp lace on the Denise set was a bit of a trial because the stitches wanted to hang up on the join. There's a slight difference in gauge since I switched to the Knit Picks, but it knits much easier and I'm not sure anyone else would notice the difference now, let alone once it's blocked out.

The Knit Picks set goes a size smaller (down to 4), but you have to buy the largest sizes separately, while the Denise set includes everything from 5s up to 15s.

The most obvious difference between the two sets, though, is the tip shape. The Denise needles have always seemed to me to be pretty rounded. But compared to the Knit Picks tips, they resemble telephone pole ends. The Knit Picks tips taper smoothly to a pretty fine point, which makes it much easier to get into tight stitches without splitting yarn, too. They're much pointier than Addi Turbos. In fact, I'd say that the new Knit Picks set is actually a bigger competitive problem for Addi than for Denise -- the Knit Picks are a really nice flexible metal needle, and would easily replace Turbos for most jobs where you'd use Turbos. But the Knit Picks and Denise products are sufficiently different in shape, size and style that having both sets available allows you more choice over a broader range of projects. I figure I'll use both sets, depending on the exact project.

Catch-up

It's been cool to cold around Seattle (well, cold for Seattle) and rainy as its reputation would require. So I've been wearing wool, and knitting.

I'm currently working on an Elizabeth Zimmerman-style sweater, the kind with no knitting, using her Percentage System for sizing. It's in a simple heathered gray (Tahki Donegal Tweed,) and I can't be arsed to take a picture of a tube of stockinette today. I've got the body up to the armpits, and half of a sleeve so far. There was a gauge swatch made into a hat, which has already been given away. I'll be doing the raglan-sleeve variant this time, and if it fits I'll probably do another one with the saddle shoulder. No sense doing the round yoke when you've got fine broad shoulders.

There's also a Mason-Dixon Knitting lace curtain on the needles, in a pale blue Hempathy that should work in my bathroom. I'm up to the top part of the chart, where there's a lot of stockinette and not so many yarn overs, and I'm thinking there are a couple of repeats of that top half of the chart to cover my whole window. But I'm liking it.

I'm using a new tool to work on the blog now, so there'll be another flurry of activity as I say what's been backing up in my head...

Death by earnestness

I've got a friend who's got a saying: "Beware earnest people. They're inevitably closet motherfuckers." So I hate it when I realize I've succumbed to earnestness. Like that last post. Which is why I've been pretending I don't have a blog -- too embarrassed to have posted something that doesn't really present what I want to present. So enough of that. I'm going to try and be a little more selective about what I say and how.

ANZAC Day

I've got family in the military, Dad and two brothers. I even started down that path myself, though for once my talent for subconsciously sabotaging myself worked in my favor, and ROTC and I parted ways. Anyway, it means that I don't look at the whole yellow-ribbon, flag-waving, "They Died so we Might Live" thing in quite the same way as most of my lefty peacenik friends. Neither do I approach it in the same way as most of my yellow-ribbon, flag-waving, etc. righty fascist friends.

Mostly when I think about war, I think about what it does to the folks who have to do it, guys like my Dad and his friends, my ROTC classmates, my brothers, or guys like Eric Bogle's narrator in And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda. Find a copy of the Pogues' Rum, Sodomy and the Lash if you feel like hearing a version that will tear your heart out...

To be clear: I mean no disrespect to the ANZAC veterans, or any others, by quoting a very anti-war and anti-celebration song to mark the day. Rather, I think the highest tribute we can pay to those sacrificed at Gallipoli and in wars before and since then, is to make sure that we don't squander their dedication and sacrifice. That means we must constantly remind ourselves and our leaders what that dedication and sacrifice cost them and us. Apparently it's a lesson we forget easily.