Happy Indepence Day, American Swine! Here are your socks!

Just kidding my Southern brethren, I love you all. Especially my most beloved Midwest room mate, who has sadly abandoned our continent to have fun in Europe. I'm not madly jealous, oh no. See, I even finished her socks, because I'm a nice person like that.

I also finished my Mom's socks, which, in spite of being lovely, foamy, soft things I grew to hate after the nearly two months (heh) it took me to knit them. They became my lazy project, the thing I did a few rows of here and there while watching a movie or going somewhere in the car. Which, would seem like a recipe for completion, but it's really a recipe for ennui. Anyway, belated Mother's Day present: finally completed.
On the needles: my much-delayed Sockpal socks. Brigit, in Colinette Jitterbug. Let's hope these go quicker than my Mom's socks, so I won't be known as a total flake. Although, I kind of don't want to part with these. The deep shadings of blue, the vaguely Celtic feel... No! I refuse to give in! The socks will go to my sockpal, and they better damn well fit. But maybe if they don't... would it be too outré to send a SAS envelope in the package, just in case?

So, at work these people bring around random crap every now and then for you to purchase. Usually it involves a mildly frightening singing stuffed animal. This month featured a canine Barry White in a cummerbund. You start ordering one thing, and then to get the special deal on the cheaply-made discount item, you get more, until you have the singing animal lulling you to bed with its tinny song. I know. It happened to me this month. It started off innocuously enough. I was still a little burnt out from spending Canada Day in London (Ontario, alack), and decided I wanted a Sudoku. And then I saw a gardening book my mother would like. And well, I was just a few bucks short of making the rolling cooler, apparently for those days when lifting mid-sized soft cooler just seems too damn hard.
So, I bought the "Mapquest" road map atlas. Now, my brain may be feeble, but road atlas of North America + rolling cooler= road trip, yes? My arithmetic is correct, no? Road trip to Mexico with friends sounds fun to me. Margaritas, ahoy.

Tomorrow: Misadventures in Spinning and the Tank Top Chronicles.

Drunk on Mint Julep Yarn

Last Friday, I had been getting tired of blogging about the same two projects. Fortunately, my boredom coincided with Mother's Day. And what better way to combine knitting, frugality, and daughterly devotion than a pair of hand-knit socks? My Mom wears all the socks I've made her religiously, even the pair that are accidentally different sizes. I decided to cast on for the Father and Son socks in the Fall'06 issue of Interweave Knits, since they have cables, a pattern with diagonal lines, all the things my Mother loves and that are easy enough to whip up. So, I cast on in some vintage Paton's Nylox 3-ply that had been marinating in the stash for a while. It was bought at a fly-by-night discount liquidation store that was open for all of a few months, a place where a stash of vintage 60s yarn appeared for some reason one day. A better daughter would have bought new yarn, or at least yarn of less... sketchy provenance. I learned my lesson when I realized, after the first chevron, that the yarn was just too damn thin for the pattern. It looked like hot, steamy ass, riddled with holes. I could have done the math and switched needles, but I told myself I couldn't spare time for math. I ripped it out, and decided to sacrifice some soft green Jawoll for my dear Mother. I had been saving it, selfishly, for a pair of delicate socks for myself, probably from Knitting Vintage Socks.

So, if my Mom is reading this, I hope we can both agree that this act of SELFLESS GENEROSITY makes up for all the hours of epidural-free labour I put you through, eh?

Because I love this yarn. Some people only knit with Koigu, and some swear by Lorna's Laces, but the Jawoll is for me. It's very soft, and delightfully squishy, and comes with an adorable spool of reinforcement thread in the middle of every skein. Those crafty and practical Germans. Now I don't want to give her the socks. Maybe I can give her some basic socks in Kroy and still call myself a devoted daughter... a week after mother's day, and with only 3/4 of a sock to show.

In all fairness though, I did start these only the night before I went to Toronto last Saturday. I got some knitting done on the bus, but the whole day was a rush. I went to H&M and clomped around the skinny and tall fashion queens, buying a seersucker halter dress and a white blouse. Then I met up with my friend Kat for bubble tea, and we went shopping some more. We went to Pages on Queen, where I bought some campus smut as a birthday present for a friend, and a Mother's Day card for my Mom. I had to go to Fluevog, of course, and there I tried on these Fiats, and couldn't help falling in love with them. Too bad they're way out of my price range, and the bank just won't give a loan for crimson patent leather flats. Then a bunch of other stores and lunch at the Rivoli, drinking Steamwhistle outside and being entertained by dancing Harajuku girl-wannabes. We went to Kensington Market, and I managed not to feed my vintage button addiction at Courage My Love. Kat bought vintage and new clothes, and I... looked at them. I even dragged her into Lettuce Knit, and (applaud my self-control here) only walked out with one Cookie A sock pattern, the German Stocking. I even remembered my Dad, and picked up an apple custard square for him at the bakery. Then I visited Kat's house over the Don Valley Parkway. After that, everything went Pete Tong, as the kids say, and after two hours of walking, half of which was spent being stupidly lost, I missed my bus by 15 minutes. Fifteen. Minutes. Just enough time to be famous, and just enough to have to leave an hour and a half later. If it had been VIA, I would have been able to catch the 8:00 train- when it lumbered in at 8:45.

So, not much knitting was finished as I stared out of my window at the 401, exhausted and wondering whether I should just move to Mississauga to make things easier. Then, a whole bunch of banal business throughout the week, including seeing Spider-Man 3, perhaps the most banal thing of all. Theaters: making the movie really loud will not detract from the reliance of the plot on the most useless butler of all time, Peter Parker's oily bangs of emo, and the general incoherency of every aspect of the movie. I've never been a huge fan of the Spider-Man series, but liked them well enough. This was a disappointment, however, and so much of it seemed like flailing on the director's part. Bruce Campbell's cameo as a french maitre d' overstays its welcome, shockingly proving that adding Campbell does not make everything better. It should, but it doesn't. Harry Osborn's character gave me whiplash with his constant reversal of mental health and motivation, largely represented by how much Scotch he swills. Both Bryce Dallas Howard and Kirsten Dunst get limited chances to act. Some of the fight scenes were fun, at least, and J. Jonah Jameson was still great. And hey- at least it was better than Batman and Robin. But that doesn't make things better for my green socks, abandoned and still only a sock after a whole week. At least I'll be able to show the finished log cabin baby blanket tomorrow, to take every one's mind off this sad state.