needles

Just a quick update to confirm that I'm still alive, and to share some pretty pictures of yarn and knitting.


This would be a scarf I'm knitting for myself, as my other scarves seem to have disappeared in the vast cosmos associated with my parents' house. I'm starting to play with openwork and lace (this is a pattern called Feather and Fan, or Old Shale, depending on who you ask), and it's really quite enjoyable.


This is possibly the most gorgeous yarn I have ever laid my eyes on. I fell in love at first sight. The colors remind me of polished agates, and of standing among the trees on the shore of Lake Bemidji, on an autumn day with the changing leaves reflected in blue water.

I'd love to share the Christmas presents I'm knitting as well... but on the off chance that the recipients will read this, I don't want to spoil the surprise.

Anyway. I'm back. I'm knitting. Life is good.

spun

Hi there.

Due to this weekend's festivities (Renaissance Festival festivites, to be exact), construction outside my apartment building, and door-to-door religious/political folks, I am working on a massive sleep deficit. Estimate for sleep for the past three days: 10 hours, total. Therefore, I am a bit weird and impulsive, as well as tired and grumpy.

This post actually just exists for me to say that I really really really really really want a spinning wheel, preferrably an Ashford Kiwi. And some pretty silk fiber to spin, along with wool. And hand cards to blend fibers with. I can almost kinda afford at least the wheel and the fiber. I just need to decide whether I can stand to part with $300. Oh the pain...

boson

Having had enough of politics and scary uber-conservative women, I turn to science. The Large Hadron Collider is set to power up in about an hour and a half in Switzerland. This is the sort of thing that makes me wish I had stuck with physics and science in college. What could possibly be more cool than shooting subatomic particles at other subatomic particles, just to see what happens? Especially when it could destroy the world (ok, in reality that's a ludicrously remote possibility, but it sounds cooler when you pretend that they're all mad supervillians).

(Actually, there was a lawsuit about this pretty recently, with people trying to get the entire project stopped because they thought that the crazy science people would create a miniature black hole that would devour the earth. People are ridiculous.)

Here's the big thing I like about this project: among other things, these physicists are looking for a particular (predicted but currently unproven) particle called a Higgs boson. Admittedly, I'm not 100% sure what a Higgs boson really does, but from a quick scan of the Wikipedia article, it seems that it's basically the thing that gives mass to particles that shouldn't otherwise have mass, and extrapolating that out into the observable world, it's the reason why all matter has mass. Now, here's the cool part: some of the people working on this project said that the most boring result that they could get is proof that the Higgs boson exists, and nothing else. Because that would mean that they were right, and that doesn't tell them anything new. They'd rather be wrong and learn something than be proven right. And that right there is why I love science.

paling

Another word about Sarah Palin: I'm sure most everyone's seen the letter written by Anne Kilkenny, who claims to have known Ms. Palin since 1992. But you never know if the provenance is really accurate, right? Well.... check out the Snopes report that verifies that Ms. Kilkenney, of Wasilla, AK, truly did write that letter (a copy of the letter is also available on the page, for anyone who hasn't read it). I love Snopes.

Note: I don't really have the resources or time to verify that the CONTENT of the letter is 100% accurate. But my guess is that it's pretty damn close, and it paints an interesting picture. I don't like her. Not one bit. She strikes me as vindictive and spoiled, as well as inexperienced. Regardless of which side of the liberal/conservative split you fall on (and I'm sure that you can guess where I personally fall), there are plenty of reasons to keep her out of the vice presidency.

verse

I admit my failure--It's been a long, long time since I wrote anything resembling poetry.

Still, I read it quite a bit, out loud to myself, from my favorite books. And today I found this site: Poetry Daily. The entry from August 25, "Two Poems" by Claudia Emerson, is incredible. An excerpt:

The men faked a collective boredom, nodded, spat,
bid—and would buy it all divided: pasture,

tractor, flatbed, bulkbarns—then the house
where the auctioneer called, convincing us

to bid for all we had desired, had coveted
all those years: her hats would go for one money—

Go read the rest, and the other poem as well.

wimp

I wrenched my back today while carrying two large, very heavy bags of groceries up to my apartment. It is achy and I am having a hard time finding comfortable positions for sitting while at work. Were I at home, I would go lay down somewhere. It seems that either leaning forward and resting on the desktop, or leaning all the way back in my chair are the only comfortable positions, and neither of these are conducive to doing any actual work.

In related news, I am tired. I wanted to say something intelligent about the RNC and all the scary stuff that happened to protesters before and during the convention. But I'm too tired to come up with anything brilliant. Suffice to say, I don't know anyone who was arrested, but my sister does and other people I know do, and it's an awful thing that they're being arrested for what was intended to be a peaceful protest. Also... the Republicans should know better than to host their convention in a liberal state. Just saying.

Final word about politics: I'm mildly insulted by McCain's vice presidential pick. It's like he thinks that all women are the same, and choosing one as his running mate will score him votes. So he picks an anti-abortion ex-beauty queen from a state that is (sorry, Alaska!) not a major player in the race, and he holds her up as his token female. As if women looking for a voice in the White House can't tell one woman from another. Shame on you, man. Shame.