One of Those Days

It was one of those days. You know, the kind of day where nothing seems to go right and Murphy's Law reigns supreme. Tuesday was one of those days for me. I didn't feel all that great when I got up---not all that unusual for me since I have fibromyalgia, but still not as good as I feel on good days. I had my usual morning bagel and diet coke breakfast while watching Martha Stewart teach the world the basics of cooking. Not so bad. then I crawled in behind my computer to capitalize on a moment of inspiration and work on my dissertation. These moments are not common, so I have to go at it while the brain is functioning. Time is irrelevant in these moments, it just goes by.

So I was late getting out of the house to go to campus for my weekly research group meetings. I arrive at the freeway to find it a parking lot. Stopped dead. I hate road construction! The drive down the back roads was beautiful, but it took twice as long as usual. Then a female (she was no lady) driving a clunker car older than mine (mine's old!) ran the red light and tried to hit me as I was turning into campus at the arena. At least my car has good brakes. Hers squealed like crazy as she gestured madly and flapped her jaw at me. I'm an extremely careful driver--the post-traumatic stress result of 2 bad life experiences involving cars--so I had been watching this woman carefully even before I turned. I thought she really was going to stop and I had plenty of room, but it was clear she was not paying attention to anything except where she intended to go. I won't post the evil thoughts that went through my mind at that moment. She didn't hit me and I survived to get to the parking lot--which was full. Totally full. I don't usually have trouble parking, but it was one of those kind of days. Finally someone leaves, I park and hike up the hill to the College. I get to the conference room only to find that the meeting was cancelled due to the fact that most everyone was gone. Its hard to do group work with only 3 people. My professor, who is in charge of the group, was away in Salzburg, Austria presenting at a conference. Oh duh, I forgot it was this week.

I get in my car and head home. Traffic is OK and no one tries to kill me this time. I'm in an awful mood, so I stop in at the Knit n Purl on my way home (it really is on my way home, no detour needed). There's been a fair amount of chat about the Branching Out Scarf (from Knitty) on the knitlist lately, mostly whining about the chart being difficult. It doesn't look hard to me, I've wanted to knit this one but I did't have anything suitable in the stash. The designer recommended Doceur et Soie, which I love but the KnP doesn't have any good colors left, or Elsebeth Lavold's Silky Wool. The KnP has lots of Silky Wool in bright, vivid colors like pink, periwinkle, and turquoise. I'm wearing a new jean-style jacket, hot off my sewing machine in shades of white, lime, and turq so I opt for the turq SW. I pick up another set of Addi circs to add to my collection and walk out of the store feeling much better about life. Visiting the KnP has that effect on me. I always feel better after a visit to look at the colors and pet the yarn.

I went home and cast on the BOS. The SW yarn is quite textured. I suspect the silk content is silk noil as the texture resembles the nubbiness found in silk noil fabric. But it is nice and I can see why SW would make a great wear-it-all-the-time cardigan. In reality I will never know this as I can't afford to spend approx $100+ on yarn to knit a sweater. I am on a very tiny fixed income. I just don't have that kind of money to spend on yarn. If I *did* have that kind of money, I'd buy a really amazing sweater that I didn't have to spend months knitting. But I can buy a skein or two of an expensive yarn for a lace scarf. And that's exactly what I did!

It didn't take long to see why some of the knitlisters were having a hard time with the BOS. Every version of a 3to1 decrease is in this scarf, often in the same row! The symbols for these decreases were hard to read and required squinting intensely at the chart--not good for smooth knitting. The stitch counts vary and I managed to lose several yo stitches while working the purl rows, typically not a problem for me. I had to tink several times to recover the lost stitches but the good news was that by the end of 2 repeats I had it all figured out and the knitting went smoothly and quickly after that. SW yarn is big compared to lace and fingering yarns I've been using lately, so the BOS should be a very quick knit. I like quick knits!