For those who are knitting Triinu's shawl (Ravelry link), here is a link to the spreadsheet I put together clarifying the charts for the main body of the shawl. You have to have bought Triinu's pattern to use these.
I have been working like a fiend on these socks - my first toe up socks, and my first done two at a time, on circular needles. I am an old hand at top down socks on circular needles, but with these I am adding two complications, not to mention the fiddly cables. These are using WendyKnit's pattern for Asparagus Socks - exact same yarn from SockPixie. The yarn is really nice and the colors are so pretty - I notice she doesn't have that color for sale right now (I bought the yarn right after Wendy posted the socks on her blog).
Paul Newman, whose passing we mourn this week, was one of my favorites, and not only because I met him once. When I was at Yale, his movie Slap Shot "premiered" at the local movie theater, the one right on Broadway. (He had been a Yalie, of course.) If you paid $22 you got a chance to go to a little cocktail party at Commons after show and meet Paul Newman! So I got dressed up in my best pantsuit and went. I remember it was really just some cheese and crackers on a table, and a line of people waiting patiently to shake hands with Paul Newman. There was no conversation, just the hand shake and some pleasantries. I remember first of all that he was shorter than I would have expected, about my height (5' 8"), his genuine smile and friendliness under the circumstances, and... the blue eyes! Yep. Paul Newman was my movie star.
Yesterday, Sep 29, after 18 days without power, we got power! YAY! I pulled up to the house yesterday about 5:30 pm and the porch light was on! So our block is back online. We spent most of the evening dismantling the spider's nest of extension cords all over the house. Phew! How nice to sleep in relative peace and quiet, without the generators and the blast of the room a/c!
Well, although I know nobody reads this blog, I feel bad for not posting for so long. Quick recap since last year: taught for 2 semesters and had a great time but ultimately decided to invest the time and energy in moving the doctorate along - i.e., taking classes instead of teaching. Spent summer in Salamanca, which was much better than before, because the weather was so much better. Now I am taking 4 classes in the fall semester - instead of 3 classes and teaching. So that's all fine...
IKE. Well, it was a direct hit on Galveston, which is VERY RARE, so we got almost the full force here in Houston. Friday night September 11. Power went out at 10:50 p.m. It was scary because the winds were so high and we could actually feel the house shaking and moving. Not that we were really afraid of a window blowing out, but yeah, it could have. In the end no damage to the house, but the power was out. Trees down everywhere and power out for 95% of Houston. 2 weeks and 1 day later, we still have no power. Clean up has been going on . Crews from all over the country coming here to work. Most of the city is back online except for inside the Loop. We stayed 4 nights in Seguin after the storm but came back, of course, to get on with our lives, but managed to find a generator at the Sears in Seguin, and found a room a/c., so we have been more or less comfortable with that arrangement, although it costs a small fortune to run that stupid generator with gasoline. Really unconscionable for someone who is trying to be environmentally responsable. Turns out you can buy generators that run on natural gas, or you can convert gasoline generators to run on natural gas -- probably too late for us now, because I'm sure any second our power will come back on (yeah, right) -- but we will work on that and be ready for the next storm.
My dad had damage - humongous oak tree in his front yard went down and fell on his house, although a) he was not in house, he was on road trip, and b) it fell across front entrance, not on his bedroom a little to the side, and c) it didn't crush the house like it could have, one of the branches drilled into the ground like a piling and supported the tree so it didn't crush the house. So actually not too much damage, all told. Big mess. See foto album for more details.
Several houses in our neighborhood (older cottages, not new construction 2 stories like ours) were crushed - will try to post some pictures.
We were lucky but we are way ready to get the power back on.
Larry in front of the Paisano Hotel:
Horseshoe by Claes Oldenburg: "Monument to the Last Horse":
Jackrabbit under yucca at high noon:
View of barracks and hangar at Chinati Foundation:
Last Thursday I had another "situation" with my scooter. I was pulling in to park at UH and noticed my termperature light was on, and then when I stopped, I saw steam coming off the engine, and also green fluid leaking out of a rubber tube on the bottom. Eek! So I got my friendly wrecker driver to tow the scooter to Metric Motorcycles, where they let me know the next day that (fortunately) the radiator was OK, but the fan blades had gotten warped or something, and stuck, and that's why the engine overheated, and the fluid was coming out of the overflow valve. So the scooter is back in the shop for another week and a half. (This is the Suzuki Burgman.)
Also a few weeks ago when I was using Larry's Vespa, I went back to get on the scooter and the battery was dead. So Larry had to come get me using his little trailer.
Anyway, everyone says that none of this is my fault, but it does seem like I have been spending more time in the past few months getting towed than I ever have in my entire life and it's not much fun.
I have started the border for the Triinu shawl but I haven't finished it. I think I have knit 3 rows in 3 weeks. I have really been busy with school - teaching my one class (a 5 hour class which meets 4 days a week) and taking my 3 classes... and office hours. I have really been enjoying it, don't get me wrong, but the knitting has come to a standstill, more or less. I am hoping to get some done this weekend - I really want to get that Triinu shawl done mainly so I can see what it looks like. I hope it is ok - the sides and the spine are a little tight, so I hope it blocks ok. And I am not really sure how the border will come out - it knit onto the body of the shawl just like Triinu said it would, but there are two pictures of two Triinu shawls out there, and their borders are not exactly exactly the same - one seems to integrate with the body, and the other has a more sharp transition between the border and the body. I think my border is going to be like the 2nd - Triinu even says in the pattern that "no consideration was taking to match the boarder (sic) and body patterns" or some such. But for all that the shawl in the picture still looks good. Also it seems to be kind of small for a shawl - which is fine with me (I am sure i would prefer to use it more as a scarf) - but since this is my first lace project I am curious to see how big it blocks to.
I got my scooter back from the shop all fixed - so it is back in action. My friends were completely freaked out about my "mishap" - Larry seemed to take it in stride! I certainly want to be more careful about avoiding "surprises" like this in the future. But I'm back in the saddle again!
OK, the big news today is actually that I had my first teaching day, as well as the first day of the fall semester for classes, BUT....
I almost had a big ACCIDENT on my scooter!
I was proceeding north on I-45, merging into I-10 at about 4 p.m.... and lo and behold.... there was a 4x6 or thereabouts on the freeway. I didn't detect it earlier because I was behind a truck and didn't see the cars in front of me bump when they went over it...
Of course a 4x6 in a car is one thing, a 4x6 on a scooter (or motorcycle) is another thing entirely....
Anyway... I had to go over it, and I tried to keep the bike upright... I actually did go airborne, and I landed OK, did not fall!!!!
I continued along, no big deal, but after a mile and a half or so it was clear there was some kind of problem, and I exited the freeway into the parking lot of PetVet (bless their hearts).
The front tire was flat, and both rims were bent big time!
I called Larry, and he called a wrecking service, and eventually they came and got me and towed me to Metric Motorcycles, where, for ruinous expense, they are going to replace both rims and tires, and see what else might have bent during the mishap.
It is actually a miracle I didn't go down on the freeway... and who knows what might have happened....
BUT I didn't....
Anyway... I am glad I didn't get hurt, and I will stay even further back from a truck next time... and I will be glad when I get my bike back (7-10 days, he said)! In the meantime, I will use Larry's Vespa to get back and forth to school.
And, oh, yeah, first day of classes went fine!
Over and out.
OK, I have finally taken some pictures of Triinu's shawl, even though I'm not done - I am ALMOST at the border. I knit on this more or less constantly during our vacation week last week in Maine, but this week since I am preparing for the fall semester, I have only done a few rows. I'm up to row 145 and I figure row 155 is the last row before the border (had to figure this out since Triinu's instructions are not specific).
The pictures and instructions that are available of this shawl are confusing - the pictures that are on the pattern seem to show 9 big leaves down the center, and the border pattern fitting in exactly with the leaves... other pictures (here) where the border doesn't fit in exactly with the leaves, and also it seems there are 10 big leaves down the center. Since Triinu says we should have 404 stitches (and 9 big leaves), and we have 404 stitches after 156 rows (10 big leaves) that is how I am knitting the shawl.
I also had to extrapolate out the pattern and correct some errors in order to knit this shawl - I put together a big spreadsheet of the whole thing out through row 155. I did ask Triinu permission to give this to other people who had bought the pattern but she has not given me an answer on this - she sent me back an e-mail that did not answer my question, and since then I haven't heard from her. So given that, I won't distribute the spreadsheet to others, but hopefully they will be able to figure out what to do themselves.
Given all this, I am enjoying it and I think it's beautiful. I hope it will block ok - it seems like the middle spine of the shawl and the edges are tighter than the middles, and I hope all that will work out with blocking! (Fingers crossed!)
And here is a picture of the first Gentleman's Fancy Sock from Knitting Vintage Socks - you can't make it out very well here - it's dark Gray Lorna's Laces - but really, the pattern is very nice, and the yarn is fabulous. It will be a very nice sock. Need to finish the next one. I did tubular cast on.
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| 28 | 29 | 30 |
