Out of the knitting bag and into the closet

Ta-da!

It's magic! Four and a half months' worth of stitching, cabling, measuring, trying-on, adding-extra magic. It's my first garment and the first thing I've knit just for myself, and despite a few flaws--there's no picture of the back here, but we'll say that the ribbed edge and the "seamless" join are artfully asymmetrical--I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out (blocking helped a lot). And I'm sure I'm not the only one who's tired of monitoring its progress. So: welcome to the wardrobe, shrug! (The shrug is noncommittal.)

The knitterly details, for those who care:

Pattern: Cabled Shrug, Interweave Knits Summer 2005
Yarn: Rowan Soft Baby in Cloud, 4.5(?) balls
Needles: Susan Bates US 5 straights
Notes: This (free internet) pattern didn't include a size of any kind, and it turned out to be written for tiny people. Thankfully, it was knitted from the sleeves in, so I just kept knitting extra rows until it fit. I added a ribbon closure to keep everything in place. Other than that, things went reasonably well for my first big project. Hurrah!

Now I'm working in earnest on the socks I took to England. I love them even though I'm fairly sure that 80% of the stitches will have been knitted at least twice by the time I'm done, as I am flying entirely by the seat of my pants and feeling free to interpret the pattern as I see fit. I'm going heavy on the lifelines, having already performed major surgery once this week--the odds that I'll have to rip back a bit are excellent. I've just turned the heel and taken a first shot at the beginning of the heel flap, but I think I'm going to take advantage of the most recent lifeline and try again. These are my Learning Socks, and I personally think they're pretty great, plain stockinette or no.

Knit on!

Playing catch-up

I've been a bad blogger. Who can't even follow up with photos of her own bookshelves? They're only in the living room. (In my own defense, getting good photo light in my apartment is a delicate business.) Someday.

But, in the last week, I went here:





Also, does anybody notice anything...wrong with this picture?



The shrug has hit some...shall we say roadblocks? in the end stages, due to my own airheadedness and the fact that knitting references the world over lied to me. Or perhaps I'm just not as good at Kitchener stitch as I expected. (I suspect it's the first.) I'm afraid this is going to end up closer to the "learning experiences" end of the spectrum than the "objet d'art" end, which is mildly disappointing. On the other hand, I may wear it anyway, because I MADE IT. Take that!

I came home sick today with a fever and some cold-like symptoms. Mostly, the whole thing involved me doing some knitting and watching a lot of the first season of Gilmore Girls. (Rory just ran away to the Elder Gilmores' and is about to tell Dean, "I love you, you idiot!" Good times.) Now I've moved on to my favorite episode of 30 Rock, in which the hot guy, The Hair, asks Liz out. She makes Star Wars/Star Trek jokes. It's great. (Ack! I just got spoiled for the future of Friday Night Lights, which just goes to show why old commercials can be dangerous. Curse you, Tivo!)

Aren't you sad that I didn't blog all week? So much excitement!

...Right.

Shelves of Glory

After looking at this and this, I've been thinking a lot about how I organize my books. Or, rather, how I don't organize my books.

You'd think that somebody as list-happy as I am would have an organized bookshelf, but for whatever reason, I'm pretty much about the Shelves of Anarchy. It kind of bothers me--list-happy, remember? Maybe I should decide on something and do it. There's alphabetical, which actually doesn't sound so bad, but it's kind of boring. Some people organize by color, which actually appeals to me, except that it makes me think of my Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants series, which are green, purple, orange, and yellow, respectively. I can't separate them; they're a series! And the by-color scheme seems pretty rigid. Anything mis-filed or granted an exception is going to be pretty obvious, and we can't have that! Some people put books together whose authors they believe should be friends, but that comes across as a whole lot of speculation (though potentially entertaining). I've also given some thought to the John-Cusack-in-High-Fidelity model, organizing autobiographically (starting, I suppose, with the copy of The Sneetches I got for my fourth birthday and ending with my new Portable Dorothy Parker?). I would love to be able to pull that off. I'm just not sure it would work. It certainly wouldn't be low-maintenance (which is actually kind of cool--an ever-shifting reflection of life, right there on my bookcase!).

I guess I do have some organizational guidelines. For as long as I can remember, the bottom shelf of my big bookcase has been reserved for the books that won't fit anywhere else: my (sizable) horse-book collection, my Calvin and Hobbes, anything by Dr. Seuss (The Sneetches, again), and the reference section. For awhile I had a "girly classics" shelf, where I kept my Jane Austen books, my Charlotte Brontes, my Louisa May Alcotts, and the like. (L.M. Montgomery would go there, but she has her own spot on top of the bookcase.) But those are all organizational whims more than systems, attempts at keeping things clean or making the books more sociable. In reality, I use the "I moved recently and might move again at any moment" scheme, which is not a scheme at all.

Coming soon: Photos of the shelves in all their freewheeling glory!

12 of 12: August

What kind of 12-of-12er can't get her pictures up by the 13th, at the latest? The kind with too much to do and a suspiciously buggy-feeling wireless connection, that's who. Think of this as...a fond recollection of the weekend, okay?

What's 12 of 12, you ask? I never explained it, you say (as accused, wrongly, by my brother)? See here.


9:02 - A new twist on the waking-up photo: overhead! Also note that a 9:00 alarm is so much better than a 7:00 alarm (but it's kind of alarming--ha!--that I can't even manage to be conscious by 9:00 without help. How can I call myself a morning person?).



9:55 - I promised the novice coach at my rowing club that I'd cox for his Sunday learn-to-row class, so here we all are on the dock. And yes, that coxswain's seat is actually as small as it looks.



12:47 - Off to Berkeley!



12:56 - Corner of 65th and San Pablo; lost/misplaced and calling my cousin for directions.



1:03 - Found it! Heading to the back yard for....



1:05 - ....Alyson's surprise birthday party! Happy birthday, Alyson!



2:43 - The birthday girl and her cakes.



3:17 - Taking a "swing through" Sephora, if a "swing through" includes inching around the Bay Street parking garage (counterclockwise), squeezing into a space, testing every black eye pencil in the store, erasing the test marks, forgetting which one I'd liked best, re-testing them all, standing in line, paying for parking, and inching around the parking garage (clockwise).



3:30 - Eyeliner tests. Winner: Urban Decay, far right.



4:46 - Plums from the icebox. I was not saving them for breakfast, but they were in fact delicious, so sweet and so cold.



5:10 - Note to self: Church is not the time to be setting up elaborate photographs. Hence the blurry.



9:27 - Birthday party #2! Apple crisp and presents for my mom. Happy birthday, Mom!


Next month: same bat time, same bat channel, possibly on time.

In pieces

Contrary to popular (or is it just personal?) belief, it's looking like I might actually finish this shrug before global warming renders it useless. I had a mild bout of knitter's block last week--I'd finished one half and stopped sewing mid-sleeve on the other, knowing that finishing the seam would only mean more knitting when I realized the thing didn't fit.

I was right--I seamed and wove ends all through Kinky Boots (delightful), and then tied the two halves together to check the fit. As expected, the sizeless pattern was clearly designed for people who don't have anything to measure, and the back needed a good three inches to even approach a decent fit. Here it is at the vital "tied and laid out" stage:





In the interest of full disclosure, I've since seen the light at the end of the shrug tunnel and have been knitting like mad, leap-frogging back and forth between episodes of Firefly and Bones. I think that around the time a) Mal and Zoey rescue Simon and River and become Big Damn Heroes, and b) Brennan actually gets to drive for once, I should have things more or less done. The new thing on my mind is: ribbon closure, or no? It's a good problem to have.

A change of mind

In reading Sarah Vowell this morning on my break, I came across a sentence that got me thinking. That happens a lot with her and me; some of her writing is about American history (and it's a fabulous, thoughtful, nerdily enthusiastic way to learn about that), but some of it's just about life, about being a young adult with friends and family and a brain. I was reading her essay about the time Ira Glass tried to teach her how to drive, and she said, "maybe rethinking driving was just part of the general mind-changing trend of adulthood, part of the same impulse that caused me to reverse my previously held opinions on cucumbers, lipstick, and Neil Young."

I've been thinking all day about the mind-changing trend of adulthood. As an opinionated person, I like knowing what I think about things. I'm a side-chooser. A friend once commented that I have a capsule answer to any question of preference--complete with full reasoning and acknowledgment of loopholes--ready at all times. I took it as a compliment: I know what I think and why I think it. I've never really understood people who don't know what they think.

But it's as an adult that I've realized that my opinions are actually not The Way Things Are, and they don't have to stay the same forever: my identity doesn't shift forever, and the world certainly isn't going to start spinning in the other direction, just because I've decided that, for example, not all pork products are gross. Just because I've chosen a side doesn't mean I can't look around and then sneak back over the line when nobody else is looking. And letting my preferences shift around doesn't mean I know myself any less, or that I'm a less thoughtful person; it just means I can recognize that things change, including myself. And I have changed--in recent memory, just off the top of my head, I've reversed my opinions on tofu, Justin Timberlake, bangs, Friends, contact lenses, Ben Stiller (and back again), Mac computers, vanilla things, sleeping in tents, and wearing pink. It's not even that hard. See?

There are, of course, some things about which I expect never to change my mind (green olives and most brown sodas taste bad; Five for Fighting should stop making records; "interrobang" is a really great word), and there are some things about which I hope never to change my mind (God loves me and is worth loving back; time is more important than money; voting is important and exciting). But I think Sarah Vowell is right: growing up is the act of realizing that the world isn't exactly like you thought it was, and maybe you're not exactly like you think you are, either. And that's okay; you can always change your mind again, anyway.

Pottermania

Done!

I spent most of this weekend sprawled out on the couch (or curled up in my grandmother's old chair, or spread out on the floor or on my bed, or sitting at a table at Bay Street) reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, and I'm finished! I won't say anything at all except that I thought it was pretty great. Not perfect, but...pretty great.

Now would normally be the time when I would break out a true-crime book--I like true crime after something big and fictional; there's something about it that cleanses the palate nicely--but instead I'm reading Sarah Vowell's Take the Cannoli, which I started a few months back and then put down when I got distracted by something else. It's actually perfect post-Potter reading: a collection of essays about America. It's funny and pop-culture-y and modern and concise, or everything the Harry Potter novels aren't. And it's not that I don't love Harry Potter; I do. I love the whole Potter universe and the fact that it makes me want to sit on the couch for days at a time and do nothing but read. But a girl's got to move on sometime, and I think Sarah Vowell is just the person to help me do that.

Two-timing

I visited a new church this weekend. I'm not church-hunting these days, but sometimes it's nice to see how the other 1% live, right? I sometimes wonder about the East Bay churchgoing community outside of First Pres--who are all of these people, and what kind of churches have they formed? So many of the churches here are basically ethno-specific. Where do all of the rest of us go? And anyway, Maggie was in town, and we'd talked about giving Regeneration a trial run, so I cheated on the 5:05.

My impression of Regen is: for better or for worse, this church out-Oaklands Oakland. They began as a church plant and eventually inherited an old Julia Morgan church building on E. 15th St. from a church that was literally dying out. The congregation is a nice match for the old building: diverse in ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and age, though tending towards the younger set. It's also hip. Hipper than hip. Can church be that hip? I'm not sure I can hang with the hipness of that congregation. They have a kickball team, which kind of says a lot, I think. They also take a pilgrimage to Israel every other year, which also says a thing or two. The worship music was determinedly against the grain of the modern church; these people were all about classic hymns, sort of bluegrassed up. Seriously, when was the last time I sang "In the Garden"? About the time Ralph Lightbody retired, I think. (That would be 1990.) I love that song. I miss hymnals, and words like "tarry."

I guess I appreciate the skeleton of Regeneration: the worship is focused and not showy, the preaching is scriptural in a way that my own church (and possibly Presbyterians in general?) sometimes misses, the congregation reflects the community, and the liturgical and the postmodern are blended in a subtle and thoughtful way. Things ran a little long--2 1/2 hours, or roughly an hour longer than my own church--but can I really fault them for being hardcore?

The thing is, though, that I'm so glad I go to my church. First Pres has its flaws, certainly, but I think it's thoughtful in its own way. For a church of 5,000 people, I'd say we do a remarkable job of not falling into the traps of the American mega-church juggernaut. I may appreciate the skeleton of Regeneration, but I appreciate the meat of First Pres--liturgical gardening (you think I'm kidding), the determination that all services should be followed by food, a visual arts ministry that actually produces interesting art, the Four Hornmen of the Apocalypse, my small group that's really kind of a medium group, "The body of Christ, broken for you; the blood of Christ, shed for you," sprinkling baptism (which isn't as lame as you'd think, coming from a church of dunkers), the modern abolitionist movement, silly Christmas skits, less-silly Christmas cantatas, and a whole host--a whole host--of other things. It's a good place, full of light and hope and learning and family, and I'm glad I go there.

So, thank you, Regen, for letting me visit, and thanks even more for reminding me of where I'm supposed to be.

First Transformers, now this

I have betrayed my inner child. When I was ten, I grew my bangs out and swore I'd never cut them again. EVER. Because bangs are CHILDISH and make everyone's faces look ROUND, and they're always in your EYES and then your mom has to cut them with BANG TAPE. I believe that I have also been known to say, fairly recently, that bangs are never a good idea. And so it's even weirder that I waltzed into my local fancy-schmancy hipster salon and asked for Rory Gilmore/Feist bangs. If I can take a moment to be totally vain, I'm pretty pleased with the way they turned out:



And because my new stylist--I have a stylist!--does free bang trims, my mother will not have to dig the bang tape, circa 1986, out of the medicine cabinet (but I bet it's still there if I need it).

12 of 12: July

Same song, millionth verse; a little bit louder and a little bit worse!


7:00 - I'm up. Really.


7:06 - Breakfast and my pretty farmer's-market flowers, which I will miss terribly when they're dead.



11:02 - Break time! A quiet moment with Atonement (excellent, by the way).

There was allegedly work in the middle of all this, but we won't talk about that.



4:48 - Boooooorn freeeeeeee, as free as the wind bloooooooows.....


4:56 - I thought this new sign in my neighborhood summed things up nicely, so I took a picture.


6:32 - Leftover salad (greens, blueberries, toasted walnuts, and dill), while the chocolate-covered coffee beans look on


6:32 - A little Gilmore Girls to feed the nostalgia ("Paris is Burning," even though it stresses me out every single time)


6:57 - Amish Friendship Bread batter is a gross, yeasty mess that makes my kitchen into a gross, yeasty mess.


7:28 - It's a good thing that gross, yeasty mess bakes up into such a nice, vanilla-cinnamon bread, or it might be more like Amish "Why is this bread so gross and yeasty?" Bread.


9:17 - My Bible study, minus about eight people. But hey, it's the faithful ones that get Friendship Bread (also treasures in heaven, I hear?).


9:55 - I am not stalking Alexis Bledel. I am, however, planning to bring these pictures of her bangs to my hair appointment tomorrow and say, "I want THAT." Aren't they cute? (I know full well that I am not Alexis Bledel, nor do I have a stylist to follow me around with a curling iron. I am aware that bangs may be a Bad Idea. But maybe not, so, you know.)


11:02 - Time to do it all over again. Good night!

"The worst thing about prison was...the Dementors."

I have Harry Potter anxiety.

First of all, to pre-order or not to pre-order? Or, really, to buy or not to buy? Normally I wouldn't. I've managed just fine begging, borrowing, or stealing the last four books a few days after the fact. Even now, the only Harry Potter book on my shelf is a paperback of Harry Potter and The Sorcerer's Stone, and I haven't felt the burning need to buy the rest of the series. To be honest, I hadn't really thought about Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows much--I've been planning borrow it from a friend or from the library (when it's available, in 2015) and call it good. But now I've been thinking: if pre-release angst is any indication of the way people feel about this book, spoilers are going to break faster and in more mainstream places than I can possibly keep up with and avoid. If Harry dies, for example, we won't even need to turn on the news, let alone read the book. People will be riding through the neighborhoods of America, shouting it from bullhorns: "Extra! Extra! Harry Potter dead on page 856! The Boy Who Lived kicks the bucket!" Mark my words. Pre-ordering would lessen my chances of being spoiled before the proper time, because I wouldn't actually have to, you know, encounter any human beings until after I've finished. So there's that.

I'm also discovering, weirdly, that I am deeply and profoundly concerned about the contents of the book, mainly who lives and who dies. I'm not the only one--the release date is two weeks out and my office is already talking about it--but I didn't think I was emotionally involved in this way. What if Harry dies? What if--even worse--we lose Ron and/or Hermione (who clearly are meant to live happily but argumentatively ever after, or J.K. Rowling is stomping all over my sad little heart)? What if it's Neville Longbottom, whom I'm afraid is destined to die a heroic death? I love Neville. The death toll in this last book has to be devastating; after the events, or Event, in the last one, it's the only way to go. And I think that knowing the carnage is coming but not knowing where it's coming, exactly, is stressing me out.

To the faraway towns: An English photo-essay

Well, helloooooooo!

I'm back.

I had a great trip, gallivanting around, seeing lots of English things, eating delicious food, and very carefully not getting blown up. All good things, if I may say so.

Christine and I went here:

and I was tremendously graceful clambering up onto the lions. I was. Are you saying you don't believe me? Fine.

We also went here:

(that's King's Cross Station, Platform 9 3/4, if you can't tell) and took a series of mildly embarrassing but totally necessary photos. I'm dying to know what kind soul decided to put up the sign and the cart and to not even charge! Or were they just pestered into it? The world may never know.

We tracked down 84 Charing Cross Road. This is all that's left of Marks & Co.:

but at least it's not the Pizza Hut next door, as previously thought.

We went to St. Paul's cathedral, which I think might be the most beautiful church I've ever been inside. I loved it. Plus: a crypt, 300-something steps to the second deck, and John Donne's grave. Win!


We also saw Mary Poppins in the West End (forgettable except for the completely awesome "Step in Time" tap-dance number), went to the Tower of London, checked out Kensington Palace, walked across the Bridget Jones Millennium Bridge, and visited all of the state-run museums. Going to the art museums with Christine was fun, since she a) cares and b) actually knows things about art, whereas I just get bleary and bored. I was, however, disappointed to find that the Elgin marbles at the British Museum are not, in fact, spherical.

And the food! First of all, I love European hotel breakfasts. There's something about muesli with whole milk or a croissant with jam and yogurt and tea that makes me feel especially civilized, and yet ready for a long day on my feet. Maybe it's that I would never dream of drinking whole milk or eating plain yogurt in the States. I'm not sure. Either way, it's delicious. There's also my mild obsession with bangers and mash: sausages, mashed potatoes, and gravy. The Brits have comfort food down, I'm telling you.

I also need to make one thing clear: I love pubs. I don't understand why we in America can't make pub culture work for us. Why do we have crazed and/or totally depressing bars when we could just as easily spend our evenings ensconced in the plushness of leather and dark wood, good friends, salty food, and a nice pint of cider? Doesn't everybody like a nice game of darts? Is this not an obvious choice?

London was fun.

But eventually I left London and went here:


and hiked from here:


to here.


It was fantastic. Doesn't it look fantastic? I walked the Coffin Track, which was the road used to transport dead bodies out of Ambleside before they had a consecrated church. I stopped off at both of Wordsworth's houses (and I don't even like Wordsworth all that much) and made friends with an older gentleman on the trail. When I got to Grasmere, I ate fresh bread and root-vegetable soup, and the rain started just as I caught the bus back. Good times.

On my last full day in England, I went to Bath. First I ignored the advice of Rick Steves and the fine folks at Lonely Planet and went to the Jane Austen Centre. I knew it would be lame, and it was, but I couldn't not go, could I? Jane Austen lived in Bath for five miserable years and set Northanger Abbey and part of Persuasion there. The Centre was mostly concerned with the BBC miniseries, and the docent actually made a snotty remark about the Keira Knightley Pride and Prejudice, which I thought was...uncalled-for, especially from a woman without anything directly Austenian to offer. Afterwards, I walked up the street to the house Jane Austen actually lived in, which is now a dental surgery:



And on a girl's last day in a foreign country, when she just can't take another historical site, what is there to do but wander in the rain and shop? I didn't buy anything, though I actually considered checking my carry-on for the flight home just so I could bring a vintage cake stand with me. Common sense prevailed.

Bath is beautiful, all honey limestone and Georgian everything:


Doesn't it make you want to wander in the rain and shop? Pretty.

So that was my trip to the UK, minus a couple of lostness incidents, a trip to the British Film Institute, baked beans for breakfast, and everything else crammed around the edges. Coming home wasn't totally unwelcome, but I had a great time and I've already got some itinerary points in mind for a return trip. A fine place. Cheers!

Ready for take-off

Well, the hotels are booked, the bags are sitting by the front door, and the Brit-pop playlist is safely on the iPod (pending arrival of the UK voltage converter with my mother). Looks like I'm ready go to.

See you July 1 (or possibly sooner, if those wacky Brits leave their internet access lying around for anyone to use)!

For posterity

My first knitting in the round: a test run with Louet fingering-weight merino in Fern Green, knit on US-0 (2 mm) double-pointed needles.

In other words, toothpicks and really soft dental floss.

Mr. Bermuda, I salute you.

Do you know who I'd like to meet? The person that invented the Bermuda short. I'd like to shake that man's hand.

I bought a pair of Bermuda shorts this weekend, my first juniors-department purchase in, what, a decade? There are lots of reasons why I love these shorts, the first and foremost being that I look like I robbed an old man and made off with his golf pants. Wearing old-man pants in public is fun. Also, they are pink and brown and green plaid, which means they go with everything I own, including my favorite "I Heart Jake Ryan" t-shirt. They're long, so I'm not doing the embarrassing two-inch inseam thing, for which I believe I'm officially getting too old, or maybe I'm just not built right for it. They're light and comfortable, and they look nice with flip-flops. They look nice with practically anything, actually. They are wonder shorts.

I also love that somebody decided to make Bermuda shorts trendy. Because, obviously, when girls are wearing the shorts equivalent of the small, small skirt (TM Bend It Like Beckham), the alternative is to convince the youth of America that geriatric shorts are the height of fashion? Is this irony, mainstreamed? Do we think they're getting the joke, or that they'd care? I don't know.

All I know is that I LOVE MY SHORTS.

12 of 12: June

Don't you just love random photography projects? Check out Chad Darnell's blog for other people's pictures.

As for me,


7:01 - Gooood MORNING!



7:08 - The food of the gods, you guys. If this were a blog like Mindy Kaling's, I would totally include the Salty Sweet Nutty mix, because it is both a Thing That is Awesome and a Thing I've Bought That I Love.



11:04 - Grabbing a quiet moment on the deck at work. Just me, Thursday Next, and a rice cake with Jif. Oh, and the blindingly bright sun.



Eternity 12:47 - DYING OF BUSY.



5:13 - I went into Bake Sale Betty's looking for an after-work snack and came out with the most amazing piece of apricot pie ever. Ever, ever, EVER. Tangy and sweet, with a sugared crust, slightly chilled (the way pie is supposed to be, in case you were wondering). The corner of 51st and Telegraph is not an idyllic spot, but I sat out in the sun with my pie and it was like...well, it was like a really good piece of pie on a sunny day.



5:25 - Danger, Will Robinson! Sale at the yarn store!



5:31 - I actually went to Article Pract to give back some unused yarn and find something new--they'd recommended way too much Rowan Soft Baby for my shrug, so I returned four skeins and used the store credit to buy sock yarn for my upcoming trip to England. Because there's no way I'm lugging the shrug around with me unless I'm wearing it!



6:27 - Still there. Fonding the goods.



6:42 - A girl and her hammer. It's a fine sight. (Finally assembling an IKEA bookcase I bought a few weeks back.)



7: 57 - Do you know what I don't recommend? Dropping a 200-pound bookcase on your bare foot. (The fact that all 26 bones in my right foot seem to be intact is amazing. I dropped a BOOKSHELF on my FOOT. With no SHOES on. But you can see the nice little blue patch coming up just below the base of the big toe; I took this immediately after I realized nothing was broken and stopped laughing at my own ridiculosity. PSA: Don't construct/move heavy furniture in your bare feet, kids!)



8:26 - Despite my battle wounds, the bookcase is up and functioning, with right angles and everything. Homey knickknacks to be artfully arranged at another time.



8:40 - The cop-out dinner: a veggie burger with nothing but mustard and a sliced peach. I rule!

Next month: July! 12 photos!