The Independent Stitch

Going "home" to Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival

Warning: Long post, with a walk through past calendars, and a bit of spinning/knitting content toward the end.

Going back to Maryland

It's hard to believe that a week from today I'm scheduled to be at the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival for the first time since 2000. On Thursday morning, I'll pick up Sharon, another former Interweave Press employee with whom I've almost always attended the festival, and we'll head for the airport.

In past years, Sharon and I have gone to Maryland because Interweave sent us. We had a great time, in addition to working really hard. This year, neither of us is an Official Presence any longer (me since 2000, Sharon since 2007). We're just going to Maryland because . . . we had a great time, and we miss the folks we regularly saw there. Not everyone we'd like to see is attending, but enough people we know will be there to make it worth the travel and the time. Because most of the people we know work the festival, as we did, we'll probably mostly just get to say hello, but still. And we never know who we'll meet that we don't know yet and will be keeping up with for years to come. Plus we both could use a short break from our respective "normal" lives.

It says a lot that . . . given all the possibilities of where we could go and what we could do, either separately or as a tag-team like we used to be . . . we've chosen to head for a fairgrounds in West Friendship, Maryland, on the first weekend in May.

Over the past couple of weeks, I've wondered how many times I've been to the Maryland festival before (nine) and what year I first went (1992). In going through my calendars, I discovered a few things. One of them is how tightly we had to work the publication schedule out a year in advance just so we could handle the logistics of being out of town right then. Another is . . . well, I'll wait for 1998 to talk about that realization, which ties to 2008 in ways I hadn't put together.

Going to the festival for the first time

Not in the calendars but in memory: Linda Berry Walker first suggested that Spin-Off magazine should be represented at the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival and urged us to get there. (This was before the World Wide Web, which wasn't created until 1989, and Linda's farm was as fine as it is now, but smaller!)

This goes back a way. I think I first met Linda at a weekend conference at Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts. The topic was "Wool as a Second Crop." I've never owned sheep, but I'm the sort of spinner who has always been interested in them (at least in wool-growing sheep . . . not all sheep do grow wool) so whenever possible I've attended workshops about the economics of wool, wool-grading, and the like. I already knew who Linda was, in part because she had written some articles for the early issues of Spin-Off, which I'd subscribed to since it started up in 1977 when I still lived in Washington state, but I don't think we'd met face-to-face.

That workshop took place some time between 1983 and 1986. I think my daughter had been born by then and that we had probably moved into town (early 1982), but we definitely had not yet moved from Massachusetts to Colorado. That move happened in 1986, when I started at Interweave as book editor. A year later I was asked to take on the editing of Spin-Off as well, which I did, starting with the Spring 1988 issue (my tenure ended with the Spring 2000 issue).

From Spring 1988 until mid-1991, Linda wrote terrific columns on specific sheep breeds for Spin-Off: Border Cheviot, Border Leicester, Coopworth, Corriedale, Jacob, Karakul, Lincoln, Merino, Rambouillet, Romney, Scottish Blackface. Plus an article called "To Save a Sheep, Spin Its Fleece."

In part because of the complications of publication schedules and budgets, Linda had to drop loud hints about Maryland for several years before we got the go-ahead to check out the festival.

• 1992 Went to Maryland to see what all the fuss was about. Came back registered for a booth for the next year.
  Friday, 5/1: 8:10a pick up Sharon. United 468 DEN-IAD, 10:41a-4:02p.
  Monday, 5/4: United 127 IAD-DEN, 9:15a-11:01a.
  Friday, 5/8: Spin-Off to press.

So in 1993, we were there officially for the first time. I spent my weekends demonstrating spinning in the booth. We didn't sell things. We just spun and chatted up spinning, and sent people off to the other booths to buy Interweave's books and magazines. I met a bunch of folks whom I only knew from online connections, through CompuServe's fiber forum.

Because demonstrations need to attract people's attention, for the first several years I did my weekend's work with a Navajo spindle. Most people hadn't seen one in action, and I enjoy spinning with this type of tool. It's both eye-catching and efficient. Here's a YouTube demo of the technique.

As the years went on, I made a tradition of buying something fun at the festival to spin up before I got home. Because of the circumstances, it was usually prepared fiber, dyed in a color that would catch people's attention as they walked by. By the end of the weekend, after between fourteen and sixteen hours of spinning, the bones of my right hand were usually pretty sore but I'd had a fine time and produced several random skeins of yarn.

• 1993 First year with a booth. Well, half-booth. Building V, booth 18B. It was a narrower-than-standard space in front of the utility closet, which fairgrounds staff needs to get into from time to time. That was fine for us, because we could just step aside from our chatting and demonstration and let them through. Building V is now called Main.
  Friday, 4/30: Summer Spin-Off to press
  Friday, 4/30 (same day): 8:15a pick up Sharon. United 348 DEN-IAD, 10:36a-4:04p.
  Monday, 5/3: United 126 IAD-DEN, 9:05a-10:50a.
  Tuesday, 5/11: Spin-Off blueline (final review of printer's proof before magazine goes on press).

Maryland becomes a regular event

For the first several years, we flew into Dulles. Later we sometimes went into Baltimore; everything depended on which was least expensive. We'd generally arrive on Friday, set up that evening (the other booths where people actually sell things spend all day Friday setting up), and then do the demo work all day Saturday and Sunday.

Sometimes it was hot, and a few times it rained prodigiously. Mostly the weather was great and the fresh lemonade tasted fantastic. We generally didn't have time to leave the booth to stand in line for food at regular lunch time, so we'd stock up with healthy snacks at a grocery store, stash them under the table in the booth, and nibble our way through the days.

• 1994
  Friday, 4/29: Summer Spin-Off to press.
  Friday, 5/6: United FNL-DEN-IAD.
  Monday, 5/9: United return.
  Flew to Maryland out of the local small airport, which had a connector flight to Denver for a few years; there was no extra cost on our tickets, but usually much extra turbulence on the short flights along the foothills; sometimes the connector flights were canceled.
  Tuesday, 5/10: Spin-Off blueline.
  
  
• 1995 My daughter went along to Maryland one of these years; neither of us can remember exactly which year, but it was between 1994 and 1997.
  Friday, 4/28: Summer Spin-Off to press.
  Friday, 5/5: Continental 1817 & 225 DEN to either IAD or BWI, via somewhere else, 10:10a-?p.
  Monday, 5/8: Continental 220 & 1804, 8:45a-3:09p.
  Tuesday, 5/9: Spin-Off blueline.

• 1996
  Friday, 4/26: Summer Spin-Off to press.
  Friday, 5/3: American 424 DEN to IAD or BWI, 8:49a-6:30p.
  Monday, 5/6: American 1677 & 419, IAD or BWI to DEN via DFW, 7:53a-11:53a.
  Tuesday, 5/7: Spin-Off blueline.

• 1997
  Wednesday, 4/30: Summer Spin-Off to press.
  Friday, 5/2: 7:15a pick up Sharon. United 296 DEN-IAD, 10:40a-3:47p.
  We almost never did anything but go to the festival, work, and come home (note pattern of to-press and blueline dates tucked around the festival; this wasn't easy, because every magazine's schedule affects every other magazine's schedule, and we were dodging around multiple publications to make this happen). Sometimes there was a contradance at Glen Echo Park on Sunday evening, after we got the booth packed up, and we'd stop and check it out. In 1997, however, Sharon and I stayed an extra day and took public transportation into D.C. and went to The Textile Museum to see two exhibits, one of very fine knitting and one about netted structures. They were fantastic.
  Tuesday, 5/6: United 1821 IAD-DEN, 8:55a-10:35a.
  Wednesday, 5/7: Spin-Off blueline.

A pivotal year: 1998

Trudy and Jan Van Stralen of Louet offered to stop on their way from Canada and bring my daughter to Maryland for the weekend from the school she attended for two years in New York. The scheduling didn't work out, but it would have been great fun all around!

The big deal that did happen, though: 1998 was the year that Don Bixby, the director of the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy, and I sat on the grass outside building V and had a conversation that led to the Save the Sheep Project.

Judy also came along to Maryland. (She was getting interested in spinning. The spacious room you see in the photos on that last link was made available to us for the final judging of the Save the Sheep entries because of Judy's efforts. But none of us could foresee that, of course.)

• 1998
  Wednesday, 4/29: Summer Spin-Off to press.
  Friday, 5/1: 6a pick up Judy. United 276 DEN-IAD or BWI, 8:32a-1:33p. We didn't have to get to the airport two hours ahead in those days, or I would have had to pick up Judy before 5a.
  Monday, 5/4: United 1227 IAD or BWI-DEN, noon-1:38p.
  Tuesday, 5/5: Spin-Off blueline.

Here's what a few of my DayTimer notes look like from my meeting with Don:

I'd been interested in sheep, especially rare-breed sheep, for years. I'd first become aware of the rare-breeds issue when I edited Shuttle Spindle & Dyepot for the Handweavers Guild of America and published an article on the Navajo Sheep Project.

My fascination had continued to grow, and a few years before my conversation with Don at Maryland, I'd had a jolt when I looked over the list of endangered sheep breeds and realized how many of the names on the list corresponded to classic handspinning fibers that I'd hate to do without. Lincoln is a rare breed? Yikes! Leicester Longwool, that glorious, shiny, exquisite stuff? Jacob? Shetland, with its incomparable colors and textures??? Cotswolds? Oh, my.

And I hadn't even encountered yet some of the almost magical island breeds, remarkable for their tenacity as well as their wool quality.

Over the next two years, in addition to my regular work, the Save the Sheep project came into being. I'd initially thought that I'd simply gather existing research to provide the background for the project. As it turned out, nobody'd looked at sheep from this perspective before. Oops. I spent my evenings and weekends putting together the resources we needed to form the project's foundation.

One last official trip to Maryland, and one on my own

In 1999, the budget was a little tight and there was some talk about canceling the trip to Maryland. Those of us who had been attending said we would cut expenses as far as we could, but we thought it was important to be there. We stayed at a different motel (an inexpensive one that usually is booked up a year in advance . . . we lucked out); I slept on a rollaway. My daughter graduated from high school the next month.

• 1999
  Wednesday, 4/28: Summer Spin-Off to press.
  Thursday, 4/29: United 1618 DEN-IAD or BWI, 12:45p-5:38p.
  Monday, 5/3: United 1641 IAD or BWI-DEN, 3:10p-4:52p.
  Tuesday, 5/4: Spin-Off blueline scheduled; actually arrived Wednesday, 5/5.

My last day as an Interweave employee was Wednesday, 5/31/2000, a few weeks after that year's Maryland festival. Amy Clarke (now Moore) had stepped up from assistant editor to editor and the Summer 2000 issue of Spin-Off was her first.

I spent my last weeks on staff finishing off the book that went along with the Save the Sheep project, which had come into being because of that conversation Don Bixby and I had sitting on the grass outside building V at the festival in 1998. So in 2000, I went to Maryland as "just me," not as a representative of Interweave. I shared a motel room with friends I'd met through the years at Maryland.

• 2000
  Friday, 5/5: United 250 DEN-IAD or BWI, 12:39p-7:53p.
  Monday, 5/8: United 1507 IAD or BWI-DEN, 5:15p-6:53p.
  Thursday, 5/11: daughter home from college (freshman year).
  Friday, 5/12: Handspun Treasures from Rare Wools to press.

• 2001 Maryland festival dates marked in calendar but X'd out; unable to attend.
• 2002 Maryland festival dates marked in calendar but lined through; unable to attend.
• 2003 Maryland festival dates not marked in calendar.

Maryland: reminders

On one of the Maryland weekends, I bought a cherry lap spindle from Noel Thurner at Norsk Fjord Fibers. And another year the weekend-spinning fiber I bought was a mix of blues, greens, and purples with some flash in it.

I spun all of the yarn for this vest (except the trim around the edges) while talking to people at the festival. I started the spinning after I got to the festival and I finished it before I got on the plane back to Denver. That's the spindle that I bought from Noel, which I used to make this yarn (and a lot of other yarn at other times):

. . . along with the book that wouldn't have happened without Maryland. The yarn is two-ply, sportweight (6 stitches to the inch in stockinette).

This vest reminds me: I've been talking about the cabled sweater I'm knitting, and have mentioned the way that I like the ribbings to flow into the patterns above them. Here, from the back of the vest, is an example of that idea in action:

The vest appeared in an early issue of Interweave Knits as part of a staff-knitted collection of vests, but when the pattern appeared it called for a regular 2/2 ribbing. For written-out patterns, that's the easiest solution because describing in line-by-line instructions what I actually did was a bit complicated. For charted patterns, you can easily put in (and knit) what's really there!

From 1998 to 2008

The rare breeds are still endangered, although some are in much better shape than they used to be (and some are just as vulnerable as they were).

And that's the connection to 2008. I'm still here, doing many of the same things to raise spinners' and knitters' awareness of where our materials come from (and that the best of them will disappear if we don't take at least some action), although under very different circumstances. I hadn't realized how much the Save the Sheep Project marked the close of my time with Interweave, nor the symmetry between that time and some of the major endeavors I've got underway for the next couple of years. I still want very much to do everything I can to keep the materials and the skills to use them alive and available, as part of our everyday lives as well as our human heritage. They can enhance our contemporary lives wonderfully, both in the doing and when we use the items that we make.

If we humans lose the skills of making things from scratch (like growing food, building canoes, spinning yarn for fabrics)—and we will lose the skills if the materials are not available to us—we will have lost something that is thousands of years old and of inestimable value, not just historically but spiritually. And that doesn't even get into the individual characters of the creatures and what they can teach us. . . .

A few days ago I got a lovely packet of Soay ram's wool that I'm looking forward to spinning, and—thanks to Donna Druchunas—twice last week I met with June Hall, who's been working on sheep conservation in the British Isles and Lithuania. June has written and published a delightful little book about Herdwick sheep called Henrietta Herdwick that is illustrated with charming felted images, and she keeps Soays herself (although my Soay packet came from a U.S. flock).

I'm unaccustomed to meeting other people who are interested in rare-breed sheep. It was quite astonishing to meet June, and I hope I can get to Woolfest some time!

Spring in Maryland and spring in Colorado

Usually when we have gone to the Maryland festival, we've been able to catch what is for us an early spring, with the dogwoods blooming. Here in Colorado, the crabapple blossoms began to open yesterday, and this morning we had both bright blooms and a light snowstorm:

• 2008
  Thursday, 5/1: 8:15a pick up Sharon. . . .

How I managed NOT to get myself into knitting trouble

Well, this is a minor miracle. I managed not to over-modify the Must Have Cardigan in making my adjustments. Once I dig into modifying a pattern I often almost completely revamp it: gauge, size, patterning, neckline, sleeves, closure. . . .

Because I haven't done that this time, the design looks like it will end up doing exactly what I want it to: being a good carry-around, ongoing project, just challenging enough to be interesting but not requiring too much attention. I wanted something that feels like doing musical scales and chord progressions for the pleasure of hearing the sounds, not practicing a symphony for a concert. 

My primary motivation was to put in a different primary cable because I definitely need to lengthen the body (I always have to lengthen the body) and I wanted a pattern that would intersect nicely with the decreases of the V neckline, no matter where in the repeat sequence that intersection occurred.

(The design is also a bit of a warm-up and test case for the book I'm editing, when the computers work as they should, which is Donna Druchunas' Ethnic Knitting Exploration, which looks in part at cabled Irish-inspired sweaters and at cardigan structures . . . and is due out in October 2008, which will happen if the computers continue to cooperate. And I'm in trouble if they don't, so they'd better. And that was more than enough "whiches" for one sentence back there.)

One of the most unusual aspects of my modification process this time is that I'm still at the original gauge, so I can use the pattern's numbers (except for lengths). That almost never happens.

I found a few cables that I liked by browsing around in Janet Szabo's Cables, Volume 1 and put them together in a sequence I thought I might enjoy. The patterns are repeats of 4, 6, and 8 rows, so the overall repeat is 24 rows but within that sequence the variations are simple. The primary cable, which I found in Janet's book, also appears as "Shadow Plaited Stitch" in Mary Thomas's Book of Knitting Patterns (1943), and long ago I'd marked it in that book to try some day. Having it show up here was like finally scheduling time to have tea with someone I wanted to get to know better.

For my swatch, I used some of the yarn left over from the Norsk Strikkedesign sweater (which, by the way, I wear frequently and happily). The swatch is the green in the photo below. If you look at the Norsk Strikkedesign sweater, it's obvious why there's leftover green. I've made some of Jared Flood's Koolhaas hats with some of the extra yarn from that sweater, but I didn't get around to using the two greens.

The green swatch, next to the blue starts of the real sleeves, provides a really good demo of the advantage of working cables (or other textured stitches) in light-colored yarns. They show up a lot better. The blue I'm using for the sweater itself is not so dark it completely wipes out the cables, but they're definitely more subtle than they would be in a lighter shade.

However, there's a plus in that walking-the-dark-side choice of mine for this garment. It comes in design-thought-process Note 7, below.

• Note 1. I had planned to have the first cable-crossings on the second row, which tucks them in nicely next to the ribbing but puts them past the increases that need to occur between ribbing and main pattern area (because of cable draw-in, there are more increases than for an un-cabled sweater).
• Note 2. I like my ribbings to flow into my cable patterns, knits to knits and purls to purls, as much as possible.
• Note 3. In order to have the cable-crossings occur on the right-side rows, a row-2 cable crossing means that row 1 is a set-up row worked from the back side.
• Note 4. For completely obscure reasons pertaining to how my brain works, I had the darnedest time getting my set-up row to work correctly.

The observation in Note 4 is one of the reasons I am grateful for swatches. They can make life lots simpler by bringing potential problems to my attention.

It's not complicated to do a set-up row and I've done it more times than I would want to try to remember, but it wasn't working. Nor were the following rows falling into a rhythm the first time I knitted the swatch. Or the second time. I was concerned that I'd need to revamp the patterning, because I didn't want to feel like I was fighting the pattern the whole way. That would have defeated the purpose of this project.

So I decided to try working my first set of cable crossings on the FIRST row, instead of the second. No set-up row.

I ripped the swatch and started again. For whatever reason . . . nothing at all changed except the set-up, so the fact that this shift succeeded is almost totally illogical, but I don't argue with results . . . this went fine and produced the green swatch you see.

• Note 5. BUT, looking ahead, I could see some challenges in the sequence moving from the ribbing to the transitional increases (which I'd normally work on the set-up row) to the main pattern area. If I worked the increases on the last row of ribbing, I'd have to cross the cables directly above the increases. That would be a little awkward to maneuver, especially since one of the cables is a 2-over-3 cross that's tighter and more fiddly than the predominant 2-over-2s.
• Note 6. I thought: What if I worked the increases in the second and final rows of ribbing? I've never seen this done (it probably has been) but I didn't see why it wouldn't work. I tried it, using lifted increases between the two stitches in a pair of knit ribs and keeping them within that rib (which became a k3 instead of a k2) for the couple of rows until the ribbing was done. I worked most of the increases (10) on the right-side, second-to-last row and some (just 3) on the reverse-side last row (which, worked on that side's knit ribs, produced p3 ribs when seen from the front). That way the stitch count for the main pattern area was well established before I hit the first pattern row with its cable crossings. (By the way, the reason for doing initial cable crossings on the first or second row is well explained in Janet's book.)
• Note 7. Here's the plus of working in a darker-than-average yarn: I blew off my own preference for knit-to-knit and purl-to-purl flow from ribbing to main patterns, in part because in the medium-dark yarn that transition wouldn't be very obvious anyway.

My new primary cable is the 2-over-2 alternating pattern that shows up pretty well in the center of the green swatch. I was afraid that it might be a bit undefined at its edges, so on either side of the swatch I worked a narrow section of that pattern with a regular 2-over-2 rope cable running up its sides. As it turns out, I like the plain version so well that I thought about taking out the rope cables, but ended up going with the sequence exactly as it is on my swatch, using both variations.

• Note 8. I made the decision to use the underarm and side-edge texture pattern specified on the original pattern to make increasing in pattern relatively easy. I'm keeping the outside stitch at each sleeve edge in stockinette, to simplify later seaming (I'm knitting the sleeves flat, and haven't decided yet about the body).
• Note 9. And I decided to work the sleeve-edge increases every 6 rows, to correspond with the 2-over-3 cable crossings, instead of every 8 rows, as specified in the pattern, just to make it easier to remember when to do them: Time for the fanciest cable? Increase at the edges, too! The sleeves get a little wider a little faster and reach their full width just below the elbow. That reflects one of my preferences for sweaters anyway: I move around a lot, and more ease at the elbow is beneficial.

Here's the proof that my decisions were the right ones:

The sleeves are coming right along, and I'm enjoying knitting them. I've knitted during a lecture, while watching a bit of television with my daughter, and elsewhere. And I am knitting a row or two when I need a break from computer work, or just to think a bit about how to solve a problem. The project is doing exactly what it was meant to do.

• Note 10. Interestingly, there's a nice symmetry in the way the cables flow out of the ribbing. In spite of the fact that I let go of that part of my intention in its strictest form.

I do keep my chart handy, and it's got sticky notes on it, but I can tell what happens in the next right-side row with a quick glance and then just do it. Even though there's a bit of pattern fiddling on the return (reverse-side) rows, what needs to happen on them is always obvious from looking at the work, rather than the chart. Before I'm done with the sleeves, I'll have the whole sequence memorized so I can work without the chart, although I'm not there yet (mostly because I'm not paying enough attention).

Since I took the second photo, the sleeves have gotten noticeably longer.

In fact, the only problem with this project is that I'm enjoying it so much, and making such good progress, that I'll need another project to fill the same knitting role a bit sooner than I might ideally want.

Then again, I think I'll like wearing this sweater, so that's a reason to be okay with finishing it sooner than I intend.

Finished: The chenille sweater

The chenille sweater! Finished!

A lot of constraints guided the design and construction of this sweater, which is for my acupuncturist. She has trouble with most protein fibers (wool, alpaca, and so on); she's either allergic to them or more sensitive than most people to the prickle-factor, even (as it turned out after many swatches) on the finer varieties of the more luxury fibers. Yet because of her preference for natural materials, I didn't want to head for the synthetics.

We finally decided on this old-gold color of Crystal Palace Cotton Chenille—not a color I would ever knit for myself (except as an accent ), and therefore a new experience for me.

She knew she wanted a cardigan; she's quite small and has trouble finding sweaters that fit. She doesn't like ribbing, especially at the waist. She wanted a V neckline.

She wanted quite a simple shape, so I started with a modified drop-shoulder (there are some stitches bound off at the underarm, so the top of the sleeve is closer to the actual shoulder . . . it doesn't "drop" as far onto the upper arm area, which was my decision because she is small and might have looked "swamped" in a regular drop-shoulder design). She also thought stockinette was dandy, so I needed to think of other ways to make this an interesting project for me to work up.

Playing with Korsnas sweater construction gave me an idea for finishing the edges without ribbing. I worked the lower edge of the body (A) back-and-forth in single crochet (Korsnas sweaters are worked in the round; the effect is slightly different) and then picked up loops along the top edge (B) and knitted up from there (C).

(These drawings are in no way to scale or proportionally correct. They're just sketches.)

When the body was complete, I worked the front bands in single crochet, putting in four buttonholes on one band; there would be five buttons, but the fifth would go close to the neck. I normally would have worked the edging all the way around the front opening and the neckline, but I wanted to take the finishing process in stages because I was making it up as I went along and there'd be less ripping if I did it incrementally. I actually ended up doing no ripping at all on the finishing, probably because I did it in stages!

Then I sewed the shoulders together and worked single crochet around the neckline, with decreases at points 1, 2, 3, and 4, and the fifth buttonhole at the top of the appropriate band. The sweater is shown as if it were worked in pieces, in order to show the whole neckline, but there weren't side seams.  The body was worked all-in-one, as it's shown in the first sketch.

Here's a drawing that shows the sequence of the bands (unshaded in this version) and the way I set the sleeves into the armholes. Each sleeve also started with a lower band worked in single crochet, with loops picked up for knitting. I worked the sleeves flat (and both at once). There's an underarm seam on each sleeve, but not on the body.

I hope she likes it!

P.S. She loves it. It looks both a bit elegant and quite a lot comfortable, and it's cozy. Not wool-cozy, but still. . . .

Around the neighborhood: bursting with color, if not yet much spring

While walking our dogs the other day, we saw this:

All of the notes say "yes," in several languages and many different ways. The front of the car looks like this:

There are also stickies on the hubcaps, door handles, and other places.

Sometimes the place where we live seems a little staid and over-engineer-influenced (there are a lot of high-tech companies here). Now and then it pleasantly surprises us. SOMEONE is saying YES! in response to a question that appears to have been (1) anticipated (it took a while to make, let alone apply, all those notes) and (2) welcome.

We chose the neighborhood we live in partly because it does not have covenants that dictate what color you can paint your house. A lot of neighborhoods in this city do have restrictions of that type, and the houses tend to be beige, sand, tan, and maybe light gray, with trim that is white, beige, or sand. It's all very tasteful. The truly risqué might use a light sage green.

When we were looking at houses, there was a house that was painted bright purple a couple of blocks from the one that we bought. While I like my own house's exterior colors a little less strong, every time I drove past that house I was reminded of a trip I took with my grandparents through the Gaspé Peninsula when I was thirteen. I still vividly remember Percé Rock, people selling handmade toy wooden boats by the side of the road (Grampa didn't stop, but I still hold one in my memory), and the brightly colored houses that were probably even more cheerful during the winter.

That house has since been painted a calmer color, but recently this appeared on the other end of our dogleg street:

Even the steel railing attached to the concrete front step is bright blue.

The color seemed a little shocking the first time I caught sight of it, but I'm getting used to it and I am glad the people who live there are free to use the color they like. It's intense. It's also very cheerful. And when I see it, I know exactly where I am: almost home.

How I get myself into knitting trouble (again)

I'm mostly knitting swatches for publication illustrations except that I've just finished two larger (and more complex) projects that will be given to other people (more on those soon, I hope). While attempting to knit one colorwork swatch as I was watching a video, I had to rip three times. Obviously, that swatch required more attention and I needed a knitting project that I could work on during movies.

I have several projects going, but none of them feels appealing.

In February, Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, of Yarn Harlot fame, finished a Must Have Cardigan from a Paton's book. She liked it. So I ordered the pattern book to take a closer look. I liked what I saw. And I've been pondering making one.

But as I pondered, I realized I'd have to lengthen the body by about 2 inches (5 cm). I always have to lengthen the body. And as I thought about that, I realized that the way the primary cable interacts with the neckline might end up disturbing me. It would change, of course, from the way it works in the design.

Instead of neatly paralleling the front opening, the cable would probably turn a corner and dead-end into it. I could, of course, adjust where I started the cable above the ribbing to compensate, but frankly I don't like to pay that much attention to row gauge and I don't like to engineer things that closely (although when I follow my thought process, I realize that statement seems totally bizarre).

So I plotted out the basic structure of the sweater . . . noting how the patterns work together and how they fit into the shapes of the pieces . . . thought about just finding another 23-stitch cable panel to substitute for pattern B, one that would not have such neat diagonals and so wouldn't care how it intersected with the V neckline.

And I also thought about how I like my cable patterns to flow out of the ribbing, even if that means my ribbing is irregular (i.e., mixes k2s and p2s and k3s, plotted to be in locations where they'll flow into the pattern above).

All this was looking like more time and planning than I had in mind, but this is how I get myself into knitting trouble. Something that was supposed to be simple ends up being a bit more complicated.

I also thought that with all the cable knitting I've done, I don't own any of it myself. I've given it all away. What I knew at this point was that I wanted a V-neck Aran cardigan for me, in worsted weight, with some combination of patterns resembling, but not identical to, those in the Paton's design.

So I went to a couple of local yarn stores in search of a nice worsted-weight wool that was light enough to show texture patterns and dark enough to be practical in my life. There's a skein of what I ended up with in that photo. It's Cascade 220 (again), color 9336. Brown Sheep's worsted was a close contender, and might have come out in first place if the shop had had enough skeins of any of the colors I wanted to use; someone else had gotten there ahead of me on the blues, purples, and greens and the shop hadn't had time to restock.

Good sign: I didn't get a bag for my purchases. I just carried my skeins (and the buttons for another garment) in my arms. As I was just outside the door of the shop, two people I didn't know at all asked if the yarn was going to be turned into something for me, because, as they said, "It's a great color for you."

Next I needed to wind the skeins into balls (I let the shop wind the first one for me, and I'll do the rest during family-and-friends visiting times). And I needed to look for a substitute cable.

I pulled out a bunch of my standard pattern references and my sticky notes.

I wanted a cable panel that felt as classic as the original, and that wasn't going to be boring (I have to watch out for this "not boring" inclination: my "carryaround, easy" knitting projects can too readily become "need to pay attention all the time" endeavors . . . there's a fine line between not-boring and much-brain-required).

Several of the books offered promising alternatives, but nothing felt right. I'm going to be working with some Elsebeth Lavold ideas for the embellishment of my daughter's (first) sweater and there's another Lavold design that I bought the pattern for last week . . . but I want to spin the yarn for that one, which means it probably won't get done for at least a year. So, in the interest of variety, I leaned away from Lavold-inspired options. I've been wanting to work a bunch of the patterns from the Japanese book, but the ones that I found most appealing kept pushing me in the direction of a totally different sweater concept. Some of the stuff in Barbara Walker's compendium (cable-specific volume rather than design collections, because I wanted the hunt to be easy) was nice but. . . .

AH! Where's my brain? I have two of Janet Szabo's books right here, and if there's anyone who knows cables, and knows how they can be both classic and contemporary, it's Janet. So I pulled her books off the shelf and brewed a cup of tea.

Fast Lane, from Celestial Seasonings, because I've been feeling kind of dragged out lately (computer problems and more). Since my acupuncturist said "no coffee" (to a serious coffee lover), I've come to appreciate the return of Fast Lane. At certain moments, it's medicinal. (It's not the caffeine she wants me to avoid but the coffee oils, also found in decafs.)

Meanwhile, I had knitted a first swatch and it's lying there drying. I knitted most of it in a darkened Cinema Savers theater while watching a bit of amusing fluff called Penelope with my daughter and some family friends. The swatch was simple enough. Stockinette.

Janet's Cables, Volume 1: The Basics is more comprehensive than the title sounds. There's lots of very cool stuff in it about how cables work. I'm looking forward to seeing what Janet comes up with in the next volume, although there's plenty here to keep me busy until she has it ready. And I'm looking through her Aran Sweater Design to see what kinds of ideas it gives me as well.

I had thought I would just replace the main cable, but now I'm thinking of that whole canvas of front cable panels . . . and I thought I'd keep the side edges of the cardigan in Irish moss stitch, but Janet's got some neat texture patterns that I'd like to try. . . .

In order to maintain this project's "carryaround, easy" status, I'll need to be really careful about which components I choose to combine. I'll be especially vigilant (I hope!) about being sure that the cable crossings occur on similar rows (or rounds, if I decide to steek, although I may not . . . this shows that I am already thinking of working the body all in one, instead of in three pieces; now, exactly what parts of the Must Have Cardigan am I using? . . . to be determined).

No, I wasn't born knowing how to do all this pattern modification. I learned it largely by trial and error over a number of years, but the thinking process that leads to my ability to make small (or large) modifications to patterns (or to launch into a design without them) comes directly from the lineage of traditional or ethnic knitting.

My strong belief in the power of the skills that come from understanding traditional and ethnic knitting is the reason that I publish the books that I do.

And where the path on this particular sweater will come out is anybody's guess right now. But I know I'll end up with a sweater that isn't just half-right. It'll be all the way right (or close enough to all the way right . . . I aim for perfection, but often take some risks that keep me from achieving it). And I'll undoubtedly learn something I didn't know before I started down this path. Which was supposed to be simple. And will undoubtedly be interesting. And may take a while.

• Aran-style.
• V-neck.
• Cardigan.
• Worsted-weight yarn.
• Similar combination of panels.
• Set-in sleeves.
• Bike.
  

Getting started in weaving (in Israel, or maybe elsewhere)

I never know what I'll find in my e-mail inbox. Today I received the note included below. I'm not entirely sure how I got this set of questions, because not that many people know that I have been a weaver even longer than I've been a spinner (but not longer than I've been a knitter). I met the woman who sent this inquiry at a writing conference in New York almost exactly two years ago.

My son-in-law in Israel, who is a weaver, wants to buy a non-computerized floor loom and was wondering if you could advise him on how to go about doing this.

* Should he buy a new loom?
* Do you know how and where he might be able to find an old and good looms?
* Do you publish magazines on weaving or can you advise where he can obtain them?
* Where can he find classified ads for looms and weaving supplies?

My responses were quite quick, because my breakfast is cooling and my list of tasks is long. But they may be useful to someone else as well, and I've expanded a bit from the request for information on a "noncomputerized floor loom" in my comments below.

New or old loom—doesn't matter, as long as it works. For a multi-shaft table or floor loom, it's good to know ahead of time that all the parts are there, that they are all hooked up correctly, and that all the beams are precisely parallel. That's harder with a used loom, especially from a distance.

Prices for looms can be all over the map. You can get set up with a primitive-style loom for $25 or so (you can even assemble or build a simple and effective loom yourself). Table looms and small floor looms run in the hundreds of dollars, and big floor looms get into the thousands.

The quality of the weaving depends on the weaver, not the sophistication of the equipment. I like all looms that work well (some fancy looms don't). You can do a lot of superb weaving on so-called primitive looms, like backstraps and inkles and rigid heddles or with cardweaving, but your son-in-law is obviously interested in multi-shaft looms. There are lots of reasons that they are wonderful to work with, even though they are more expensive than and not as portable as the simpler looms.

In the more complex styles of looms, a table loom is fine to start with, and useful forever, as long as it's sturdy. Four shafts (or harnesses) are plenty to work with, and a four-shaft loom always comes in handy even if a weaver decides to get another loom with more shafts later. I have eight shafts on one of my looms, but there's so much to do with four shafts that I really don't need them often. Even though they're fun. The floor loom he's looking for would let your son-in-law balance the effort of weaving between arms and legs, and there's a rhythm to working on a floor loom that isn't available with other loom types. I have both table and floor looms (as well as so-called primitive equipment).

There's a site for used equipment (and fibers, and books . . . ) called Spinners', Weavers', and Knitters' Housecleaning Pages; it's a terrific resource. Participants are being asked to contribute a bit to support the site's maintenance, and contributions are well deserved. The trick would be arranging shipping to Israel. The sellers tend to be individuals who might be challenged by the prospect of arranging for the safe movement of a large, heavy piece of equipment across multiple thousands of miles.

There are undoubtedly looms closer to Israel, but I'm not sure how to find them.

There are lots of other great new looms out there, and a number of fine makers of looms. Schacht Spindle Company produces a wide array of excellent looms and has been around long enough that the folks there could probably figure out shipping to Israel. Schacht's offerings should definitely be on anyone's short list of loom prospects. While you're checking out the equipment, take time to discover Violet Rose, the blog written by Jane Patrick, a gifted weaver and writer and the former long-time editor of Handwoven magazine (noted below).

I don't publish magazines on weaving.

Handwoven magazine is the primary resource for weavers and includes superb classified and display ads for equipment and supplies. It's edited by Madelyn van der Hoogt, who knows an astonishing amount about weaving, especially magically complex weave structures. She serves up a continually fresh array of projects and ideas in Handwoven.

The best publication that I know of for systematic understanding of four-shaft structures and design—for weavers at any level of experience—is Weaver's Craft; a set of back issues would be a good idea for anyone interested in weaving on table or floor looms. It's written and published by Jean Scorgie, another former editor of Handwoven magazine and one of the best technical weavers that I've ever met . . . who also has one of the finest design abilities I've encountered. Jean can present a weave structure that I know really well and I'll learn new things about it.

But I've been so busy with computers and publishing that I haven't woven in way too long.

Maggie Casey's new book: Start Spinning

Well, hallelujah! A wonderful, inspiring new introductory overview of spinning is now available. While many titles on handspinning have recently been published (that's very good . . . and, as a long-time spinner and the former editor of Spin-Off magazine [1988–early 2000], I enjoy checking them out), few have been as remarkable as Maggie Casey's Start Spinning: Everything You Need to Know to Make Great Yarn. This treasure, just published by Interweave Press, will get new spinners set up solidly and will give more experienced spinners a chance to say, "YES!"

While you'll still want to take a class or workshop with Maggie if she's within your traveling distance, the book manages to transmit a nice portion of Maggie's calm, focused wisdom in printed form. (Maggie is teaching in person at the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival in late April/early May and at the Estes Park Wool Market in mid-June; she's also a co-owner and instructor at Shuttles, Spindles and Skeins in Boulder, Colorado.)

In Start Spinning, Maggie covers all the necessary points, with just the right details—not too many, but not too few, either. Information, organization, and tone are all just right: A two-page section on troubleshooting for wheel spinning begins, "If you feel like you're fighting with your wheel instead of working in partnership with it, keep this in mind. . . . It is always the wheel." (Page 52.)

The book's major emphasis is on wool, which for contemporary spinners in North America (and lots of other places) is the default fiber . . . and it's a great and logical place to start, even though in some locations and times other fibers have been the beginner material.

(Like, for example, cotton. . . . Some folks may find this difficult to believe, but historically many spinners have learned with cotton. With the right preparation, tools, and expectations, there's no reason not to start with what you've got.)

The photography and book design enhance the material. The photos are simple and show what they need to with grace and clarity. One of the things I noticed immediately is that the photos feature beginner, proficient-spinner, and novelty yarns of many fibers and constructions, often within the same picture.

This is, in my mind, a huge plus. A number of the recent spinning books show only thick-and-thin yarns (or fun but structurally questionable novelties . . . not all novelties are structurally questionable, of course). Many older books and spinning periodicals show only extremely even, fine yarns. The first situation, while appealing in the textural and "you can do this!" dimensions, doesn't encourage spinners to increase their skills so they can spin any yarn they want . . . and thick-and-thin or funky-novelty yarns are fun some of the time, but not all of the time. They're often not very versatile to work with when you want to actually make something. The second situation, of showing only the most masterfully spun yarns, can be completely intimidating. I think that irregular yarns can be beautiful, and that evenly spun yarns can be exquisite. It's nice to see yarns of a broad range of types nestled happily together. You might call this "yarn diversity" in action . . . and all of the yarns shown look like they'd be nice on the needles or hook or shuttle as well as in the skein or ball.

In the body of the book, Maggie talks about both spindles and wheels. She demonstrates spinning from the prepared fibers that most beginning spinners today will start with, but there's a lovely appendix that gives framework for understanding wool types along with information on choosing and preparing a fleece. She pinpoints the reason spinners choose to start with raw material: it's "the difference between a meal prepared at home and dorm food."

Quibbles, all the size of grains of salt: A few copyediting glitches got through, mostly relating to the placement of punctuation; no one but another copyeditor is likely to notice (and Elizabeth Zimmermann's last name has only one N on page 92 . . . this is possibly the most common typo in knitting-related books and magazines). As I recall (I'm writing at the library), all the wheels in the photos are double-treadle; there are a lot of single-treadle wheels around as well. Due to production vagaries, the driveband is partly invisible in a photo that's used more than once (first on page 29). The description of how to start a wheel, "Start with the footman in the one o'clock position," shown with a Lendrum, may be a bit confusing to a total neophyte, who may not know that the part of the footman that's supposed to be in that position is its upper attachment point, and the idea might be even more difficult to understand for someone who has a double-footman Saxony-style wheel (like the one shown in that lefthand photo on page 29 . . . actually, for any Saxony-style wheel it's hard to figure out where "one o'clock" is). Changing drive bands is mentioned as a possible necessity on page 53, but the cross-reference page, 38, doesn't tell how . . . the information does appear in the back of the book. Maggie apparently sometimes walks on the wild side with her skeins by using two ties with small amounts of yarn, although she generally recommends four. I never use less than three . . . especially with small amounts of yarn, which in my experience are even more likely to get messed up than large skeins. "Bird's nest" needs to be in the index (it's on page 14, and the mention on page 81 is the reason it needs to be indexed). Overall, the index could have been more thorough; however, the book is small and well-written enough that I suggest just sidestepping the index issue by reading the whole thing through and flagging items of personal interest with sticky notes.

In sum: This is a FANTASTIC book. If you have been thinking about learning to spin, this is a superb place to start. If you've already been spinning for a while, connect with it to fill in any gaps in your foundation. Maggie and I have different carding techniques . . . they both work . . . and otherwise I read through the entire text thinking, "Yes, exactly. That's what I think, too. Oh, good! She presented that the way I'd want to if I were doing this. . . ."

It's sort of weird to find that another spinner, whom I've known for a number of years but with whom I've never had the opportunity to actually sit and spin or talk about spinning, has developed an approach to spinning, and to teaching beginners to spin, that is so similar to mine. Of course, Maggie's actually teaching classes . . . and I've mostly been involved with publishing instead of teaching since I moved to Colorado from Massachusetts, where I did teach spinning on a regular basis. So I haven't been of much use as a direct instructor for a lot of years. My energy's been channeled into putting information into print. Although the desired end results are similar, the activities for getting there are extremely different: like the difference between getting some place on a bike versus on a train (sometimes I think teaching is the bike and publishing is the train, sometimes vice versa; it doesn't matter which corresponds to which).

I am so glad Maggie has written this book, which gets exceptionally close to putting three dimensions into two. She made me miss teaching (although I think I need to stick with the publishing), and also made me wish I'd been able to take her classes when I discovered yarn-making. My introductory spinning was trial-and-error, largely guided by Elsie Davenport's Your Handspinning (a great book that would not compete effectively in today's market) and with a bunch of fellow learners as support. In many ways, it was a fine way to learn to spin, but I wasted a lot of time (years, actually) discovering the hard way things that Maggie explains beautifully in a few pages.

And so, in two words, Start here!

______

NOTE: There's a picture up there! This post is not about computers! PCConnection is wonderful!

PCConnection got me the exchange computer about two weeks faster than I expected to receive it, and it arrived with the extra RAM not only installed (I'd said I could do that, easily) but also checked out. I want to be sure to acknowledge all this before I rocket right back into publishing and spinning and knitting, all of which has been in computer-failure-enforced slow motion for weeks.

I haven't got all the software loaded onto the new machine, but the big stuff I couldn't get to work on the other computers (the one that glitched and the first replacement machine) has been installed and a few of my documents are in place. It takes the better part of a day to download and install updates for the Microsoft software, and just over half a day to install, update, and the spend time on the phone activating the Adobe suite, so I'm glad to be through those passages (again).

Ah, the first computer has also arrived back, two days after the second PCConnection shipment arrived, and will be moved to my daughter's office area to handle image processing for the next book. Which is now more than a month behind, because of my computer problems.

Over the past several weeks, I have begun to wonder whether something in my personal aura (or magnetic field, or whatever) was toxic to computers. Fortunately, that does not appear to be the case. The new/exchange machine is doing just fine. And an e-mail I received yesterday indicates that the tech folks at PCConnection are also experiencing some odd behavior with the returned unit. This seems to further suggest that it wasn't just me. Whew.

Computer problems: Much better than a toothache

Still no pictures here.

Computer saga, with perspective

As Buddhist monk and simply wise-person-in-many-dimensions Thich Nhat Hanh observes, the good thing about a toothache is that it teaches us how nice it is not to have a toothache. I extend this teaching to the understanding that a mess of computer problems is also much less painful than a toothache, and working computers are much more convenient than malfunctioning computers.

To recap, with some updates:

• The original computer (code name A3) that was doing strange things was sent back to the manufacturer (after many days of online and phone contact with tech support and many drastic actions here). I've received an e-mail saying it will be back some time in the middle of next week, although no human communication to indicate what the problem might have been. The assumption is that the problem has been fixed. This computer will now become my daughter's, thus improving and speeding up her work with the Nomad Press images (she is using a nine-year-old P3, 448MHz, maxed out at 768MB RAM, code D1; she will have a two-year-old P4, 3.0GHz, 4MB RAM, that being A3).
• The replacement computer (A5) I ordered for myself arrived and after six days (including many drastic actions like restoring factory defaults three times) was shipped back to the source. I don't know whether that particular machine is a lemon or whether some of the non-essential software was interfering with the installation of the software I need to run, but PCConnection graciously agreed that it was time to give up on it.
• The exchange computer (H6) that I ordered was listed as "ships in 2+ weeks," which was really bad news but after another day of research it looked so much like the best alternative that I figured I'd just have to tough it out for another two weeks. The great news here is that my call to one of the manufacturers to ask questions about my specific needs connected me to a young woman named Cressida in the sales department. I said, "I do print publishing. I tend to have InDesign, Photoshop, and Illustrator open simultaneously, and I put together large files that may contain as many as 600 linked images." Cressida said, "Ah, I know your problem. I'm a graphic designer." ! She steered me away from both computers I was considering and toward another, saying, "THIS is what you need." It's no more expensive than the ones on my list. So I ordered it, thinking that I'd limp through the waiting period by installing the most essential programs temporarily on the laptop, which is a Linux machine but does have a small XP (Home) partition on it.
• However, the laptop (T4) has only 256MB of RAM (it was bought to run Linux, after all; it didn't need much RAM . . . which puts me in mind of my first computer, which did very nicely with 64KB of RAM, although of course it didn't multitask). Adobe Creative Suite 2 requires a minimum of 384MB to install. There are ways to force the Adobe installer to work with less RAM (as little as 100MB), but even if I did that it's not like I could then open an InDesign file for a heavily illustrated book. The laptop is upgradeable. The RAM for it, ordered at 3:30 on Thursday afternoon for overnight delivery (extra cost), will, through the peculiarities of order handling and shipping, arrive by overnight standard delivery by 3 p.m. on Monday. Oddly, if I'd chosen regular shipping (USPS, probably Priority Mail) it would most likely be here now. Oh, well. (According to the tracking number, it arrived in town at 5 this morning, but it's not like FedEx would let me drive out to the depot and pick it up. The depot is closed.)

I have written in my head, but not gotten onto this blog, several posts on how it's a miracle that any small business survives. This is just one of many of the amazing types of hurdles that small businesses deal with every day.

Taxes are due in ten days, too.

Knitting helps

So yesterday I left town. Sometimes it's good to just change the view completely.

I went to Denver for three other errands, listening to Thich Nhat Hanh while I drove.

Along the way, I got to visit A Knitted Peace for the first time, and there was a Habu trunk show going on. Very cool stuff, including two pieces I might even wear . . . although I don't get dressed up enough that I'd use them more than once a year.

I learned about String too late for a visit. Next time.

After my errands, I ended up at the Tattered Cover on the way-south-end of the metropolitan area for Stephanie Pearl-McPhee's road tour appearance. I sat near the back, next to Erynn and and Isaac and Isaiah, whose photos are on Stephanie's blog, as well as two Wyoming folks who'd driven 4.5 hours to be there (one of whom I knew from Cyndi Lee's knitting circles at the Yoga Journal conference in Estes Park . . . nice to see, and visit at length with, someone I knew!). I also got to briefly see Amy Clarke Moore and her daughter Hannah, a child whom I had only previously seen in photos. If there were a cutest kid contest and Hannah was in it, the other kids would all be very worried and might even go home, no matter how cute they were.

Stephanie is, of course, very talented both on the page and in person, putting together excellent humor and thoughtful content, and I brought home a copy of her new book, Things I Learned from Knitting (Whether I Wanted to or Not), which will be very sanity-inducing to read while I am waiting for my current band-aid computer (D2) to load Firefox (4 minutes), move an e-mail message to a folder (30 seconds to 2 minutes) or pick up mail (20 minutes or more, although I usually leave the room during mail pick-ups).

During the Yarn Harlot event, I finished the hand-dyed rayon Landscape Shawl variation (based on Evelyn Clark's pattern), with 1.5 inches (3.75 cm) of yarn to spare. Photos when possible.

I have also finished my acupuncturist's cotton chenille cardigan. When I left for Denver, it was drying on a towel after its initial washing.

Sometimes knitting progresses when other things don't.

Shifting sands in the publishing world

In another development this week, Amazon is attempting to force authors and publishers who use print-on-demand (POD) printing technology to use the printing service that Amazon owns to produce copies sold through Amazon. If the publishers and authors don't agree to this change, their books' "buy" buttons on Amazon will be disabled. Amazon is also setting the pricing and discount structures for the sale of these copies. Although Nomad Press doesn't produce its books with this technology and is not affected by this move, we have been vulnerable to other Amazon policy changes. "Amazon is attempting" means, essentially, "Amazon is doing this." They do hold nearly all the cards in the game they're playing.

Some very good news conveyed by e-mail

My copy of Stephanie's book is unsigned. The south-end Tattered Cover is very far from my home, so I left without waiting in line, although I sent hello-and-hang-in-there-on-the-tour-blitz messages to her with friends. I got home before 11:30 p.m. but didn't turn on my computer. It would have taken most of an hour to retrieve e-mail.

When I fired up the old machine (D2) this morning, I discovered the following lovely message from my stalwart primary contact in the technical solutions (I think "solutions" is much better than "support") department at PCConnection, with reference to the "ships in 2+ weeks" exchange computer that was plugged into their ordering system for me late on Thursday:

• "Deb, The units are due in today. John"

! ! ! !

I think that counts as a miracle, right up there with completing the shawl and the cardigan within inches of the last of their yarns.

Adventures in TechLemonLand

I still have no pictures. I continue to limp along with the help of a seven-year-old computer that wobbles frequently but has not (knock on wood) completely lost its mind. Unlike the new system.

____

No news on the original problematical machine, the one that started all of this.

I've just restored the new, replacement computer to factory defaults for the second time and am about to power it down and put it back in its original packaging, with all original papers and other bits and pieces, and ship it back to its source.

One should not have to be messing with the Windows registry just to install software. Or not more than just a very little bit.

After six days of full-time effort, a new computer should have on it at least one packet of owner data, or one user document. This machine did have a small handful of my actual files over the weekend, when I thought I was making progress even if by devious means, but they were eradicated when I restored the factory defaults the first time. This has been far too reminiscent of the days of CP/M operating systems and the need to know about hex codes to install a printer.

Note: I have bought a number of pieces of equipment from PCConnection over the years and have always been happy with the service. That's true in this case, too. The folks there have been very helpful, even though they've been as baffled as I have been by the weird goings-on with this machine.

A couple of days ago one of the tech support people (Mike) e-mailed me some ideas about how to manage the corrupt registry, and he included this quote at the end:

• As Henry David Thoreau once said, "Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which distract our attention from serious things. They are but improved means to an unimproved end."

It has helped preserve my sanity.

And last night, John at PCConnection sent me this wonderful message:

• "I think we, meaning mostly you, have tried just about every reasonable step to resolve this problem. I own a [computer name] that has given me very little trouble but that does not mean they can't have problems. . . . If you have a complete unit down to the packaging we can work on exchanging this system."

I have a complete unit. I even have the tiny screw that was rattling around inside the tower when the shipment arrived, and the plastic bag the box was wrapped in.

And now I have an RMA number!

_____

Other progress, in the cracks between computer-wrangling sessions:

1. Once I realized that appropriate computer channels would not be available to set up a freight shipment, I figured out how to do it through other means. Some time today Yellow Transportation will show up. I hope my daughter is here (i.e., has finished her shift at the bookstore) and will be able to help me move, stack, and shrinkwrap the 1800 pounds of books I've got organized and labeled in the garage. (We will both be glad to be able to open the freezer door again without raising the garage door and moving our two bikes out onto the driveway.)

2. I have almost finished the cotton chenille sweater for my acupuncturist! Can't wait to take photos of that. It looks pretty good.

3. I am making forward progress again on the shawl that is an invention on Evelyn Clark's Landscape Shawl concept (I'm making a shawl, but putting on the shaped ends of the scarf, and customizing the size and configuration to the amount of yarn I have . . . which I slightly miscalculated, thus the pleasure at making forward progress after some backward regression).
____

Okay, I have a computer to put back into a box, and a bunch of other stuff that's running behind to catch up on because of that computer.