Tour de Fleece Part 2

Still keeping up in terms of spinning every day, but I’m certainly not turning out the quantity of spinning that some people are. However, the roving for the guild challenge is over half spun. I divided my 150g in two at the start, just for an idea of what quantity I had and for plying it later. 75g looks like surprisingly little, though – it doesn’t fill a bobbin.

Now I’m going to worry about the yardage, and whether there’ll be enough to do what I want. Very fuzzy pictures today, sorry, don’t know what the cause is, maybe ‘cause I’m tired. But this, if you can see it, is the picture of the shawl I want to copy.

I’ve got a bit more time after lunch today, so I’ll get in more spinning. I really would like to see how this will look plied, and get my yardage totaled, so I can start planning the shawl!  

Blackberry Picking as a Martial Art

I do tend to like old-fashioned activities, and on occasion, you get people asking why. Why do you spin/knit/make jam etc. when you don’t have to? What good is it? Some of us had a discussion on the transferable skills from knitting, such as dexterity, memory, math, creativity, and problem-solving, following a comment I heard that putting knitting down as a hobby on your resume was pointless.

It’s summer, and the blackberries are ripe. I spent a few hours picking them this weekend at the parents’. It’s a very meditative process, and one I’ve been doing for years – it was our job as kids, and I suspect one that was very good for us. Because thinking about it as I picked, I am declaring that maybe blackberry picking is worth more than it seems like also, in terms of skills and processes – and you get berries as a bonus! For example:

Dexterity, memory, spatial orientation: Blackberries have thorns. Lots of them. And the bushes frequently have layers, with some hidden underneath, or that you can only see from a particular angle. You need dexterity to get them out without ripping yourself to shreds, (and flexibility to duck and dodge the canes in the process), a good memory to keep track of where that cluster was you saw while you’re finishing the current section, and good spatial orientation and hand-eye coordination to get some of the berries underneath when your hand and eye are starting from different places and the action of aiming for them moves leaves and blocks your view of your target.

Planning, control of impulses and multitasking: Berry bushes have three things in quantity. Berries, thorns – and mosquitoes. We think they set the bushes as traps for humans. Be that as it may, you learn very quickly that it is necessary to pick in long sleeves and pants. Hands and face are still exposed, but your hands are usually occupied in holding canes back and picking berries. This means that automatically smacking a mosquito landing on your hands or face, or trying to flap away the ones buzzing in your ears, will usually lose you berries and/or get you caught in the thorns. You must, instead, carefully transfer your current berries to the bucket or detangle from the canes to free a hand, and then gently, deliberately, squash the mosquito(es) biting you. This will occur many times over the daily picking time, and you just have to allow for it, and pick as fast as you can while being thorough, to minimize the time you spend being bit and scratched. 

Patience: This is not a fast process. We have several berry patches you need to make the rounds of daily. These are wild blackberries, so the productivity and location of the patches can change from year to year. Picking takes about an hour per litre of berries, maybe a bit less. Last summer at peak it was 4 litres in 3 hours (raspberries and blackberries), and picking season lasted over two weeks. Some years there are less berries – but you still have to check all the bushes daily until they’re slowing down noticeably. Then you can pick less often – but by then it’s blueberry season too. And the work doesn’t end with picking. Berries have to be picked over every day to remove bits of leaves, bugs, etc that have snuck in, then either frozen or made into jam if they’re not to be eaten fresh.

Given all that, I say forget about all these toys and games designed to teach your kid whatever. Get thee a blackberry patch, a set of knitting needles, and all the rest of that old-fashioned stuff. It’s probably cheaper, and you get jam and socks as a bonus!

21st Century, Here I Come

I am, for the first time, posting from my own living room. The tech came this morning to set up my internet. And I'm using the new computer I acquired this weekend, an Apple iBook G4 (my first Apple!). Not a new one, but free, and my father checked it over and put some fancy stuff on it, and I think it has wireless capability also, and a few hours battery life, so I could even go and play at the coffeeshop or something.

Anyway, it's all terribly exciting. The fact that I can check e-mail without going to the library or the old lab, or asking to borrow when I visit someone is...dizzying. Completely new idea. I may have to concentrate on not spending too much time surfing around! I never bothered to get it when I moved here, because I was in the lab 6 days of 7 anyway, and could always make time to do whatever I needed online there. But I'm using the 'net more than I used to (thanks, Ravelry!), between blogging and designing, and whatnot. And it's not really nice of me to keep using the lab stuff now I'm done school - besides, it takes a good 40 min to get there, so a lot of wasted time travelling.  No more. I can do this in PJs if I want. Look things up the moment I think of it, rather than writing it down and waiting for my next trip. Not miss job openings or important e-mails because I don't get on line for a couple days. I think I'm going to like this.

It doesn't mean I'm getting an iPOD or a microwave, though. I have to draw the line somewhere if I want to maintain my reputation!

Tour de Fleece Part 1

The Tour de France is almost a week old, and I’ve been managing to keep up with the spinning along with it. Not a lot each day, true, but some at least.

The first few days, I finished the bobbin of blue I had started, and did another one, spun and plied. So two more skeins of that, making a total of 14 blue skeins – and the bag isn’t done.

I decided I needed a change again. Even multicolored peacock blue can get boring.

And the fiber for the Guild challenge was sitting there. So guess what’s on the bobbin now?

Can you see the sheen on it?

It’s a really well prepared roving, easy to spin from. I’m spinning it fine and tight, I guess it’s probably semi-worsted.

You know how people talk about letting the yarn or fiber tell you what it wants to be? I think that’s exactly what happened here. As soon as I sampled spinning it, my previous idea for a ‘Crimson and Clover’ shawl went out the window. I’m not even sure I want to dye it. And if the plied yarn ends up the way I think it will…there’s a shawl on the cover of one of my Piecework magazines that would show it off perfectly. It’s a shawl the article’s author bought in Russia. The pattern (and even the stitch pattern) don’t seem to be out there on Rav, based on a quick search. So I may end up doing some reverse engineering (sure, make it difficult, eh?) Well, it is supposed to be a challenge!

What’s Next

Started at the new job this week. We have training for the first week or two, so it was back to class for me. Two whole binders' worth of reading for homework, talks on expectations, confidentiality, and harassment, forms galore, new people, new building…The job posting didn’t sound like call center, but it appears that’s what it is. Not my favorite pastime, but it will definitely expand the resume, and at least the people I talk to will be farmers. And most of the people in my group have some farm/rural background or interest, which is great - it's nice to have people who speak my language! Plus I'm listed as bilingual, and on night shift, and both of those give extra pay. That will justify getting internet chez moi - a necessity since I discovered that I can't upload on the library computers, and the nearest one to work is a 10 minute walk and busy enough in the afternoon to mean I waited 30 minutes for a 15 minute slot.

I was hoping that there would be something else new to report this week. I was out at the parents’last weekend, and one of the hens, Amy, is sitting on some eggs - our first broody hen. She’s been sitting for at least a couple weeks already, and they could hatch any time. We’re hoping the eggs are fertile and the rooster’s not shooting blanks. If effort counts, he shouldn’t be! Amy’s so funny, takes it so seriously. She sits on her nest very flat, trying to cover as much area as possible. If you talk to her she makes funny noises, and she won’t look at any treats you give her (although they do seem to get eaten later). And every day she gets up for a little while to stretch her legs, and goes and stands on the fence and talks to the other hens, giving them the daily report I guess. I think she’d be such a cute mother hen.

Anyway, things overall are going well (it's just the transition that's a bit wobbly), and it's Canada Day. I slipped over to the lab to do my internet stuff, but will not be pausing downtown on the way back, even though I now have a bus pass. Much as I'd like to see the Royal visitors and the concerts and the Snowbirds and all, it's a hot day and crowded on the Hill, and I really ought to plant a few neglected things and otherwise catch up on everything at home I haven't been doing this week. And warm up for the Tour de Fleece starting tomorrow!

Dictionary, Please and Parental Dilemmas

I was walking home yesterday and saw the following sign, crudely printed and propped against a tree.

CHILdRE

NSAID

PRAYS ON

PREGENT

WOMEN

Dudes, I don’t know whether you’ve got a case or not, but I don’t think the sign is going to help you. I mean, I’m sorry, I know there are people who have trouble with language, and I know what with not teaching spelling and grammar in school and the rise of text messaging, things are a bit shakier than they used to be. But if you’re trying to communicate something and be taken seriously, you might want to verify things like homonyms, spelling, and appropriate places for word breaks. I’m pretty good with language, but I was halfway down the block before I figured it out, after trying and rejecting theories involving aspirin (included in a class of drugs called NSAIDs for Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs), religion, and possibly sex-change operations.

Reminds me of a T-shirt I saw back in high school, printed with “Huked On Foniks Wurkt For Me”.

And the parental issues: Julia caught a mouse last night while she was out on her leash with me! Just came to attention all of a sudden, stuck her head in a clump of soapwort, and came out with a cute, very plump, white-bellied mouse. It was still apparently unharmed, but squeaking most distressfully, so I asked her if she was going to kill it and eat it. But she wanted to trot off and play with it instead, so I made her let it go. Poor thing took a moment to get its bearings, and headed off into the bushes, with a tale to tell the grandkids, I suspect. And Julia looked for it for a few minutes, and looked very reproachful at me. She squawked to go back outside again once we got in, too, despite the rain.

 I feel kind of bad – I mean, this is what cats do, right? And I’m sure she’s caught them at the farm. She will be out in the field for hours at a time, and only stop in for half a bite of food now and then. Chances are she’s not emulating T.S. Eliot’s Jennyanydots and teaching the mice ‘…music, crocheting, and tatting.’ But any of the other cats there bringing their prey home bring it dead (except for the time Lily tried to teach old Nick to hunt again) so I don’t have to hear it squeaking. Besides, who knows what these city mice eat? And it’s not like she’s starving. So while I’m proud of her hunting prowess, um, let's go with the catch and release method, please.

Errand Day

Since I do most of my travel in the city by bus, it’s become second nature to lump as many stops into one session as possible – get the most for my money, as it were. In one of Piers Anthony’s Xanth novels, he mentions a practice of requiring three reasons to go anywhere, and that’s something like what I try for. So Monday after my e-mail check, I went to work off accumulated errands, being out of cash, out of reading material, and requiring a saw. Stop one was downtown, for the bank and library. I think I did pretty well with my library session. (There seem to be issues with adding pictures today. This is as good as it gets, sorry.)

I always like to see what people get at the library and the grocery store, as a way of learning something about them. Wonder what my library pile says to others? This week’s run included 2 Victorian-set mysteries, 2 sci-fi/fantasy, Ovid’s Metamorphoses in two volumes, a book on Louisburg and one on the English conquest of Canada, and two on rural schools – Glengarry Schooldays by Ralph Connor and Tales from a Village School by Miss Read. Sadly, I’m on the third book of the 10 already. I have this issue with putting books down.

I ran down to Lee Valley also before going home, for the saw. Just a small folding one for pruning, as I’m cleaning up the garden for someone nearby, for a little extra money. They have lots of soft maple invading, and an old honeysuckle interfering with the clothesline, among other things. I suspect they haven’t done much at all in years with the place (he says, ’The garden is here, or it was 8 years ago.’), and it will be satisfying to see it come alive again.

I also bought garden shoes there. I had a couple of gift cards to spend, and I know these shoes are comfy and tough – my parents have them also, and if Mom can’t kill them, they’re pretty darn good. I use them when I’m there, and love them, except they’re a couple sizes too big, so now I have my own. And in red not green like the others, so it’s hard to mix them up – think of the confusion three pair of almost-identical green shoes would cause. Bad enough our rubber boots are the same.