Thursday, August 17, 2006

There are still ants in my office.

...and Blogger is fucking up even more than usual. Sorry for the double-post, for anyone on Bloglines. I think I've figured out what I'm doing wrong. (It might not be the baby's fault - how is that possible?)

And the title has really nothing to do with the rest of this, it's just the first thing that went through my head when I sat down to write and saw the little black fuckers running in a little trail along the edge of my desk.

Ahem.

Alwen asks where I scored a 0000 circular needle. As I recall - and the memory is a bit foggy, these days, what with one thing and another - I custom ordered it through a shop in Virginia Beach, Virginia (that may have been called the Hook and Eye, but it may not have, too) when I LIVED in Virginia, which would have been somewhereabouts 1992. Ish. It was ordered from Germany (of that I'm fairly certain) and took about a month to arrive, and cost about $20 USD. It looks, for all the world, like an Addi Turbo. (I have compared it to my brand new Addi Turbo size one, and they seem identical, down to the floppy cord.) You may want to check with the company and see if they make circulars that small. It might be one of theirs. If you do find out, let me know. I'm kind of curious. In my latest round of small-needle purchases, I didn't find anything smaller than a size 0 circular, but I didn't look that hard. With the legions of sock-knitters out there, there SHOULD be someone making the smaller needles.

You know, in Hawaii, we used to say that the only cure for ants in the house was arson. Just saying.

Aha. Blogger is finally taking photos. Here we can see a lameass shot of me wearing the yoke of the Blue Shimmer. You can't tell much from the photo (except that my photography sucks, which I've said all along), but you can tell the yoke is acting like a yoke. I put it back on the needles and did another increase round; I'm up to 440 stitches and those rounds are really starting to take a while.

I considered working on the lace, but decided that's first-thing-in-the-morning knitting (I'm supposed to take tranquilizers as soon as I wake up but I skip that dose and usually have a good six or eight hours where I'm wide awake). The pattern I've chosen is one I've knit at least five times before and love for it's symmetry and the fact that it doesn't LOOK knitted. I just don't know how it's gonna hold up against the inevitable Orenburg Lace Shawl entry at the State Fair. Hopefully tatting thread (Alwen, you were right, it says tatting and crochet on the ball label) and tiny needles will count for something.

Did you know, ants are not native to large parts of the world, but were hauled in by idiot white men who were too bloody stupid to take care with the plant crops they took along with them? (That's how ants got to Hawaii - in the sugar cane.)

You know, arson is looking like a fine answer to this ant problem.

3 comments:

Sheepish Annie said...

Mine are back,too. I suspect that it is some sort of hazing ritual perpetrated by the hornets just to see if the ants will really try to make a comeback. There has been a great deal of ant carnage...

Anonymous said...

If they're the tiny black ones Terro(http://www.terro.com/)might help- it's only borax(sodium tetraborate decahydrate)& corn syrup.(Gardens Alive has it too- but a diff name) Put it on their trail, then take cover bec they GATHER a day or 2 & then vanish. With a tiny cup of it left out, the scouts come & don't return. But if they're big ones... worth a try, maybe, but good luck!

TrishJ said...

I'm not much saner than you are...I looked at the yoke photo and thought, "Look! It's R2D2!"

Anyhoo, it's looking great, keep chugging. Those judges are going to LOVE your lace!