Monday, August 07, 2006

Trish's comments,

commented upon.

A word of warning, Trish is a good friend of mine whom I've actually met in real life, and she's gone back to knitting after a long break due in part to my nefarious influence. She e-mails me a lot of questions, and I attempt to keep up. So here we go. Brace yourselves.

The Great Minds and What They'd Knit Debate:

Trish: What about Freud?? I'm seing him as a bikini knitting sort of dude, then he'd blame it on his mother.

Me: He'd have knit a cigar and explained how it wasn't a cigar, it was symbolic of penis envy or penisness or penile disfunction or gonads and strife, in a bad Austrian accent sounding vaguely like the Terminator, until we all shrieked and/or threw up. Or he'd have knit something that looked like a bird's nest with not one real stitch in it while whacked out on cocaine. I don't consider Freud a Great Mind. (He was a guy with One Good Idea: see Eli Whitney and Henry Ford, among others.) And the concept of Penis Envy? HAH. I've got enough stuff flopping around on me without one of those.


Knitting Issues:

Trish: Inox circulars, all the way!!!

Me: I love them too. The craft store didn't have them. I'm ordering some as soon as my last writing paycheck goes through.

Trish: can you imagine Julie with clickety clack needles?

Me: Can you imagine me heavily sedated? Oh, wait....

Trish: how exactly do you take the pink yarn out? (I assume she means the provisional cast-on I've got going on the neck of the Blue Shimmer.)

Me: Slowly, with great annoyance, snipping off bits every few stitches. I'll probably have to get a swing-arm mounted magnifying glass to keep track of what I'm doing. I should have used a crochet cast on, which would just unravel right out, but I brain-farted and used a long-tail cast on which I will pay dearly for, later.

Trish: And why didn't you tell me that trick when I asked you that for the hat I am making???

Me: You asked me about yarns to use, and told me you were starting over because the hat was too big and if you'd payed attention to that gauge swatch article you proof-read for me, you'd probably know why. You never MENTIONED needing a cast-on for it. Ergo, I did not tell you about it. What am I, the Psychic Knitter? No. I am the Samurai Knitter.

Trish: Seems like you're keeping the good tips for yourself :::sniff sniff:::

Me: Ditto on what am I, the psychic knitter?

I will happily write a book containing every shred of my knitting knowledge. Get me a book deal and I'll get right to work.

I think that concludes todays sniping commentary (mine, not Trish's.)

2 comments:

TrishJ said...

Oh, she makes me SEARCH the bowels of AOHELL to prove Julie is, indeed, fallen under the ruthless and consuming mind control blitz of the dynamic duo (baby and cat).

First, you could have taken out your damned tarot cards or runes to find out what I needed and wanted, since indeed the world revolves around me (unless you're one of my kids, or the DH, or the dog, and then the world revolves around them).

But since you didn't, here's a snippet of the email volley titled, "Annoying Questions", which I will next time title, "Questions You Should Have Known I was gonna ask, Oh Psychic One, But Didn't Bother to Divine so here they are"

:::snip from email, dated 8/2/06:::This is from that cabled hat...what's a provisional cast on? :::snip:::

Your answer??? Sent the next day, mind you...

:::snip::: "A provisional cast-on is anything you can pick out again. I use a crochet cast-on sometimes, or the long-tail method which is a pain in the ass but works. ANYTHING you can take back out is fine." :::snip:::

Did you mention the pink yarn tip?? NO! I would have used the same yarn and blinded myself from the sheer agony, and then killed myself in front of the A&P with a Susan Bates needle. After I had coffee, of course.


Furthermore, Freud isn't a great mind as far as I'm concerned, and he would have CROCHETED a cigar because that's the kind of dude he was. He would have NO PROBLEM crocheting a cigar or even crocheting with some metal (unlike a blog owner I know, dig dig), and making kinky hand cuffs or something. Then he'd knit a bikini, give it to his mother and blame it all on bad mare's milk Germman chocolate AND cocaine AND diet pepsi.

If I wanted a great mind to take up knitting, I would have gotten Leonardo to do some hand-paint yarn for me, and I could knit myself a Mona Lisa shawl.

I think I'm done now. When the baby and the cat take over, I'm gonna be on their side, let me tell you. The baby will remember Auntie, the woman in charge of getting her those yummy COOKIES.

TrishJ said...

I forgot to add, my hat came out PERFECTLY the second time and it FITS. (it's just a plain ole hat, not the cabled hat). It's not my fault, as I cannot add or subtract. FYI, this is why I have children.

"But DOCTOR, you said day seventeen was SAFE!!"

Part of the problem was the yarn, a Rowan tweed thing which is really stretchy in feel, let me tell you. It's like knitting soft rubber bands.

That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.