Wisdom Tree

I got no pithy intro this afternoon - it's a holiday, and my nap-addled brain is like a dehydrated fig. (Wait, is that pithy?)

At the beginning of this month, I finished this:



It's for the Arthouse 5x7 show. And y'know what? It sold the first night. Didn't expect that!

I called it Wisdom Tree. It's supposed to represent the tree from which Odin hung for a week while he figured things out; the eyeball is the man himself. (High concept? Me?) I imagine some folks might look for heavy interpretations, but in truth, it was all about "Dang I wish I could just finish this," since I had two days to start and finish, thanks to our recent move.

My fella also contributed a piece - which also sold. See the wall of artwork for sale? This was taken on the second night. Ours are right next to each other, the only ones with the tags taken. (To purchase at this show, you take a tag to the cashier.)



I have enough iffy things in my life without starting a career as a visual artist, too, so this is likely a one-off deal that was lots of fun.

The Creatures You Meet

Yes, it's been a while.

So we bought a house.

And I didn't want to say anything, because for a while there it looked like it would all fall through. Then it didn't, and we had a house, and we had to move into the house. And I was like, blog? What? Do I have one of those?

But we're moved in now. It's way more suburban than we'd prefer, but there's this thing about price ranges and location.

On the upside, we have a yard. I've planted some things that will hopefully survive, and there's room for us to take crazy art projects (more on that later) outside where we won't destroy the wood floor.

On the downside... we have a yard. DANG it.

And suburban though this might be, I'm learning that having a yard brings you a little closer to nature. You take care of the lawn and observe every critter you see, in case its behavior turns invasive.

In fact...

We chose this morning to attack the lawn. I went as the vanguard, trowel and gloves at the ready, pulling weeds so the fella could mow. (And by the way, there is no faster way to age yourself and face the sudden reality that your hipster days are like so totally finished than to push a lawnmower around the place. Again: DANG it.) Everything was going swimmingly - and then, I spied something unusual:

At least, I thought it was unusual. I don't know, we're new to suburbia. Maybe these things crawl out of the sewers all the time.

But that's probably Florida. And this is Texas. Do they have free-range crawfish in Texas? Um.

He was still alive, too - he was crawling through the St. Augustine. I was willing to pick up the guy, but we had no idea where to put him. Should we be humanitarian and give him a shot at life? Or boil him ourselves?

Turns out, the neighbors are having a crawfish boil. He'd set down the cooler for a few minutes next to the house... and a couple escaped, and tried to make a run for it. Quite fresh and healthy little buggers, too: they were like five feet from where he'd set the cooler. The neighbor kindly picked up the stray crawfish and returned them to death row.

We combed the yard to make sure no more renegade crustaceans waited for us. After all - and I'm no expert - but I think that would gunk up the mower.

(DANG it.)

2010 SXSW update

Currently I'm caught in a messload of stockinette on a sweater of original design, so I thought instead of knitting content I could provide you with an update on SXSW 2010.

Except I'm like totally sick. I'm pretty sure it's just a cold (if you trust the hack doctor at the clinic this a.m., and yeah, there really are hack doctors), but this has become perhaps my number-one worst cold of all time. I'm not issuing a challenge, mind. If there are worse colds out there, it's fine. I believe you. No need to prove it with me. All I'm saying is, this is a bad cold. It's even spread to my eyeballs, and that's the kind of detail right there that makes you lose readers.

I'm on drugs now - the fancy-schmancy prescription kind - but my SXSW participation level has been lacking. As in, zero. Which apparently raises me to the level of a True Austinite: Complain about the traffic, welcome the sudden and temporary burst of municipal income, tell people not to move here, but above all, do not participate in SXSW if at all possible. (Unless, you know, you're an income-generating business. But don't worry, folks, I'm in no danger of becoming one of those. I'm a writer.)

So instead of standing outside Shangri-La trying to get into the showcase of a new Icelandic jazz/hip hop-fusion label and wondering where the nearest pink Port-o-Potty is in case the last $6 Lone Star (special SXSW prices) I guzzled is going to demand action, or standing outside a movie theater wondering exactly how far into the wristband line they're going to go before declaring capacity and hacking off all the people who didn't want to buy a badge, I'm watching a clip on Discovery channel about a newcomer hippo hoping to defeat the overlord hippo in hopes of having a chance at one of the like 200 hippo chicks in the watering hole. And what I'm wondering is, if he loses, what's the overlord hippo gonna do? Boink all 200 ladies? Come on. He's a hippo, not a rabbit. How is this to the genetic advantage of the species?

I'm also nosing over to Twitter on occasion to see Tweets like this: "Woody Harrelson moving E on 6th St. Watch out." And I'm like, (1) Where did Woody start out? Sixth Street is pretty long, if you're on foot. Did he start out at Buffalo Billiards? If so, then he's really going through some heavy foot traffic. Or did he start at I-35, in which case he'll be dodging tight-pants hipsters and Chevy pickups coming in from the East side and teed off that all these fariners are messin' up their town? Give us a starting place, or we won't be able to "watch out," and before you know it, we'll be nose-to-nose with Woody and boy will he be mad at you for not having been more specific. (2) Leave poor Woody alone. Dude probably just wants to find a blue Port-o-Potty. 'Cause the $6 Lone Star.

Ravelympics: why the heck not

Occasionally, I do strange things.

Back during Ravelympics, I made one of these.

It's a single-cell flagellate organism, knit from laceweight scraps.

It has little purpose other than to sit between the two panes of a picture frame, in the style of a microscopic slide.

I had a reason, if you must know. But every time I start to type it out, my nerdiness begins to appear socially fatal, and I think in this case it might be best to leave the world guessing.

Olympic rundown

1. I finished a hat for Ravelympics:

Pattern: Sixteen-Cable Hat, by Circe Belles.
Yarn: Berroco Ultra Alpaca in Lovage. I love this yarrrrrn.
needles: sizes 6 and 8
notes: I think my gauge was off (didn't check). Two fewer rounds of ribbing, started decreases after third cable round instead of fourth. Love it; husband seal of approval ("I like the twisty bits").

2. I dyed yarn for Ravelympics:

I don't know what to use it for, because I suspect the base (Brown Sheep Top of the Lamb Sport, tag removed by the weirdo store so I don't know the colorway but it was white) is too scratchy to wear next to the skin. I'm not getting a "felt me" vibe off of this, either. Thoughts?

Still: look at what you can do with food coloring and Kool-Aid! Just mix your complementary colors until the Kool-Aid is coaxed out of neon status, and you can get almost anything.

3. My husband and I attended a curling league open house last Sunday. There were 600 people there.

4. Yes, I love the crazy pants of Norway.

5. SXSW is almost upon us. Brace for impact.

FO: Mitten Puppets

A few weeks back, I finished a late Christmas gift for a couple friends of ours.

See? They're mittens...

and they're puppets!

The puppet faces only sort of resemble my friends themselves, but it's enough to get the point across. I'd suggest it as a great gift for any newlyweds in your life.

Pattern: Basic Mitten Pattern from Ann Budd's Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns (remembering to take at least 10% off her stitch count for each size, of course).
Yarn: Rowan Soft Baby, color SH004, less than one ball.
Needles: Size 5 bamboo DPNs, and oh my gosh has anyone told you how wonderful those feel? Very light and easy on the hands.
Notes: The embroidery is all scraps from the stash, in fingering and laceweight.

Defeating Bad Juju, One Skein at a Time

Sometimes, you're in the middle of knitting a sweater for somebody, and a big reason comes along to stop knitting it. Sometimes you keep going with it, and along you float down De-Nile river, feeling increasingly sad about the state of the sweater, mean things that have happened, health care in America, every possible character flaw you might possibly possess, and the Amazonian rain forest.

A blog is not the place to discuss specifics of this sort, but rest assured, I'm still married. (Not that kind of sweater curse.)

In November, I abandoned one such case of denial. In a burst of highly effective catharsis, I frogged a partial sweater.

I used some of the yarn to make a gift bag for someone else.



With my new sewing machine, I sewed a lining out of a fabric whose color coordinates in a very clever way with emerald greens, browns, and grays. (Didn't shoot a picture, drat! Trust me?) The gift bag has been given, and with it some of that negative energy (dang, I sound like one of those people) has been defeated.

It was altogether for the best.