KnittingBall

Great day yesterday--spent the first part of the day with friends, ShopHopping, eating and schmoozing, and then saw a great movie with Mr. Pug. A movie I would never have chosen but I really enjoyed. 


A baseball movie, for a couple that never, never--well, hardly ever--goes to a baseball game. What's the deal? And what does it have to do with a knitting blog? Well, it does.


First off, it was a well-acted movie. I'm not a huge Brad Pitt fan because I've always viewed him as a pretty guy without much substance but, well into his forties, he's growing into his looks much the same way Harrison Ford has. He could, in my opinion, become a Clooney--Beautiful at a Certain Age. There are some other well-respected character actors in the movie like Philip Seymour Hoffman, but also some new faces (at least to me) like Jonah Hill. So, not a Beautiful People movie, just good acting and a good story.


Moneyball is based on the real story of an Oakland Athletics general manager faced with competing against larger-market, bigger-budget teams like the New York Yankees, who bought and stole talent from smaller, less well-funded teams. In a year when he lost three of his superstars to such teams, he had the challenge of rebuilding from the ground up on a beer budget. He became convinced that the answer could be found in statistics--that if he could find the players who could (statistically, at least) get on base more often, he could win ballgames. He was battled every step of the way by his scouts, the team's manager, and a skeptical press, yet that team ended up winning an unprecedented 20 games in a row that year (although not the Big Win they were looking for). 


And how does this relate to knitting? Hold on, hold on ... I'm getting there.


Now, I'm really not a student of baseball but the characterizations of the old-time scouts in Moneyball rang true to me. They sounded an awful lot like my father did when he talked about baseball, which he loved way more than anything else in his life, including us. He talked about baseball players the way old racetrack touts talk about horses--about stride and form and athletic build and how they "look" at their particular chosen "spot" on the field. Intuition and past experience play heavily in choosing potential winners. This one's a mudder, that one's good for the sprint but can't go the long haul. Always bet on a red horse, or one with a star on his forehead. (I had a BFF long ago who always bet on a horse with the name "Steve" or one with the title "Doctor." A horse named Dr. Steve would have sent her into ecstasy. She won as often as anyone else, as far as I could see.) 


One player in Moneyball was even criticized for having an ugly girlfriend which supposedly spoke to his self-confidence--how could he be a good player if he didn't have the confidence to have a pretty girlfriend?


So, first and foremost, Moneyball reminded me of my father and of another longtime friend, Larry. I've lost touch with Larry over the years I've been here in Atlanta, but being with him always made me think of my father because of his love of baseball. Larry was the first person who ever explained to me why baseball was more of an intellectual exercise than a game like football or basketball, which were (in his opinion) purely athletic pursuits.


My father died in 1979 and never knew the 2002 team that Moneyball is about but he'd have LOVED this movie. It combined his love of All Things Mathematical with his favorite sport.


But here's how it relates to knitting--you knew I'd get there eventually, didn't you?


I picked up some yarn at Only Ewe and Cotton Too yesterday (hi, Elyse and Bill!) because it was flat-out beautiful. Oh, and it felt good, too. Zara Chine, a gorgeous DK weight, heathered bright red with a hint of black. Great twist, fabulous color and perfect for a vest pattern I have in mind.


Perfect? Well, not exactly because the vest (the Portland Zippered Vest if it matters)--heavily cabled and intricately patterned, calls for worsted weight. If I'm going to use the Zara, it's going to require some heavy rethinking of the pattern to make up for the difference in gauge and weight. Thankfully, Susan D volunteered to help me and it MIGHT work but that's really not my inclination. My inclination, like the old baseball scouts, is to use my intuition and say, "oh, what the heck! I'm sure it'll all work out" because I desperately WANT it to work out. 


But that's really not my experience--I have a pile of failed projects that didn't "work out" because I skimped on the planning (and plodding) process.


The way it's going to work out is with a heavy application of math and statistics, not with a hopeful spirit and a generous dash of wishes. I'm going to have to add spreadsheet and calculator to my knitting bag. I'm going to work with Susan to rehash the pattern--add a repeat here, go up or down a needle size, actually fit it to my tension and my body size, and there's a good chance it might actually fit when I'm through. 


But like the critics and the old scouts, I think it'll take some of the magic out of the old game.

Peg Aloi and Tough Women

 

So, somewhere in cyberspace, a freelance writer named Peg Aloi thinks women aren't tough anymore.

She seems to think that we (the stereotypical women who probably only exist in her mind) are soft and girly because some of us blog about canning vegetables and sewing clothes and even knitting. Somehow that makes us less worthy of respect, that we show that we're multidimensional people, not paper dolls. She seems to think it's anti-feminist to show what she thinks of as our feminine sides.

Ya gotta love it. If Gordon Ramsey writes about cooking, he's a real man. If I do, I'm a lightweight, ruffled, girly-girl who's there to make fun of?

Here's the comment I left on the page:

Yup! I burned my bra (figuratively if not literally) so my daughters would have the respect of their peers, be welcomed into J-School and law school and med school as equals, and be employed to write pithy columns that would get people talking, even if the columns were crap. You're welcome.

I really thought by now we'd be past laughing at stereotypical portraits of the sort of woman who knits or cans tomatoes or hunts or fishes or plays soccer. I thought we'd be talking about REALLY tough women--the ones that are serving in the armed forces, sitting on the Supreme Court, caring for sick relatives, and sending their kids to school well-nourished and clothed on a recession income, among other things. That was what my generation of bra-burners was trying to do. Apparently in some quarters, we're still back in the '60s.



Oh, well. Maybe your daughters will be more enlightened.

'ey Mate! That's My Tooth!

So, I was lying in the dentist's office today -- literally lying upside down almost -- while a probably otherwise nice enough woman dug and scraped and wrenched and grappled with my teeth. Seriously, a root canal is nothing to be trifled with, and I'm not the greatest patient in the first place. I was not a happy bear.

But nowadays dentists have all sorts of tools at their disposal to keep you from being distracted by the tools they're using -- IPODs and TVs and Sirius Radio and audiobooks and, for all I know, Chippendale men pole dancing on toothbrushes. As for me, I was watching Regis and Kelly, whom I only get to see when I'm in the dentist's office. (And, frankly, I don't miss them at other times.)

Today Kelly was talking about weird syndromes and she mentioned a Croatian woman who awoke from some type of surgery speaking German, never having spoken it before. And another woman (why is it always women? Are men too embarrassed to report this type of insanity?) who awoke from oral surgery (hello!) speaking with a British accent.

The syndrome was called ... get this ... Foreign Language Syndrome and it seems it's a real complaint, if not a medically recognized syndrome. (Obviously whoever named the darned thing has a bad case of Overly Obvious Syndrome.)

Well, so there I am, with a mirror and a rack full of nasty-tasting purple gunk and a drill and someone's entire hand in my mouth and I'm wondering ... what language will I be speaking when I finish with this procedure?  With my luck, I'll end up talking like Tony Soprano or one of those fakey British-accent guys who sell kitchen gadgets on early morning cable.

Crikey!

And then I got to thinking, maybe I'll have some new syndrome, and it will change my life. I'll have a really fabulous talent, like opera singing or dress designing or I'll look like Sofia Vergara. What the hell! I'd settle for looking like Kate Middleton!

Maybe Sofia Vergara with a fabulous talent?

Never mind. Once all those implements were gone from my mouth, it was just me in there. No accent, no new body, and definitely no talent. Maybe a little slur until the anesthetic wore off completely.

Rats! Why is it always me?

Happy Springtime Holiday!

Today's a Pajama Day and I'm very much enjoying spending [Insert Generic Springtime Holiday here] at home.

Just me and the pugs... Mr. Pug had to work today if you can call frying multiple turkeys for the other Home Depot folks work. To me, it would sound like fun if I didn't know he was up most of the night (after getting off work at midnight) injecting and brining and whatever else it takes to make a fried turkey taste ... not so fried.

Seriously, I told him this morning, "they take advantage of your good nature," and he just looked at me. Then I remembered, and said, "well, yeah, I take advantage of your good nature too, but I'm entitled!" Much eye rolling ensued.

Anyway, much celebration of the  beautiful weather around here. For Lucy, a sunbath in the backyard. For me, a big pot of vegetable soup. (Oh, and the great pedicure I got yesterday--see toes at bottom left--OPI Roller Girl, if it matters.)

My entire accomplishment for the entire day thus far is that I'm within 4 rows of binding off the Lakedale shawl, no mean accomplishment since the last few rows are long, long, long. I'll withhold photos until it's complete, just so you know I don't show ALL my cards.

Finally, in an Attitude of Gratitude, I'll share this from Older Daughter: she and I were talking as she drove home from a beach weekend. She was fussing that I was alone.

(Question: why do people think that an arbitrary date on the calendar is somehow a day that One Cannot Be Alone For? Just because we always had a big Easter dinner with all the family around the table, searching for eggs and eating chocolate bunnies? And now we don't?  Never mind, I think I just answered my own question.)

Anyway, I was sitting on the screened porch with the phone, talking about what a nice day it is--pugs in the garden, irises and azaleas and snapdragons and roses blooming, butterfly bush almost in bloom, bird feeder doing a land office business, hummingbird at the feeder, etc.--and she reminded me that it was really all thanks to Mr. Pug, whom she somewhat irreverently called "the Man Slave." She said that without him, I'd be living in a hovel and I should be grateful.

I reminded her that without the Man Slave, I'd be living in a hovel in her back yard, and we were both grateful!

Still Blocking

And here's Ishbel! Ishn't she ... I mean, Isn't she ... beautiful?


MadelineTosh Merino Light from Eat.Sleep.Knit. The color is Cherry. Isn't she ... oh, never mind, I already said that!

Ode to the Glove

Knitting as we know it today is a trendy thing. A trip through what researchers would call “the literature” – Ravelry or the blogs of young and (dare I say it?) hip designers. or the knitting magazines and especially the online magazines such as Knitty and Twist Collective—show that today we’re knitting as much to express our personalities as we are for utility.

Kicky ruffled skirts, ChaCha scarves, embellished swing jackets travel alongside intricately cabled sweaters and socks of twisted stitches that make your head hurt when you try to follow them. Shawls--once the domain of sturdy housewives and women selling vegetables at the local farmers market or even (and I know I’m going to get bitten for this one) your grandma—are now exotic, bright, beautifully, intriguingly complex, garments.

But few items of clothing are more homely and comforting than the knitted glove. Early examples of knitted gloves have been dated to about 1000 AD in Latvia, so they’ve been around for awhile. And most of us wear them at one time or another. Even for those of us who live in the South where winter is mercifully short—even we wear gloves. Growing up farther north, my daughters wore those great fluffy mittens I knit out of Lopi; today they wear delicate mitts, with or without fingers, designed to keep their hands warm on the steering wheel while still showing off their jewelry.


Be it ever so humble, you can depend on a glove to keep you warm, to protect your manicure while gardening, or, for knitters, to provide a quick venue to practice a new cable or a fair isle technique. And, of course, gloves have had protective uses for years and years, from the ubiquitous rubber glove to wash dishes to the leather boxing gloves that protect a fighter's hands and the ones that baseballers use to catch a potential home run.


But now, according to a piece I heard last night on NPR’s “All Things Considered,” gloves have taken on a new life. The Aglove keeps your hands especially warm on the ski slopes, due to silver threads (no, real silver!) that conduct heat better so you can operate your IPad while you schuss down a slope. The SensoGlove has a computer chip in it with a screen. It analyzes your golf swing to identify weaknesses in your grip. Use the Power Glove to control your computerized gaming system. (The Power Glove was invented after an earlier prototype for Nintendo, the Data Glove, failed.) The Bionic Tennis Glove is supposed to improve your swing and control of your racquet.


What’s next? Socks that diagnose pronation or an incipient bunion? A shawl with underwires to keep the girls in place after age and/or childbirth drag everything south? Knitted knickers that dispense a steady dose of contraceptive?


No! I say, no! It’s time to stop this nonsense. Sometimes a glove is only a glove. Keep knitting, and don't even think about how to knit in those computer chips.

Okay, the Day Could Have Started Better

Doesn't that just say it all? 


On a more positive note, here's what I'm doing while the Oh, So Wonderful Mr. Pug labors with Tire Stuff.

Blocking Multnomah, and it's about time! Multnomah has been finished for months and months but this is the part I hate the most. Soon she'll be beautiful. She's made of Dream in Color Knitosophy (Discover is the colorway).  

OMG! I just checked--I finished Multnomah in February 2010--she's been sitting for over a year waiting for blocking. I'm sorry, Multi! I'm a bad, bad crafter.


(Please don't let me look to see how long Saroyan's been waiting--hope it's not the same length of time but I bet it is. Definitely a question for another day!)


In my defense, it's really not my fault. It's the Atlanta Spring's fault. I make the item, of wool no less, and just when I'm thinking it's time to block and wear it, the weather changes (around early March) and I switch out to open-toed shoes and that's the end of the wool garment. After that first official crocus springs forth, it's all sandals and light clothing, and no waiting for Memorial Day.  I mean, really, once I have that ceremonial First Real Pedicure of the Spring, I never, ever look back!


(I have no excuse about why I didn't block it in time for the cold Atlanta winter, which starts in late December and ends in February. Just a bad crafter and a sad, sad case of poor memory.)