Wednesday, October 14, 2020

 

I  felt substantially better today,  and got once around the garden with Helen.

 

Thank you very much indeed for all your help with all my problems. I was so interested to discover what the long-tail cast on would look like with two colours, that I pulled my stitches off the needle (from Attempt Two) and started again. Interesting, indeed. Having finished the cast-on (and cut off the extra colour), I turned back, as I always do, even for socks, in order to have a bit of knitting on the needle before joining into a circle, in order to avoid an unwanted moebius. And what turned out to be interesting, was how different the two sides were. The only possibility was to go on with the “right side” – the one facing, as I was casting on, not the first knitted row of my turning back.  “Look at your knitting” is one of the very best of EZ’s maxims.

 

And I won’t forget, I hope, how to do the cast-on with two sources of yarn. Nor your suggestions that the cable cast-on would be a better idea to begin with.

 

I’ve now joined it up, making the connection after the fourth row. One of the great joys of circular knitting is that a stripe can be an uneven number of rounds if it wants to. After doing the fifth row/round, I switched to the other colour I had used for the cast-on, and that’s where I am now. This is certainly a lot more fun than dark charcoal, round and round.

 

And I failed to thank you yesterday for advice about “Audible”. It sounds to me as if you have more choice in the US. It is possible here to buy individual Audible recordings, but at enormous expense. And there doesn’t seem to be an alternative. I think I will have to bite the bullet. I am impressed with how much they offer, unabridged: “I Malavoglia” “Il Gattopardo” and Barbara Vine’s “Minotaur” which I have turned to after finishing “House of Mirth”. To name but three. It wasn’t all that long ago when finding an unabridged recording of anything was a bit of a challenge.

 

And think how much more knitting I could get done…

13 comments:

  1. Since Audible is now owned by Amazon, I’m surprised there isn’t the same range of offerings. It does take much longer (at least for me) to listen to a book than to read one, but you can knit, garden, drive, or walk while listening. Knitting and reading I can do for simple knitting, but nothing where I can’t be on autopilot.

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  2. Okay, this will be an odd comment, and I'm kind of working it out as I type. What was the weather like yesterday? And today? My husband was a meteorologist and a firm believer in the effect of air pressure on your physical well-being. He used to get headaches when weather was coming . . . so my point is, could your bad days be in part a result of stormy weather? If your heart is not functioning at 100%, you could be more sensitive to small changes. Just a thought . . . .

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    1. I was a primary teacher and one year I had a class that reacted very badly to coming storms. All would be well and everyone happy and then suddenly they would all be snipping at one another. Everytime that happened I would look out the window and see great, dark clouds racing our way. I was always sure it had something to do with air pressure.

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    2. I had a coworker who always got a migraine when there was good weather coming!

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    3. =Tamar4:45 AM

      I have read that the emotional effect of oncoming weather changes is a result of a change in the radio of negative and positive ions in the atmosphere. Hence household ion-generators (which unfortunately make dust stick to everything).

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    4. My grandmother, a doctor in the 1920s, always held that barometric pressure was a factor in how well one felt.

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    5. =Tamar5:29 PM

      Oh dear. Of course I meant "ratio", not radio.

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  3. =Tamar8:14 PM

    I'm glad to hear you feel better today, and wonder slightly about the coincidence of that and the brighter colors.
    Another advantage of audiobooks is not having to hold up a heavy hardcover book.

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  4. For single rib on hats or socks I always use alternate cable cast on. It looks good and is stretchy. WoollyWormhead has good tutorials on her site.

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  5. Anonymous11:11 AM

    I also thought it might be the weather. Library audio books are unavailable or wouldn't suit? Even as an extra resource. Such as when you might hear that the narrator on an Audible version has an awful voice. Free and no regular commitments. Chloe

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  6. Here in the states the library system lets you download audiobooks onto your cell phone or computer through Libby or Hoola or onto an MP3 player as well as check out CD versions which you can listen to from a portable CD player or your computer if it has a CD drive.

    I enjoy your comments about knitting and your life, thank you for sharing!

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  7. Could we see a pic of your colours for your new project? It sounds like just the ticket for these dull days. And I have more than a few Shetland oddments myself...

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  8. =Tamar3:26 PM

    Even width stripes are interesting enough.

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