22 days later and I'm finally posting...

A lot has happened over the last 22 days. I've packed. I've moved. I've mostly unpacked. In between that I've bought a dryer, received furnace quotes, bought a dining room table with 6 chairs, bought 2 red wine leather chairs for the living room, found a couch but didn't buy it and agonized over paint chips. Things have been amazing and I'm still in shock that I finally own my own house. I' m just tickled pink. Although I do have that sinking feeling that someone is going to come by and say, "Oh sorry, we were wrong. This isn't yours." But luckily as the days pass that feeling also passes. But I digress. Everything has been wonderful, except one thing. For the last 16 of those 22 days I've been without a proper internet connection. I've been "borrowing" the neighbor's connection. For small parts of the day, the connection is wicked fast. For most of the day, it's worse than dial-up. But I digress even further.

The one thing I did not do during the last 22 days was ignore my knitting. In fact, even though I had precious little time to knit I did make the time that I had productive. And it felt so good! You may recall the episode I had with the Gigantic Clap which set me back with completion. Well, I'm proud to say that I finished the project with a small handful of yarn left. And you know what? It is beautiful. It's bright. Almost sickly so. And I love it. And I haven't really removed it from my body except to sleep and shower. I have to admit I was obsessed with starting this project and I would spend countless hours combing blogs for yarn ideas and FOs. But now I think the obsession is satiated and I can move on. If a friend or family member asks for one I won't hesitate but I don't think I need to make any more.


Next on the needles will be Beryl Tsang's brilliant invention, the Tit-Bit, and Lace Wings by Alice Cooley. The Tit-Bit is for donation at next month's Downtown Knit Collective meeting. (BTW - September's meeting was a success and I promise to write an update before the next meeting.) To add a little extra fun, I think I may learn how to knit socks in an extreme fashion -- two at a time.









CLAPOTIS
Started: July 30, 2006
Completed: September 19, 2006
Pattern: Clapotis by Kate Gilbert (knitty.com)
Pattern Modifications: did only 5 increase sections (instead of 8)
Yarn: Noro Iro (5 skeins)
Color: Rainbow (#18)
Needles: US11/8mm Clover bamboo circulars

Knitpicks Options (first thoughts)

Literally as I was walking out the door for the airport to head to Minneapolis last week my package of Knitpicks Options arrived that I ordered for my birthday. Now since I've been back I've been incredibly focused on the Big Move so I haven't had much of a chance to play with them. Yesterday, Paul was very sick and spent most of the day in bed. I couldn't do much else so I decided to get the needles out and give them a try. Well, I have to admit I'm off to a rocky start. I really like the weight, balance and sharpness of the needle tips, however I'm a little disappointed in the cables.

I ordered 3 packs (2 cables per pack) of different cable lengths and 3 of 6 do not screw into the needles properly. One cord you can visually see the damage to the threads (how did that get past Quality Assurance?). Two cords do not have visual damage, but refuse to go all the way to the bottom at the same place on both. I've tried multiple needle tips.

I left a message for Knitpicks customer service (as they are closed in honor of Labor Day -- that's labour without the "u") and I hope to hear from them tomorrow. I hope they send me new cords for free without making me return the old ones. Although I don't see that happening. I'm sure I'll have to pay some sort of duty or tax or whatnot to return $8 worth of cables. Sigh!

EDIT: Since I didn't hear from knitpicks yesterday, I gave them another call today (Wednesday 9/6). My interaction with customer service was... strange. I felt like I had to guess what information she wanted from me (plus she had a runny nose and she kept sniffing the snot back into her head. Gross!) which made me overcompensate with blathering niceness. Why I reacted this way I cannot say, but that's how I responded. Short story is that they are replacing my order for free and I don't have to send the broken cables back.

And there was great rejoicing.