Tuesday, August 10, 2004
Quickie
Real quickie today. I found this while surfing and as a yarn snob, I couldn't pass it up. I'm a geek sheep. Shocked? Yeah, me neither. It's British so I didn't fit in well to the choices. Maybe you will. :-) I like the description they gave of me: Bespectacled geek by day, fearsome DND warrior by night! How bout you?
Which flock do you follow?
this quiz was made by alannaOh yeah, go to Google, type in "failure" and then click on the "I'm feeling lucky" button. God bless Google.
Monday, August 2, 2004
The Boyfriend Sweater
Knitting lore tells all of us not to make a sweater for "the boyfriend" as it inevitably will culminate in the end of the relationship. The length of the relationship doesn't matter. The quality of the sweater doesn't matter. It doesn't matter that it's difficult to find any patterns for men that won't make your guy look like that yuppie Isuzu trooper guy when he was on Empty Nest. What matters is that you will spend weeks and months of your time working on a piece of fabric that can never be worn enough. Inevitably, you will turn to the one who puts stars in your eyes and say, in July or August, or at any special occasion, "How come you never where that sweater I made you?" Which will lead to him potentially criticizing your work ("the sleeves are too long") or just out and out insulting you, ("It makes me look like that guy from Empty Nest") or trying to weasel his way out of the question with "logic" ("It's July/August").
This will cause you to say, "You don't care about how much time I spent on that!" which translates to "you don't care about me." He will tell you it's "just a sweater" and that you're being "ridiculous." Which will lead to the drudging up of all kinds of problems that will lead to the demise of the relationship. Anthropologists say that this phenomenon is similar to the feared "being named cutest-couple" syndrome.
Ancient and wizened yarn shop owners, bloggers, and grandmothers say to us "Save the big knitted gifts for fellow knitters who will appreciate your work, the time and effort you put into things."
Yeah, but I really want to make my boyfriend something big. There is only one solution as I see it:
That's right, folks. Call me Pandora. Call me Frankenstein. Call me Ishmael. I've really done it this time. I've been saying to Justin for a few months now, "C'mon, let me teach you to knit. It's fun. EVERYONE'S doing it. I'll give you your first hit for free." Shocked was I when he said to me one rainy July evening. "Sure, yeah, ok. It's fascinating watching you. I'll give it a try."
Never let anyone tell you the grass is greener on the other side. At first I thought it would be great if Justin would learn how to knit. We'd sit there watching movies,clicking along together. He'd appreciate the effort that went into everything I made. He'd actually be able to enjoy himself when I dragged him to a yarn shop. But all of those same anxieties that you get when you give your boyfriend a sweater TRIPLE when you teach him how to knit. "Is he doing this to placate me? Is he ACTUALLY enjoying this? I'm not going to ask him if he wants to knit. He's got to come to me. But what if he never comes to me? What if he just caved that one evening? Will he continue to knit after I leave for school?"
I have to say, I'm dating a very unusual person who has proven time and time again that I really don't need to worry about him. He's not the kind of guy who will say, "alright, I'll do it" just to keep me from nagging. His nag threshhold is quite high. Shockingly, he's been the one to say, "when can I start on something bigger?" (That's a washcloth he's working on right now.) He's been the one who's pulled the knitting from the couch-side toybox and started clicking away without provocation. He's the one who decided to take his project with him on Sunday night, so that he has something to do while he's sitting in a waiting room or hanging out with friends. Finally this quiet individual has an instant conversation starter right at his fingertips.
There are times when I look over at him on the couch. He's just finished a row and he's holding the needle out, admiring his work. "One piece of string becomes fabric. Weird." There's this look on his face, a gleam in his eye. We've been looking for an easy first project that's not a scarf. As he turns the pages through the knitting books, I catch it again. That look. He's actually enjoying himself, imagining all of the stuff he wants to make. The following is an actual quote from an actual email that he just sent to me today. We're planning a trip to a Monroeville yarn store. "Yarn store sounds like a good activity for Friday. It should be less crowded during a weekday afternoon, I think. Plus if we find yarn there, I can start sooner on my project. :-)"
Dare I say it, he's possibly caught the bug.
Yeah, I knew there was a reason I loved him.
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