The Universe is Against Me

Why, you ask, is the Universe against me? Listen up. First of all, I'm a sucker. I will pretty much knit anything for anyone who asks me. A few posts ago we went over the assortment of crazy hats and other things that my brother has asked for and I know that I've related the troubles a certain pair of slipper-socks for my dad caused. Well, my father was at it again this week. It started with a seemingly harmless request: "Melanie, can you make me a hat that will keep my ears warm when I go running?" Um, I am a knitter aren't I? What could be easier than a hat (OK, a garter stitch scarf, but what else?) So I open up ravelry and start showing him the thousands of hat patterns that could be his new hat. He picked the third picture down which happened to be Turn A Square by Jared Flood aka Brooklyn Tweed. Cool. No problem. I have some Noro, I have some neutral colored wool... I go to my stash and pull out the Noro (which is total male-friendly colors) and the plain wool and show pops. He doesn't like the Noro, it's light blues and greens and he wants dark colors. OK, I don't have any dark Noro, so I ask: "Do you really care if the stripes are variegated?" Of course he does. Me: "Will this at least work for the solid color?" (as I hold up the good plain wool.) Of course not, it's scratchy. For the record, no it wasn't. Then dad says, "Can't I just come with you down to the store and pick out what I like?" Sure, sure, no problem. Only two weeks ago did I swear off buying yarn for the next six months, but sure, get your coat. On the up side, it's a pretty rocking hat.







The Noro is Silk Garden in a bunch of gorgeous neutral shades ranging from cream to gold to light grey. The other color is Wave by Filatura Di Crosa which is a really nice Wool/Silk blend. The Wave knits up just a little bit nubbley so it the hat has kind of a rustic feel... Alright, no joke, as I'm sitting here typing this my dad comes in and says: "Melanie, can you do me a favor?" Me (looking at him out of the corner of my eye): "That depends..." Dad: "Can you make me another of those hats so I can give it to my running buddy?" Me: "Same yarn?" Dad: "Yeah, will you need to buy more?" Me: "Yes." So I set out to write a post about how the universe is against me and (obviously against my yarn fast) and here is incontrovertible proof. In the middle of the post, I'm asked to buy more yarn... Luckily I have enough of the Noro left over, I just need more of the Wave. Really Universe? Really?

Also, I've been garter-ing away on my Op Art blanket and have made some progress. I thought I was whizzing right along, it kept getting bigger and bigger and even though my logic center told me that it was because the blanket is knit from the center out I thought it would end up being a pretty quick project. So I call Andrew and ask him to do some math for me... If I start with 4 and I add 4 every round and I need to get to 888, how many rounds is that? Answer: 222. OK, sounds like a lot but I've already done over 50 rounds so I'm 25% done already. No says Andrew, that is bad math. Because each round gets bigger the first 50 rounds are certainly much shorter than the last 50 rounds. OK, says I, what percentage have I done. Andrew calculates.... 8, EIGHT! that's it. Universe, I hate you. Also, Andrew calculated that there will be 99,012 stitches in the blanket, and that I've done just under 9,000.