brainylady

Like many others, I'm sad to see the end of Dangerous Chunky, which had been a factor in my decision to get online. She always had a good mix of craftiness and pop culture.

There was an excellent column in the Guardian the other day (as usual), by Simon Tisdall, making an analogy between the UN and an unruly kindergarten class: "Act your age, not your security council coalition size".


You are the classy pin-up! You are everything
sophisticated and refined about the entire era.
You exude class and dignity.
What Type Of Retro Gal Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla


So I have very exciting news: I'm going back to Canada to visit my parents for two weeks, and I leave on Friday. It's an unexpected trip, and I'm very happy to be going. Besides seeing people, here's what I'm looking forward to the most:

• The Summerland Hospital Ladies' Auxiliary Thrift Shop: I plan to buy enough crap that the local hospital can buy a few new beds
• my mom's washing machine: give me an F! ...E! ...L! ...T!
• washing my hands with warm water in bathrooms
• being specific in stores and restaurants: instead of either (a) pointing at something and saying "yi-ge..." [translation: "I'll have one of those things, whatever it is, I don't know your language"] or (b) waving my hands in front of me and saying "bu yao" [translation: "I don't want that"], I plan to be like Sally in "When Harry Met Sally" ["Yes, I'll have the green salad with French dressing, but I'd like the dressing on the side, and..."]
• watching the Academy Awards

Here are some things I'm not looking forward to:

• paying sales tax
• that's about it, actually

Anyway, I'm going to knit like a fiend from the time I get on the bus in Taipei to go to CKS Airport. And then while I'm home I'm going to pester my two knitting aunts. Remember I was so excited about the green-and-cream sweater? Well, I knitted most of the back of it and it was just so small that I couldn't imagine a baby fitting into it. I clearly am not working with "bulky" yarn. Hmmm. So I pulled it all out. I considered making some adjustments to the pattern so I could just cast on more stitches and make the sweater with the same yarn, but once I decided to make the trip to Canada I put the sweater aside. I can take the pattern with me and just buy the right yarn while I'm there. So in the meantime I'm back in the comfort zone of a sport-weight hat. I'm making a simple and cute little apple hat from this pattern. There are a few kids I'll get to meet for the first time on this trip, so I'm knitting for them. The apple hat will be for Sam (age 14 months). I've knit about four inches of it so far, and I'm thinking that -- despite the fact that, for whatever reason, toddlers + apples = cute -- the hat is going to look much more like a tomato or a large radish than an apple. And you're just never going to see a pattern called "Adorable Radish Hat". That's just life: some produce is cute, and some isn't...