the Village Knittiot

Sleep deprivation is a bad thing, and don’t let anyone tell you differently. After a couple of weeks of self-imposed martyrdom, I finally gave in and admitted that Mr. Knittiot was right about me not needing to do everything. And that since he is home now, it makes sense to let him handle the paper route on his own Monday through Saturday. And then on Sundays, when it’s really important, we can tackle it together. I am sure he would want me to point out here that this was his suggestion from the beginning and that his stubborn yet well-meaning wife insisted on joining him every morning even though she had to come home and go to a full time job shortly thereafter….

*sigh*

Yes, this is all true. But in my defense, I just really like hanging out with him. Even if it meant having to get up at 3:00 in the morning to do it. The unfortunate side effect of the lack of sleep, however, was a very cranky Knittiot who cried a lot out of sheer exhaustion. Which, I’m sure I don’t have to tell you, wasn’t a lot of fun. For either of us.

So, here I am, the new and improved Knittiot (Now with sleep!). And guess what? I’ve actually been knitting! (Surely not!) I’ve also been playing World of Warcraft, but more on that later…

Yes, indeed, the Knittiot sometimes finds time to knit. And this time, it’s all Norma’s fault. She just had to go and point out this free pattern (magic words to knittiots everywhere), and with one look, I knew they had to be mine. Mr. Knittiot saw them and felt the same way. Thus a dilemma was born — knit fingerless gauntlets for the man who spends three hours every morning out in the freezing cold wrangling newspapers, or make them for myself just because. You could probably have guessed that I decide to make them for him. I tried to make them too small…I mean, despite my best efforts, I feared they would be too small, but today when he tried them on they fit him perfectly. Drat! This is how they look on my arms. I think it is a much better fit and that I should really keep these for myself and make a different pair for him. A pair that will fit him better than perfectly. Wait… there is a flaw somewhere in that logic… only, I can’t quite see it…

Also, I can’t let you leave without at least mentioning Purl, the adorable little Gnome that walked into my life sometime about a week ago, and completely stole my heart (and a good many hours — days maybe? — of my life). She is so sweet, you almost don’t mind that she’s crazy. And she’s so harmless and well intentioned that talking with her fails (mostly) to be purely maddening. Plus, she has a bunny. Yes, a bunny. It follows her around and looks, well, just plain cute. But don’t take my word for it, see for yourself.

So, what did it take to get me knitting again, you ask? Well, as it turns out, all I needed was a day and a half at home sick, laying on the couch watching DVDs, with my lower back hurting too much to prop myself up and limp through a few levels in WoW (although I did log on for a half hour over my DHs lunch and we ran around for a little while until he had to go back to work). In just a day and a half, I finished the entire left mitten and almost all of Buffy season 6 (again). I took a picture of the mitten so you would know I was telling the truth about finishing it. See.

I show you this because today, the mitten once again looks like this.

I don’t know what happened, but the mitten, which had been going along perfectly, somehow went wrong just after the thumb. When I finished it and tried to put it on, it was so tight I could hardly get it over my wrist. The thumb was like a vice grip and I don’t think any blood was circulating between my hand and my thumb. Needless to say, after all that work, it was very disappointing.

See, I could hear my mitten say, see how it feels to be disappointed? I did see. I saw that I had made one simple mistake. I forgot that Anna Zilboorg is an anarchist.

Patterns, to a good knitting anarchist like Zilboorg, are a whole different kind of beast. Sometimes the inappropriately named “instructions” are simply suggestions, even though they may be phrased as a direct command. Sometimes they are, indeed rules to be followed. And then, sometimes, they are tests. Tests designed to separate the real anarchists from the casual toe dippers. Tests to see if you will, like a good anarchist, ignore them, throw caution to the wind and lean on your own instincts and intuition. Anna Zilboorg patterns are not for the faint of heart.

I haven’t done anymore knitting since I did all that frogging. The WoW obsession still lingers. Having set some rules about getting stuff done around the house has worked (mostly). Tonight, DH and I are preparing for a potential excursion onto the Alliance side of things. I tend to find the Alliance folks a little dull and lack-lustre, so DH and I have come up with the perfect way to make them interesting. Two human characters — a Paladin and a Priest — named Bland and Milquetoast (Together, they fight crime!). They are going to be very, very, very good. In a rather zealous and obnoxious manner. Should spice things up a bit, eh?

It has been nearly two weeks since I have done knitting worth any consideration. My mitten is no longer sullen, it is downright hostile.

On Saturday I agreed to pull myself away from the computer for a couple of hours and go yarn shopping with a friend. I have to admit it was fun to get excited about yarn again. My mind was awhirl with all the projects that I want to do. And that giddiness was accompanied by my usual panic over all the things I want to do and how very little time there is for them all. Especially when there is so much World of Warcraft to be played.

I came home from my excursion filled with that yarn euphoria, thinking I might get a bit of knitting done that afternoon, and promptly sat down at the computer to play WoW.

I started a new character last week — an undead priestess named Oola. Oola. The name just came to me. It rolled around on my tongue and it felt right. Usually I agonize over a name. I spend far, far too much time consumed with worry that I will pick the wrong name. And worse that I won’t know it is the wrong name until I have played her for too long and then I won’t want to start over, but I will also hate her for having the wrong name. So when Oola just popped into my head, I went with it. I thought it sounded vaguely Norse in origin. Some lesser known mythological creature that was somehow stuck in my subconcious, perhaps? As it turns out, no. Not exactly.

Three days after Oola and I started romping around the Earthen Ring server, a little alarm went off in my head. I Googled Oola and here is what I found. Oola, it turns out, is not so much stuck in my head because I have this great subconcious knowledge of lesser known Norse mythology, but because I am a child of the 80s. And because I saw Return of the Jedi in the theatre on opening night, and more times after that than I care to admit. Oola was the sexy Twi’lek dancer in Jabba the Hut’s court. You know, the one with the strange tentacle things coming off the top of her head. The one that got eaten by the Rancor (please don’t ask me how I know all this stuff).

Oola, I have learned, is also an aboriginal word meaning “Red Lizard.” If anyone asks me about it, I think I’m going to go with that. But I’m pretty sure that noone is going to ask me about it. I’m pretty sure that everyone just assumes that I knew *exactly* what I was doing. And I’m pretty sure, judging by the favorable interactions I’ve had so far (all with characters who I’m pretty sure are powered by adolescent boys), there are at least a few people out there who think that is just fine. As a matter of fact, they probably think it is just great. And they are probably hoping that I am, in fact, a girl.

*sigh*

Still, I love Oola. I love her with an unhealthy passion. So my husband and I have decided that we have to start setting some rules about the WoW playtime. This is probably good, because everything in my house (not just the mitten) has been feeling the neglect. Tonight we will cook and then we will do one hour of housework. Only then may we fire up our laptops. Last night, we went to bed at a reasonable hour. We are getting better. I promise. Maybe soon, I will have some knitting pictures to show you. Maybe soon my mitten will stop hating me.

The late nights and early mornings are starting to get to me. Not that I have any intention of giving up play time in favor of sleep, mind you. But I am tired.

My knitting, has been pretty patient about the whole WoW obsession, but I’m starting to detect a sullen air coming from my yarn. My mittens are actually pouting. Just so they would feel included, I put them in a bag and I take them with me whenever I leave the house. I know they feel neglected and in my heart I know that I should do something about it, but I am overcome with this need to kill things and take their stuff. I feel an obsession like I have never had before to increase my character level, to spend talent points, improve my skills, and advance my professions. If knitting is an addiction, I think WoW may be a disease.

Last night I had a Kung Fu dream — just like a movie, about 4 kids who were Kung Fu masters. There is a book somewhere in this…

My house is in total disarray, but I can’t be bothered right now to do anything about it. And since I’ve decided this is the perfect week to give up guilt, I don’t even feel bad.

Tonight is my usual “Me” night (we call it “Me-vening around here, it’s just one night a week where we each have the entire night to do whatever we want on our own). I plan to knit a little. You know, make sure the mittens understand that I still love them. But I’ve already been away from WoW for 5 hours and I’m starting to get twitchy. *twitch* See? I need help.

Here’s a little picture of Strand (my Troll character from WoW) getting a little shut-eye with her husband Brogo.

I have been working on “clever” all day. I assure you, a valiant effort has been put forth, but I think I’m going to have to abandon clever and settle for grammatically correct. And by the time I am done typing, we may have to abandon grammatically correct and just give me an A for effort.

It is 3:34 in the afternoon. I have 1 hour and 26 minutes left before it is time to go home, and my brain is more preocuppied with my grocery list than it is with being clever.

The next four days will consist of laying around a lot in my pajamas, playing video games, knitting, watching movies, and in general just relaxing. I seem to have come up against that usual hollywood-induced feeling that things are supposed to feel different because it is the holidays. Of course, things just feel as they always do. Probably I’m just missing my family. And I’m also sure that if I were home, they would be driving me up the wall.

More knitting was done, despite staying up way past my bedtime playing on the computer. I am definitely making progress on the mittens, but I don’t have a picture of them right now. I’ll try to post one later!

This is the decision I will face tonight at approximately 5:45 pm when I sit down with my newly purchased copy of Worlds of Warcraft(or as it is referred to in our household — WoW) to create my first character for my first MMORPG (massively multi-player on-line role-playing game –isn’t that a mouth full?).

I must choose a side. I think I am going with the Horde.

And this is not all that is joyous in my life at the moment. This is the mitten, or at least the tip of the mitten, I was enticed into making by that yarn-pusher over at Skein Street. She’s been on a bit of a mitten kick, and I decided to tag along. I am forever indebted to her for introducing me to the amazing Anna Zilboorg, who does wonderful things, like never ever referring to needle size, just giving a general gauge, and putting blank mitten patterns at the back of the book for you to fill in with your own kick ass designs. This one here is from her book Magnificent Mittens, but you can bet your ass after I get done with this pair, that I am to be putting funky pen to paper and coming up with a graph all my own.

Michelle, over at The Orange Yarn Please said they reminded her of Mitten Cakes (eliciting chortles of delight and laughter) — something to do with a Martha Stewartesque quality to them. But now, after discovering another fantastic book by Zilboorg called Knitting for Anarchists, I think maybe my new pal Anna is a little more Tank Girl than Martha Stewart.

Tackling the ultra-cool mitten pattern, which wasn’t at all as complicated as I had feared it would be, I was not surprised in the least to discover that Ms. Zilboorg caters to us independant knitters.

1 hour and 24 minutes until WoW…