Will It Go Round in Circles?

I wanted to talk a little about spinning. A few weeks ago, in a fit of insanity, I decided to learn how to spin. Apparently, tea, crochet, silent film, cooking, reading and steampunk don't afford me enough entertainment. Nope, I needed another hobby. Preferably one that I could justify by saying to myself that I was saving money by making my own yarn, as opposed to admitting that I had found yet another wasy to have my hard-earned cash sucked out of my pocket.

The truth is, learning to spin can get a bit pricey if you don't know what you are doing and have no self-control. You will be tempted by all the pretty drop spindles, wool batts, and other nonsense out there, and forget that you are still only learning to spin. However, for once I must actually have some self-control, because I am not knee deep in wool yet and I only own one spindle (although another one, for spinning silk, is in the mail).

So, I'm going to tell you about my Adventures in Spinning. I bought a Louet top whorl because that's what they had at one of my local shops. I did this while tired and coming off an eight-hour shift, so I didn't even notice if they had any bottom whorls. to explain- a top-whorl spindle looks like an old-fashioned top, only turned upside down, with a hook in the short end. You twist some yarn on the shaft (I found it was easiest to do a hand twist), bring the strand over the whorl up to the hook, twist it a bit more so that the filmy, loose wool (called roving) won't pull apart, and, well, spin. It helps if you have four hands. And an extra foot. Since I don't, I sat on the bed and did it, and it worked out well.

My first bit of yarn came out looking pretty funky, but hey, that's what the learning process is about. I did have some help- I contacted my Ravelry friend Camanomade, and asked her about spinning, and she sent me tons of fiber so that I can actually afford to eat while learning to spin. but, evil creature that she is, she sent me a variety of fibers, to tempt me and make me a yarn junkie. No doubt the first hit is free.

Over the past three weeks I've spun combed wool (which took practice), kid mohair (hard but not too hard, once you realize your strands are supposed to be hairy), combed silk (very slippery- I really needed a lighter spindle), more wool (uncombed, which makes slubby but interesting stuff, and lets you know if you can really spin or not). I'm a zennist, and in Zen it's said that one should have no preferences. I'm finding that having no idea how any of these fibers will behave actually helps a lot, as I have no expectations. I am finding that my product is getting less slubby (bumpy), more smooth, and I'm spinning continuous thread for much longer wtihout the fiber running out. I'm also finding that I can unwork slubs now, and that I'm keeping a much more constant thickness in my product.

I now feel ready to make more professional-looking yarn, which means I'm about to take some of the singles (individual strands of yarn) I've made and ply them (make a thicker strand of yarn). I also did some looking around, and after seeing roving at what were to me ridiculous prices (confirmed to me by Camanomade), I found some nice inexpensive roving online at Knitch. Currently on the spindle is some really soft Corriedale top in silver, which is a really soft fiber and therefore takes some concentration. Eventually, I want to learn how to slub my yarn on purpose so I can make boucle (thick and thin) yarn.

What this all means is that I'm having a lot of fun.

Crochet Love: Catskill Merino

Sometimes you really need yarn. No, I mean it. Like today- I have to make a square for a project on Ravelry, and I needed blue yarn. Now, I thought of going to my local yarn shop, but quite frankly, I find them a bit annoying. It was rainy, so I didn't want to run all over town. Thank goodness it was Saturday, because I was able to combine my food and yarn shopping at the Saturday Greenmarket.

My local Greenmarket has wonderful raw and cooked ingredients. I bought bacon today from the incomparable Violet Hill Farm- I think they have some of the best bacon in North America. I also bought some apples from Terhune Orchards, and some potatoes from yet another stand. Tonight's dinner is bacon cooked with potatoes, onions, and apples. In winter I like making as many one-dish meals as possible. It seems more homey that way, and I can do it fairly on the cheap.

Still, I needed yarn, and for this project it had to be blue. Therefore, there was only one business with whom I could shop: Catskill Merino, a farm located in Swan Lake, New York which is owned by the Wyatt family.

Catskill Merino makes yarn the old-fashioned way- they grow it on their sheep. Then they send it out to be spun, and do the dying themselves. Their yarn isn't cheap- it's $13-$16 a 125 yard skein. However, is soft, pliable, and dyed with natural dyes such as fustic, cochineal, madder, and indigo and set so they won't run. If you are looking for yarn to go into your historical project and you actually want to feel the yarn you buy, this is the way to go, since these are the very types of dyes that were used from ancient times through the early nineteenth century. The yarn takes J, K, and L size hooks, as it's thick like some of the well-known Noro yarns (needle sizes are 10, 11, or 12).

How do I know which hook sizes? Because the information sheet given to you when you buy a skein says so. Which means Catskill Merino is crochet-friendly and therefore (say it with me) deserves your business.

Ravelry: 'lazy, stupid, and godless'

There was a bit of a fracas on Ravelry recently. A member asked the musical question, 'Is swearing allowed on Ravelry?' Hilarity ensued as people who believe grownups should use swearboxes were pitted against lovers of naughty words. This being Ravelry, the conversation was pretty polite and well-mannered, and didn't devolve into nastiness. However, several people implied that those who use Anglo-Saxonisms are none-too-bright, morally suspect, and lacking in industry.

I will be honest- I took the swear side. I won't repeat what I said here, as I used language that in a PG-rated world is still fairly unprintable, albeit funny. However, an idea was born; what if a Ravelry group existed where hardworking, highly intelligent, and often spiritual crafters could meet and let their hair down and be as free-thinking as they pleased? A place where using a hook or two needles wouldn't matter, and spindles would be welcome, too? And so at around 2pm today, a new Ravelry group was born- the 'lazy,stupid, and godless' group (the lower-case spelling is intentional, since members are presumably too lazy to use a shift key). It's is now 8pm ET, and the group is seven shy of the century mark.

What does this all mean? I think it means there is a hunger among crafters to join together, regardless of equipment, and have fun. The segregation in the crafting world is silly anyway- we are all trying to bring beauty into our lives. While this group has had a silly beginning, I hope that it will lead to more groups not preferring knitting over all other crafts. The group will soon be working on charity projects and other mutually-approved past-times while, with luck, becoming the home for some of the crown princesses and princes of the crafting world.

The Wonderful World of Work, or, I Feel like Ripley, Except for the Aliens and the Screaming.

Working from midnight until 8am is very surreal. My day starts at 10pm, when my alarm goes off. The phone usually rings shortly after- it's my boyfriend, calling to wish me a good night as he goes to sleep. I yawn, shuffle past the yarn all over the bed, and go downstairs (I have a loft bed). My alarm is a local radio station that plays really peppy music at this time of night. otherwise, I would never make it to work on time.

I take a shower, figure out what to wear, and have some breakfast if possible. I make a quick lunch or grab a premade one from the fridge. I check Ravelry, write a note or two, and wait for my cell phone to ring. The call comes from the livery service that sends a car to my house every work night. Pretty snazzy, huh?

At 11:30 at night there is relatively little traffic, even in midtown. It usually takes 15 minutes for the driver to get me to work, and as he drives I fill out the voucher from work that pays the far. I'm outside the building at 11:45. I take out my work pass, say 'good morning' to the security guards and walk through a mostly empty lobby.

The floor on which I work is devoid of people except in my work area; four people are usually going off shift when I come in. The second shift people are made up of two proofreaders and two 'operators', or word processors, and a traffic coordinator. There's usually no immediate jobs when I come in. At night I'm the only proofreader on shift in the US. The others who work for the company are in India. I've never even spoken to them.

We have one operator who works swing and leaves at 3am. Three others come in on the same shift as I do, and and so does a fresh traffic coordinator. Except for the cleaning people, we are almost the only ones on the floor of the building until around 5:30am, when a few lawyers with overseas clients trickle in. I have never seen my floor when it's in full swing, except about once a month or so when we have proofreader meetings in the middle of the night (4 in the afternoon ET to you). A few lawyers come into our office from other parts of the building for the first three hours of my shift, bringing documents that need to be ready by morning. In most cases the operators handle them and they are passed to me for proofing; over in India, the same thing is happening, but at a busier pace because the work there is being sent from our law offices in Europe and Asia. when they have too much it spills over to us. Occasionally I get in-house documents- menus for seminar dinners, employee health info- and I get a lot of confidential documents having to do with finances, since we service major corporations whose corporate offices are in New York. What this means is that very often I have a pretty good idea of what companies are merging, which ones are breaking up, and which are about to undergo some major shift- and I can't tell a single soul. I don't even discuss the work with the operators, most of whom aren't interested in the economy anyway. Nor am I allowed to invest based on the documents I see, since I could get in trouble for insider trading.

My office has tons of windows looking out onto Times Square. I see the lights at a distance, but there's no sound. I'm too high up to hear cars, or the tourists who are straggling back to their hotels. The only thing I hear is the ticking clock in my office, the music I sometimes put on, and the conversations of the operators in the next room. The coordinator or an operator will drop in as often as needed to bring me work to proofread, and it's all very slow-paced and sleepy- which is dangerous because that makes it easier to make mistakes. I constantly guard against falling asleep. I only drink coffee during my first work hour, so that the caffeine will be out of my system before I go home to bed. Lunch is around 3am, when I open my lunch container and eat at my desk. Most night workers gain weight on shift, because the only food available is junk, an there are no stores open to tempt one outside for a walk. Bringing lunch keeps me reasonably healthy- I've also lost weight. but it's lonely work, and trying to keep from falling asleep can be difficult. Add to that the fact that the building's thermostat gets turned down; I'm perpetually cold and am usually swathed in scarves and shawls to keep from freezing to death.

When I get off from work I usually can't shop for another two hours- everything is only starting to wake up. socializing is almost impossible, since most people are going to work. My DVR records my favorite shows, and I plan ahead. I have to wait until the weekend to eat out unless I want breakfast. When I go home I force myself to stay awake for a few hours by reading, catching up on my favorite shows, going online, taking a bath. Then I roll into bed at 2pm for a nice night's sleep, and hope a telemarketer doesn't call me. I have velvet curtains at the windows to keep out sunlight.

Why would anyone want to live this way? Well, the money is pretty good. I get to crochet on the job when work is slow and I don't have other talks. I get to avoid sunlight- I've always had very light-sensitive eyes, and this way I'm not in perpetual pain anymore. I get to see museum exhibits in the morning, before they get crowded. plus, I get to pretend that I live in a spaceship. I intend to do this while I pay off some bills, or until I find something that pays more. It would be nice to see movies when they come on tv, or to watch the sun go down. But I get glorious sunrises, fresh bagels, and a chance to live like a vampire. In my book that's not too bad.

Crochet love: Thank you, Adriann!

I received a wonderful note on Ravelry the other day from a woman named Adriann. It seems she's a crocheter, and so far I'm the only New York-based crocheter she's seen on Ravelry. She offered me her extra copy of the 2008 Crochet-a-Day calendar if I was willing to pick it up from her job, which just happens to be near my apartment.

I've really been wanting the calendar, so I said yes. This morning I went and picked it up from her, and left while she clocked in.

Sometimes the universe is a wonderful place.