etc.

I’ve been in all day, seaming a sweater and cleaning house for the mister’s return to-morrow (he’s been in L.A./Korea/Hong Kong for the past three weeks, did I forget to mention?), so it’s been pretty easy to buy nothing to-day. I’ve been acutely aware of this anti-consumerism movement for years, and try to participate when I can, and as much as I think that everyone not shopping for one day is a little like trying to bail the Titanic with a bucket, it’s still one of those things I think people need to be made aware of, if they aren’t already. So, do try and buy nothing to-day. But please also try & consume more responsibly everyday. OK?

OK. </pontification>

You’re probably used to me by now, aren’t you? All quiet for a few days and then this — a sudden bellow in your ear! Well, it’s not supposed to be clamourous at all, in fact I was going for calm and soothing (for those of you reading this via RSS: I redesigned. Again). As usual, let me know what you think. I’m mad over these colours (non-colours?) at the moment, so you’re not allowed to criticize those, but everything else is up for grabs.

Some details: the template/layout is designed by Fernando, who is very strong and brave and has designed a few other WP templates that are quite glorious. Also, I’ve had a look at the new CSS on IE 5+ and Firefox. Do let me know about any possible funkiness on other browsers, would you?

And, have you see the way comments display now? Go on, have a look! It’s all neat & pretty!

And, we have a tagline now, yes we do. “Dispatches”, because that’s what they are, and “minor”, because that’s all it ever is.

Finally, and unrelated whatsoever to this new layout, I still need your advice on raglan-sleeve seaming. I didn’t want you to miss that little post admidst all this excitement!

So, raglan-sleeve seaming. I’ve done it once before but it was pretty much a hack job (look closely!). Any tips?

In the unlikely event that you have recently found yourself asking, “does she even knit anymore?”, I am here to let you know that, yes, yes I do. Proof? Remember the mitt-kit the generous Melanie sent me weeks ago? Well, I finished knitting them while I was in New York (also, weeks ago) and have been teribly lax about showing them to you. These are wonderful mitts — cozy & warm, and they’ve already come in handy (pardon the heavy-handed pun) during the cooler Fall days we’ve had (again, weeks ago. The weather has been oddly temperate lately). Here’s a bonus sideways shot of a pair of disembodied, yet appropriately-mittened, hands. Thanks again, Melanie!

And I’m not sure what sort of foolishness made me think that, admist all the birthday and Christmas knitting I’ve undertaken, this is a good time to try out a new technique, nevermind a whole new sweater. I’ve had five sizeable skeins of brown, tweedy, chunky, New Zealand wool in my stash earmarked for the Big Sack Sweater from Stitch n’ Bitch, and late last week, I pulled out the book and did a little practice-cabling to get my feet wet. I had no idea that there was so much tugging and wrestling involved in cabling, but I soon got over the bizarrely unnatural feeling of fighting with my yarn and needles when I saw the results. That picture (clickable!) is the practice cable. This one is the practice stitch pattern for the Big Sack, and this one is the completed front. I’m half way through the first sleeve and hope to have the second done this weekend. Then I’ll be back to ask you for your favourite raglan-sleeve-seaming technique.

You probably didn’t notice that the weighty “General” category (into which all my archived Blogger posts were imported) that used to sit, all bloated and self-important, over in the category area to the right is now gone. Well, inquiring readers, it’s gone because I’ve actually gone through all old posts and assigned each one a category or two that is actually meaningful, and I accomplished this onerous task with the help of Stephanie Booth’s invaluable WordPress plugin for batch category editing. I had been putting off this task until I had a few spare moments to locate such a handy time-saver, and there just aren’t enough plaudits I can shower upon Stephanie that would do justice to her remarkable efforts. (Thank you, Stephanie!)

Remember the Big Bad Baby Blanket from earlier this summer? Here’s the angelic little recipient, Ella, all cozied up in said blanket (click on the image for the full-body shot). More Ella pictures are right here, and go here for details on the exploits of this 7-week old traveller and her intrepid parents!

Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation, Lynne Truss.

Try this: go to your local library or nearest bookstore, pick up this book, turn to a random page and read a couple of paragraphs (read an example or two while you’re there). If you’re not clutching your sides and howling riotously OR thinking about that one other grammar stickler you know and how you wish he/she were there to share the truth and hilarity with (for me, it’s my whole family), you might as well just put the book down and forget I said anything. If ever there was a book written for a niche market, this is it. And who knew this niche was so sizeable?

Not only does this book call upon some hysterical grammatical injustices, it sets the record straight on a lot of style guide stuff, like: periods (erm, full stops, that is) outside or inside quotation marks, plurals of plural surnames, effective comma use, dangling apostrophes, and a whole slew of other punctuation goodies (preview them, & test your level of sticklerness here). If you’re not already slack-jawed with awe and anticipation, move on; if you are, run, don’t walk, and get a hold of this gem.

Knitting for Anarchists, Anna Zilboorg. Published September 2002

Perhaps unfairly, I had exceedingly high expectations for this book. When I stumbled upon the record for it in my public library’s catalogue, I was thrown. A book about knitting and anarchy? Why, it must have been written just for me! As you have probably already guessed, expectations were not met. This book is less about knitting for anarchists than it is about knitting for people who have tried to follow the canon of established knitting rules and conventions and simply didn’t like it (quite different from anarchy, that). There is a lot of how-to information in the first half of the book (remarkably lacking in illustration), and much of it is in the “this is how other knitting books tell you to do this, but you can also do it like this if you’d like” vein, which was interesting and refreshing (I particularly appreciated the part where Zilboorg says — and I’m paraphrasing — “don’t like weaving in ends? Don’t bother! Who’s going to see the wrong side of your sweater anyway?” To which I respond, hip huzzah!). Ultimately I think I was expecting something quite different from this book (not a peep about free form knitting!), which is part of the reason why it doesn’t work for me. But expectations aside, when most of the knitting instruction and patterns disappoint you, there just isn’t enough left to redeem it.

It’s been a week, hasn’t it? Oh, yes it has. Here are a few:

• More gift knitting lately: a mistake rib keyhole scarf and bucket hat for my mum in Extra (Australian merino).
• It finally snowed here, just a light flurry, but snow nonetheless. We can no longer claim the fine distinction of being the last part of Canada to have received snow.
• The university I work at has been ranked among the top 10 best places to work in academia. Indeed!
• The touring used-CD-people that travel between Ontario university and college campuses were here again (the last time they were here was October 2003, when I bought 5 CDs for $20), this time sporting a formidable collection of used DVDs. I stocked up! I’m now good for Buffy 1-4 and Angel 1 & 3 (2 eludes me). I can’t resist recycled media.
• Have you searched this site lately using the search function over on the right nav? The indexing is remarkable!
• I still haven’t told you the story of Klaralund, have I? I fear lack of fortitude, presently, so stay tuned.
• Sorry Everybody [via mellowtrouble].
• I’ve started a new category for posts like these: lists. Because you already know how ridiculous it would be if I assigned 6 different categories to such a grab-bag of unrelated things. Changed my mind. Have you seen the list of categories over on the right? It’s out of hand. I am a librarian and need to exercise some restraint in the provision of subject access and authority control. Watch me.

Lately, I came upon another knitting librarian blogger (via LIS Blogsource) and got to thinking about how many of us there are. This thinking led to some searching, which in turn led to this list, which is not at all exhaustive, and which I encourage you to append to in the comments:

• Black Sheep
• Cavalier Stitches
• Crafty Librarian
• Detroit Diva
• Hairball
• Knit with Me
• Knitnick’s Studio
• Knitting from Outer Space
• KnittinK
• Librarian Knits
• Step into My Thimble
• The Knitting Revolutionary
• when usually it’s nothing
• Yarn Lust (who has a lovely guide to knitting Web rings on her site)

My hope is that these brilliant and arresting links will distract you from that other thing, of which I cannot speak, for I am heartsick.