Congratulations IPCC and Al!

How cool is this? Ok, I'll grant you that "An Inconvenient Truth" may not, on the surface, have an immediate connection to global peace, but...isn't it in the best interests of the planet to try and address the issue of climate change? I certainly think so.

Not that this will make any difference on the (non-)actions of the current administration, but it does make me smile. You can certainly argue about whether or not global warming is influenced by our actions, but the bottom line is that it does seem to be heating up around here, and, like it or not, the consequences of that warming are going to be catastrophic. Particularly if we spend a lot of time bickering about who's fault it is, or whether or not it's true, or whatever semantic bullshit politicians and lobbyists come up with to try and get out of addressing the issue. I'm too cynical to think that anything is going to change anytime soon, but this does give me a little bit of hope. We'll see I guess.

And just in case anyone is worried about the alleged knitting and spinning content of this here blog, I'm planning on this being a double post Fiber Friday, so stay tuned.

Gourdess bless the folks in retail

I'm sure everyone and their mother has already visited this site, but it is the funniest thing I've seen in a long time.

I am thanking my lucky stars that I managed to get through high school and college (and grad school for that matter) without having to spend more then a summer asking the nutters "Can I help you with anything sir?"

Fiber Friday: Tour de Wool, Part II

White American wool, Shetland Moorit, Merino 64's and BFL

In the previous post, I reviewed the coarse wools from the sampler pack. This installment will cover the softer fibers. Note: I meant to reference Sarah's review of this sampler (page down to April 20 and 23 entries) in the first post but managed to leave it out completely. Check out what she has to say about the fibers as well.

1) American wool - 5" staple, soft and smooth. This was the coarsest of the softer fibers. I wouldn't have any trouble wearing it next to my skin, but I'm not very sensitive to that sort of thing. This was really easy to spin - it just flowed. After washing, 9 wpi, 12 yds from 0.5 oz.

2) Shetland Moorit - ~4" staple, crimpy and soft. This felt much softer as fiber then yarn unfortunately. I found that it wanted to be a thinner single (although given the final wpi counts of these samples, "thinner" is all relative!). Certainly the softest of the colored fibers. After washing, 9 wpi, 16 yds from 0.5 oz.

3) Standard merino 64's - very very soft fiber, ~3.5" staple, didn't note down the crimp. My notes say "the new crack", so I guess it was pretty good to spin! Very soft in the skein too. 19 wpi, 14 yds/0.5 oz.

4) Blue Faced Leicester - A favorite, ~4-5" staple, lots of crimp, soft and so easy to spin. BFL is one of my favorites (even after only a few months of spinning), and I'm looking forward to lots more of this in the future. 10 wpi, 12 yds/0.5 oz.

Superwash Colonial, American Targhee, Fine South African, Superwash Merino and Superfine Merino 80's

5) Superwash Colonial - ~4-5" staple, soft with medium crimp. This is the first superwash I've every spun, but it didn't seem that different from the other fibers. It was nice to wash something I knew wasn't going to felt in the process. Final wpi = 11, 11 yds/0.5 oz.

6) American Targhee - 4" staple, very crimpy. In the skein, this feels very similar to the Standard merino 64's top that I tried. Which makes me happy because I've got 4 oz of it to spin. Very soft, squishy yarn. 9 wpi, 12 yds/0.5 oz.

7) Fine South African - 4" staple, very crimpy. This was a pleasure to spin. Not quite as puffy as the Targhee after washing, but it has a nice sheen to it. I'd be interested in dying up a bunch of this stuff, and it's got enough definition that I think it might work really well as a three-ply for cables and textures. 10 wpi, 14 yds/0.5 oz.

8) Superwash Merino - 4" staple, crimpy. The other superwash sample. I had some trouble with this one - I think it needed a lot more twist to hold together then I realized initially, so I had a bunch of breaks while spinning and plying. However, once spun, its really nice stuff. 11 wpi, 16 yds/<0.5 oz (I lost some while plying).

9) Superfine Merino 80's - ~3.5" staple, crimpy. This stuff literally spun itself. I just held the fiber in one hand and it flowed into singles all on its own. Amazing. Some of that is certainly that I've gotten better at spinning but this was some beautiful stuff. Final wpi=12, 17 yds/0.5 oz.

Spinning up these samples has been a great way to try out different types of wool. Woodland Woolworks  has an exotic fiber sampler too (mmmm...yak! Cashmere!) and a variety pack with a bunch of non-wool fibers, that I'm also looking forward to trying out. For all you new spinners who might be reading: here's a closeup of how your skills can improve in not very much time:

The sample on the right is the first one I spun - the grey Swalesdale - on July 16th. It's underplied and fairly inconsistent. The hank on the left is the superfine Merino which I spun last night. Much nicer stuff (although some of that may have something to do with the fiber too). It is pretty thrilling to see how much I've improved without a huge time investment. My spinning has definitely been somewhat sporadic this summer, but I am getting better. It might even be time to start spinning with a definite project in mind (gulp!).

Go Sox!

I am nothing if not a desultory fan of most major league sports, but I'm always happy to jump on any post-season Beantown bandwagon that comes to town. Unfortunately, our lovely basic cable package doesn't include coverage of the playoffs, but I'll be thinking good thoughts for the boys tonight. And if Papi does well, I'll bust out his shirt in celebration tomorrow. Go Bosox!

FF: Thistle

I know, I know, I was supposed to post the second half of my fiber sampler review. But I can't because...I'm not done with the samples. Of the 1.5 I had left to finish, I still have 1.5 left. And I'm afraid I'm terribly unmotivated to do those last samples because I've gotten distracted. By this:

Wild Raspberry Handpainted Targhee top, Woodland Woolworks

And this:

Maldives, 21 micron merino, Hello Yarn Fiber Club September fiber

And this:

Mollusc, Wensleydale, Hello Yarn Club August fiber (I have 12 oz of this!)

And this:

Thistle, 18 micron merino, Hello Yarn Fiber Club June fiber

It's been a tough few weeks for me, with Devil being home sick more often then not, and me having a paper to revise and resubmit that I had just gotten started on when she got sick. I've been pretty wound up with trying to get work done, and take care of her, plus the fact that I am so not cut out to be a stay-at-home mom. I have infinite admiration for those who do stay home with their kids, but I am too much of an introvert to be happy taking care of someone all day without a break. So with the sick kid, and then the sick husband and the sick me (how Boo did not pick up this bug with forever remain a mystery on par with the final resting place of Mr. Hoffa*), and then more sick kid, I haven't been getting enough down time, which means I haven't been doing any spinning and hardly any knitting.

And on Monday I realized that I truly needed to just sit down that night and do my own thing. So I pulled out the big pile of Thistle roving, split it in two long strips and predrafted it. I wound it up into a ball and grabbed the wheel to get started. Before I knew it, it was almost 11:00 pm, and I had this:

What's more, I had some semblance of my sanity back. Phew.

*Literally 10 seconds after I typed this sentence I got a call from IronDad, who had just left the daycare after his lunchtime Boo visit. I asked him how she was doing, and he said "Well, it's kind of up in the air as to whether or not she's getting sick." I'm glad someone up there has a fucking sense of humor. But at least I have some merino waiting for me at home...