Red Skein at Morning, Spinner Take Warning

Mr. DeMille, she’s ready for her close-up.



Yes, the hand is much better after washing.

And I am seriously coveting the lush curve of that lazy kate I saw on Brooklyn Tweed’s blog. [Fourth photo.] Truly a thing of beauty, and I’m not sure I’d ever use it, given my method of plying. Amending the Tenth Commandment to read “... nor his lazy kate, nor his niddy noddy ...”

Thankfully, there will be no room at the inn for extraneous toys and tools when I move. Though I do believe I will splurge on the prettiest niddy noddy I can find. It will make a great conversation piece on my coffee table, and what else is that rebate check for? [Oh yeah, the map console I’ve been yearning after for the better part of three years now. I’d almost forgotten. OLS = OhLookShiny = me]

I just realized that I know someone locally who loves to play with wood as much as I love to play with fiber. [I did look first at Ed’s website, but niddy noddies are conspicuously absent. Not that I’m complaining. Sometime we have to specialize, for sanity’s sake. I remember the time that I simultaneously coughed, sneezed, and hiccuped when I was seven years old and Mom was trying to fix my ponytail. I almost broke my neck, and she almost snatched me bald! Now I try to do only one of those activities at a time, and thankfully my hair isn’t long enough for anybody to inflict a ponytail upon me.]

The children’s father is no longer singing “Jailhouse Rock”; LittleBit picked him up on Saturday night and took him home. I guess he really did get the senior citizen discount! Today’s [4/22/08] NonSequitur seems apropos. OK, I’m done. At least for awhile.

The charcoal tweed stole is galloping along nicely. I draped it around my neck and shoulders this morning, and it reaches down to my waist on both sides. I think I may reasonably expect to wear it by the end of the month. Therefore, I find myself contemplating the next sweater. [Heaven forbid I should only have one project on the needles!]

Why? The dress code at work has changed for the better, recently. We have the freedom to wear jeans every day if we choose, assuming we do not have to appear in court or at a deposition, etc. And as the receptionist, I stick mighty close to those phones. So I wear jeans two or three days a week; the other days I tend to wear skirts, because I *like* wearing skirts.

We cannot wear T-shirts with our jeans. We have to wear something dressier. Though I confess that I push that line every chance I get. I have a number of knit tops that in the strictest sense of the word might be called T-shirts [notice how neatly I prevaricate? one of the results of working with lawyers] but are made from good-quality fabric and are neatly finished. These are not your basic Wal-Mart $6.99 throw-it-on-to-work-in-the-yard shirts.

I do adhere to the “no logos and no slogans” rule. I could wear a polo shirt with the corporate logo of our corporate parent, but polo shirts were not designed for these curves, and furthermore, those shirts are ugLEE. So, I wear a lot of scarves, a growing number of shawls, and the odd jacket. [You may take that any way you like.]

One of my attorneys, also a pusher-of-lines, commented recently that she found herself scouting for that third layer, something to take jeans and a top squarely into safe territory. As do I. It started with the acquisition of the black leather jacket, year before last. And continued with the late, be-nibbled Swallowtail Shawl, the scarf-width Clapotis, MS3 [Swan Lake], and my embellished suede jacket.

I never used to think that I looked good in a jacket. I just hadn’t found the right ones for my body type and personality. Yes, I resemble an ambulatory chair-and-a-half if I put on a traditional “Dress for Success” boring navy blazer. But in my Fibonacci sweater, or any of the things I have bought in the past couple of years, I look like the sassy, competent, confident Red Hatter woman wench diva matriarch force of nature that I am.

I want something teal. And lightweight. And relatively quick to knit. But not quite as mindless as stockinette. KnitPicks Gloss Lace is calling my name. I sat down with my copy of Knit Kimono last night and found shapes that I like, but no stitch patterns that appealed to me. I saw a floaty little cardi in a magazine recently, probably whipped up in $2K worth of Kidsilk Haze. The model was wearing it over a LittleBlackDress. I could wear something like it over a NearTee.

AARP now has “Beach Sudoku”, as well as the traditional kind. Kenny Chesney and Jimmy Buffett must be so proud! But the endless whooshing of the “surf” reminds me of some of the environmental tapes that we used to own, and now I want to drive down to Galveston.

Wow, this post is even more ADD than usual.