I'm working along on the foot of the second Opal Southwestern sock. Thank goodness I have Good Friday off this week; as a result I actually get a full Saturday to myself to do what I want. Which means finish some stuff.

One of my self-described "loyal readers" (wow, it's good to have those) e-mailed me and suggested that vinegar is a good ant repellant. I will have to try that. I toyed with the thought of getting a Super Soaker watergun, filling it with vinegar, and blasting away at the foundation of my house. And I'd do it, too, if I weren't afraid of killing my flowers and my lawn. I'm really getting sick of the little sixlegged freeloaders.

Some other random thoughts:
On creativity: One thing I have often thought, in my more Pollyannaish moments, is that if everyone in the US, no, if everyone in the world had some kind of creative hobby that they enjoyed and that gave them a sense of accomplishment, we would see far less vandalism than we do. Because people who are planning their next knitting project/recipe tryout/garden/sculpture do not have time to destroy, and for that matter, people who can appreciate the effort that goes into creating, are less prone to destroy.

over last weekend here, a bunch of the plantings on campus were vandalized. I don't know if that makes me more sad or more angry.

I'm reading a book on quantum theory. It's one of my pet interests - I do so not understand all of it but it intrigues me none the less. One of the things the current read ("The Elegant Universe") goes into is that quarks - one of the sub-sub-atomic particles - are descibed based on 'color' - red, green, or blue (sadly, the color names are a convenient fiction - they simply describe indescribable characteristics of the particles that are somewhat like electrical charge). The other night I was dreaming about knitting quarks - there was a scarf that was black with lenghtwise stripes of red, green, and blue, and I had a pair of quark socks, that were black with red, green, and blue bobbles on them.

I actually kind of like the idea of the quark scarf. I can picture it in my mind and it makes me happy. I might - when I start buying yarn anew - get some black, red, green, and blue 1824 wool and make myself one. Just so I can say I did it.

I could probably also make the quark socks seeing as I have remnants of the different colors. But doing bobbles is a PITA and I try to avoid it when I can.

The book also mentions "string theory" (short for "superstring theory") which proposes (as best I can figure out) that at its most fundamental level, matter and energy interconvert, and matter is made of "strings" of energy.

In other words, the universe is made of yarn. It is what holds things together, it is what everything we can see or touch is made of.

Yup. I like it. Works for me.

Perhaps God is a fiber enthusiast?