Well, well, well.

I've been forcibly migrated to New Blogger. (I think I will hold off on the Diplaced Person analogies until I see how this works).

Anyway: Kucki, I had totally forgotten Jaywalker as a pattern for self-striping yarns. But yes, that's another good one. I think just about any pattern that has a double decrease in it somewhere will probably give the zig zag effect.

*****

Yesterday afternoon I went out and did something I've been talking about for a long time, and kind-of sort-of doing for a long time: I went and picked up all the trash off of my block. In the town where I live, there is a program called "Adopt a Block," where you sign up to take care of one (or more) block(s) (or parks), which obligates you to pick up trash at least 4 times a year off of them.

I haven't officially signed up but I thought it was best to pick up first in order to
a. Have the block looking decent before I sign up
b. See just how timeconsuming it is.

It took about 45 minutes yesterday afternoon - I went all around the block and also up and down the grotty little alleyway that divides the block in two. (The alley was by far the worst - for one thing, people use it as a shortcut and blow through it in their cars (I know, I've heard them, late at night), and also all kinds of trash blows in there). I filled up two big bags.

One thing that made me angry? I found a Starbucks cup. We DO NOT HAVE A STARBUCKS. This person had to drive to Sherman, get Starbucks there, drink it, and then decide as they were driving up my alleyway, to throw the cup out of the car.

Another thing I'll say just as an aside (and this is one of the things that frustrates me about trash pickup): I never have, and never would, throw trash out of a car. (I MIGHT toss an apple core, for example, if I were eating lunch out in the field, but even then I'd think twice about it...the seeds might germinate). When I was a kid, my dad would have TANNED MY HIDE* if I had thrown a drink cup or something out of the car.

(*Actually, he wasn't really into physical punishment. He would have much more likely stopped the car, made me get out and pick it up, and then park somewhere and make me clean up the rest of the trash along that block. Or at least, that's my guess. I never littered as a kid because I knew it was wrong without being shown.)

I remember that a McDonald's wanted to come to the little town where I grew up, and a lot of people fought it like crazy, because they said it would contribute to litter. And I remember thinking that was a bogus idea as a kid, because what kind of idiots thought it was ok to throw stuff out of a car?

Now as an adult, I can kind of see the point of the people who fought McDonald's. We have a lot of carry out places in my town, and probably 75% of the litter is directly traceable to one of them.

Anyway: The people who pick up trash are a disjoint set with the people who litter. And that frustrates the part of my brain that wants life to be fair.

I was also frustrated when I went out to go to work this morning: More trash had appeared. The area was clean for less than 15 hours. And that frustrates me, because it feels kind of like other things in my life that frustrate me: you work and work at something, you get it done, and then, very shortly later, it's as if you never did it.

And I wonder sometimes if the trash picking-up efforts aren't counterproductive; if there aren't some people who see the trash go away and who think either the city employs someone to do it ("Your Tax Dollars At Work!") or it's the "little people" who do it...and so they feel free to toss that Sonic cup out the window.