the shawl grows

It's a lot bigger than the last picture I took. I have about 2 1/2 skeins left to add.

And my friend has gone BACK for more testing. I hope this is just follow up and not "we think something else is wrong."

***

I learned something today. Apparently the "tsch-ah!" sound of disapproval is somewhat international. I have a couple of African students (not sure from what country, but it sounds like African French is their first language - I can't totally understand it because the accent is so different from the European or Canadian ones). One of them handed in something today and showed me how she hadn't completed the calculation. I gave her my standard, "I grant partial credit for partial answers" and then she made that sound and said, "But it is not a partial answer!" (except, it is.)

I don't like that sound. Especially from students.

***

In happier news: Accio lana! I had been looking at the Harry Potter Knits special issue again the other night. (My SOP before taking the blood pressure reading is to sit fairly still and read something that makes me happy, like knitting patterns, for five or ten minutes. Yes, I'm probably biasing the outcomes a bit. Shut up.)

Anyway, I kept looking at the Hagrid sweater and thinking about how I'd like to make one. (But not in the sort of brownish yellow that the original was, I'm not sure that's a color that would look so good on me). Well, I checked the Knit Picks site (I know, I know - they got hacked and had a lot of CC numbers stolen a while back but I'm sure they've fixed it) and found that they had some colors of the Heavy Worsted "City Tweed" (which is what the original sweater was made in) on sale.

I chose "Rhubarb" - a purplish pink color. Yes, I know, it's not the "canary yellow" that Hagrid knit on but I am also not an eight-foot-tall giantess with a skill for calming animals.

I got the e-mail this morning saying my order had shipped. (Yes, I know, I buy a lot more yarn than I actually knit up, but....) This might be a fall project IF I can motivate myself to finish the basketweave sweater.Or maybe even if I can't.

***

I'm re-reading my way through the HP books I've read, and am going to continue on with the ones I haven't read (the later ones). Yes, I'm emotionally prepared (have seen at least parts of most of the movies) that a lot of the sympathetic characters get killed, but I suppose you have to expect that in a good vs. evil war. I was able to order inexpensive used copies (off of Powell's) of the later ones I did not already own.

The early books at least are fun escapes to read. One thing about Hogwarts that I like - even the professors who might not be particularly liked are mostly respected and listened to. There does seem to be a respect for education and more or less a respect for smarts (yes, Hermione gets teased, but then she is a bit of a prig, at least early on, and it's more for that than for her brains). It's kind of a nice antidote to days of "I don't see why we have to learn this" or "Is this going to be on the exam?" or whatever that I put up with on a regular basis.(There's also no huge bureaucracy hanging over the professors; they are not expected to do a lot of the jumping-through-hoops things real-world professors are increasingly having to do, in the name of weeding out the ones who don't follow the rules or whatever.)

Sometimes I think about, what would I teach if I were a wizard-school teacher? Probably something like Herbology, seeing as that's closest to my real-world discipline of botany. (Though if there were magic done with numbers, maybe I'd like that too, seeing as I teach statistics, and that some of my students seem to think I'm a wizard for the level of mental calculation I can do without having to pull out a calculator (Thanks again, Mrs. Bynum, for expecting that of us....it's served me well))