what I'm knitting

I've mainly been working on two very simple projects in the limited amount of time I've had to knit the past few days.

First, what I'm calling the Big Purple Thing. I started this well over a year ago, and originally used it as invigilating knitting, until it got too big to haul around:



That's a terribly dark photo but it's varying stripes of dark purples with some greens and grays mixed in. It's like Hobby Lobby's attempt to re-create a Noro-style color sequencing. (This is one of their novelty yarns; I forget what it's called. Diva, maybe?)

Here's a close up. The yarn has randomly spaced sequins, which are what is reflecting the flash.



It's not quite five feet long yet, which is kind of the minimal length for it to really work as a shawl for me. (Ideally, these kind of shawls, I like them to be close to my armspan width - which is probably about five and a half feet, if the old height-armspan thing is true - or slightly longer).

I'd really like to finish this one before break because it seems to me that it would be appropriate to wear for the season, and I have a plain brown dress that it would go with, and I could take both of them to wear.

And this is the other thing. Perhaps I should call it the Little Purple Thing, seeing as it is also purple and has sequins on it:



The sequins really don't show up well in that photo but you can see the stitch pattern - the book I got this from called it Turkish stitch but it's really kind of a net or mesh. It's very simple to do but I think it's quite pleasing for a scarf kind of thing.

And it's funny. I noticed something I hadn't noticed in a while. In the exam I gave yesterday, I started off finishing up a bit of grading on the previous exam, then I finished going through my proofs (this was just a second read-through to make sure there was nothing I had missed), but then I pulled this out. (Yes, I was like that old Sesame Street bit where Ernie was going to the laundry room with that exam - I had my grading, and the exams for that class, and my knitting, and my proofs, and the grade sheets for the people who had to do their presentations after the exam.....all I lacked was a rubber ducky and a coloring book). Anyway, I pulled it out and started and immediately felt better, less stressed out.

(For various reasons, not all work-related, this has been an extremely trying week.)

I don't notice that when I'm knitting at home, but I suppose the mere fact of BEING home helps me to relax a bit. Maybe I need to keep some small project (probably acrylic or cotton, as my building has periodic meal-moth outbreaks and I don't know for sure if the larvae will infest wool) in my office as an emergency stress-reliever. (Kind of like the legends of the old newspapermen with the bottle of scotch in their bottom desk drawer). Maybe dishcloth cotton? And close my office door and knit dishcloths when I am stressed and want to throttle someone?

And one last photo. (These are posted from my work box; I turned my home computer on about an hour before leaving the house - it still seemed okay (though I didn't try opening any programs or the browser, which is where the real problems came in the other day - nothing would open). I'm going to leave it on in the perhaps-vain hope that it cycles through whatever update problem it's experiencing and heals itself. I still need to get a new one but the need will be less urgent if the home computer heals itself).

This is the most festive t-shirt I currently own:



If you can't read the text, it says "I dare you." (Kitty has a headband with mistletoe on it.)

I saw this on one of those online t-shirt sites last year, and it made me laugh, so I ordered it. Unfortunately, it didn't come until after Christmas, so it's been hanging in my closet for nearly a year, so I figured it was time to wear it. (I put it on over a thermal long-sleeved shirt - it's still cold here - and I did add a grey cardigan over top of all. Yeah, rocking the Amy Farrah Fowler style here, I should probably add one barrette to my hair...)

I don't know. It makes me laugh but I suspect mistletoe, as a traditional thing, is pretty much gone. Or at least, in my world it is - I've spent pretty much my entire adult life on college campuses where things like getting kissed without explicit permission are frowned upon. (Though I think the proper mistletoe protocol is this: chaste peck on the cheek unless it's someone you're already involved with (and, if it's a public place - that you're open about being involved with them). So married and dating couples are fine to liplock (just, nothing TOO gross, please....) but everyone else, I think the sort of kiss that some churches use as a greeting kiss (And actually - a peck on the cheek passes fewer germs, potentially, than a handshake does).

I tend to be an extremely arms-length person - not a big fan of personal contact. Though I will say there are one or two people I would not pull away from if mistletoe were involved and he leaned in toward me...)


****

Also, I got the cards for the card exchange (plus a couple extra for other people I wanted to send to). The cards have had their ponies inserted in them, been put in mailers, and the mailers addressed. I hope to get them out this afternoon. I might check to see if the campus PO is willing to do the customs forms ("Il s'agit d'un cadeau" and the value is less than $5)  and send them from there rather than braving the local post office, which will probably be swamped.