*I bagged up Friday's offending yarn; might stick it in the -80 freezer if there is indeed space and maybe use what's left for mitts. I'm not 100% convinced the damage is all insect; it's possible some yarn bases just degrade with certain hand dyes, I suppose. Also I think it did get caught in the zipper once or twice.
Anyway. I found a nice ball of a wintry looking Opal (the pattern is called "Storm" so I think a grey/blue mix will do well). It's newer, and it's a commercial yarn and I bet Opal is more careful about not mismatching dye chemistry with their wool (I don't KNOW that that's what happened to the other yarn, but I found no frass or insect casings). Also the opal has one of those metallic strands which could be pretty in a shawl.
* But first, I want to finish the corner to corner blanket so I can use ITS needle, I wonder if the needle I had used for Storm had a rough spot on the metal ferrule and the blanket's needle is a Clover bamboo and Clover has never done me dirty as far as needles are concerned.
* Tomorrow is the first hot fieldwork day. I'm telling myself it will be okay since (a) we are only working from 7 am to 10 am, and at 10 am today it was still manageable in terms of heat and (b) there's less walking than there was at the other site and I managed that OK (although it was cooler)
Still I will be DARN glad when this is done, and if I can somehow get the rest of the soil sorted (I have 12 samples left; I had some time this afternoon but was so burned out on it I fixed up a couple more slide decks instead), I'd be tempted to book a night at a nice-ish hotel somewhere easy to drive to with intersting stuff and just....drive up one afternoon, do a few things, stay overnight, and then do more stuff the next day, then back home. Maybe go up to Sulphur? There is a fancy (Casino-affiliated) hotel there, I have no idea how expensive or if they'd even have a room. Or maybe I consider Farmersville and swing over to McKinney (which should be doable and I could avoid 75 traffic)
I probably won't, though. Time will probably get away from me.
* Something I splurged on a (comparatively) long time ago came (it had to be shipped from the UK, and that takes a while. It is a dinosaur print wrap dress from Snag! Yes, it's maybe a little silly but it's very comfortable and I think it's fine to wear for teaching (I am telling myself that within spitting distance of 60 is not too old for a dress like this).
I think it's subtle enough you don't notice the dinosaurs unless you really look; it's not like they're printed on there in primary colors.
Snag's clothing is (comparatively, to the places I have shopped) expensive (I suppose PART of it could still be tariffs) but it's extremely high quality and comfortable and is designed with a diversity of bodies in mind (too often dresses are imperfectly scaled up from a six, and if you're a bigger woman you're tugging at it, or it's too loose in spots...)
It's a heavy-ish knit and will be good for fall, and it has pockets (Almost all of Snag's clothing does.)
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