the trip out

 I don't NEED more yarn (as I regularly remind myself) and yet, buying yarn is one of the ways I feel cared for? I mean, I know that's a fairly dysfunctional form of self-care, but whatever.

Anyway, I needed to get out and do stuff (including going to the natural foods store) so I went out Saturday midmorning after doing some grading

Denison was having a fall festival; I was misled on how much of the Main Street corridor it was going to occupy - I thought it was just going to be the north half, but it crossed the street and was around the Katy Depot. It was hard to get around (lots of streets closed, both for the festival, and some were just torn up*)

Eventually though I found a spot on the other side of the building, near a sports bar type restaurant (which was open, but it was early enough there was no lunch crowd yet)

The yarn shop wasn't busy. A couple people peeked in and out, I hope this doesn't mean they won't make it. (They do offer classes which may be well attended, I don't know. And they sell online). Already I'm losing Quilt Asylum; not sure I will deal well with losing one of the very few other businesses that is a fun and nice place for me

At any rate, I did my part to keep them afloat a little while longer:

A skein of Smooshy with Cashmere in the color Water Dragon (sort of Monet colors), a skein of a yarn of an unfamiliar brand in a green speckle. Both probably for socks, though I could see a shawlette out of the Water Dragon. 

And a copy of Knitting Van Gogh. It's rare enough these days I find a new knitting book that's remotely affordable (A lot of them are art books in the $60 range now). This one is nice; Van Gogh is probably my favorite painter** and there are lots of projects in here, from the simple and adaptable (A peasant-type cap, which may be the first thing I make: it takes one 400 g skein of sockweight yarn and is knit in such a way that you essentially fold it double so it's warmer) to the very complex and probably requiring specialized yarns (a really lovely blanket reflecting one of his landscape paintings). There are also some brioche knit items, something I have never learned to do. 

I didn't look at the WHOLE book - I know some shopclerks hate that - but I looked and saw enough to know I wanted it. I looked at it more last night at home.

There's a nice ombre top made with KnitPicks' Palette that I'd be tempted by except the big dolman sleeve style isn't so great for me.

But there is also a Van Gogh doll! which I might make, though I'd consider getting nice acrylics instead of wools - anything that sits on a shelf here, you have to be careful, because here in the south there are enough Critters (even if you're a more careful housekeeper than I am) that will eat things like that. 

And it's just a nice book to look at.

So I paid, and walked back out to my car, and realized something. 

This is the parking lot by the Green Growler. It's brick, and it's fairly uneven (I am guessing it dates to the early 20th c). And I remember how the FIRST time I came to the yarn shop's location here - their opening weekend - it was a month after I injured my knee, and I could BARELY make it across this, even with the four-footed cane, and it was intensely painful to walk across (as was the hard floor in the depot itself). 

This weekend? No discomfort.

I stopped for a moment to feel the gratitude for the fact that I'm almost entirely healed (and that if I keep up with the stretching, I can walk almost without any pain at all). 

After that, I had an unmemorable lunch (a salad and cup of mac and cheese at the Panera) and decided to hit Michael's before the grocery shopping. I didn't NEED anything but it's nice to look around

And I saw this, and first cringed and then chuckled. And took a photo, which I posted on bluesky with the caption 

"Angry Auntie Trixie Voice: 'MUFFIN CUPCAKE HEELER!""

I can't tell if the shelf just collapsed on its own, or if someone did that. At any rate, I don't envy the employee who has to reorganize that. 

And then I did my grocery shopping, and then back home.

(*we just LIVE with constant disruptive road construction everywhere. I've forgotten what it's like to get somewhere easily. Just like I've forgotten what it's like to walk into a grocery and find everything I need in stock. I don't know if it's just where I live, or if everything is just.....worse......now than it was like 15 years ago)

(** yes I know perhaps "basic," but I've loved his work since I first saw reproductions of it as a kid. And this never fails to make me cry, knowing how unhappy he was during his life and how he never received recognition)