Knitting: Girasole and Lanesplitter Knocked out!

In a finishing frenzy, I knocked out both the Girasole blanket and Lanesplitter skirt this past week.  Just in time, as the voting for the Ravelry "True Blood" knitting group's season four Knit Along has finished.  The Vlad shawl won (which was not my pick... I have trouble figuring out what to do with shawls).  And because I am contrary by nature, I will be knitting it twice... once immediately with some yarn I dyed myself that turned out less-than-stellar, and once in some lovely Twisted Fiber Arts Arial in the "Warlock" colorway, which is uniquely appropriate for the coming season of True Blood.  Witches.  Yep.

I actually started the practice Vlad yesterday, and it is a surprisingly simple pattern for a charted shawl.  Short charts, repeated several times, nice clean lines of YO's and k2tog ridges.  Pictures will be coming soon.  My photo area is once again buried in the crap that my family feels compelled to drop onto any horizontal surface with nothing on it.  It makes me want to put hedgehogs on the surfaces I want to be kept clear.   :D  Or cacti.

AoA: Telling Tales

I've always wanted to talk enthusiastically on topics to the point of frustrating anyone who was listening to me.  This was brought to my attention two years ago when I was visiting my grandmother up in Minnesota.  My (now grown-up cousin) was visiting with his new baby.  He said something to me about how I always used to talk about Rick Springfield when we were kids, and how it was kind of funny.

I launched into a description of Rick's latest activities, new albums, the book that was coming out.  My cousin said, "I'm sure he's a nice guy." in a calm voice, like he was placating a mental patient.

Sigh.  I'm just more comfortable talking about what I know.

I don't think I'm very far into the Autism spectrum.  I think I got it just enough to give me the sound and smells sensitivity, the obsessive behavior, and the difficulty in relating to people.  I don't have the perfect pitch, or the eidetic memory, but I can visualize horrific things I've seen on the news or *heard about* on the radio with vivid clarity, sometimes making me wince at what I see in my head.  I can't listen to the radio anymore.  My husband's alarm is set to a radio station, and one morning it woke me up with a news story about a little boy who was killed at a reception for his own baptism by his father who was moving the parked cars around so all the relatives could fit their cars.  They hadn't seen that the toddler had wandered into the front yard and gotten somewhere behind one of the vehicles.

The mental images that news story conjured up in my head can still make me cry when I remember them, and it's been four years.  It's as vivid to me as if I witnessed it.

At least my condition has made me rather safety-conscious.  If a tall, narrow dresser is against the wall, I can see it tipping over and hurting someone, so I anchor it to the wall.  If we're in the car bringing a large purchase home, I see us getting into an accident and the item hurting someone even worse than the accident would, so I rearrange our seating so that everyone is safe.  Sometimes these imaginings make me wince, as well, but I take steps to avoid them and feel much better.  Power strip too close to the water cooler?  Find an enclosed one or move it further away.  LAN cables running across a high-traffic area because the cable company can't get permission to install a new outlet in the other rooms?  Tape them down under an area rug.

In the past, when I've said something, told a story, or made a comment, I've often heard the response "No one cares!" in an exasperated tone.  Not all the time, but often enough.  I'm getting better at telling when people are bored with me, or irritated, but I'm not great at it.  I have to do a lot of self-monitoring now.  If I'm bugging you with something, I will not be offended by a simple request to change the subject, or ease off the behavior.  It will help me learn.

Knitting and Crochet: Girasole Hanging On

So last week, I'm thinking "Oh, all I have left of the Girasole blanket is a one-inch wide border to knit on... I can finish that in a day or two."  Oh, foolish, foolish knitter.

This is my first attempt at a knitted on lace border.  For those of you not familiar with the process, you knit the lace across the width of it, using the last stitch on the right side of the work (on the left end of the needle, go figure) knitted together with live stitches you've left on another needle, one at a time, to join it to the main body of the shawl or blanket.  Basically, you're using one stitch from the main blanket every other row.

It's been a week, and I'm a little over halfway.

It doesn't help that I find this process so mind-numbingly boring that I keep distracting myself with other things.  Like games on Facebook.  Or crochet projects.  Crochet flies along at warp speed next to this thing.

My good friend Iggystar sent me a crochet book (Crochet So Fine) and enough Aunt Lydia's Crochet cotton to make the Dragonfly Shawl.  I was not getting the process at all.  Here is a quote from my Ravelry project page: 

"A friend bought me the book and enough Aunt Lydia’s crochet thread to make this shawl. Unfortunately, I just wasn’t getting the construction method. I knew I was making the side from the point out, but I just couldn’t wrap my head around the order of making the shells and SCing back across the top of the shell.

The written directions are worded very poorly in this regard.

Finally, I decided to try it in a thicker yarn, because I’m not normally a crochetter and my tension was looking all wonky and wasn’t helping. I’d ripped all the way to the beginning nine times or more.
Using the thicker yarn, and looking over some in-progress pictures here on Ravelry, I finally got it. You start with one shell (fan shape) and SC across. Then build the next row of two shells, then SC back across. Then three shells, etc.

The use of the word “row” in the written instructions is not helpful at all the way they worded it.
Since I only have the one ball of Chroma, but I like the way it’s turning out with the color progression, I shall have to purchase two more balls. Then I think I can tackle the version in crochet cotton."

Here is what the Chroma version is looking like now that I "get" it.

I love it, but this is going to be a warm version.  It's not nearly as slinky and sexy as the mercerized cotton version would be.  But at least crochet flies along, and I'll make all my mistakes on this yarn, which is fuzzy and forgiving, and will show fewer of them.

AoA: Coming Out

It's just best to do these things simply and quickly:  I have Asperger's syndrome.  If you see a post with the header AoA, that stands for Anecdotes of Asperger's.

My daughter has been having trouble in school.  Scholastically she's doing excellent work, with As and Bs the normal grade on every subject... when she remembers deadlines.  I read a blog by another knitter who has Asperger's, and I recognized some things in my daughter, so I brought it up when we were in a consultation with the school councilor and the vice-principal of the school.  The district psychological councilor was brought into the discussion, and CC had a full-day testing of IQ and emotional development.  The end report?  She's borderline Asperger's with alexithymia... a difficulty in identifying and expressing one's own emotions.

While waiting for the tests to come back, I had started reading.  I began with "Pretending to be Normal", Liane Willey's firsthand account of living her life with Asperger's.  In it she details how she frequently has trouble with walking and driving directions, getting lost often.  I have at least six or seven hair-raising accounts of my dangerous adventures in getting lost while driving or walking.  I started wondering.

I had devoured the first book in about 4 hours, so I moved on to the next book, "Eating An Artichoke"
a mother's account of the diagnostic and coping process with her Asperger's son.  A few bells started to go off.  Asperger's is genetically passed down.  Typically at least one parent has Asperger's traits.  Asperger's children often have writing difficulties, though their reading is excellent, and I remembered that in fourth grade, my grandmother was asked to have me start typing my homework, because my handwriting was so poor. 

I had to wait to make the purchase, but I moved on to Temple Grandin's "Thinking in Pictures".  She describes her method of working, building livestock handling facilities, as a process of seeing the parts of the construction in her mind, being able to swap out parts as needed, and seeing the whole thing work.  I once spent an entire afternoon, staring out the window, building a modified weaving loom in my head.  I was frustrated with traditional looms, and I wanted to improve upon them.  Only my fear and lack of knowledge in using power tools safely held me back from making a prototype.  But the entire plan is still in my head, in fact I'm picturing the heddles and harnesses in my head right now, trying different materials and wondering if I should attempt a computer interface device to raise and lower the harnesses.  Ah, multi-tasking.

When discussing Asperger's with friends and family, the first question usually was "What makes you think you have it?" and while I'm not terribly articulate when speaking on the phone or in person, I believe I can wrestle with it here, in a written format.  My primary clue?  The enormous sense of relief that I *finally* have an answer to all the questions that have been bugging me my entire life.  The descriptions click;  it just makes sense.  I have 10,000 anecdotes in my head, and I will never have time to share them all with you, but I know them and remember them, and they've plagued me my entire existence.

The most recent one was just last week.  Aspies often have extreme sensitivity to sound or smells, and are also easily distracted.  They also can have some difficulty with very high-register or low-register sounds. 

My daughter had a band concert, the final one of the season, so there we were in attendance.  There was a child maybe a little younger than Caitlin sitting in front of me, and he was very distracting... he kept fidgeting, scratching himself all over under his shirt, front and back.  I was tempted to tap his mother on the shoulder and say something, it bothered me so, but if she wasn't distracted by it, I wasn't going to say anything.  When the band started, I was fine... it was a single grade's worth of students playing in a gymnasium.  But when all three bands... honor, 7th, and 8th grade bands combined for one final number, I just couldn't deal with it anymore.  It was far too loud.  I pretended to lean forward with my elbows on my knees, holding my chin in my hands, but what I was really doing was covering my ears.  And this was not the first time in my life I had done this in an auditorium or gymnasium. 

Also, when the teachers came up to the microphone to speak, I could only understand one word in five, though clearly everyone else could understand them, because they laughed at jokes... even the three old ladies sitting two rows of bleachers in front of me.  To me, they sounded like the quintessential Charlie Brown teacher's voice... mwah mwah, mwah mwah mwah mwah.  I could hear the inflections, but not the words.

There have been other times, when Caitlin and I are together, where we have covered our ears and looked around, wondering why nobody else was bothered by the noise... the sheer painful assault of it!  I'd dismissed it as maybe we were directly under a speaker, or in the acoustic "sweet spot", but now I know... we're just wired different.

There will be more anecdotes to come.  I am going to try to make this a regular thing, as I feel an obligation to all the other undiagnosed AS people out there to raise awareness.  The character of Sheldon Cooper on "Big Bang Theory" is not enough... especially since it seems the character is undiagnosed as well.  I spent 43 years wondering what the hell was up with me... now I know.  And knowing has actually made me happy.

Cooking: Family Favorite, Pork Spareribs in Mexican Barbecue Sauce

It's a day for grilling, and this recipe turns out some of the most flavorful, delicious spareribs you've ever tasted.

Pork Spareribs in Mexican Barbecue Sauce
(from the Encyclopedia of Creative Cooking)

mexican barbecue sauce
1 T. olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, peeled, minced
1 fresh chili pepper, stemmed, seeded, chopped
1/2 T. salt
2 large tomatoes, peeled, chopped
2 T. chili powder
2 T. sugar
1/4 cup vinegar
1/3 cup olive oil
1/4 cup beer
4 lbs. pork spareribs (country style)

Make sauce:  Heat tablespoon of oil in saucepan.  Saute onion until lightly browned.  Add garlic, chili, salt and tomatoes; simmer until mixture thickens.  Add remaining sauce ingredients;  cook 8 minutes, stirring constantly.

Marinate spareribs in sauce several hours before grilling, if possible.  Grill over hot charcoal or under broiler, basting periodically with sauce, until tender, well-browned, and crusty.  (I have made the following change due to today's food safety guidelines.  Original recipe says to add raw meat marinade to cooked ribs and serve... yuck!)  Boil remaining marinade for five minutes, then add to the ribs before serving.

*End recipe*

When I was in the Army, whenever there was a holiday I'd have a bunch of the guys over who couldn't go home to celebrate, and we'd cook up a big mess of these and some corn on the cob.  There was usually a keg of beer at hand.  Good times.

Shopping: Experiencing Online Yarn Stores

I shop online... a lot.  If I could shop online for groceries with a service that didn't cost an arm and a leg, I would.  Everything else, I pretty much do shop for online... from kitchen gadgets to garbage cans, I get it online.  This especially means yarn.

This week I made the big decision to stop using my main standby, Knit Picks.  Their prices are going up to those comparable with other yarn lines, and while I understand the reason behind it, I've found that their actual quality does not justify having the same prices as other yarns.  Over the past five years I've had bad experiences with loose dye (color coming off on your hands, needles, and stitch markers), excessive broken/knotted ends in the middle of a skein, sock yarn that mats and felts under light use... well, you get the picture.  Add to that the fact that they drop colors frequently, have very little in the way of novelty or boucle yarns, and in general have color palettes that are muddy and drab, and I find I have very little reason to shop there any longer.  A good, clearly easy to use shopping cart system is not going to make up for all that.

I have tried YarnMarket in the past.  They have an excellent selection, although they're missing a few yarns I'd like to try, but they are rather expensive.  A friend recently recommended Jimmy Beans Wool, and though I have yet to try them, they seem to meet my criteria for a pleasant shopping experience... easy to find specific yarns whether you're looking by weight, brand, or price, a decent checkout system, and site security.  I've even ordered yarn from Fabric.com, as they have had excellent closeout prices on discontinued yarns.  I recently got some very nice linen yarn for almost $2 a skein.

This week, I decided to go for a small order of Noro yarn on Webs, at yarn.com.  They were having a fabulous sale price on a laceweight Noro Kirameki (Nylon, wool, and cashmere) I'd been dying to try, but held off because the only other place I could find it was YarnMarket, and it was hideously expensive. It was going for nearly half off, and comes in a nearly 500 yard skein.  I'm also trying Chirimen (cotton, silk, and a smidge of wool) which is a DK weight.

If their Noro Taiyo ever goes on sale, look out.  I loooove that stuff.  As long as Noro doesn't put Mohair in it, I like it.  Otherwise, too scratchy.  (Although I may finally have an explanation for why I find Noro with mohair so icky while everyone else seems to like it, but that's for another post.)

Knitting and Crochet: Lafayette complete, on to Girasole

The "Lafayette" afghan is finally complete.  Well, technically I have two more single crochet rows around the entire blanket for it to be considered finished, but I'm not doing it in this heat.  I have the yarn, I have the hooks, it's good for now.

I've started in on Jared Flood's "Girasole" shawl/blanket pattern in the blanket sizing.  I'm using the crap-ton of "Hot Rod Heather" sock yarn I bought on sale.  It's DK weight, but the pattern calls for worsted-weight yarn to achieve the blanket proportions needed, so I may have to add an extra pattern repeat or something to make sure I don't end up with a very sturdy doily.  I am well into Chart D and it's only about two feet across, though it's hard to tell while it's scrunched up on a circular needle.  There are only two charts left to go.  I'm contemplating re-repeating the zig-zag of D... I like the feel of it, and it's a pretty simple four-stitch repeat.  I'm just not sure what it would do to the even-ness of the blanket's circular shape.  I'm thinking of putting some kind of increase series between the two sets of zig-zags, but that might just look silly.

I think before I decide anything, I may need to put it on another, larger circular needle that will really stretch it out, let me see what it's doing.  I don't want subsequent increase rounds making it look like it's ruffled, or the added zig-zag looking stretched out.  We'll see.