Tear Warning

A fellow raveler shared this story about workers decorating the I beams for the Yawkey Center for Cancer Care.

Books: E-books

I keep meaning to spend more time talking about e-books. And then Dear author does such a nice job of it for me. (Well, not specifically for me.) Like in this post. (The Guardian also ran a nice overview article found here.)
I do want to expand on my biggest pet peeve. The DRM crap annoys me. The music business has already proved that DRM doesn't stop any of the things that it's supposed to. That it only annoys people who are not tech savvy enough to understand that instead of buying a copy of the story they are buying a format and sometimes device specific version that might be useless one day but still costs the same amount (usually) as a print book that you could mail to your mother.
I think the potential market for ebooks is huge, but it's so limited by format and price point right now that some of the tech savvy people are waiting (I didn't, and I know plenty of people who are diving in, aware of the limitations) and the non-tech savvy people are sometimes scared by all the talk.

Dreamy Scarf

I went to the Knitagogo handspun fiber retreat and got to meet Molly of Molly Miller by Appointment who talked about stitches that work well with handspun fibers. As part of the retreat we got a full size skein to take home and enjoy and I selected this yummy faux cashmere yarn. I used a variation on Wendy Bernard's Dream Swatch Head Wrap, knit it up on 15's, and here's what I got. (A super fast knit too, I cast on Friday and finished Saturday. Love big needles.)

(Oh, and PS, as I start up a rash of knitting posts, I have fallen way behind on the knit blogging, so while I have been doing a lot of knitting lately, it will seem more so as I finally get around to documenting December and January projects.)

Where I Resort to Linking

So, back in September Chalicechick posted a link to a funny exchange between church signs.
And it was fun to imagine. Well, apparently a possibly less funny version is occuring in the United Kingdom. Apparently the atheists started it, with bus ads stating such things as, "There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life."
And I just want to take a moment to step onto my soapbox and say to the people who find that ad annoying, our society, here in the US, and my recollection is that it was more so in the UK, we have such a predominance of not only a theistic but Christian viewpoint that constantly gets excused by people saying well people are just expressing their faith. So, here, you go. Agree or disagree, this is the atheists expressing their faith. /off soapbox
Okay, so in response (after trying to get the ads blocked), some Christian groups are responding with their own signs. (It's fairly amusing if you clock the links, they have also mimicked the layout and design used in the atheist campaign. My personal favorite "response" bus ad is the Russian Orthodox Church's, "There IS a God, BELIEVE. Don't worry and enjoy your life." Can't wait to see how this ends.

The Stars are Shining

I had picked up this gorgeous yarn at Artfibers and was searching for a pattern to show it off. The Gossamer Stars patter from the Summer Interweave, seemed just it. The pattern is a small enough chart that it's easy to follow, and while not quite mindless, goes quickly. The pattern suggests using a provisional cast on, knitting one side to the end and then picking up and knitting the second side. While I typically am not one to worry about whether all my stitches face the same direction when I wear it, I was interested enough to see the results. (It looks nice, I don't think it makes a huge difference with this pattern.) Also, the patterns use of stockinette and reverse stockinette, means it looks pretty interesting from both sides.


Interestingly, for whatever reason, I used about half as much yarn as the pattern called for (it called for three skeins of 220 yards each, I used about 300 yards on a smaller needle and got the called for length.)

Dear Folks #19

Dear Men Who Wish to Attract Women via the Internet (part 2),
I imagine you think putting up cute photos of your child(ren) will a) weed out those tho do not want and/or like children and b) score aw points with those who do want and/or like children. However, there is a catch, someone judgmental (like, say, me) might decide that the presence of a picture of a small child on a dating site is a little squicky, and that the overly posed nature of the photo possibly indicates you are a creepy parent. But, I guess that's a risk you are willing to take.
Best of luck,
Really, it was creepy.