kmkat and her kneedles

Eye candy Friday.

From Younger Son: 

I went to Ikea with my friend last night. All at the same time, we left the store, the rain ended, and the sky became a beautiful mix of colors. He snapped a picture of me silhouetted against the sky.

Yarn!

I have been accumulating a little pile of yarn. Time to photograph it, blog it, and upload it to Ravelry.

  

    
  

Clockwise, from upper left:

• 100g (420m) of Marks & Kittens Kattens Fame Trend sock yarn, 74/25 superwash wool/nylon,420m in another imaginatively named color '662' (good brand name -- the yarn really IS soft as a katten kitten);
• 4 oz (116g)(425 yds) of Sweet Georgia Tough Love sock yarn, 80/20 superwash wool/nylon, color 'Kill Bill';
  
• 100g (420 yds) of Dream in Color Everlasting 8-ply sockweight, 100% superwash Australian merino, color 'Tidal';
• Three skeins of Yarn for Sox, a worsted weight sock yarn; each is 4 oz (116g)(215 yds), 80/20 wool/nylon, colors, from left, 'Oatmeal', 'Ecru', and 'Greystone';
• 100g (800 yds) of Misti Alpaca handpaint laceweight, 100% baby alpaca, in the enchantingly named color '29'.
  

The orange/copper/gray sock yarn was acquired at the knitting event I attended in September. Don't remember the vendor. It is lovely soft; comments in Ravelry make me think it may not wear well enough for socks. Perhaps another Citron, this one for me...

The Kill Bill sock yarn is destined for a scarfy shawlette for Alex. More on this below.

The Dream in Color sockweight I acquired months ago, from Webs, I think. It has been draped lovingly around my mannequin's neck ever since. Don't know what it will become, but probably NOT socks. No nylon in it, plus the tonal colors are too pretty to hide under pant legs.

The worsted weight sock yarn will be... socks. Very warm socks, socks that will have to be hand washed. I found the yarn at The Tall Tale in Tofte, Minnesota, little town on the North Shore. The proprietess, a very nice and friendly dog lover, told me that one skein was not enough for a pair of socks but that I could get two pairs from three skeins. Hence, the multiple purchase. Don't know what they will look like yet, but they should be fast and fun to knit. The yarn is rustic, i.e., a bit scratchy -- perfect for rustic socks.

The laceweight alpaca is nearly the same color as the laceweight Schaefer I bought at Knitty City in May, but is thinner. Guess I am attracted to pale, pale browns and grays.

Oops, forgot some other recently acquired yarn.

That is 6,000 yards of lace weight cashmere from Colourmart. Actually, it is not lace weight; it is more like cobweb weight, much thinner than I expected which is why I got the second cone. Some of it may become a scarf, some may become a sweater. Someday.

Now, the Kill Bill.

Last year Matthew bought himself a hand-made bike painted in a Kill Bill color scheme. 

Here is a better picture of it, taken by the person he bought it from.

(Why a bicycle painted in a Kill Bill color scheme? Who knows...)

When I saw this yarn on the Simply Socks website* I knew it had to come to my house. So it did. 

When it arrived I emailed Alex and Matthew and asked if anyone was interested in a pair of socks or a scarf to match the bike. 

A few more emails, a few Rav searches, and it was decided: the yellow yarn will become this.

* Does Simply Socks's website remind anyone else of a 1960s Betty Crocker cake mix? It's the two-tone red horizontal stripes and the vaguely spoon-shaped thing at the top of the page that does it. 

It's a two-fer day.

Late breaking news!

 

Matthew is part of the 4-man team Spoke Girl riding in a 24-hour bike race in Milwaukee*. They placed 2nd in their class last year; looks like they might win it in 2011! You can keep track of their place here.

x

* Conditions in Milwaukee at 4:58 pm:

Thank FSM for the low humidity...

My boy young man.

From City Pages:

New bike!

Matthew got himself (half of) a new winter bicycle; he went halvsies on it with a good friend who works in a bike shop.

What's a winter bicycle? You may well ask.

One with big-ass tires.

Apparently, with a conventional bicycle, the largest diameter tire that will fit within the frame and the brake pads and not interfere with the chain is 2-1/2". Anything larger requires a whole different frame designed to accommodate the aforementioned big-ass tires, which can roll over sand, mud, snow, whatever.

This one is a Surly Pugsley (Is that a great name or what?)

His also has a sweet bell.

Big doin's this weekend.

#2 Son is doing it again.

0

The image above is the hi-res version of what appears on the spoke cards, below.

No-Hater Rolling Dance Super Bike Mega Party 2010.1, Saturday, August 21, 5 - 10 p.m.

If biking is not your thing, you could instead come HERE, where I will be announcing the speakers in Building 1 on Saturday:

#2 Son: famous.

Click here to hear him interviewed about the No-Hater Super Bike Rolling Dance Mega-Party 2010.0.

No-Hater Rolling Dance Super Bike Mega Party 2010.0

That's my boy front and center, backed by about 70% of the total crowd that participated in his bike ride & dance party.

As I mentioned before, he had gotten a parade permit -- perhaps as a response to my semi-humorous suggestion that might need one -- and was glad he did. He said that at one point on the ride, a bit after midnight,

"...a squad car rolled up a block away and stopped. We were on an area off of the greenway, which is why he had to keep his distance if he wasn't going to drive on the trail...But we walked over, told him exactly what we were doing, told him we had a parade permit...And name/position dropped the lady we got the permit from and he had no problem...and drove off, without a closer look...And that was it for police interaction."

Whew. I would not have liked to have to bail my boy out of jail. Although, come to think of it, that would mean all three of my menfolk had been arrested. Not me, though; I am squeaky clean. It's the knitting. Keeps us honest. Or at least sneaky...

I was following the Facebook comments before the event.

A few more photos from the Facebook albums of the participants.

 

Yup, a DJ. Here is some of the prep in our garage:
 

A few more from the event itself:
 

More random.

Censorship: it's as American as, well, censorship.

From boingboing.net:

"A music-industry speaker at an American Chamber of Commerce event in Stockholm waxed enthusiastic about child porn, because it serves as the perfect excuse for network censorship, and once you've got a child-porn filter, you can censor anything:

'Child pornography is great,' the speaker at the podium declared enthusiastically. 'It is great because politicians understand child pornography. By playing that card, we can get them to act, and start blocking sites. And once they have done that, we can get them to start blocking file sharing sites.'

The venue was a seminar organized by the American Chamber of Commerce in Stockholm on May 27, 2007, under the title 'Sweden -- A Safe Haven for Pirates?'. The speaker was Johan Schlüter from the Danish Anti-Piracy Group, a lobby organization for the music and film industry associations, like IFPI and others...

'One day we will have a giant filter that we develop in close cooperation with IFPI* and MPA. We continuously monitor the child porn on the net, to show the politicians that filtering works. Child porn is an issue they understand,' Johan Schlüter said with a grin, his whole being radiating pride and enthusiasm from the podium."

IFPI's strategy on porn.

* IFPI = International Federation of the Phonographic Industry. From their website:

"IFPI represents the recording industry worldwide, with a membership comprising some 1400 record companies in 66 countries and affiliated industry associations in 45 countries. IFPI's mission is to promote the value of recorded music, safeguard the rights of record producers and expand the commercial uses of recorded music in all markets where its members operate."

* * * * *

I just finished reading this book. It was absolutely fascinating -- I read until 2 a.m. two nights in a row because I was so enthralled.

Markopolos was a quant -- a numbers guy in the securities industry -- who figured out after five minutes analysis (5 minutes!) in 1999 that Bernard Madoff was a fraud, either doing a type of trading that is illegal or, more likely, running a Ponzi scheme. Markpolos's boss at the investment firm where he worked wanted him to reverse engineer Madoff's trading strategy so they could duplicate it. They were losing clients to Madoff and wanted to be able to compete with him. 

From Amazon/Publisher's Weekly:

"Markopolos, the whistleblower who filed five unheeded complaints against Ponzi king Bernie Madoff over nine years, has produced an astonishing true-life whodunit set amidst the personalities, plots, and international intrigue of Wall Street. Having collected damning information on money manager Madoff -- the respected co-founder of NASDAQ who ran the largest financial scam in history -- since 1999, Markopolos's work as a chartered financial analyst and certified fraud examiner, aided by an industry journalist and two colleagues from his days as a derivatives portfolio manager, lays bare the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) as a tragically inept regulating agency that 'didn't give a rat's ass about protecting investors,' and seemed to consider Madoff 'just another guy cutting some corners.' Realizing he had not one but two powerful opponents -- 'Madoff and this non-functioning agency' -- Markopolos refused to give up, despite fearing for his life and his family; accordingly, he transmits his team's determination and fascination in contagious detail. The hows and whys of Madoff's eventual arrest, Markopolos's subsequent appearances before Congress, and the carnival of press coverage makes a satisfying conclusion to this strange epic; Markopolos also includes complete documentation of his formal submissions to the SEC, plus his recommendations for much-needed reform at the agency."

Part of my fascination with this story stems from my professional history. I was an auditor for three years and by sheer chance ended up specializing in the securities industry. After that I spent seven years at a regional financial services firm. This was back in the 1980s and things have changed since then, but enough has remained the same that I recognized the industry I was acquainted with. Plus, after I had finished the book, I realized that a number of my tax clients probably had invested for years in one of the funds that had >$1 billion *invested* with Madoff; the head of that fund committed suicide two weeks after Madoff was arrested.

If you have any interest in the world of finance and/or fraud and/or government regulation -- or you just like a good thriller -- you should read this book.

* * * * *

This video brought back memories. Back in about 1987, when #1 Son was 2-1/2, he loved Labyrinth. He must have watched it 50 or 100 times. Srsly.

He would put on a pair of tall black dress winter boots with 1" heels that I had then (the boots were knee-high on me; on him they came up to his crotch) and carry some kind of stick to be a scepter/wand, just like The Goblin King. He would stand in front of the TV and [attempt to] sing along with "the baby song", all the while wiggling his butt and dancing back and forth in an imitation of TGK. I especially liked it when he would yell "Quiet!" at the goblins, right along with David Bowie.

Smokey sent this YouTube video to #1. We are waiting to hear if he remembers anything of those days.

* * * * *

Speaking of sons, #2 Son is, even as I type, hosting the No-Hater Rolling Dance Super Bike Mega Party 2010.0. Perhaps you remember the N-HRDSBMP2K9? Apparently that one was such a success that he is repeating it.

As you can see in the photos in the linked post, one Saturday night in last October he and about 20 others rode their bikes together through light rain and partied and danced (under bridges, where it was dry) until the wee hours. This time? As of some time last week there were already 248 people signed up to attend.

He got a parade permit from the City of Minneapolis, just in case.

* * * * *

On the knitting front, my multicolored striped top-down raglan now has a yoke, two sleeves, and a few -- say, 3 -- inches of body. I will definitely have it ready to wear by next winter. I hope to be able to wear it if necessary when we go camping near Glacier National Park in June.

Currently, I also have the second sock of two different pairs OTN and am having great fun making log cabin felted potholders for the Friends of the Polk County Libraries to sell this summer. I also have committed to at least one hat for a Relay for Life in fund raiser in June. Progress on all projects is being documented photographically. Stay tuned.

Winter.

Clockwise from left: Christmas Eve day in Minneapolis; Minneapolis; biking by the lake in Madison, WI.

Photos are from a biking site the #2 Son directed me to. None of the bikers are he.

Besides the high-tex windproof balaclava and SmartWool glove liners I gave him for Christmas, he has invested in some other winter biking gear.

 

Mega-tread tires with tungsten carbide studs. ("Tungsten carbide drills? Oooh, aren't we posh?" -- name that quote)

.

Once the snow came, he parked his really good bike and rides this one instead.

 

Still a Bianchi, but quite a clunker compared to the summer one.

We have had a fair bit of fog lately, which makes the trees... awesome.

Eye candy Friday, sort of.

 

#2 Son has ordered me to add this photo of he* him and his bike on a hockey rink. He suggested that a video would be more impressive because it would show how fast he can get going. I don't know -- could YOUR heart stand the excitement?

* Sheesh -- use English much, Kat™?

The biking continues.

I was perusing Facebook and found some ::cough:: interesting ::cough:: photos of #2 Son.

No, not that interesting.

"I don't need no car!"

"Biked eight miles to work this morning. It was only five below (F)*."

* Note: since Christmas, he has a high-tech windproof balaclava and a merino hand-knit hat. No more of this silly ice balls in the stubble. Also, the temperatures here on the Great Frozen Tundra have (finally) risen north of zero.

2009: That was the year that was.

January.

Well, there was this (bad).

And there was this (good) (from left, Wendy, me, Chris, and Susan).

On the knitting front:


 

February.

Good intentions.

 

Snow and cold.

Knitting:

March.

Winter melted away.

Knitting.

April.

Spring arrived in earnest.

Yarnover.

End of tax season.

Taste of St. Croix.
 

Knitting resumed after tax season.

 

May.

I scored big at Macy's sale racks, I helped Norm go away, I celebrated Mother's Day in an eco-friendly way, the bears and the ticks came out of hibernation, I picked up trash, I enjoyed the Memorial Day weekend, I bid farewell to our local librarian, and Hannibal discovered the joys of catnip.

Knitting was primarily of a stealth nature, but did include scientific swatching and the F'ing of a couple of O's that had been OTN for nearly, and over a year, respectively. (I am rather proud of that sentence -- and its punctuation -- awkward though it may be.)

 

June

June was for knitting and vacation and celebrating that brief magical time that is summer in the north woods.

 

 

Lots of knitting.

 

 

July.

July was for more vacation -- the rest of the one in Wyoming and another on the North Shore.

And summer.
 

And injuries.
 

And knitting.

 

August.

It was a very good month. I turned 60, had a contest, and laughed. We went to a concert.
 

I learned the difference between eagles and turkey vultures, and I had surgery to remove some extra/unneeded bits and pieces and repair that torn cartilage in my knee.
 

Knitknitknit.

 

September.

In September I had lots of cats on the blog, it was my turn to give the prayer at the beginning of the monthly county board meeting, the county budget process blew up, and the most gloriously gorgeous month of the year was here.

 

The knitting, she continued.

 

October.

I became a biker by proxy,

more new-to-me music found its way into my iTunes, and we celebrated 35 years together

by not-camping on Lake Superior.

The kneedles continued to fly.
 
 

November.

The van that took us on some wonderful vacations met up with an unfortunate bear on the road and was replaced by an older but bigger and more customized van.

Cold weather arrived, and once more I cooked and baked.

 

Mostly, though, I knitted.




Apparently I can crank out hats like other knitters crank out... sweaters

December.

I continued to be thankful (there is a lot to be thankful for).

With the help of Matthew and Maggie, I decorated for Christmas. This decorating thing is never a given.

I showed you my ornaments, y'all showed me yours.

 

We ate well.
 

A bit more knitting* for others.

I pretty much finished my Christmas knitting. (Shhh, the Calorimetry is a surprise.)


The medical mittens are still OTN -- stay tuned.

*For someone who doesn't like pink, I sure knit a lot of it lately...

Happy day after Christmas!

Above belongs to a biking friend of #2 Son. Said friend decorated his bike for the holiday with jingle bells attached to bike with red and green zip ties. Festive!

And now I am being paged and implored and begged to please make waffles! for everyone so that everyone will get up and then we can wake Smokey and then we can open presents. Not that the younger generation is materialistic or anything...

Hardy boy.

#2 son keeps me updated on his biking adventures.

 

Last night we had a brief discussion on the phone about the virtues of a high-tech windproof balaclava vs. one hand-knit of a silky-soft and warm yarn by a loving mother.

No decision yet, but there is a possibility of both. Don't want no frostbit boys...

Eye candy Friday: the random edition.

 

Carved ostrich eggs in store window, Cape Town, South Africa; December 2005.

* * * * *

Thank you all for your help in finding someone to design the caduceus for the Christmas mitten! Lisa hooked me up with an amazing Canadian knitter (I know, that's redundant) who has already knit a prototype for me. Follow the link to her Ravelry page -- she has done amazing stuff.

I'm going to share the other resources that y'all offered me -- there are some really good ones.

From Ruth @ 5elementknitr: "...this woman does outstanding things with dishcloths and she has a whole medical category here. There's two caduceus...es - one at the top and one if you scroll down a bit. They are not cables just knit/purl and when I bought a design from her before, there's no charts, just row by row instructions." digknittydesigns

(Blogless) Berta in Texas sent me to Knitting Pattern Central for several dishcloths that have wings in their design. Several are by RaAnn Clegg, who clearly loves to create knit and purl designs and is very good at it.

KMK (she and I share the same initials) told me about the DNA helix scarf she had in medical school. A light bulb went on over my head. The mittens will be fraternal twins: the other one will have the DNA helix design on the back.

Helen offered to design for me, but she has several (amazing!) things OTN right now and wouldn't be able to get to it right away.

Thanks again -- you guys are the BEST!

* * * * *

In addition to November being the month of NaNoBloMo and NaNoWriMo and Vestvembe, it is also Novembeard...

 

...in which Matthew is clearly participating.

He showed me another of his artistic creations, one which is in the header rotation over at MplsBikeLove.com.

 

Here's a closer look:

 

He and Maggie surprised me at 8:30 last night by showing up with a pumpkin pie cheesecake and saying, "No one should be alone on Thanksgiving." What a couple of sweeties they are.

* * * * *

And now, in honor of Black Friday/National Buy Nothing Day, one last image:

Biking.

Matthew showed me these awesome biking videos last weekend. He says he is not inspired to learn to do these things, but he would like to know how to do them. I think what he means is that he would like to acquire the skills magically, without the bruises and potential broken bones that he would incur during the learning process.

Wouldn't we all prefer to acquire new knowledge that way?

And now for something [not] completely different...

Eye candy Friday, the NOT version.

I am blogging today under orders from #2 son. He sent me an email with links to these photos and the command, "BLOG THIS."

Ever the compliant parent, I am following his instructions.

The City of Minneapolis recently revised its downtown street usage and directions. Among other changes, two formerly one-way streets became two-way again, now with both parking lanes and bike lanes at the side. But the lanes are a bit... odd. The bike lane is next to the curb, separated from traffic by the parking lane.

Yeah, people no longer park next to the curb. Like I said, odd.

There is plenty of signage to help people do the right thing.

 

Below you can get an idea of the layout. Bike lane next to curb, separated from parking lane by a double white line, then driving lane. The parking lane is only a parking lane during non-rush hour times.

Those two cars next to the curb? Yup. Parked in the bike lane.

 
 

One problem immediately evident to everyone who ever rode a bike on a city street is that in this configuration bicyclists will constantly be confronted by passengers opening their doors into the bike lane, getting out of the cars into the bike lane, standing in the bike lane while retrieving purse, briefcase, toddler, and/or packages from the car, and eventually crossing the bike lane to get to the safety of the sidewalk. There does not appear to be any way to avoid that conflict.

A biker commented on the bumper sticker:

You have to realize that this is meant as a command to bikes, not a statement of support, in this case.

#2 son wrote:

As I was taking the last two pictures, a black SUV pulled up behind me and patiently waited for me to move so that he could park behind the road-sharing Volvo.

Another biker commented:

Ok, I have a plan. Let's do this. Since they are allowed to illegally impede traffic, let's all go over to Steef's shop and get a kickstand out of the box. Then we'll put them on our bikes.

Then we'll all go down First Avenue and for every one car parked there like that, let's have one bike take the middle of the right-hand lane and put the bike on a kickstand and say were waiting for someone to come out of the building.

Seems fair enough. 

Here is what the bikers would really like, bike lanes like those in Paris, with a concrete barrier wide enough to prevent the disembarking passenger/bike conflicts I described above.

 

A worthy goal, but methinks it will take awhile -- some major rethinking on the role of bicycles in urban transportation, some tax dollars to construct, and some dedication on the part of snow-removal crews. (Yes, dedicated bicyclists ride year-round in this Land of Seven-Month Winters.)

Highway safety has come to be seen, not just as a matter of educating and exhorting people to drive safely, but also of designing roads and vehicles to enhance and ensure safety. Likewise, part of bike safety means designing potential hazards OUT of the system, not INTO it, as was done here. I have no doubt that conditions and infrastructure will improve. Minneapolis is, if nothing else, a relatively well-run and citizen-friendly city. Like so many things, it's just gonna take some time and some money and some effort.

In the meantime, Bicyclists! Be careful -- it is dangerous out there!

* * * * *

Just in case you really, really, really need an Eye Candy Friday image, here is one taken at Autumnfest two weeks ago.