Everything looks better in the morning

Okay, okay. I didn't even knit yesterday. I took a walk, and had a nap, and ate brownies I was saving for other people who, in the event, expressed no interest in brownies. Probably because I was very careful not to mention there were any.

But today will be better, because I woke up with inspiration that kept unfolding as I staggered around looking for a non-brownie breakfast. And it was completely unrelated to a better way to clean the bathroom sink.

Keep your fingers crossed for me, yes? And have a lovely weekend!

Rhinestones

The other day I was working on something and the details just weren't meshing for reasons I couldn't understand until I suddenly remembered one of the things Wayson Choy taught in the 2008 Summer Workshop I was fortunate enough to attend: 'one rhinestone too many.'

That means too much embellishment, basically - even when those embellishments are lovely, too many of them distract from what is true about what you are creating, and form a barrier between you and your audience.

I had way too much embellishment. I realized I would have to step back and cut away at some of it, once I decided what is true about my creation - the story I want to tell, and the feelings I want to share - and what enhances that.

Today I think I know. I'm going to sit down with the project again, starting mostly from scratch, and see if I'm right.

And I'll be doing that while watching a movie because you know what? It's knitting, not writing. The process of creation is the same, something I still find staggering though it's becoming easier to accept and even celebrate - because it means I don't have to feel like I'm procrastinating when I knit!

Mary Poppins' carpet bag

Behold, the little bag I bought myself from tinyhappy just before the shop component temporarily - thank goodness - closed up for travel purposes:


When I bought this I thought it would be quite small, and useful perhaps for subway tokens and lip balm, plus maybe my cell phone.

When it arrived and I saw it was much bigger than that, I thought I could carry knitting in it, and since I will be spending a little over 2 hours on public transit (not on strike!) today, it seemed a good time to test my theory. Which was perfectly sound - the pouch is wider than my sock needle holder case thingy, and roomy enough for a sock's worth of yarn, plus the measuring paper I am using for people's heads. (I will be seeing a friend today who insists she has a Big Bean - a very useful person to know when working out a Size Large hat pattern.)


Then I realized I would need to take a little more with me than this. You can knit a lot of sock in two hours, so I tossed in A Sock I Knit Earlier for comparison purposes, and my measuring tape, so that I don't accidentally work past the heel.


Then I realized that if I do go far enough to need the heel, I should switch to the second sock, since heel-knitting and public transit and me are not a good threesome.


A pen seemed sensible as well.

And there is still room in the bag for my camera, and maybe a little snack! Definitely, Mary Poppins magic.

Just in case you are thinking this post has nothing to do with writing or procrastination - though I assure you the process of setting up and taking such photographs is highly procrasinatory - today's trip is to the open-to-guests night of SummerCamp for Writers. I didn't register this year, knowing that I wouldn't be able to commit the time, but some other friends did, so I'm going to lend my support as they all read from their work to a roomful of people.

And I hope to have a good deal of writing inspiration in my Mary Poppins bag when I get back.

Procrastination R Me

Yesterday I... oh, I can barely bring myself to say it:

I procrastinated.

I really did! I spent about 2 hours taking and uploading photographs of something I designed, and wrapping a present, and then I went for a run (which I am still feeling today, ow ow owie), and then I spent about 3 hours backing up all my photographs with the shiny new CDs I purchased on the weekend. And then I toyed with supper ideas, and wiped down the top of my stove and dusted the fan cover over it.

The trouble was that the only project still left standing - apart from the novel, for which I am still not ready - was another very daunting design thing. I was scared to start.

Fortunately, I recovered in the evening and made good headway on the sample and even worked out a neat technique to solve the problem that was scaring me.

Moral of the story: If you're going to spend a whole day putting off the inevitable, you might as well accept it and clean the bathroom. Because nobody cares much about the top of the fan cover for the stove.

Post office deliverance

This is one of a few times of the year when I look at the months' worth of flotsam and jetsam that choke the corners of my kitchen counters and laundry shelf and say

Enough!

and sort it all into File, Recycling, and - worst case - Landfill.

Unfortunately, my city is currently hosting a strike for a variety of services, including garbage/recycling/composting pickup. So I can't throw anything out.

I did my best this weekend. I carved out temporary storage space for some of it. I made a big box bigger by folding up the top flaps and taping them together, and filled it with paper to be stored in the garage and recycled when times improve. I recycled some mailing envelopes (another perk of online shopping) by filling them with other things I have left sitting out for the day when I might get around to mailing them. And then I mailed them.

Here's an interesting but little-observed-by-me fact: When you mail stuff, it stops being in your space! You don't have to plot or scheme or shift things around - it's just gone! and you have the added bonus of knowing that the things that were becoming a weighty responsibility while in said space are going to make a happy moment for somebody else, just as you intended when you first set them aside in a pile of papers on the kitchen counter.

Love, love, love the postal service. Especially because they didn't go on strike this summer.

Sunshine and puppies

Do you like stuff? I do. I like...

Puffy white clouds

Fresh clean sheets

Croissants (especially when they have chocolate in them)

Free hugs

Sand, and the way it adapts itself to the arch of my bare feet

Rocks big enough to sit on, or flat enough to wade out into water on

Pink

Cucumber sandwiches

The way raccoon families look walking the top of a fence at night

and

a whole day of 1930s movies - including one with Carole Lombard! - on Turner Classic Movies.


mmmmmmmmmmm, sofa knitting.

Release the hounds!

Yesterday, a delivery guy left a box in front of my door without knocking. It contained

the predator mites

Unpacking insects is an interesting experience, if you have
a/ a vivid imagination and
b/ no experience buying crickets to feed to pets that eat live crickets.

Suffice it to say I was daunted.

I cut the packing tape and opened the lid and found:

shredded paper.

After a few minutes I gingerly lifted the shredded paper and found:

bubble wrap.

After a few minutes I poked at the bubble wrap and unpicked it a little and found:

a pair of ice packs.

Below that:

nothing.

I looked back at the shredded paper on my kitchen counter and poked at that and found:

a medicine bottle full of tiny bean leaves and, presumably - they're pretty small and my sight isn't that fabulous anymore - predator mites.

Deep breath. Quick shift of medicine bottle to the coolest room in the house (they like to be around 50 degrees F if they can get it.) And then after a brief rain in the evening (they like humidity) I talked somebody else into sprinkling some of the contents of the bottle over the shrubs that the red mites have been destroying in my garden.

And now: I wait.

(and eat ice cream.)