Around and around and around we go

Well. Here we are. Tomorrow, I’m getting a gallbladder scan.

I’ll try to contain my excitement.

I’m taking the entire day off tomorrow. If I feel up to it (and they haven’t shot me up with morphine) (or maybe even if they have, ha ha!) I’m hoping to hit up a new yarn store I discovered in the neighboring burg of Ripon. They carry Dale of Norway yarn/patterns. While I’m not worthy of either one, I’d like to go and gaze with respectful deification at them.

But it all depends. Yesterday I thought I’d like to take my $300 in gift cards to Sears and get myself some decent clothes. And I went to Sears. And I walked into Sears. And I grabbed a bunch of crap off the racks more or less at random and got out of there as quick as I could. I felt OK before we left the house, but by the time we had gotten to Sears I just wanted to go back home and go to bed.

I don’t expect that tomorrow will be any different. While I’m sitting here at home I can say, “…and then I’ll go to the yarn store! And the coffee shop! And I’ll dine at Max’s! And then the library! And then…!”

But the truth is, I probably won’t have a damned thing left before I even start the test.

Being sick sucks. It’s like, all this time off from work – and no gumption to do anything interesting with it!

I have reserved the right to flat out not come back to work at all until the dust has settled. I say ‘reserved the right to’, but I think what I mean is, ‘offered to save my coworkers the aggravation by’. Have you ever driven past a construction site and seen three guys digging like crazy while a fourth guy stands on his shovel and looks impressively stupid, like he just can’t figure out what to do with the thing?

I’d be that fourth guy right about now. Basic things are a bit beyond me. And I have to admit to a certain lack of enthusiasm for anything that doesn’t involve not doing anything. If whatever it is involves not doing anything whatsoever, I’m all for it.

Otherwise, eh. Not so much.

I have, however, been knitting socks. This is the Year of the Socks, thanks to my having suffered a bout of momentary insanity and gotten myself the sampler packs of KnitPicks sock yarn. I have two huge boxes of sock yarn in my closet. Everybody gets socks for Christmas this year.

I apologize in advance to my family and friends. Some of the colorways are…hmm. Rather…surprising. Also, personal opinion, I dislike the cotton/wool/nylon blend socks. They feel weird. Lumpy. Bumpy. Kind of unforgiving.

A hand knit sock should be all about warm fuzzy comfort. I feel like the cotton blend is kind of harsh; not exactly scratchy, but…dry. Like when I wear them, they make my feet feel unloved.

So I’m sticking with the wool for socks. It just feels more loving to me.

This is about the only thing I’m interested in doing right now. Knitting socks from the most basic pattern imaginable. Socks like these:




These socks? Simplest. Pattern. Ever. This is a pattern that is so easy to keep in mind it’s ridiculous. You don’t have to remember anything but a formula: the heel flap is half the originally cast on stitches knit back and forth to that same number minus two, that kind of thing. I don’t have to go running back to a pattern asking, “Now, do I do K2tog, or SSK, or P2tog or…?”

It appeals to my need to not be thinking about anything in particular right now. Around and around and around we go.

Hey. That’s kind of like my medical treatment these last four months! Get sick, go to doctor, be sent for test, go back to doctor, go home, get sick, go to doctor, be sent for test…

Around and around and around we go…