It ain't your grandma's knitting.

The poor unfortunates who come into contact with me for any significant period of time soon find out that knitting has a culture all its own. And that culture isn't what you might expect from the stereotypes of knitters the big culture clings to. There are still grandmothers knitting scratchy things out of crappy acrylic, and there are still pregnant women knitting tiny booties and caps, but they're not the bulk of the knitting community.

How can you tell that knitters aren't as mild and sweet as Muggles think? Look at what they're knitting.

There are patterns out there that would make your grandma blush. Heck, some of them make me blush. Thongs, bras, pasties, and willy warmers are just the beginning. Today, for some reason, I keep running across patterns representing the male anatomy. Dishcloths. Purses. Chapstick cozies. Stuffed models. (British/Anglophile readers: you know what I meant.) Pillows with male bits poking out. I am deadly serious. I swear, I'm not looking for them.

And not only are there patterns, people actually make these things. Cruising through the finished objects at Ravelry, I just keep stumbling over them. The things are everywhere, apparently making up something like 2% of projects- which doesn't seem like much, unless you browse a few hundred patterns at a time.

As my poor Muggle housemate says every time I tell him about the exploits of assembled knitters, knitters have their own culture. It's weird. And this time, I can join him in saying, "I don't get it."

Using our powers for good

So, the thing is, I'm a linguist. Playing around with made-up languages is fun; I get that. But there's a sobering statistic that bothers me.

2,251 of the world's languages need a Bible and have none of it. Not a single verse.

On the other hand, there are at least partial translations of the Bible into:
Lolcat
Klingon
Pig Latin
Quenya (that's Elvish, for non-LotR fans)
D'ni (okay, I'm the guilty party here)

...and any number of other conlangs, probably. Think about all the translation power that's getting used up in wikis and forums across the net. Imagine what that could do, were it loosed on natural languages, ones that actually need translations.

The internet is a great place to see the power of lots of people to do little things that add up to big things, like Wikipedia or Knitters without Borders. I wonder, are there ways to loose this flood of power into the realm of Bible translation or literacy?

While I wonder about that, ponder this bit of good news:

"So liek teh Ceiling Cat lieks teh ppl lots and he sez 'Oh hai I givez u me only kitteh and ifs u beleevs in him u wont evr diez no moar, k?'"

Iz John 3:16, k?

It's finally spring!

Finally finally finally! It's spring outside! That means...

Cherry trees!



Flowers!



Bike cops!

Okay, I don't have a picture of the bike cops. Wish I did, though. They're yummy-licious.

The weather is beautiful, the windows are open, I'm wearing shorts, I have a positive balance in my bank account, all is right with the world. Any minute now, the Torchwood season finale will show up in the On Demand menu, and I'll be in about a perfect a condition as a person can be on this earth.

Happy Spring!

I iz on Harlot website?

Sort of accidentally, but hey, I still think it's cool! Look for the third picture from the bottom, and then look left.

Kaarina, the person whose picture this actually is, was my knitting buddy for the night. She's awesome and incredibly brave for a new knitter. That bag she's wearing? Her first project. Those socks she's holding? Her second. We worked on the heel flap together while we waited in line for a very long time. Then we went to the Busy Hands Afterparty and Yarn Sale, where I bought the yarn I'm struggling to save for North Dakota.

Things I have learned about knitting and the world.

• Stoplight knitting should be done on circs. There's less chance of needles falling out.
  
• If you come enough times to her book signings, the Yarn Harlot will recognize you.
  
• When on meds that cause weight gain (or, I suppose, pregnant), shawls are more practical to knit than sweaters.
  
• The best way to get family members to understand knitting is to get them to have a geeky craft of their own. Like woodturning.
  
• Strangely, the above rule does not seem to apply to scrapbookers.
  
• You can find a group on Ravelry for anything. Anything.
  
• And speaking of Ravelry? Endless source of entertainment.
  
• Being in the company of knitters makes me want to knit more.
  
• Make that "knit every waking hour".
  
• And several of the non-waking hours.
  
• Being sick is a great way to get more knitting done. Assuming the meds don't knock you out.
  
• If you ask the lys owner if she has more colors of that lovely and dirt-cheap laceweight, she'll pull out her entire stock to check without complaining.
  
• Some new knitters are really really brave. They are examples to us all.
  
• Lace knitting is the best knitting in the world.
  
• Yes, you can knit lace without a lifeline, but it's better not to tempt the knitting gods.
  
• Don't pull laceweight from the center of the ball. Just don't.
  
• It is totally normal to have yarn piled on every available surface of your room/house. Totally.
  
• It is also totally normal to knit while soaking in the tub.
  
• Knitting socks in public draws out the curious inner knitter in everyone around you.
  
• Having three lys's makes me really, really spoiled.
  
• Some lys's have better yarn selections than others.
  
• Give up looking for sock yarn at Meijer's. It ain't there.
  
• Everyone can knit the same pattern and their projects will still be totally unique.
  
• Before modifying a pattern, at least consider that the designer might have known what they were doing.
  

I will now continue to pretend that the last... *counts*... five months of blog silence never happened. Toodle-pip.