Knitting in the Shadows: Still Alive ---

It seems that every so often, I'm posting that I've not fallen off the face of the earth. Evidently, my lungs continue to be weaker than they ought to be, so when the local (or, perhaps airplane inspired) resperatory virus catches me, I'm down for days on end. Somehow, when I can barely stay awake for four hours in a day, blogging falls by the way side.

Luckily, this time it did not involve me trying to cough up a lung, or spleen, or any other inappropriate body part. Nor, knock wood, did it come to antibiotics. But it certainly meant sleeping all day, for days.

I was out of it enough that I barely knit for a week.

Yes, you read that correctly. If you consider a normal week's knitting output around here, in the past week has yielded maybe a day's worth. Sad... so sad.

I did, however, manage to read (or finish) more than half a dozen books. Three of them were fun fiction (I do so enjoy Kelley Armstrong, and I had myself a bit of a feast with Frostbitten (Women of the Otherworld) , Waking the Witch (Women of the Otherworld, Book 11) and Men of the Otherworld: A Collection of Otherworld Tales all in a row). I then ventured into the pile of books that Golf Pro was reading, and read Dennis LeHane's Moonlight Mile ; I enjoyed the first half or so, but I started to have doubts during the scene in which the protagonist got mugged for his laptop. In the end, the Russian mob involvement just became to unbelievable for me, and by the last sixth or so of the book, I was reading just because I hate to quit before I finish a book. The first book of my gluttonous book week was Cathrynne Valiente's The Orphan's Tales: In the Night Garden, which I highly recoomend if you like fantasy literature at all (or fairy tales, or even books just a step outside the run of the mill). It is a delicious book full of nested stories within stories, all connected in ways you didnt' expect.

In addition, I actually knocked out some NONFICTION (yes, I know, an uncommon thing for me, but there you have it). First, I finished up The Smart Swarm: How Understanding Flocks, Schools, and Colonies Can Make Us Better at Communicating, Decision Making, and Getting Things Done (which I highly recommend - I'm going to read it again so I don't forget some of the stuff that I learned while my brain was fuzzy), and then I read Sex at Dawn: The Prehistoric Origins of Modern Sexuality, which I found fascinating. I highly recommend it if you're at all interested in athropology, primatology, or even psychology of relationships -- food for thought indeed (and well written, with a sense of humor).

But, lest you think I'd forgotten that this is, allegedly, a knitting blog - an update of the fiber kind.

Just before I was sidelined, I did finish Inebriate of Air...

Here she is, before blocking

And yes, she did get rather large -- but still so light and airy, despite all the beads. Not that you can see the beads in this shot, but it's pre-blocking, and poorly lit... I'd show you more, but, well, the background carpet pretty much obscures anything I'd be trying to show you anyway.... (alas).

I'm also making real progress on Fairy Stars. However, as with most things knit on yarn that fine, it mostly looks like a soft blob right now. If my pseudo blocking stretching and stitch counting last night holds any validity for predicting the finished dimensions, I seem to be only a few repeats away from the top edging pattern though (at least to make it the size it's donee wants it to be), so I'm still within striking distance of finishing on time. I'm going to have to resist strongly the urge to keep going until I've used up all of the luscious yarn. I'm pretty sure that she does not, in fact, want one that reaches the floor.

Oh, and I darned another pair of socks.

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I am so tempted to read some of those books, then I realized just how overwhelmed I am with reading right now. Remind me of them again this summer, k?
You're inebriate looks lovely, but you just had to add more lace, didn't you?

Posted by: Colleen G | February 24, 2011 at 11:23 AM