forgetgutenberg

So I had this purple fiber, right, and was in the process of making it into a nice skein of yarn … 

Well, it went all right for the first bobbin. The second bobbin was a little bit … feisty. That should’ve been my first clue, but I went and wound it off on the ballwinder so I could ply it anyway.

The first problem was my wheel’s unwillingness to spin counter-clockwise. I don’t know what its problem was, but whatever. The drive band kept falling off. Foul language ensued.

Then it wasn’t taking up the yarn. It was spinning, but really there are other things it’s supposed to do. I kind of solved that problem, by treadling at about warp nine and a half. At least I’m starting to actually get the hang of the long draw necessary for even plying. 

Treadling at warp nine has its own set of problems. The treadle keeps flying out of the leg it’s attached to, which is at best disconcerting when you’re trying to concentrate on plying a yarn without little nubs of tangle. 

Having two bobbins means that one of the batches of yarn was just sort of rolling around being tangly, since one of them had to be on the wheel - I should find out how to put a brake on my lazy kate so it doesn’t backspin quite so much.

I persevered. I am not going to let the spinning wheel win. Thump thump squeak *foul language* thump squeak. Right. But by Jove, there is going to be plied yarn at the end of this.

And lo, there is. With a ruler for scale, even. One day, Frankenwheel will understand how stubborn I can be.

All right, that’s a little strange. Accidentally deleting all the comments makes it even harder to write posts. I feel a bit like I’m talking to myself. I suppose I am, really, whether or not anybody comments.

It might be a side-effect of having finished the first draft of a major project. I’ve got more work to do on it, but it’s the biggest thing I’ve finished in a while. Now I’m staring down the barrel of two weeks I’ve set aside for finishing wish. Remember wish? With the cranes? I think I can do it, if I don’t get distracted by too many interesting side-projects. Stick to doing the basics, what I suppose is the foundation - if I’m going to make it a long-term project (I don’t think I have a choice, at this point) - and get to all the other bits once I actually have something to work with. 

Argh. 

You know how frustrating that is. 

Then again, a little bit of focus, with nice reasonable (daily) goals, works. I know this because I’ve done it. More than once, actually, to be honest. It’s just a lot more difficult to come up with goals that work for projects that aren’t writing. Word count is so darn convenient.

It meant I could write something novel-sized, seriously. You’d think, after that, I’d be all about folding little bits of paper. That’s not nearly so much like pulling teeth. (Actually, I’m sure it is once it gets past a certain point.)

So I’ll spin some more, as an avoidance tactic. Should work, right?

In the interest of reading things outside of my defaults, I’ve decided to bother the booksellers at my friendly neighborhood bookstore. Porter Square Books has some good people working for it, and they give fascinating recommendations.

I got a Wendell Berry novel, Andy Catlett: Early Travels, and read it the other day. Mostly I want to read Faulkner now, which is unusual.

Then, the people behind the counter suggested The Name of The Rose, which of course I’ve already read (and ought to re-read), The Shadow of the Wind, and something by Murakami. Which batch is not all that far out of my usual reading, but I think it should do nicely anyway. 

I’d forgotten something about reading Mojtabai - I either take weeks to do it, or need one serious sitting. All That Road Going is clearly the former. It’s good, but it’s not one of those fast, easy, freedom-of-the-open-road numbers.

Also, I ought to be reading something entirely different, but … I’m a slacker, I admit it.

Or I could be finishing this knitting. I’m about five rows from the end of a shawl I’ve been working on for more than a year and a half. It’s going to be lovely, and I am going to have to find it a nice home far away from me. 

There’s something to be said for sitting in my (clean) kitchen, writing. 

Also, I just accidentally deleted all the comments on the blog. Whoops. This might turn into a problem, since I still haven’t actually figured out how the spam settings work. Anyway. I still like you, even if I deleted your comment. I’m going to go back to trying to talk myself out of trying to come up with a way to buy a loom, and step away from the computer before I do something else silly.

Seriously, please go look at my etsy shop. It’s forgetgutenberg.etsy.com, and it’s over in the sidebar as well. 

Today, I finished Hell & Earth, which is one of the many books Elizabeth Bear has coming out this summer, and The Titan’s Curse, which is the third book in the Percy Jackson series. They’re both quite good, although in no way alike. I wish I knew some convenient middle-school boys to give the Percy Jackson books to. I know some people who will want to read Hell & Earth, and a few who probably should whether or not they want to. The pile of books I need to read continues to grow - I’ve added A. G. Mojtabai’s All That Road Going and Mo Yan’s Life and Death Are Wearing Me Out. (I loved Republic of Wine, so I clearly needed the new one.)

Other than that, I’m working on making words. It seems to be working, which I’m pleased about. I’ve given myself an unreasonable deadline in the interest of finishing wish. I’ve got this schedule all planned out; I’m not going to follow it, because that’s not what calendars are for in my world. On the other hand, I’ve got a concrete goal for the project, which should encourage actually doing it. Then I have to decide whether or not I want to try taking it back to Alabama. I think that’s going to depend on what direction the work goes in this time. Given the idea I came up with - assuming that one can spin the paper I want to spin - it might just not be a book arts project anymore.

I scraped in just under the wire and finished a charming skein of bamboo on Wednesday night at knitting. The only problem, since I had to leave the store, is that I’ve got something like half of a bobbin of singles left. Oh, the tragedy. I’m pleased with the yarn, although I’d really like to get the next bit of bamboo spun to a lace weight.

What I really want to know is why this writing thing is making me so much more productive about all the other projects. It’s probably exactly the same principle as having a paper to write causing your house to be clean. I know that’s not just me.

I know, two posts in one day, what’s wrong? Nothing, except that it’s too hot in my house to do much of anything.

The purple yarn I posted for sale is now spoken for, so I’m putting up the next one.

This is two skeins of merino/tencel, in teal. Something I didn’t realize before - when this fiber is gone, there’s no more. Apparently the supplier has stopped making it. It’s basically sport to worsted weight, and about 208 yards total. For now, it’s available at $18. I would guess that it’s less than two ounces, and I reskeined it so it’s a little neater.

Ah-hah. I’ve finally got an Etsy shop, under the username forgetgutenberg. It’s a little sparse, but … well. One ought to start out small, and I’m fond of my printed stuff. So. It’s something, anyway.

Also, I’ve got two fabulous new additions to my spinning wheel. The more exciting one is the second bobbin, which works beautifully and is all shiny and full of purple singles because of course I had to test it. Soon, I will have three, and then the yarn production is guaranteed to get out of hand. The other thing I got was LRF technology - little rubber feet. They appear to be helping with the tendency the legs have to slide around on the floor. Who knew? Not having to put the treadle back in every five minutes, that’s priceless.

Now, back to spinning. Pictures when I’m tired of that. 

Once upon a time, about five years ago, I decided to try the NaNoWriMo experience. It was interesting, to say the least, and I produced 50k of words with no plot but a little bit of decent worldbuilding. I read that … document again a few months ago, and thought I might want to do something with it. I intended, I think, to write a short story or two and be done with it.

It can’t be that simple, though. Of course. It developed a plot, and maybe a little bit of character, and suddenly I’ve written this tremendous amount of stuff. The thing is, it’s still awful in a lot of ways, but it’s satisfying to make the attempt. It’s also well on its way to being the length of a novel, which is an accomplishment all on its own. Writing fiction is a huge challenge, although it’s actually probably more accurate to say that getting a whole piece of fiction is the challenge. It’s something about plot consistency, or maybe it’s just that it’s so much easier to get off the nice simple linear path if I’m writing something that isn’t based on a narrow field of research. Of course, I’m going to finish it and either hate it or be too freaked out to do anything with the darn thing. I don’t know how anybody gets the cursed confidence to sell words.

On the other hand, writing frees up a lot of other creative energy, so I’ve been working on other projects. I’m even scheduling some time to finish that … thing that isn’t a thesis (unless I decide that I do want to re-contact my old department and see if I can work something out) anymore. I might fail miserably to finish it, but I’m working to solid goals - and oddly enough, giving myself deadlines is sort of working. This is a new feature. Mostly I’m terrible with deadlines, but time is kind of at a premium around here for some reason, and as long as I’m keeping my goals reasonable and focusing on specific milestones in one project at a time, it’s working. Saying that is probably going to make it suddenly less effective, but I’m going to risk it anyway.

Either way, though, it’s been a successful couple of months. Writing is another one of those things one has to do often and in large quantities to appreciate properly. I suppose that’s why all the advice about blogs includes several repetitions of “post often.” I should probably pay more attention to that. Sorry. I appear to be putting most of my words in this other document.

When the current piece is done,  I’ve got another one to do, because certain elements of the plot suggest the thesis for a piece of research-intensive writing. That should be fascinating, at least to me, especially since it requires a solid basis in sixteenth century English law, modern law, principles of aesthetics, two major technological breakthroughs, the idea of a singularity, and visual culture. That’s not a whole lot, right? I can totally manage it.

Now, if I can maintain this level of optimism, I think I can do anything. 

Check out the previous post. It’s really nice yarn. 

Anyway. I missed the start of this book-relate bandwagon, but there’s this series called Percy Jackson and the Olympians. The most recent one is apparently selling quite well, and it’s the fourth book in a series which I hear is improving with each book. The people who told me this are professional book-hawkers with good taste, so I picked up a copy of The Lightning Thief, which is the first one. (Man, I’ve changed - I read books in order and stuff. Never used to do that.) They were right. It was exactly right. Percy is twelve, about to get kicked out of yet another fancy boarding school, and has major problems. Aside from the fact that he’s dyslexic and ADHD, certain teachers are seriously out to get him. The first chapter’s title - “I accidentally vaporize my pre-algebra teacher” - says everything, I think. Percy is a half-blood, son of a greek god, and his pre-algebra teacher is one of the Kindly Ones. This isn’t even the good part - that starts when he gets to Camp Half-Blood, meets the children of Ares and Hermes and the others, finds out that his best friend is a satyr and gets sent on a quest with one of the daughters of Athena. It’s a fun read, with excellent mythological details, fantastic fights, and a smart-ass hero who has a whole lot of potential. I’m going to get the next one, soon. After I finish reading some more of my book backlog.

In the interest of having some money to pay for new bobbins, possibly start an etsy shop, and keep myself in fiber, I’m offering some handspun yarn for sale. Because this is a, how shall I say, introductory offer, I’m pricing it low. Very low. There are several skeins for sale, but I’m going to put them up one at a time.

 This is 230 yards of two-ply sport to light worsted weight purple merino/tencel blend, spun on Frankenwheel. I’m selling it for $20. Email me at forgetgutenberg at gmail dot com for other information.

Or designing.

 I forget that I like designing things, mostly because every time I make a sketch for something, it gets lost in my incredibly disorganized collection of notebooks. Also, it takes a very long time (particularly knitting) to test it to figure out if it actually works in the real world.

I must need a test-knitter.

Anyway, that’s what I’ve been up to. I’m knitting a shawl, because I happen to like knitting odd, deceptively complicated triangular (or, as in the case of that one thing, jellyfish-shaped) objects. The current one has some charm, and I’m not putting up pictures because if I manage to get the pattern written up, I’m going to submit it to Knitty or try to sell it.

It’s nifty, either way. The process of coming up with lace that does what I want it to is stretching my brain a little; not too much, because I’m still figuring things out - like, oh hey, in a couple more feet I’m going to have to figure out how to turn a corner with the edging. That should be interesting. Fortunately, I’ve got a book with pictures and a bunch of people who are actually good knitters who hang out on Wednesday nights. 

I keep saying I’m over-extending myself. Actually, that’s wrong. I’m not challenging myself enough, that’s all. That’s why I keep getting bored with projects that aren’t either tiny or really wacky.

I hate being bored. It’s not that I don’t want to do work, or whatever, it’s that I want to be challenged. All the time. I don’t want to spend any time at all being bored and dealing with routine. Routine is boring, and boredom is the devil’s pillow. Or something like that. That Soren, what a wacky guy. Pfft.

What should I teach?