Derby and String

Just to verify...

I am a Harry Potter nerd.  And possibly also very very evil.  (But not so evil that people hate me, for some reason.)

Your Score: SLYTHERIN!

You scored 44% Slytherin, 12% Ravenclaw, 44% Gryffindor, and 16% Hufflepuff!

Or perhaps in Slytherin
You'll make your real friends,
These cunning folk use any means
To achieve their ends.

Slytherins are known for their ambition, guile, and Machiavellian sensiblities.

Link: The Sorting Hat Test written by leeannslytherin on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test

ETA: Oh, and apparently, thanks to this post, I am result #27 for "REI Tent Parts."  I could tell them where they would LIKE to put the tent parts after an hour of sitting and watching Mr. Man struggle with the tent while telling me he doesn't need my help "passively assisting" with the "erection" (sorry, I honestly could NOT come up with a better word!) of an REI tent!

Workin' 9 - 5

Well, more like 2am to 4am and then 7am to 4pm.

I've got 2 jobs now people, thanks to my inability to learn about credit cards and the fact that they are not "free money".  And my ability to spend money like it is water.

SO!  As of today, I am on a diet of all sorts.  A food diet (got at LEAST 40 pounds I can afford to shed), a money diet (got me some debts, people!) and a *GASP* yarn diet (which is directly tied to the money diet part.)

AND! I am quitting smoking.  It's expensive, and gross.

SO!  If I disappear for a few days, don't call the police.  I'm probably sleeping.  Or scrabbling desperately through Mr. Man's Suburban for his "emergency cigarettes".

I will keep you posted.  And yes, I have been playing Ansel Adams with my UFOs.  There will have to be several posts.  I'm ashamed of the number, but I've got UFOs I can't even identify.  It's bad.

ETA:  Just to give you a taste, off the top of my head the UFOs I can think of:

• one pair of Fetching gloves, plus the yarn to make one more pair (were for me.  Probably headed to the "Omigod, I can't believe I finished a Christmas gift in July" box.  There are 2 FOs in there right now.  I am awesome.)
• one more mitered square for the Bloggy Blanket.  (I still only have 30 something done.  I want an 80 square blanket.  This is taking a long time, and I have deeply pondered why I cannot force the children to knit these for me.)
• 2 multi-directional scarves, one in Noro Kureyon (i think?  It was originally meant for MHP's teacher, but I found out she's allergic to wool.) and one in my very own hand-dyed wool(which MHP did the colour direction for and named "SuperHero" because it's the colour of Superman! And Spiderman!  And The Incredible Hulk! )
• 1 lacy scarfy thing the cats half ate, and I put in timeout
• The Peacock Shawl.  Lost, right now. But it's somewhere, I know that.
• One pair of Coupling socks from Knitty (too lazy to find the link, but it's the Summer 2007 issue) that I stole the needles from to make...
• One pair of socks on 2 circs for my dad in some weird yarn I don't remember buying.  (My father is so excited I am making him socks, I think he's told everyone.  No joke, the checker at the grocery store (incidentally, where I had my first "real job" and everyone still knows my family) told me he had heard about the socks.  At the grocery store. Excited.)
• 8 various pairs of socks in various stages of being finished.  I think ONE of them has a finished mate and just needs a toe...or maybe a heel and a foot?  Or a heel and a leg?  I'm not 100% sure.
• One pink thrummed mitten from a Fleece artist kit without a thumb
• One half of one spider sock.  I've lost the other ball of yarn for this, and am very depressed about it.
• The Rogue Sweater.  Needs sleeves, and to fix the hood.  It is currently resting somewhere in the State of Denial, AKA the closet.
• One piece of cream-coloured knitting with a pink bunny on the front.  I think I was making a purse, but I'm so shocked that I would try intarsia and that it would look decent AT ALL, I am not positive what it was intended for.
• Fair Isle mittens.  I love these things, and I've finished a cuff all by myself with the help of seventy-leven knitting books to help with the Fair Isle-ness of it all, but for some reason I cannot move into the pattern part.  Plus?  The colours Knitpicks showed on the website are NOWHERE NEAR the colours that they provide for this kit. 

I can't think of anything else right now, but there shouldn't be but a few more.  I can't imagine there will be more.

Which, of course, means I've got an entire trunk full of them.  Which reminds me, I haven't checked the car trunk....

Interesting Factoid of the Day

I'm bored at work again....

Didja know (as I alluded to in this post) that somebody in my family has the maiden name of Roswell?  And someone else has that middle name so he could carry on the family name and possibly his great-grandfather's dream of playing NFL football?

Didja know that, during a 6 month period when MHP was 2-ish, he had not one, not two, but 5 trips to the emergency room?  I may be a total scatterbrain and a little nutty, but when it comes right down to it and someone needs to go to the hospital (other than me, remind me to tell you of my trip to the hospital a month ago) I am your girl.

I am calm, cool, collected, and possess enough medical terminology (thank you, 2 semesters of Pre-Med in college and one full year of Sports Medicine classes in high school) to know exactly what the doctors are saying without needing to ask them to "say that in English?". 

Blood everywhere, and I am perfectly level-headed and downright businesslike. 

Even if it's my babies.

Just wanted to mention one of my strengths - I'm feeling a bit useless at work.

Rubber Baby Buggy Bumpers

I don't think I want any more babies.

Mr. Man and I have been discussing the merits of Marriage and Babies and The Future and things of that sort, and I've been on the fence about the issue of Adding More Children To Our Already Too Small House.

Last night when I got home, the baby from across the culdesac (who turns 2 tomorrow, not such a baby anymore) was standing on my front porch.  Her mother was standing in the street watching her, so she was not completely unsupervised.

A little background on Baby Hey (the only word I thought she knew for the longest time): she hates me.  She hates me with a passion unbridled, burning with the heat of a thousand suns.  Why?  Because I moved into the house and took Mr. Man from her.

She was convinced that he belonged to her, and was there for the sole purpose of her amusement.  Now he's around for my amusement :)

So imagine my utter shock and amazement when she sees me, smiles and comes over, does the "hands in the air like those Evangelical-type Christians when they sing" thing that babies do and says: "Hi Gibby!  Up?"

So up she goes, and she starts in on her entire vocabulary, most of which translates into Grownup English fine, but most of her Baby English I am sorely out of practice translating.  (It has been 5 years.  MHP uses words like "salutations" and "psychotropic".  No, I'm not kidding.)  So we chatted about the airplanes and my "geen ca" (the Spatturn is green) and her brother, and MHP and the bicycles and pretty much anything in the whole culdesac until it was time for me to go inside and make dinner for the current inhabitants of Casa Derby.

She takes one look at her momma, who has come to fetch her for dinner, and clings to my neck and starts sobbing.  "No momma!  Gibbyan{insert Mr. Man's name here}! I go dere!"

Ah.  I remember this vividly....the "Anyone Else But Momma!" phase.  Yeah, I think I can hold off on having any more kids any time soon :)

I'll just borrow Baby Hey.

Oh, and we were watching "the good parts" of Top Gun with MHP last night (he's 7.  He can handle the cussing, we skipped over the sex parts and the volleyball scene. And we only ended up watching about 10 minutes of it anyway) and he was quiet for a little bit with his head cocked to one side....and then....the questions (from him, not Mr. Man)

"Do you think that's an f-16 Fighter Jet or an f-18?"

"What kind of aircraft carrier do you think that is?  Is it the same model as the USS Abraham Lincoln?"

"So when the jet lands, because it doesn't have enough room on the ship deck to truly {no joke, he talks like this, ask Christina} slow down on its own, it uses that string and hook as a brake mechanism?"

"So the catapult thing launches the jet because it can't speed up enough not to crash into the ocean?"

Ah, my son.  He keeps me young, and yet makes me feel a wee bit old all at the same time.

And hell yes! I am TOTALLY Rita Hayworth! In fact, Mr. Man's great uncle told me that the first time he met me. (although...I think he might be partially blind in one eye.)

You scored as Rita Hayworth, You're the one who has the most fun. People are attracted to you because you don't pretend to be anything but what you are. You know you are attractive and like to play on that - which makes you even sexier. However, when it calls for you to be serious, like Rita, you need to know that only hard work will get success. Rita Hayworth 90% Mae West 80% Audrey Hepburn 75% Judy Garland 70% Marilyn Monroe 65% Vivien Leigh 65% Which Classic Screen Goddess are you? (pics) created with QuizFarm.com

Um....what?

Hi, Geek Queen here - head of all things statistical for the Jet City Rollergirls.

Why am I surprised about this?  (And yes, I am stalling until I get all the UFOs in my house photographed.  And UFO is not aliens, for those of you who do not knit.  I do not live in Roswell....although....ask me about my middle name. :)

Of course I am.

Who else would I be?

My 2 favorite "pick me up" movies?  The Lara Croft series and POTC.  (although I STILL have not seen the third one.  Shame, shame on me.)

You scored as Captain Jack Sparrow, Roguish,quick-witted, and incredibly lucky, Jack Sparrow is a pirate who sometimes ends up being a hero, against his better judgement. Captain Jack looks out for #1, but he can be counted on (usually) to do the right thing. He has an incredibly persuasive tongue, a mind that borders on genius or insanity, and an incredible talent for getting into trouble and getting out of it. Maybe its brains, maybe its genius, or maybe its just plain luck. Or maybe a mixture of all three. Lara Croft 83% Captain Jack Sparrow 83% Indiana Jones 79% El Zorro 79% James Bond, Agent 007 75% Batman, the Dark Knight 75% William Wallace 67% Neo, the "One" 63% The Amazing Spider-Man 63% Maximus 58% The Terminator 50% Which Action Hero Would You Be? v. 2.0 created with QuizFarm.com

Oh, and? No wonder M3 hates me. Maybe I'M the devil, and SHE's the good one? Nah.

You Are 68% Evil

You are very evil. And you're too evil to care. Those who love you probably also fear you. A lot.

How Evil Are You?

Camping Out for (fill in the blank) Tickets

Has anyone ever camped out for tickets to a show before?  I did a couple of times (A band which will not be named, but was horribly popular with the screaming "tween" set in 1992, Pearl Jam, Dave Matthews and Presidents of the United States of America.  The band, not the old white dudes. OH!  And Apple Cup student tickets in 1997, the first year WSU went to the Rose Bowl in like 493 years!  Not 493.  More like 67.), but unfortunately, as is the case with a lot of my "childhood memories", the advent of the internets has made camping out for tickets a moot point. 

Now you can sleep at your desk and click a webpage a whole mess of times, instead of making friends with the other crazies who slept out in the cold, sharing your REALLY hot rum-laced cocoa with them, and possibly huddling together for body warmth, since the day you decided to sleep overnight outside of a stadium also happens to be the first day of the year it decides to snow.  A lot.  And you forgot your hat.

*ahem*  Where was I?

Oh, camping.  Jessie sparked today's blog post with her hilarious posting about her annual camping trip.

So, I mentioned briefly that I had gone "camping" with Mr. Man, MHP, T&G and Mr. Man's mother (for whom I really need to invent a VERY appropriate blog name.  Like Damian.  Or Satan.)  over Memorial Day Weekend.

What I did not tell you is the reason I call it "camping" and not camping (sans "air quotes").

Once upon a time, when I was but a wee ankle-biter, I used to go camping.  The kind of camping where you take a tent and a backpack and find some spot in the woods that's flat enough, and you have to hang your trash and your food up high so the raccoons and bears and other sundry animals do not cause you to end your camping trip early, for fear of starvation. 

The kind of camping where you spend the first 2 hours after arrival playing my favorite game: "How Many People Does It Take To Set Up An REI Tent?"  Where the outcome is not dependent on whether one has a Masters in Engineering! or someone else has a Doctorate in Mathematics! but whether or not it's raining and we "have to get the stuff in the tent RIGHT NOW or we'll be mildewed by midnight".  And then the kids take over after the adults have given up and get the tent up in about 8 minutes, and it takes that long only because Too-Tall was playing Star Wars with one of the tent poles.

The kind of camping where the bathroom is about a half-mile hike from the campsite, so you don't really worry about the shower thing until you can smell yourself, or the person you're bunking with decides to sleep outside because he thinks a skunk got in the tent.  And you pretty much postpone it as long as possible, because there's no hot water.  At all.

The kind of camping where there's no television, no video games, no computers, and your primary form of entertainment is hiking, swimming in the ice-cold lake, hiding various belongings of your mother's and waiting until she's running around frantic to replace it exactly where she put it, or playing another game of Nerts.   (I'll tell you another time about why I'm not allowed to play Nerts with my family anymore, and haven't since I was 14.)

One can only imagine my horrified expression when we arrived at the "campsite" for Memorial Day.  This place has 4 pools, a rec center, miniature golf, 94 bathrooms, and hot showers.  Mr. Man's Mom brought her trailer, then her aunt sister cousin (I dunno, the family tree is so huge I can't keep them all straight) brought her trailer as well, and they had back-to-back campsites, so the kids could basically run all over kingdom come.

Unfortunately, there was not enough room for everyone to sleep in the trailer.  The kids took the couch and the "table bed", and Mr. Man's Mom (M3?  Yeah. That works.) was sleeping in the bed, so Mr. Man and I slept outside.  Woot! 

But he wouldn't let me help putting the tent up.  And he hasn't used a tent in a loooong time, since B.M. (before me, and yes, I know what else BM stands for...) he slept in the trailer with the kids and M3.  So yet another version of my favorite game "How Many People Does It Take To Set Up An REI Tent?" commenced, this time with a new title!  "How Long Does It Take One Grownup To Set Up A Tent Before He Asks For Help? And How Many New Cusswords Do The Kids Learn?"

So eventually, I jumped in (despite Mr. Man's feeble protests) and between the 2 of us, it only took 15 minutes to set up the tent.  In an odd moment of foreshadowing, Mr. Man says "I wonder if this tent is waterproof?  Well, it isn't supposed to rain this weekend, the rainfly should help anyway."

And, of course, the next night, after I returned from fleeing to Seattle for a roller derby bout my much needed vacation from my "vacation", and after we settled onto our foam mattresses, listening to the sweet sounds of the people in the campsite 9 1/2" from our tent next door blowing up their air mattress and watching "Pimp My Ride", it started to sprinkle. 

(For those of you not native to the lovely Pacific Northwest, we classify our rain.  It's not really that big of a worry until you have a downpour.  By then, you're pretty much f*cked.)

We weren't that concerned, so we drifted off to sleep.

The next morning, I awoke in a bit of a panic.  I thought I had wet the bed.

Turns out, it rained about 1 1/2" overnight.  All of which ended up in our tent.  Where our clothes for the weekend were stored, since there was "no room" in the trailer.  We were not amused.

So the whole rest of the weekend Mr. Man and I wore wet underwear, and M3 told me at one point that she didn't want another daughter-in-law because she already had one (meaning Mr. Man's ex-wife, who M3 talks to all the time, even though The Ex pretty much ripped out Mr. Man's heart and blew it up with a rocket launcher) and I did not lose it because I was more focused on the fact that I had not eaten anything of substance in 2 days, because M3 made only beef dishes for "camping."

And I can't eat beef.

So!  All in all, it was pretty much the worst EVER most interesting weekend I've had in a long time, and I am not really looking forward to the next one, but at least I have learned the following:

1. The back of our Suburban sleeps 2 full-sized adults, and does not require putting up a tent.
2. Foam mattresses are pretty much people-sized sponges. 
3. I need to bring my own food and earplugs when camping with M3.  For my sanity and her safety.
4. Burn the Little Mermaid DVDs that M3 has in her trailer.  Enough with the Disney Rip-Offs. (I love the Disney version.  But this version?  Not so much fun.)
5. If M3 wants to make fun of you in your bathing suit, point out her judicious use of the fanny pack and the Crocs with Socks.  At least my suit has skulls on it.
6. Bring marshmallows and hoard them.  When M3 says something rude, shove one in your mouth.  Don't eat it, you'll gain 174 pounds in one weekend.  Just keep your mouth SHUT.
7. Kiss Mr. Man more often.  It's a miracle he loves me as much as he does, when his mother seems to hate me so much.

Anyhoo - no knitting to speak of lately, but I am cooking along on the boring Sock on 2 Circs.  I'm almost to the toe....I'll post some pictures when I find my memory card reader....

And just for fun, I "borrowed" this from Jeanne at Knitty Banter, because I feel this post is a little bitchy.  So some knitting stuff!!

Mark the items Bold for stuff you’ve done, italics for stuff you plan to do one day, and normal for stuff you’re not planning on doing.

1. Afghan/Blanket (knit a teeny one for Baby Too-Tall, does that count?
2. American/English knitting (as opposed to continental)
3. Baby Items
4. Bobbles (was not succesful. I hated them. Mini-boobs, what's the point???  And yes, I may hold a grudge against bobbles.)
5. Buttonholes
6. Cable stitch patterns (including Arans)
7. Cardigans (I failed miserably on the Maid Marian dress, so Tater has requested a cardigan with purple buttons.  Yay!)
8. Charity Knitting
9. Continental Knitting (I don't know which method I do, if I do one at all.  I pick, if that makes any difference.)
10. Cuffs, fingerless mitts or arm warmers
11. Darning (does this mean swearing while knitting?  Because this is totally a BOLD if it does. And yes, I have darned socks. I'm not a total doofus.)
12. Designing knitted garments (doesn't include minor/major modifications) I am working on some super-secret stuff.  SHHHH! Don't tell.
13. Domino Knitting (modular knitting)
14. Drop Stitch Patterns (Hello Clapotis!  I love you and your blues and purples!  I need to post a picture, I just realized.)
15. Dyeing with plant colours (this scares me.  I will leave it plain. The mordants are poisonous?  Hi, have you met me?  I am accident-prone and would like to not die while dyeing.  HA!)
16. Dyeing yarn
17. Entrelac
18. Fair Isle knitting (got me some purdy mittens in the works!  My Fair Isle skills suck!)
19. Freeform knitting (I have no idea what this means.  I don't like the sound of it, though.)
20. Fulling/felting (Hi!  This reminds me, I have also not posted pictures of my Yorick I knit for like 4 Halloweens ago! I need Ravelry.)
21. Garter Stitch
22. Gloves  (they sucked, but I knit them.)
23. Graffiti Knitting (knitting items on, or to be left on the street)
24. Hair accessories
25. Hat
26. Holiday-related knitting
27. Household items (dishcloths, washcloths, tea cozies)
28. I-cord
29. Intarsia
30. Jewelry
31. Kitchener BO (I love this!  Yay for sock toes!)
32. Knitting a gift (seems this is all I do lately....)
33. Knitting a pattern from an online knitting magazine (hello Knitty!  I love you!)
34. Knitting and purling backwards (um...what?  What does this mean?  Am I knitting-retarded because I don't know how to do this?)
35. Knitting art
36. Knitting for a living
37. Knitting for pets
38. Knitting for preemies
39. Knitting in public
40. Knitting items for a wedding
41. Knitting on a loom (no desire.  Not a stitch.  HA!  I am funny today!)
42. Knitting smocking (again, WTF?  Smocking?)
43. Knitting socks (or other small tubular items) on two circular needles (and I still like it! Woot!)
44. Knitting to make money
45. Knitting with alpaca (hello alpacas!  I love you!)
46. Knitting with bamboo
47. Knitting with banana fiber yarn
48. Knitting with beads
49. Knitting with camel yarn
50. Knitting with cashmere (I did both on this because I've knit with cashmere BLENDS but never straight cashmere.)
51. Knitting with circular needles
52. Knitting with cotton
53. Knitting with cat/dog hair (doesn't this actually come with knitting NEAR cats and dogs? :)
54. Knitting with DPNs
55. Knitting with linen
56. Knitting with metal wire
57. Knitting with recycled/secondhand yarn
58. Knitting with self-patterning/-striping/variegated yarn
59. Knitting with silk  (I got some GORGEOUS Fleece Artist rovings a few weeks ago that are merino/silk blends.   Hopefully I can get those spun up as soon as I slay the green dragon, which I need to post about. Damn!  Y'all are missing out on a lot!)
60. Knitting with someone else's handspun (I can't even bring myself to knit with my OWN handspun.  I just like to pet it and show everyone that comes in my house.)
61. Knitting with soy yarn
62. Knitting with synthetic yarn (I was not such the fiber snob I am now when I was a wee knitter, 4 years ago.  Now I can't bring my very first project out of its shroud for the sheer embarassment of it all.)
63. Knitting with wool
64. Knitting with your own handspun yarn (One of these days, Alice....)
65. Lace patterns
66. Long Tail CO
67. Machine knitting (I saw Christina's knitting machine.  I have enough trouble with 4/5 DPNs.  Can't imagine what damage I could do with that thing. :)
68. Mittens Cuff-Up (right now, I've got some killer Fair Isle's on the needles.  They're in Time Out though.  I should make an actual Time Out box for my knitting.)
69. Mittens Tip-Down (not sure if I ever want to try these, but I'm not shutting the door on them.  I'll probably do it sooner or later.)
70. Moebius band knitting (remember the long-strapped purse a couple of months ago? No?  That's probably because I neglected to post pictures.  Woot!  But I've done it.  I'll see if I can wrestle the purse away from my mom.)
71. Norwegian Knitting (what is this exactly?  Vegas Shannon is bringing me some yarn from Norway, does that count?)
72. Olympic Knitting (I've done it, but haven't finished it.  Which reminds me, I haven't touched it since the Olympics ended.  Is that bad?)
73. Participating in a KAL (again, done it, haven't finished.  I'm bad at this.)
74. Pillows (no desire.  which means next week, I will have knit 3 or 4.)
75. Publishing a knitting book (a desire, at best.  It would be cool, though.)
76. Purses/bags (see #70)
77. Rug
78. Scarf
79. Shawl
80. Short Rows
81. Shrug/bolero/poncho (does anyone else want to sing "Volare" when they hear the word bolero?  Just me?)
82. Slip-stitch patterns
83. Slippers (Still trying to figure out my gramma's pattern from the slippers I've had since I was 12.  No dice.)
84. Socks toe-up
85. Socks top-down
86. Steeks (incidentally, the mere WORD "steeks" makes me want to throw up for some reason.)
87. Stockinette stitch
88. Stuffed toys (The kids all want stuffed penguins after finding this pattern in a stack, and watching Happy Feet for the 45th time.)
89. Swatching (and no, I'm not happy about it.  For some reason, I'm very anti-swatch.)
90. Sweater (It's half and half because I still have half of a Rogue sitting in a bag in the closet.  The sleeves are where I've come to a standstill.)
91. Teaching a child to knit (I tried to teach Tater.  She got the basics, and then ran away to play with the boys.  *sigh*)
92. Teaching a woman to knit (I will teach my mother to knit if I have to move her hands for her.  She is being stubbourn.)
93. Teaching a male how to knit (I've pretty much given up all hope of Mr. Man, Gav or MHP ever having any interest in knitting, other than wearing what I knit. It's okay though, someone has to catch the frogs in this house.)
94. Textured knitting
95. Thrummed knitting (another haflway FO that I have not shown you...I have a thrummed mitten that's all done and GORGEOUS for Vegas Shannon....)
96. Toy/Doll clothing (the Barbies in our house only do couture.  There is no need for sweaters or anything of the sort, apparently.  I've asked.)
97. Tubular CO (like totally to the max!  Surf's Up!  I have no idea, again, what this is.  But it sounds like fun.)
98. Twisted stitch patterns
99. Two end knitting, Tvåändsstickning.  (Um....what?  Doesn't all knitting have 2 ends? And WTF is that word??)
100. Writing a pattern (I've sort of got one in the works.  Don't hold your breath, though....it's a crazy idea.)

C'est tout fini.  Maybe tomorrow I'll do "7 random things you didn't know about me" while I stall and photograph all the FOs in my house I've never shown you.  And there's a lot.

OMG, TGIF WTF LMAO ROTLFLASDFH!

I have been texting on my Blackberry entirely too much.  Everything is OMG!  or LMAO!  I almost used one of those in a F2F conversation yesterday.  I need to PUT THE PHONE DOWN.  (Doesn't help that I have MSN Messenger on there too...and a free Blackberry Messenger, which I can text Mr. Man with FO' FREE!)

Anyhoo.....nothing super exciting today....I hurt my shoulder somehow last week (I have a lot of injuries like that) and it's been rough to lift my arm.  Which means I cannot skate.  (Don't ask.  There's a train of reasoning there I seem to have jumped off of.)

I can post my camera phone pictures directly to the blog now....so check 'em out.  I have a very odd picture of Kumar  (one of my two bathroom-bound-until-they-get-their-cojones-chopped cats) and a very cute picture of MHP at Little League.   Keep an eye on that album....I tend to drunk dial. :)

Have a great weekend everyone!

Watch out.

I've just now figured out that I can not only blog, but I can post pictures from my cell phone.  Y'all are in trouble now.  (No, I have not shaved my head, that is me with no makeup and a kerchief holding my uncontrollable bangs back.  And that is my lovely cube.  :)

The Art of Snark, or the LYS You Wouldn't Bother With

In light of Stephanie's post about "what you say on your blog about someone should be able to be said to their face" and Cara's post about an LYS in San Francisco she did not particularly care for, it got me thinking:

What do you like about your favorite LYS?  (Local Yarn Store, for those of you who do not speak fluent knit-blog-ese.)  Why do you keep going there; is it the atmosphere or the people?  The selection?  The location?  Your Aunt Mabel owns it?

Personally, I go to Village Yarn and Tea a lot.  More than any other yarn store in my area, except maybe the one 3 blocks from my work.  It's a little out of the way for me (about a 20-30 minute drive, if traffic is good and I don't stop for coffee) but I go there because it feels like hanging out at my friend's house.  The ladies in the shop always are polite and helpful and they always look glad to see me; they let MHP draw on their white board (he will march right over to the board in the class "nook", like he has been for a long time, even if there's a class going. And they let him.) and he knows right where the bathroom is, and he knows not to pull all of the yarn down off the shelves (he's not a destructive child), but he can pet it.   And he does.

And I have been known to hang out there all day.  Because I like it.  And MHP likes it.  And because there is yarn involved.

My geographical LYS (the one located closest to my house) is not my style.  It is 5 minutes away, but I choose to make the drive to VY&T because I base half of my yarn-shopping habit on my experience.   

(DISCLAIMER: I'm not linking to or naming this particular store or even hinting at its location, because I am a chicken and I wouldn't say any of this to their face, but I have commented in this manner in email to them.  Several times.  Got no responses.) 

It's a little cold and clinical in this particular store, everything is precisely ordered (although in what order, I honestly cannot tell...), and it seems very....um...impersonal.  The several times I have been there (I always give a second and third and sometimes fourth chance to most yarn stores) there has only been one person working.  And even though I am the only customer, they ignore me.

Until MHP touches something.

Then whomever is working there apparates (hi! Harry Potter geek here, thanks! Butterbeer, anyone?) right in front of us.  The last time we were there, the employee sighed in a very "Hi, my name is Marie Antoinette, please let them eat cake, and why on earth do people procreate such nasty little monsters?" sort of way and snatched some yarn from my son's hands and wiped the invisible specks of child filth from the skein and set it on the shelf like it was spun by Rumplestiltskin.

Then, (and this is my favorite part), she says:

"You should keep a closer eye on your child.  He almost destroyed that skein of yarn."

Okay. First?  MHP rarely leaves my side in a new place.  He's a boisterous young man, but he knows his limits, and he knows the MomWrath (tm).  He would like to avoid the Mom Voice of Doom and the Look of Death, so he stays within arm reach.  (T&G, Mr. Man's kids, have not yet learned of the MomWrath.  MHP keeps warning them.)

Second, he had taken a skein of sock yarn off the shelf, was gently petting it like a rabbit, and was asking me if that was where socks came from.

Third?  We had been in there for 20 minutes with not even a "Let me know if I can help you" or other acknowledgement of our existence.  (A time period which I was able to cram about 20 skeins of much needed yarn into a small shopping basket, which I had to hunt down myself.)

I smiled at her, did not bother to explain our reasoning for our very being there, said "Hmm.  I'm sorry to inconvenience you," picked up MHP and set down the basket in the middle of the floor and walked out.

When I got everyone situated in the car, I looked back into the store, and the lady was right back behind the counter, doing whatever she had been doing before.  Like I had never been there.

So I don't worry about that store, and save my money for other places.  Like ArtFibers.  (I do believe I entirely forgot to tell you I found that store on my first 18 hour passport-fetching trip to San Francisco.  And I did buy yarn there, and I will dig it out of the hiding place I have for it, and take pictures so you can bask in it's awesome-ness.  And if you've got a spare moment, I need help finding an appropriate pattern for it.)

ETA: I don't doubt that plenty of people enjoy the yarn store down the way from my house.  I see people go in there all of the time.  It's just not for me.  Or MHP. 

And just so's you know, I don't like giving negative feedback to small business owners (I have no problems bitching at the Gap or Starbucks, for some reason).  But they do deserve to know what's going on when they are not in their shop.  (Or if the negative comment is towards the owner, maybe they should be more customer servicely, instead of acting like I've invaded their personal yarn stash storage unit and I am touching THEIR YARN. :)