Twists of Fate

It hasn’t even started but I’m already blue. Sad about missing something I probably will never attend. Seriously, that many people at a baseball game? OK. At a fair? Not so much with the love.

Sometimes it’s hard to watch what seems to be all of blogland squeeing about going and meeting up with friends scattered hither and yon. Know what I mean? So everytime I hear Rhinebeck I think of the color blue, even if it happens in the gorgeousness of upstate NY.

Today is a very “meh” kind of day. :P

I missed the Harlot’s most recent visit to the wet green Northwest here thanks to the Sox/Angels series.

Tonight I’ll miss Mason-Dixon’s signing at University Bookstore thanks to the suckage that is game four of the Sox/Rays series.

Note to authors – can we time your tours to avoid the baseball post season please? Just kidding! Mostly.

I like going to the signings, mostly because I can be among My People but there’s so many that I don’t stand out much. I see a few folks I know, get a nice new book with some signatures, and go home to drool over the pages and plot what to make.

Unfortunately, given that the Sox are desperately fucking up trying to come back from a 2-1 series total here in the ACLS, my mojo is needed to cheer on my adopted team. I even have the hat on! Foo.

Ah well. I’ll be with them in spirit tonight, as I work on a sock while watching the Sox.

OK, not really a condo so much as a studio apartment.

I have this sweet abandoned kitty who has made me her human for now. I can’t bring her inside due to some severe cat allergies (I like being able to breathe, thanks), and I’ve been worried about the dropping temps.

Enter feral mew shelters, made from plastic totes and some simple materials.

The 35 gallon totes wouldn’t fit in my car, so I had to make due with just the 18 gallon ones for now. I did cut the 1″ insulation to the inside of the tote, but am now wondering if maybe doing it on the outside would be better for the short term. I did manage to find some “mini bales” of straw at a feed supply store in Woodinville, which was a relief.

So far, attempts to show Ms. Mittens her prospective new home haven’t gone well. She made like *starfish!kitty* when I tried to put her in the top just to show her what the idea was, and she hasn’t yet managed to find the Pounces I laid on top of the straw. But I hope she’ll smell the residual scent from me putting it together and will go in when the temps drop tonight.

She’s curled in the ivy under the porch right now, where she’s taken to watching the insect world go by during the day. I really hope she’ll take to her new home tonight or in the nights to come.

If you have some stray kitties and/or know of a feral colony nearby, please think about providing a shelter for them during the long cold winter. This was a really cheap way to make a snug and safe spot for her to curl up in. There are also some really awesome pre-made ones to be found by googling “feral cat shelter” and checking out the results.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled baseball championship games. GO RED SOX!

Four course meal for the kitties!!! Sometimes, in all our charitable acts, sometimes I think we forget the needy with four paws. Or legs. Tails. Fins?

If you know of anyone who might be interested, please pass that along. I’m trying to find a no-kill shelter to take my sweet stray mew to, but they’re all functioning at about 400% capacity right now and there’s no resources available. For those in the Portland area, this is a great way to help a shelter in need!

I’ve been thinking about this a lot in recent months. The bruhaha over the alleged lack of cashmere in Debbie Bliss products, another suit against Noro, and the fact that the skyrocketing demand for cashmere fibers & clothing is having a HUGE, GIGANTIC impact on northern China and Mongolia’s environment brings me to a conclusion that I’m reluctant to state aloud. B?ut I think I kind of have to.

I think I can’t ethically buy cashmere anymore.

There may be one caveat to this, though, and that’s if it’s grown here in the states and/or sourced from areas that are perhaps more ethically responsible about how it’s obtained. And given that restriction, the price is likely to be out of my price range much of the time anyway. As I think about the fiber blends I’d like to do, cashmere is of course in the “zomg gimme” category, but I am not sure I can, in good conscience, be a part of a growing problem by participating in the supply/demand cycle for this particular fiber.

Never say never, and all that, and I do have some cashmere in my stash. I lost my head not too long ago in a late online doot through eBay, and found some cone ends that weren’t too expensive and I could overdye. But that may be the last purchase I’ll make for some time.

What do you think about cashmere, the current supply levels and production methods, and continued support of the industry?

I love me some Harry Potter. I really really do. But does it strike anyone else as completely bizarre that, in the newly released Half Blood Prince sock yarn series from Opal, there’s no SNAPE?!

I get that Snape isn’t everyone’s favorite character. I understand Ms. Rowling disliking him. I recognize that he’s nearly universally loathed by those who stick to the strict canon. I, personally, adore the man and all his horrible, possibly evil, scathing, awful, wretched, biting sarcastic ways. On those really really cranky days, I wanted to have a pair of Snape socks to wear, as an inspiration and a comfort that I probably am not as mean in real life as that man is in the books.

Foo on you Opal. >:/

My favorite Finnish kit source has a new web page and store! Go and check out her mitten kits, the yarn done with all natural dyes and totally and completely beautiful. I need to find the two kits I have, because I’d like to work on them this fall.

I’m on the fence about the Harlot’s new follow on idea. If only because I think approaching heads of state with sharp pointy needles in this day and age is probably not the best idea ever. The event that sparked the idea, however, was completely full of awesome. I won’t say that it cemented my vote, because I’m already there, but it did make me laugh out loud with glee.

I am wondering what Aaron Sorkin would make of the whole thing. I love me the days of The West Wing, and can just see Josh, Sam and CJ debating about it, with Donna tossing in a fabulous bon mot about how donations are linked to MSF and it’s a win-win all around, and Josh will never ever see a piece of hand knitted anything for the rest of his life thanks to his sneering and chauvinistic stance on the craft.