Her Reputation Precedes Me

Now then, where were we?

About three weeks ago, I started noticing occasional visits to The Panopticon via Ravelry. If you knit, and you're reading this, you probably know about Ravelry. If you don't, here's a quick briefing:

1. These two nice people decided it would cool, and perhaps profitable, to launch a Web space for knitters that would allow them to create profiles (like MySpace), catalog their stuff (like Librarything), and interact with other people (like the Knitty boards, et al.).
   
   
2. The two nice people wanted a couple hundred beta testers to play with the shiny new (if still incomplete) toy so that they could make it run properly before asking the general knitting public to step inside.
   
   
3. Knitters beat a path to their homepage so quickly, and in such numbers, that it tore a gash in the fabric of the universe and temporarily reversed the flow of the Mississippi, the Ganges, the Nile, and the Rio de la Plata.
   

At present, "Where are you on the Ravelry waiting list?" is a question as much on the lips of the knitting community as "Did you finish yet?" was among Harry Potter fans last week.

Those who have been let past the velvet ropes are known to be enjoying themselves heartily on the dance floor. Occasional squeals and giggles heard through the door suggest a level of orgiastic delight akin to the parties thrown in Rome just before it fell. Those of us still waiting on the sidewalk are doing our best to be patient. Fortunately, we brought our knitting.

The proprietors are wisely employing a strict policy of only inviting new users according to their places on the waiting list. As one commenter over on Stephanie's blog said, "If they made you wait, we know there are no exceptions."

As of today, I'm 11,565 [edited. oops. originally published with wrong number] on the list. In front of me are 4,107 people. Behind me are 10, 198 people. Ten thousand one hundred ninety eight. The number keeps rising; even as those ahead of me have been allowed in, the total percentage of admitted applicants has held steady at about 33%.

I will admit I've been damned curious about what's happening in there, particularly since it's started sending folks over here. I'm reminded of an episode in middle school when one of the boys discovered one could hear conversations in the girls' toilets via a transom window facing the playground. He took to hanging about under the window, trying to find out if they were talking about him. (They were. They were saying, "Why is that little dickhead always trying to listen to us while we pee?")

Here's one thing I do know, and it makes me nervous as hell: Dolores is already in there. Naturally. She's already got her own fan club, the Dolores Devotees, complete with their own badge and banner.



Madam is over the moon. I can't get her away from the computer, and every time I come into the room she closes the browser and pretends to be deeply engrossed in a spreadsheet.

Should I be nervous?