Excuse the Dust

Dolores is off to Kankakee and I have a bit of free time on my hands, so I'm engaging in some long-overdue renovations to The Panopticon's layout. During this period you may become disoriented or frustrated. You may find yourself unable to locate things that were right here just a moment ago. You may experience nausea, dizziness, or mild hallucinations.

Welcome to my world.

The Subject Was Movies

So listen, if you're interested in hearing me shoot off my mouth about a topic I don't normally dwell on in here, check out my interview over at the Film Experience blog. Far better than my responses, if you ask me, are Nathaniel's graphics to accompany them.

Such a clever man. It makes you wonder why he doesn't knit.

Coffee In, Coffee Out

If you're a long-time reader you may remember this cartoon (now re-drawn).



I hesitated to even post it, but when I did a bunch of you asked for it on a coffee mug. Here it is.

I don't know why Cafepress makes the close-ups of mug designs look so dreadful on screen, by the way. All I can tell you is the artwork shouldn't be pixelated on the finished product even though it appears so on the screen.

I also don't know whey they changed the template for tote bags and never bothered to tell me, especially considered the flood of spam messages I get from them on other topics of no import. I've got to go and re-do all the bags. Ah, the life of the bourgeois shopkeeper.

Happy weekend, y'all.

The Warm Embrace of My Peers

For those of you who are slow to comprehend the obvious, I'm gay.



I don't write about it much, because frankly after 23 years (I started coming out at age 12) the novelty has worn off. I even forgot about National Coming Out Day until a straight lady reminded me of it.

So imagine my suprise at being listed among the "Readers' Favorite Blogs" in The Advocate, a gay and lesbian news magazine that's the community's equivalent of Newsweek. I'm not kidding. Here's a link.

This probably the closest I'll ever get to acceptance by the A-list gay community, so I want to make the most of it. David, who also made the list, says it doesn't entitle us to throw attitude at exclusive nightclubs. But maybe I can use it to wrangle a discount on the red underpants I saw in the window of Manifold that say DISCO BITCH across the butt.

Q & A Period

It's the end of one hell of a week and I'm feeling too tired to turn cartwheels for your amusement, so I know what let's do. Let's dig into the giant, mouldering heap of Unanswered Reader Questions and see if we can't answer a few.

Oh, I know. I'm excited too. Just please take your shoes off if you must jump and down on the sofa. Thank you.

Question: I asked you a question in your comments two months ago and you never answered me. Are you a snob, or a moron, or what?

Answer: I forget to answer questions because I'm a moron. I refuse to listen to Kelly Clarkson because I'm a snob.

Question: WTF is holding up your Baby Surprise Jacket in that photo?*

Answer: If you guessed "rolling pin," you're correct! I was so delighted to find yet another use for it, beyond making piecrust and threatening Dolores.

Question: Is Dolores Jewish, or does she just have a penchant for Yiddish slang?

Answer: Dolores was raised agnostic and claims to be a Taoist. However, like me she finds the allure of the Yiddish tongue irresistible.

Question: What does fahrklempt mean?

Answer: My goodness, how funny that you would ask. It's Yiddish, meaning (roughly) all choked up with emotion.

Question: Wait a minute. What is a former-Catholic-now-Buddhist doing using Yiddish words in his blog?

Answer: Trying to attract a hot Jewish man. So sue me.

Question: What sort of yarn is Jo Sharp DK Aran?

Answer: That should be just plain "Jo Sharp DK." Host du bie mir an avleh. I keep forgetting to go in and fix it. It's a nice double-knitting weight wool. It worked well for the Ruana because it didn't weigh too much; the trade off was the amount of time involved in knitting it to size. I'd advise anybody knitting the Ruana according to Cheryl Oberle's pattern to swatch, swatch, swatch with the yarns of your choice before you begin–you'll want to check out in advance what sort of fabric your yarn choices will yield.

Question: Howzabout you put Dolores on some baby stuff in your online shop?

Answer: Bist meshugeh? Oy, I've been losing sleep over this one. Dolores? The shikker with the cigarettes and the gigolos du jour? On baby stuff? I'm not certain whether to be flattered for Dolores or afraid for your child, but okay. I finally figured out a way to do it that won't make me feel responsible for the collapse of morals in the next generation. Watch for it soon.

Question: Any word on a Dulaan Knit In for Chicago?

Answer: Yes. Tentatively hold the first Saturday of November, during the day, at a venue in Evanston, Illinois. More (and firmer) details this coming week. We'll knit, we'll fress, it'll be a simcha.

Question: Can you recommend sources for learning to knit lace?

Answer: Yes. For a concise and informative overview of lace tips, check out Marilyn's handout. For a full-blown online primer, visit Eunny. There lots more out there on the Internet–these are just two favorites that spring to mind. Please note that both Marilyn and Eunny are really good about answering reader questions. Ahf mir gezogt!

Question: Boxers or briefs?

Answer: On me or you, yungermantshik?

*On rereading, this reminds me of my favorite anecdote about Mary Garden, an opera singer who in the early years of the 20th century had the sort of fame we now reserve for giant creative talents like Lindsay Lohan. Garden was a hottie, to put it mildly. At a party Chauncey Depew took a look at her plunging neckline and asked, "Tell me, Miss Garden, what's holding up that dress?" To which she replied, "Your age and my discretion."

I'm Feeling the Love

I was completely overwhelmed by your outpouring of support and advice in the wake of my mini-rant (rantette? rantini? rantchen? ranteleh?) about the world shortage of non-variegated male-oriented sock yarns.

Turns out there's not really a shortage in the world, just in the places I've been looking. This had enitrely escaped my notice, which will surprise those who know me not at all. I appreciate all the pointers to the sort of yarn I had in mind, believe you me. Left to my own devices I might have stumbled around for years wearing socks in colorways like "Itty Bitty Baby Ducklings on Parade."

And I also appreciate deeply the offers to send me yarn, but darlings, you mustn't. Please don't ever interpret anything I say in here as a request for freebies. Money is precious. If you have a little extra, enrich your own stashes, or take your Mom out to lunch, or pay your kid's bail. I'm just glad you're here. There's no membership fee.

Meanwhile, the first sock is about 1/4 inch from toe shaping. No, I'm not going to show you a picture. Who wants to see a picture of that? Somebody asked what the yarn is. It's wool. I'm pretty sure it's from Regia. I lost the ball band somewhere between Wisconsin and Chicago. Should you find it, write and tell me.

I'm Franklin Habit. Who the hell are you?

I'm just finally getting around to writing about Monday's most enjoyable "Meet the Bloggers" event at Arcadia Knitting because it has been too hot to download the two photos I took. The heat wave is also the reason I haven't done laundry, or called Grandma, or finished shredding my old credit card statements, or vacuumed the living room, or learned Japanese.

What was I talking about?

The blogger thing at Arcadia. Right. Well, it was the hottest night of the summer–we're talking 111 degrees Farenheit after dark–and still about four dozen people showed up to eat cookies and play with wool. Quod erat demonstrandum, knitters are deranged.

Needless to say, I felt right at home.

Here are some of the deranged who held still for my camera. Please to identify yourselves in the comments, won't you, with links to your blogs? I swear I remember your names but not your blogs, which embarrasses the hell out of me. How the @#%%!* does Yarn Harlot do it?



Gail there on the left is just a little too happy about all the yarn. The absent Margene is represented by the sock, center. That's what they told me. The sock is Margene. Margene is a sock. (You see? Deranged. Deranged.)

Just behind Gail is Lynn. Lynn had been deeply moved by the post in which I described carrying a stitch marker in my bosom for several days without knowing. In a display of compassion worthy of Kuan Yin, she gifted me with two two markers rather more elaborate than my little orange rings of plastic. Lookee.



Could she have chosen better? No, she could not. Stitch markers that speak to who I am, to what I love. Stitch markers that reference my fascination with Orientalia and my long-time Anglophilia. Stitch markers way too substantial to ever get lost in this:

Two Good Things

Thing One

I set about knitting the Glencora Shawl on the train yesterday morning and dropped one of my point protectors. It's of the rubber, bullet-shaped variety. When it hit the floor of the car, it bounced and rolled. I sighed and gave it up for lost.

Then a man sitting nearby, a man I would place with utmost confidence in the "straight" category, leapt out of his seat, got down in the aisle, and then presented me with the protector, which he had gallantly saved from oblivion. "I figured you must need this," he said. "You looked pretty upset when you dropped it."

"Thank you so much," I said, and meant it. Without that protector, I would likely have lost a dozen or more lace stitches on the way to the office.

"No trouble," he said. "Just being neighborly. Whatever that is you're making, it looks pretty cool."

Miss Van Hoofen, please file this one under "Hope for Humanity."

Thing Two

Today is the blessed anniversary of the birth of a friend and hero. Blogger, knitter, spinner, quilter, underwear model, all around mensch.

I'm a fan of occasional verse, so I have composed the following haiku in honor of the day:

See the queer man knit.
Swift needles go clickety.
And check out those buns!

Dolores will be by with the cake later on. She may possibly be inside it.

Benefits of Blogging

Work continues to be a pain in the tuchus. But we will not muddy a lovely fall evening with chatter about that.

Scribble, Scribble

I think it's grand that you've been enjoying the little cartoons, because I like making them. As Birdfarm will tell you, I drew incessantly through college, which explains the marks I got on some of my papers. (She's no slouch in the sketching department, either. Some of her letters to me resemble the Book of Kells in terms of exuberant decoration. I will have to pull some out of safekeeping and post them.)

And yes indeed, even before you so kindly asked I had determined to work up a couple of knitting cartoon shirt designs. I have been working on them tonight. I'll let you know via the blog when they're ready.

There will also (thank you for asking, Linda) be a woman's version of the "Don't mess with..." shirt, as nobody ought to mess with a knitter of either gender, if you ask me.

Joanne is among those who have suggested a book of cartoons. I'm not ruling it out, though my puzzle at the moment would be turning the little I know about knitting into enough funny stuff to make it work. But we shall see.

Advice

I am completely floored by the quality and variety of suggestions for dealing with the recalcitrant lower edge of my sweater. I'm going to devote time this weekend to deciding which course to pursue. This is for Greg, Jove, Sir Edwin Pegasus, June, Selma, Kathy, Dianna, Irv, Uncle Joey, Anonymous (2), Margie, Marilyn, Lee Ann, Sean, Sahara, and Joe, who weighed in with suggestions. And it's also for all of you who just chimed in with sympathy, because sometimes that's just as good.

Good grief, I hope I didn't miss anybody. It's dreadfully late as I write this and my eyes are a bit wonky.

Recommended Reading

Sahara, who writes with authority and style, has just published the best blog entry on construction and finishing I've ever read. Go read it, particularly if you're a newbie like me.

I also found Jean Miles' words (part of a blog dialogue with Obscure) on lace knitting very inspiring. I've become very enamored of knitting lace but felt guilty about it because I can't use it after I knit it. I'm a combat-boots sort of guy, so mantillas and fichus are not going to blend readily into my wardrobe. And neither my mother nor my sister, the only women I have to knit for, are given to gadding about draped in shawls.

Then I read that Jean, a woman who has turned out enough lace singlehandedly to give Belgium a run for its money, finds herself in the same quandary. And she simply decided to go ahead and make lace because it is beautiful.

Ars gratia artis. With my fondness for Latin tags, you'd think I might have remembered that one.


Even boys can dream about lace.

Q & A

Q: Wait a minute. Wasn't there an item here this morning about the snow falling in Chicago?

A: Yes, there was.

Q: Well, what I happened to it?

A: I deleted it.

Q: No kidding?

A: Do you see it here anywhere?

Q: Why did you delete it?

A: Because it wasn't funny, original, or especially interesting.

Q: Are you suggesting that the rest of your blog entries are?

A: I smell garlic. Did you have salami for lunch?

Q: Stop answering my questions with questions. I am the "Q. " You are the "A."

A: So that means I'm never allowed to ask the questions?

Q: You did it again!

A: Alright, alright. I'm sorry.

Q: I should hope so.

A: Can you ever forgive me?

Q: Gaaaaahhhhhhhh!

(Sounds of a scuffle. Fade to black.)