Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Crazy Scheme: Cryptic Christmas Edition

[19. Steamed pork buns--a visit to a dim sum place brings my total to 43!]


But before I get all cryptic, a photo that illustrates the joy of living with cats.

Last weekend I picked up a free-standing closet thing--basically a frame made out of metal pipes with a cloth cover. I set it up, then took a shower, and when I came out, I saw this:

That crescent-shaped dark spot on the left is not a handle or a decorative element. It is a hole, freshly scratched by the evil cat (who is even now begging for love in a very adorable way). In disgust, I unzipped the "door" and rolled it up, and the cats now seem to be leaving it alone--but my clothes are falling victim to cat hair. Oh, well. If I had left it closed, they would have gotten in soon, anyway.

In Crazy Scheme news, I skipped SnB yesterday in favor of getting started on my Super-Secret Christmas present project. This project involves borrowing a sweater machine and using it for a non-sweater purpose, and thankfully Robyn had one she was happy to lend me.

Now, I am a visual learner. I benefit strongly from seeing someone do a thing and then copying what they did. So I was really happy that Robyn's sweater machine came with an instructional video. However, I was in the grips of a Crazy Scheme last night, and my thought process went something like this: "Ooh, I can't wait to get started! This is going to be so awesome. Hmm, here's the video. Oh! And here are all the parts! And a sheet of directions! I bet I can figure this out, no problem."

So after about 45 minutes of struggle, I ended up with a fully set up sweater machine, instructional video left unwatched.

Did I mention that I don't have an appropriate table for the sweater machine? I'm using a little TV stand on wheels. One that is not long enough to use both clamps to hold the sweater machine steady. But the urge to partake in the Crazy Scheme will not be ignored!

I got started and had a merry old time moving the carriage back and forth, until I realized one big drawback of this sweater machine: when things go wrong, you can't see it immediately.

For instance, I had no intention of dropping any stitches, but I had to get quite a bit past the first stitch to fall off the hook thing to see that there was trouble in River City. By the time I noticed, there were a number of stitches to fix.

Also, things seem to have a tendency, when they go wrong, to go very, very wrong.

What happened here? I have no idea.

By the end of the evening, though, I think I had gotten a pretty good handle on using this machine. I plan to set it up to make a wider cloth before I finish up the ball I made using my shiny new swift and my ballwinder. Then I can move on to Crazy Scheme Part II, which will involve a trip to the drugstore and some hardcore planning. There may be more photographic evidence of Things Gone Horribly and Amusingly Wrong before too long!

5 comments:

Samara said...

Did you actually see eve do this? George is the one that likes climbing up the curtains and do crazy stuff. I'm not saying that it wasn't Eve, she can get into stuff. Keep the bathroom door closet closed or else, you'll have cat hair all over your towels.

Have fun with the sweater thing. My great aunt pearl used to have one of those in her basement. I used to pick a some of the yarn off the hooks while she wasn't watching. I bet she hated that.

Ann said...

I did catch Eve scratching at it in that general area when I went into the bathroom. George was on top of it--this was before I put crap up there. I suppose one of the other cats could have made the hole, but Eve looked very suspicious...

I bet your great-aunt did hate that, you bad thing!

Samara said...

Yep, that's cats for you. And you can never really tell which one was the one to do the stupid thing. Sorry they messed up your new toys.

Zabet said...

I am intrigued....

Aaron said...

You made new internet, and it was in the middle of the week, not Caturday! Hooray!

It's weird to see my house with other stuff in it.

Also, not surprising that Samara comes to the defense of her favorite cat. :)

Hug cats for me!