Ever Happen To You?

Have real life responsibilities ever kept you from knitting as much as you wanted? Me too! Wish there was a product that could help? Me too! But there isn't. Sorry, you'll have to look elsewhere for your infomertial. This, my friends, is an upcoming whine and pity party. Prepare yourselves.

I have a lovely pair of summer socks on my needles (still undecided as to the lucky recipient), using a new groovy yarn called Wick, made from soy, in scumptious handpaint denim colors. AND I have a pair of older women staying at my hotel who are anxiously checking the progress of said socks every night. The pressure, the pressure!! And the bad news? I'm having a hard time holding my needles, much less getting stitches right. Why, you may ask? !@&*!% porch floor.

Like the unfortunate man in the picture, I have been spending my spare (ha ha) time and giving up well deserved sleep time working on my porch floor. Floor which is soon to be my Dad's floor, not mine, I might add. Floor that should have been done loooong ago. But no, the wonderful man who installed the carpet (yes my dears, that IS sarcasm you're sensing), that bleepity bleep handiman decided to glue the carpet to the subfloor. Not just around the edges like he was supposed to, but THE ENTIRE FLOOR. So I am suffering, me and my teeny tiny little pallette knife, to rip up 300 square feet of carpet. And then, even more blood sweat and tears, to scrape up every last bit of cream colored padding.

This was supposed to be finished yesterday. As usual, the magnitude of the job was underestimated by me. I know this is par for the course for me, being ADD as I am, but I swear I was thinking realistically this time. I swear! But two hours of work got me 1/3 of the carpet ripped up and a strip of scraped floor 1 foot by 5 foot. I had to quit after that because I could no longer hold my scraper. My poor fingers weren't gripping anything very well and both hands were shaking. Let's not go into the shape my knees were in, either. I quit for the day, completely depressed and overwhelmed, at least looking forward to 2 hours of nap before work. But my muscles continued to shake and shiver like I had the beginnings of the flu. I dozed a bit, but that's all.

And that brings me back to being at work, chatting with the sock knitting fascinated women, and trying to hide my poor uncoordinated hands. Sigh. Did I mention this is the 4th time around for these socks? I've tried 3 other patterns that didn't end up looking good, worked up too small, or too big, and had to be ripped out after 20 rounds. Poor yarn. I'm not all that excited with the present pattern, but I'll be darned if I'm going to rip out another pair. For better or for worse, these socks are going to be made!

But probably not in the next few days. The laminate floor installer comes tomorrow to look over the site. I am going straight from work to the porch and my scraper. I hope I don't kill myself or fall fast asleep in the middle of a pile of carpet pad scrapings (nasty stuff) face down on the half scraped floor. The job seems endless! Dad has promised to help but I don't how we are going to finish today. And that doesn't even leave room for the primer. Quite a few cat "accidents" have to be sealed into the subfloor using Zinnsser's Bin Primer and Sealer. I've been told the stuff stinks so bad you will pray for death. So the cats will have to be moved out of the house while we do this. Don't know how this will all be done by Wednesday, when my Uncle arrives and I have to move out of his place and back into my own until the first week in May. Nothing like unrealistic but set in stone deadlines to make a girl cry.

So that's why knitting news will be slim for a week or so. And that's my whine. I hope everyone pities me. I'll be the girl popping Advil and moaning about socks I could knitting. Oh Regia, oh Opal, wherefore art thou lovely Koigu? My heart yearns after thy colors as my soul jumbles knits and purls into patterns of loveliness and longing...

Hey, I saw you throw that tomato! I know where you live!