Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Peep show

First off. The picture is terrible, I know. My camera has been just incapable of taking a decent photo lately. They all end up blurry and out of focus and I think the tax refund may go to buying a new camera! :-)

Anywho, the pic is “The Peep Dishcloth” named in honor of Easter’s sugary little treats. Are those colors not classic Peep colors? The pattern is called Basketweave from this booklet, that I have had for years. I wanted to knit something that would give me a bit of instant gratification, because let me tell you, I am so bored with my Under the Hoodie sleeves right now. A bright and easy dishcloth seemed like the perfect solution, and it was. I really like it.

While knitting the Peep, I watched Escaflowne, another anime that came pretty highly recommended. Both my hubby and I hated it. There is also a series with the same name, which looks like it might be better and we were wondering if we should have watched that instead. In fact, I put in on my Netflix queue to give it a try. Keep your fingers crossed that it will be better than the movie!

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

A movie or three

When I revived this blog last summer/fall, I had promised that I was going to talk about my non-yarn hobbies, too. I have been terrible about that promise, though, even though I spend a huge amount of time on them. I'm not sure why. Maybe I think that the people who stop and look at my knitting won't have the same taste in movies/books/games as I do? On the other hand, I love when the knit blogs I read mention something besides knitting. I have found many great books and movies based on the fact that I like so-and-so's taste in knitting patterns, so I *must* like her taste in movies, too. Ok, that logic is completely busted, but it has been true a surprising amount of times.

Anywho. Besides re-knitting my sleeve in the proper color (ahem), I have been watching:

1. Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? This is part of my Top 100 challenge that I blogged about, oh I don't know, six months ago or so. Excellent movie. It was a bit like watching a car wreck; you feel like you should look away, but are strangely compelled to keep watching the carnage unfold on screen. Taylor and Burton were amazing.

2. Spirited Away and Howl's Moving Castle. I have been on an anime kick recently and these are the two I started with. They are from the same studio and share a lot of the same themes, which is why I mention them together. The animation is beautiful and the stories intriguing. The stories never quite go where you expect them to, which makes them much more engaging than a Disney movie (at least, to me). My hubby and I often sit and talk about the motivations and meanings in these movies for days afterwards. Also, Christian Bale does the voice of Howl and man! That man has a sexy voice! :-)

If anybody out there has any anime recommendations, please leave them in the comments. Specifically for movies, as I don't have the patience to watch a long series right now. Thanks!

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

In which I discover that I am color blind

Or can't properly read very, very, VERY easy directions. Scroll down to my last post. See that nice little sleeve I had started? Well, I have been diligently working on it ever since. Last night, I was one repeat (one repeat!) from finishing it. I noticed I was short on light gray yarn so I went rooting through the yarn for this project to make sure I had another ball. I didn't, but for some bizarre reason I had three balls of red. My brain sorta froze as I processed this information. And then it hit me.

I was knitting the sleeve in the wrong color.

The sleeves are supposed to match the thick stripe on the front, not the little tiny accent of light gray. What the heck was I thinking?

So, yeah. I am pretending that this whole incident was due to a temporary onslaught of color-blindness and that I am not just plain ol' retarded. I am also pretending that I didn't frog an entire sleeve last night. You know, setting myself back WEEKS and all.

I need a lot of pretending right now.