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Socks Blog - Thursday 20 May 2004

Heading for the ankles

Knitting down to the ankle

Today I will continue knitting in stockinette toward the ankles of the socks and rest up from yesterday. At this point in my life, one fun thing a day is the limit, with a day or two after for recovery.

I had trouble getting to sleep last night, so uploaded photos to the Meetup page. Sometimes I get too tired to rest properly. This morning I slept in late, then checked email, the meetup bulletin boards, Slashdot, then put together the gray hats page and started this blog.

One of the things I decided to do with this site was to use a MySQL database instead of a static site map. I add the release date, path, a short description, and mark columns for applicable catgories. I wrote a Perl script that allows pulling up the most recently added pages by category. Although a script to automatically look for new files and supply paths to them is an option, I like having the control of this approach. I need to remember to update the database when I add a new page though.

March 2005. I changed the Perl script when I moved to a new web host. It is now here.

By then I was tired and stopped for lunch, then lay down to do some knitting and to start a nap. I was sleeping well when the phone rang, a telemarketer for one of those organizations that sound like charities but are not.

I was running low on milk and eggs, so went to Walgreens. Yesterday it was cool, temperatures in the low 50's when I went to meetup, so wore a wool hat I made ages ago, my parka, wool socks, and a pair of fingerless gloves I made last year. Today the temperatures were in the 80's (F) and it was humid.

The two pieces of knitting are now committed to becoming socks or stockings. Had they been mittens or gloves, I would have started increasing every second row for the gusset for the thumb an inch above the ribbing. Had they been a sleeve, I would have started increasing more gradually. As socks, I will continue knitting straight until I reach the ankle. If I want to make them into knee socks or stockings, I could knit straight for about a third of the distance between the knee and ankle and decrease along the back.

This is one of the more relaxing phases. Things will pick up again with the heel. I used to carry a ball of yarn and socks or mittens along on the bus to work on while commuting to work or waiting for appointments. I tried knitting at faculty meetings, but found that I needed to work exclusively on ribbing as the tension of my work seemed to increase to match the tension of the meeting.

There are thunder showers this evening. For a while there was a steady downpour illuminated by the setting sun. Because of the nap being interrupted, time to pack it in and start again .