If you’re into Harry Potter, the film is worth seeing. I’ll be honest and say that the first two were my favorite, as were the first two books. I felt as if the later books needed trimming and shaping, some good editing, and became commercial productions rather than exercises in good story telling. But they were still fun. While this movie only covers half of the last book, it takes its time and ends at a solid point. It doesn’t feel as if it skims over anything significant, and in some ways it paces better than the book itself.

It was a thoroughly enjoyable evening despite the cold, and I was definitely thankful.

Work has settled down, and for the first time in months, I think I’m caught up and don’t have any nasty deadlines shrieking at me for attention. So, there have been a few “finishing” moments, and I’m thankful for those, too.

This has been on the Victoria for nearly two months, and finally got finished about 3 weeks ago.

Wensleydale fingering-weight singles, from Spunky Eclectic in the “Cold Front” colorway.

Given the weather at the moment, that name seems appropriate.

In August, we made a short trip to Taos. The historical district there is incredibly cool, filled as it is with art shops, crafts, and so on. Admittedly some of the shops are a bit on the amateur side, but it’s a fascinating area to explore.

We walked in through the gate, and what did I spy but a yarn shop—a proper yarn shop—off to the left. It was The Yarn Shop, owned by Lori Adams. I was drawn to the door by the art yarns hanging just outside the entrance, candy to the fiberholic’s jaded eye, then through the door as if by magnets. It’s not a large shop, but it is jam-packed. I stood there, simply enjoying the visual riot of color and texture, while the woman who seemed to be the owner chatted energetically with another about a BFL yarn. I couldn’t quite quell the shiver of sheer pleasure, and my movement must have caught her eye, because she turned, and without pausing for breath, tossed me a skein of BFL yarn, explaining that BFL was a lovely fiber and could be used for . . .

“All sorts of things,” I answered with a grin. “It’s short for Blue-faced Leicester, and it’s a lovely middling fiber which can sometimes be soft enough for next-to-skin use, and can be used for everything from hats to scarves to sweaters to lace.”

She paused, but her own enthusiasm for what I later learned was all things fibery was apparently bigger than her controls.

“Right! Isn’t it just great stuff? You’ve used it before?”

“Yes,” I nodded and smiled, a bit self-consciously. “I spin.”

“Ooooh!” she cried, and the next thing I knew, she’d grasped my hand and pulled me around the corner of the table to show me a Lendrum wheel sitting next to a Majacraft Rose. The Lendrum had a bobbin of bluish singles started, and as she tells me that she’s just learning to spin herself, she thrusts an 18″-long strip of roving into my hands to show me what she’s spinning. It’s a lovely blend of alpaca, silk, and wool, and I found myself a little worried. It was a beautiful fiber, but not what I’d have recommended for someone just starting spinning; it’s slick. But her singles look good, so she’s clearly mastering the fiber, even if she doesn’t feel she is.

“Wait,” I ask, “you’ve spun other things before this, right? This isn’t your first fiber?”

“Oh, no,” she tells me, and I learn that she’s done a few fibers I would encourage new spinners to start with, but just had to try this particular roving after she laid hands on it.

Her enthusiasm was infectious, and as we talked, I found she had shifted from the Rose to the Lendrum because she found the Lendrum easier to control; it seemed to fit her better at the moment. But when she found I’d never tried one, she couldn’t stand it; the next thing I knew, she’d pulled the wheel out, grabbed a chair and plunked it down in front of it, and told me to spin away. I looked at her a bit aghast; I didn’t want to mess up what she’d already started, and I didn’t want to use her good fiber. She wouldn’t take “no” for an answer, however, and I couldn’t resist the temptation for long. It took me about six inches to get the hang of it, but once I found how the wheel worked, I was at least able to match her grist and avoid turning her yarn into a disaster zone.

The Lendrum is a very smooth wheel, but it has a surprisingly heavy feel. I’m accustomed to the light agility of the Rose, and the Lendrum feels like a Clydesdale to the Rose’s Morgan. Once it got moving, it moved—and kept moving. But getting it started took a push, and in that way made me think of the Majacraft Suzie Pro. It’s a simple, no-frills wheel, plain in its lack of ornament, but very functional. But the weight—that was surprising.

So, Lori and I talked about spinning for a little while as I span a few yards on her currently-favorite wheel, and what a pleasure that short visit was! But before I stopped, she dived into a back shelf and came back out with a clear plastic bag.

“Try this,” she said with a wicked smile, thrusting the bag into my hands with the same energy she’d used with everything else.

I noted the writing on the bag as I reached in to stroke the fiber: farm-grown Suri alpaca roving from a male named “Merino” on a ranch in Colorado. I had to laugh at the fun; an alpaca named Merino who’d won his class at the Colorado state fair. But it was incredibly silky, and a gorgeous chocolate color that I’m absolutely a sucker for . . . and again I couldn’t resist. It was far too expensive for me—even after she reduced the price by 25%—but I couldn’t stand it. Part of the issue was the fiber, I know, and I had happy visions of laceweight yarn dancing in my head. The other part of it, however, if I’m honest, was simply the chance to buy something from a stateside yarn shop—something I very very rarely have the opportunity for. And, let’s get real: I cannot remember the last time I bought yarn. I consider buying fiber in a yarn shop a very good alternative.

So, that farm-grown roving, that bit of “Merino,” came home with me. Of course.

It’s been on the wheel for the past month, but it’s finally finished.

Fiber: Farm-grown roving, Suri Alpaca from a male named “Merino.”
Yardage: 911 yards / 833 meters
WPI / TPI: 32 wpi and 10-11 tpi.

And the color doesn’t even come close to doing this yarn justice. It really is a luscious dark chocolate, and I just can’t capture that at the moment in the current lighting conditions. For those who’ve not tried it, Suri is as soft as Huacaya, but has a VERY silky feel, and the fabric will have marvelous drape. I need to find a lace pattern which will do this fiber justice. Because, friends and neighbors, if I say so myself, it’s gonna be gorgeous.

Telenor is the carrier, and after two weeks of negotiations and broken promises, I’ve come to a conclusion.  Specifically, I’ve decided that the problem is not the employees.  At least, not generally.  There was an exception.  One individual hung up on DH when he called to see if we could pick up the modem they were requiring we get, and when DH began to ask also why no one had called us to tell us that there would be no one coming out for a service call even though they knew that there was someone (me) sitting there waiting for them—riiight.  Apparently the fellow didn’t want to be reminded about concepts such as professionalism or customer service and decided to hang up.  Clever, eh?  And DH never even got to ask about the silly modem.  (Which, incidentally, turned out to NOT be the problem.)

Generally speaking, though, the employees are polite and do want to help.  The problem is that the system in which they’re working is chaotic, ineffective, and prioritizes the company rather than the customer.  They have the worst customer tracking system of any company I’ve seen in decades, and other sections—sections which are more concerned with company expenses than customer service—are permitted to override the technical section.  That’s problematic since it’s the technical section which makes the first evaluation of a problem.  If the technical section can look at their own systems and see, for instance, that the problem appears to be a break in the line and NOT the modem, then it should not be possible for another section to decide they’re going to require you get a new modem instead of sending out a service tech two days later and while you’re sitting there waiting for said service tech.

The more we worked with Telenor, the more I found myself convinced of one thing:  Telenor’s administrative procedures and internal data systems frankly suck.  They need a major overhaul—and they need training for their people, and then followup on that training.  Their slogan is that they’re trying to improve, but without completely revamping their system and processes, I genuinely believe they’ll never be anything other than mediocre, and will never portray any interest in or concern for their customers.

Was I frustrated?  Obviously.  Was I ticked off at the fellow who hung up on DH?  Absolutely.  That individual should have been reprimanded.  But again, the fact that it could happen demonstrates a lack of professional training for the company’s employees—and no followup.  While I can blame the employee—and yes, he should have known better—this is the company’s problem.

These kinds of things bother me.  Customer service is not rocket science.  It should be common sense.  In many places, however, it is not.  In Norway, it’s a developing concept.  Norwegians are simply not accustomed to good customer service.  Neither have they felt they could demand it, and here I think a colleague nailed the problem:  Norwegians come from a history of purchasing from or receiving services from a single source which had no competition (e.g., a state-sponsored telephone company).  Until fairly recently, it was a poor country, and what was available was all there was.  There were no options.  Neither was there motivation for companies to improve themselves; why should they, when the customer wasn’t going anywhere?

That’s changed.  Now there are choices, although not as many as I’d like.  And, I can honestly say that I’ve seen a difference even in the past ten years.  Young people and those who’ve experienced good customer service outside the country are bringing those standards and expectations home with them, and people in general are beginning to demand a bit more.  People are beginning to feel they have a right to complain—and are actually doing so on occasion.

I’m proud of them; it’s taken a lot for them to reach that point.

But there is still a long way to go.

On a more cheerful note, a few things made it back with me.  Quit laughing; you knew there would be something!

There were actually several things, but you’ll forgive me if I dole them out a little at a time.  ONE of those things, however, I really want to show you now.  Remember this?

Remember my telling you that it was being used in a project? And I think I eventually also told you it turned in the Tudor Stole in Miriam Felton’s new book, Twist & Knit?  Scroll down on that link page and you’ll see Miriam’s professional photos of the completed projects—including this Tudor Stole.

Well, guess what has now come back home.

The pattern is easy to follow and to knit, assuming you have two functioning grey cells.  I didn’t at the time, and poor Miriam had to undo and reknit one of my borders.  I tried to use all the yarn, but let’s get real:  the thing currently measures in at 18 inches wide and 8.6 feet long in its resting state.  And therein lies the key to something I’d thought when I was knitting it . . . I want it wider.

My gut feeling when I was knitting was that it was going to be narrower than I wanted, and I came within a hair’s breath of ripping it back and starting again.  Were it not for the fact that I’m the world’s slowest knitter and that Miriam had already waited an eternity, I’d have done it.  Had I had more time and energy and focus, I’d have done it.  If and when I knit this pattern again, I will do it.

See, here’s the thing.  If you’re short or petite, then you don’t really need a wide stole.  If you’re taller or, well, not petite, then you need the extra width.  In this case, the current pattern configuration works beautifully if you want a scarf—or you’re short/petite.  If you’re normal and want a stole, and you want that stole to fit comfortably around your neck and still go past the small of your back, you want more depth.  In this case, I’d recommend doing half again the number of repeats.

Note that the middle portion of the stole—that honeycomb bit—is incredibly elastic, which means that some of the weight of the stole will help expand that depth a little.  While my example was knitted in a heavy laceweight yarn, I have a feeling that this pattern would work very well indeed in a heavier yarn.  Increase the width and shorten the length (considerably), and you’d have a perfect mid-weight stole rather than a scarf.  Knit the pattern as it is and in laceweight, and you’d have a scarf which will do beautifully to keep your neck warm against a winter chill.  Knitted in a glittery or glamorous lace or fingering weight and with the added length, you’d have the perfect accessory to that special evening dress.

It’s good to see it home.

And yes, that’s DH for scale under the arch.

There’s a colleague down the hall whose laugh is as musical as round-voiced wind chimes, and you can’t help but be drawn toward it. A gal in my knitting group has a laugh that comes from the belly and startles the unsuspecting and more timid around her, and which may not be stereotypically feminine but is wonderfully human. DH has a laugh that always catches my attention, an unpretentious and unplanned bark that rolls into a round, baritone, nearly sensual roll of life, warmth, and genuine amusement.

I fear we don’t laugh as often as we should . . . and I suspect we aren’t as good as finding things to laugh about as we should.

Like this. Click for bigger, but the interesting bit is the For Sale sign in the middle of the photo. Seriously, there are 4.7 (I think) acres up for sale there, and not for the life of me can I figure out why. You know the deep South joke about having some swamp to sell? I’m convinced this is the desert equivalent.

The trip west was a joy. I’d never had the chance to see much of it; airports, USAF bases, and conference centers simply don’t count. And no, mountains are not all alike.

There are lovely scenic views.

And there are stunning panoramas, such as the one you find from the top of Pike’s Peak in Colorado. At 14,110 feet, you feel the thinness of the air, and having the temperature drop at least ten degrees is a bit startling. It’s impossible to judge distance . . .

The depth and distance tricks the eye. You find yourself looking out, then beginning again from close up in order to try and make sense of what you’re seeing. Not until you put something (or someone) recognizable in the frame . . .

can you put things into scale. Between the low clouds and the high mountain, you felt as if you could simply reach up and touch the sky.

We met a biker from San Antonio who had made a long journey of his own, and as the three of us stood there looking out over the mountain heights and valley depths, DH laughed and said that in Florida, there are hills (Tallahassee is, after all, built on seven hills), but there are so many trees that you go around the corner and all you see is another tree. He’s right—live oaks, pines, and magnolias dominate my home turf—and being able to stand in a place and see for miles, or to the horizon, tends to make one feel naked and very very exposed.

Going from mountain to desert is a change—particularly when you’re accustomed to seeing trees. Florida has red clay hills, but this . . .

This is definitely not like anything you’ll find in north Florida. It’s impossible to see the scale and distance here, but please click that photo for a larger one. In the lower left quarter, you’ll find a note centered over the head and shoulders of someone standing on the path. Now do you get the idea?

That is the first stop in Arches National Park in Utah. Massive walls of red . . .

with odd holes crafted by wind, water, and time. Long sculpted cliffs that look rather as if someone poured a thick bread dough over a counter top of random shapes . . .

. . . and which provide fascinating keyhole spaces to look out onto the rest of a red, red world . . .

Yet, between those desert spaces, there are wonderful little green spots. Spots of wild grasses, sage, and flowers that thrive in spite of the drought.

There are chubby marmots who aren’t much intimidated by passing cars . . .

and inquisitive little fellows who turn into kamikaze pilots in their mad dashes across the road in front of you, but who don’t mind taking a moment from their frantic scramble to sit on a nearby boulder and consider what in the world you’re doing before their nerve fails them and they dash out of sight again.

All the traveling has cemented one thing for me: Spindles travel in PVC pipe. I don’t bother with dressing it up, but it absolutely does the trick for protecting fragile spinning bits.

In this case, it’s a lovely stone spindle from Running Moon Farm, and some Merino-Tencel blend from Spunky Eclectic in the Aspen colorway, gifted to me by Margaret who decided it just didn’t speak to her. It definitely speaks to me, however, so her thoughtfulness is gratefully appreciated. (And you do need to check out her blog; she’s back, and she’s done a major plunge.)

But now I’m afraid I need to go back to lesson plans and student papers. The next two weeks are full of teaching, commenting, and serving as examiner for oral exams. One set of lesson plans left to go before Monday.

Next update: hopefully next weekend, 28 September.

Hang in there with me; I have lots to share.

First, you’ve seen ONE of the fibery things I worked with this summer:

(Go to the flickr page for bigger if you need the refresher.)

While I’d really intended to get all that into the luggage on the way back, other things had to take priority, so a good portion of it is winging its way over in a couple of very tightly packed boxes. And I’m realizing that I need to come up with an additional shelving unit in the loft to hold it all . . .

However, the first results of that Louet Victoria which is sitting rather cozily in the middle of that heap of now-clean fiber were these:

The big lump to the upper left is Spunky Eclectic’s club fiber for May, a Corriedale dyed in a colorway named “Rosebud.” Amy is brilliant about colors, but the name of this one really nails the colors. It’s got the various roses, but it also has that new-bud green which tempers the pinks exactly like a spring rose garden. To the left, though, is the fiber Terry of Bizyhands on Etsy sent with the Victoria so I’d have something to test the wheel, and I simply cannot get over how closely matched these two colorways are. The photo doesn’t do them justice, and shows Terry’s a bit darker than it really is. But they’re the products of two artists in two comletely different parts of the country. I’m convinced that large portions of the fiber community are psychically connected.

I hate to give you the technicals of these, because they’re absolutely not brilliant spinning. They were the orientation fibers for the Victoria, and they really do show that the spinner was unfamiliar with the wheel she was using.  The little skein was done first, and that one is the more inconsistent of the two and includes a couple or three breaks in its three or four ounces. It’s roughly 18wpi, and I chain plied it in order to get a handle for the wheel—and because I didn’t have my usual handy tools for making a center-pull ball worth working with.

Amy’s fiber benefitted from the other’s lessons, and by the time I finished plying that one as a standard 2-ply, I’d managed to form a fair relationship with Victoria. It’s still irregular and I found a couple of snarly eyelashes when I skeined it, but it’s a decided improvement over its little sister.

Fiber: Corriedale
Weight: 8 oz
WPI / TPI: 16-18 / 7-8
Yardage: 402 yards

It really does amaze me how different wheels have different personalities.  The Victoria is, however, a very cool little wheel. It’s not one I’d want to use for long-term spinning—it’s a sprinter rather than an endurance runner—and I find myself having a more difficult time judging the twist than I do with the Rose. I can’t necesarily explain why that is. You’d think that because the Victoria sits lower and you can see the yarn as it spins, well, that it would be easier to see. But somehow, it’s not. Even though the Rose is nearly level so that I can’t see the single actually on the bobbin, it’s still easier for me to judge the amount of twist I’m actually adding to the yarn.

Other than that, though, the Victoria serves its purpose just beautifully. I’ll admit that the plastic connection on the footman—the one which has to be snapped out of place when you disassemble the wheel—makes me a bit nervous.  It works, but I have a concern that it’s going to break at some point, and it may be that I’m just worrying needlessly. I’ve yet to see a report about anyone actually experiencing that. Once it’s broken down, the wheel is light, compact, and transports very easily. Not an eyebrow was raised on any of the international flights when it went into the overhead bin with room to spare. Nor did Atlanta’s security blink twice when it passed through their scanners. Interestingly enough, it was the Amsterdam security who wanted it unpacked and examined because they couldn’t figure out what it was; I had to explain it. It says something when a wheel’s country of origin knows less about the product than the country to which it is imported.

There was other spinning as well, but I won’t show you that just yet. Let me finish getting it all transcribed and boxed up, and then I’ll share. It is, however, the first level workbook for the Master Spinner program. Aside from transcribing my notes from hieroglyphics into something readable, it’s done. I won’t say that it’s done well, or rather as well as I’d like it to be, but it is done.

And there was a bit of dyeing. The colors aren’t good, and I can’t seem to  get them properly captured, but look at this:

(I’ll try to replace it with a better photo later.) From top to bottom, there’s a very soft camel color from live oak leaves. That surprised me; I expected an olive or sage green. Next is actually a very soft butter yellow, not the ecru you see in the photo. You won’t believe where it comes from; I didn’t: Spanish moss. Seriously. In reality, it’s a lovely, clear, soft butter yellow. The pale kind, like real butter—not margarine. Finally, the bottom skein is actually a sharp lemon yellow, and it’s from kudzu. You know, that plant which is threatening to take over the South? That stuff. So, dyers take note, and harvest to your heart’s content. Maybe the stuff will be good for something.

Like many others at the moment, I turned some of the handspun into a Morning Surf scarf.

I changed the dimensions slightly so that it would actually be more of a rectangular shawl than a scarf, but the fiber is a soft Merino roving, and the yarn was dyed with onion skins to get that color. It’s very vanilla, but it’ll work.

The trip

Spinning and fiber aside, I promised to share a tiny bit of where we were and what we saw. I’ll do more later, but for now, I rather thought you may need to see dimensions, and a very, very rough route.

In 15 days.

We started in Atlanta, jogged a bit north, then took the interstate across to Colorado Springs. Outside Colorado Springs, we went up Pike’s Peak, and I have to tell you that that was very, very cool! It doesn’t seem like much as you’re going up . . .

. . . but once you get there, it’s easy to feel a bit overwhelmed.

Of course, it doesn’t help that at 14,110 feet up in the air, you’re gasping like a fish out of water after a few steps and seriously wishing everyone else would leave so that there would be enough air! For a couple of folks who are accustomed to being pretty much at sea level, it was extreme. That’s when you walk fifteen feet, pause to pretend to catch your breath, look at each other, and have to remind yourself to NOT laugh because laughing uses precious oxygen which seems to be in very short supply at the moment. Sheesh.

The altitude was a serious adjustment for us during the entire trip, and I think we were only starting to get accustomed to things when we returned to Tallahassee. Along the way, however, we did see a few things, and I’ll share some of those photos shortly. For now, though, check this out:

That’s Sheep Rock in Arches National Park in Utah. They believe it’s part of an arch which collapsed ages ago, leaving this very sheepy-looking support rock standing. Is that not just too cool? It’s impossible to get an idea of the sheer size of the thing from this photo, but it’s huge. And I have to laugh: Send a spinner into the desert and see if she doesn’t find something to do with fiber!