Shipwrecked!

"Dark days, Sword-face. We've shipwrecked here on this desolate place, no friendly flag on the horizon for many a month. Without my sextant, I cannot but guess where we've landed. I foresee no return to the glory times."

"Cap'n, yer wallowin' terrible deep in the bilge. Chin up, sir! Always keep a weather eye on the horizon. Ain't that whatcha always say to us mates?"


"Aye, Sword-face, aye. But this time I be feelin' too low to lift my gaze o'er the rail. We've seen naught but hardship. My adornments have all shriveled and dried up, and there's no hope for their return. We be among the naked savage every day, threatened by the slavering beasties, wi' no hope of rescue."

"I dunno, Cap'n. This here ain't so bad. Warm air, dry land, and the companionship ain't lackin' in looks..."

"If ye be talkin' about the wench behind us, ye've proved yerself a fool, Sword-face. She don't e'en have a head. Not too companionable, if ye ask me."

"Well, sir, if ye asked me, I'd tell ye it makes her more companionable."

Hey! Watch it with that, boys.

"Oh, so ye've finally decided to come to our aid in our time of dire need? Awfully kind of ye, lass."

You know, Pirate Skull Planter, if I didn't know better I'd say that you were being sarcastic. And what's this naked savage business? I put you in the master bathroom because it was the brightest spot in the house and I put you up on the counter to keep Molly and Winston from knocking you around. We're not going to turn you toward the backsplash every time we get into the shower, you privateering prude.

"Ye couldn't have moved us when you moved the Greek wench onto the credenza? She made out a'right in that deal."

She's in a dark corner, near a heating vent. Not a hospitable climate for you, Cap'n. I thought being in the moist air for part of the day would be good for your "adornments", but they slowly died anyway. I am sorry about that, by the way. Clearly, I don't know how to take care of the easiest plants in the world to care for. Speaking of which...

"Might I inquire as to why we're havin' this impromptu reunion on the cask lid, then, lass? If we've all made berth where ye've seen fit to strand us, what devilry is afoot now?"

Speaking of which...

"I ain't too concerned about it, Cap'n. Long as the Greek wench ain't too far out of me line o' sight."

Speaking of which...

"Πάρτε αυτούς τους δύο ανόητους μακρυά από με!"

SPEAKING OF WHICH, I brought you all down here because I have a surprise for you. Pirate Skull Planter? You are a fine and true planter once more. I have once again voyaged to faraway lands for you, my good sir.

"Beyond the map? Ye don't mean...ye couldn't mean...the Straits of Martinez Home Depot?!"


Yes. After braving the Narrows of Self-Checkout and crossing the vast Sea of Asphalt Parking Lot, I have returned from this magical place with treasures. And I bought special air-plant adhesive and fertilizer, so that your finery will remain a source of pride for many a fortnight to come. I'm going to keep at this until I get it right, Cap'n.

"Lass, ye've made my black, miserable heart a little less dark. My apologies for th' insults and such."

"I ain't makin' no apologies. Seems to Sword-face that everyone's gettin' a good deal exceptin' for Sword-face."


Sword-face, you're not being left out of the dividing of the share. How would you like some adorning of your own? You've been a faithful mate to ol' Pirate Skull Planter for so long, and you've probably seen more travel than he has, since you came from the untamed lands of Treasure Island. You've earned it.

"Much obliged, ma'am! Aye, this ain't a bad day at all for Sword-face! I got this fancy headdress, I got to look up that pretty wench's dress, and the cap'n ain't in such a bleak mood no more. Ain't a bad day in any accounting."

"Μπορώ να πάω πίσω στο credenza, τώρα; Είχα αρκετών αυτών των δύο ηλιθίων."


I can't get you guys back to your home port, because the facilities manager...uh...harbor master says that we can't have plants in the office because their soil harbors pests, and I won't risk your safety by smuggling you in. It'd break my heart if he threw you out while I was away from my desk.

"Aye, but we be unsoiled, lass..."

He be a hard man, Pirate Skull Planter. There's no reasoning with him. Can you make go of it in this new place?

"Aye...but could ye perhaps turn us around some of the time when ye're indecently exposed to the elements?"

It's a deal, Cap'n. It's a deal.

Make Just One Someone Happy

After more than a few months of being in the state we've been in here at work, we've all slipped into a familiar pattern when talking to each other. The conversations typically follow a line something like this:

"So, looks like it's getting down to it."

"Yep. Who would have thought it'd even go on for this long, huh?" There's usually a short, shared chuckle at this point.

"Yeah. I guess we've been pretty lucky, all things considered. What are you going to do, you know, once it's..."

This is where I don't know how to respond. What am I going to do "once it's..."? Take a couple of months off? I'm lucky enough to have that option. Daisy wants me to ride with her on her move back to the east coast. I have a garage full of home improvement projects. Accountant Boy has a fantasy about me making sandwiches and seeing him off to work every morning, then settling down in front of the computer and writing the next great American novel. I could make a major lifestyle change and do something completely different than what I've been doing.

On the other hand, I like being a programmer. Do I keep going along my current career path? Do I look for another job right away? How much of my identity do I tie to my profession? How much of it am I willing to let go? I don't know.

What I do know is that the workspace in these picture is the last one that I'll have with this company. Ten years and nine months and they finally let me have a window cubicle. Sure it's only for two, maybe three more weeks. Look how nice it is, though! I'm enjoying it while it lasts.


I dragged all of the standing plants from the other side of the building over to my area. I've always wanted a conservatory, a very Victorian space, with parlor palms and all sorts of exotic plants. I think this might be as close as I'm going to come to having one.


What desk of mine would be complete without my trinkets, even pared down to the minimum in anticipation of the final pack-up? I've still got the skull with the sword through its mouth, which reminds me of all of our fun times at Treasure Island, before it replace its cheesy-awesome pirate theme with the cheesy-crappy "Sexy Siren" theme. This little guy came from a clearance shelf in the gift shop, a casualty of the iconoclasm of kid-friendly Vegas.


And, of course, there's Pirate Skull Planter. He's with me to the end and beyond. Hey, Pirate Skull Planter! What's up?


N'yar! Don't cast yer gaze upon me. I be hideous!

Oh, c'mon, Cap'n. You look fine to me.

I look like I'm sportin' a bit o' ratty anchor line for a cap.

Didn't I tell you that I'd help you out with this? I'm sorry it took this long, and it was going to be a surprise, but...surprise! I bought you a new batch of plants.


Ye've...ye've gone to all of the trouble fer me? Searched the far points of the compass for such rare treasure? Fer me?

Well, yes, if you consider the Home Depot in Martinez to be off the edge of the map, then sure, that's what I did for you, guy.

Yar! I be a lucky planter indeed! This puts the wind back in my mainsail, lass!


Let's get to it then. Chose the piece that you want while I pop over to the next cubicle and plug in the glue gun.


See, the thing is, ahh, ye've been so kindly toward me that I feel low fer askin', but, well, what I was gonna ask was, uh, would ye be opposed to me wearin' it all? T'would be a fine headpiece!

I was more thinking of giving you a sportier look, maybe a tall, slender grouping. We'll keep the rest of it in reserve, just in case we have to freshen up your look again.


T'is probably a fine tack to take. Do ye think it would make me look less fearsome if I picked the bit with the posies? Be honest now, lass! Don't worry about breakin' my black heart wi' yer response.

I think you'll still be the toughest looking skeletally-based trinket on my desk, Old Salt.


Yar!

Silver and Soot

I wasn't going to do it, but the unfinished pieces kept floating up out of every dark hold where I'd stowed them. They wouldn't do me the courtesy of staying down so that I could forget about them. Here, then, is the finished Julia tank from Hot Knits.


I don't have too many details about it, because I kept trying to forget everything about making it. I think I used size 11 needles, and I think I made the small. I know it all came out wrong. The armholes were too deep, and the body was too short.


I picked up and knit three out of four stitches around the armholes and bound off on the next row. Rather than making the turtleneck, I went with a little rolled neck.

I don't even know how much yarn I used, because when I abandoned it a few months ago, I took a couple of skeins of what was left and used it to make that crocheted top. On the bright side, I did get that yarn out of my stash, so that's cool. That's the main reason I picked it back up and finished it. I kept shoving the unfinished pieces into the stash bin, so it still felt like it was part of the stash to me. It's graduated to garment status now, even if I only wear it once before giving it away. I feel good about that.


If I'd been happier with any part of it, I would have kept better notes. As it stands, I don't have enough to say about it to warrant the usual finished object details rundown. Besides which, I don't want anyone else to be so influenced by the details section that they try to make one. Save yourselves. It's too late for me.

"...yarrr...cough...cough..."

Pirate Skull Planter? Is that you?


"Aye, lass, though I fear I'm not long for these waters."

Was it the sweater? Was it that I didn't make a flag out of the yarn instead of trying to fashion it into a garment? You know I'd do it differently if I had it to do over, right?

"Ye've done nothin' wrong, lass. 'Tis a nice little top. Perhaps you'd be good enough to wear it to see me off to Davey Jones' locker."

What the Hell are you talking about?

"Have ye not noticed? I be dyin'. Shufflin' off the coil. Look at my head!"

But that's just the plants, Pirate Skull Planter. They've been flagging since we moved down here last year.


"What makes me what I am if I'm a Planter what can't keep plants? I'm steerin' toward a Charybdis of existential crisis. I am broken in spirit, lass! Can the rest of me be more than a day's sail behind?"

Oh, for God's sake. I'll buy you some new plants and hot-glue them to your head, O.K.? You'll be good as new. I'll put it on the list of things to do to kill time during the workday. I'll put it above "knit", "look up useless facts on the internet", "see how long it takes to walk around the building", and "chew gum". I think all of those things should come in second to "make Pirate Skull Planter feel jaunty". Which should itself come in second to "do actual work for which I'm paid", but never mind that now. Cool?

"Aye!"

I do have some better projects in the works, now that my Summer of Ribbon Knitting is officially over. I don't want to go out to the car to get it, though. Pirate Skull Planter seems kind of fragile right now.

Blown Off Course

"Ahoy!"

"Oh, hey there, Pirate Skull Planter. What's up?"

"I be wantin' to thank ye, lass."

"For?"

"Fer the fine scarf ye've wrapped 'round me neck, o' course. It'll keep the icy spray of the sea from chillin' the bones. Might be a tad long, though. We're ya aimin' to make a neckerchief or replacement rope for the mainsail?"

Aww. He seems so happy. Nobody tell him that the long foundation chain isn't going to be a scarf for him. Also, nobody tell him that he doesn't actually sail or have a neck.

Yes, with only an hour's worth of work left on my Tagliatelle ribbed tank, I've abandoned it for another stumbling attempt at crochet. Daisy took it up a couple of weeks ago, and she's already producing beautiful, complicated work. She's currently about halfway done with the Butterfly Wrap from StitchDiva. I, on the other hand, keep making foundation chains and ripping them out again.

Complicating matters, because nothing's ever simple in Bananaland, I seem to have broken my middle finger on my right hand yet again. Remember when I said that I have no depth perception? Way back in high school, I broke my finger trying to catch a football, because I couldn't really tell where the football was in relation to my hand, and more importantly, to my face. It's a thing I do, panicking when something appears to be flying at speed toward my head. I throw whichever of my appendages is handy in the flying object's path.

"Aye! I've got better depth perception, though I be missing both eyes and wear a patch o'er one of the holes."

Thanks for that, Pirate Skull Planter. Anyway, a couple of weekends ago, I pulled a rolling cooler off of the top of the beer fridge and lost control of it. I kept it from landing on my head by deflecting it with the tip of my middle finger. The cooler had a bottle opener in it, and I wanted a beer, but I didn't want to go inside to get the opener off of the bar because I didn't want to wake up the dog. What? Like you've never almost clocked yourself in the head with picnic furniture because your dog was napping on your couch, but you really wanted a bottle of beer, even though you were standing inches away from a keg refrigerator and a freezer full of pint glasses. Yeah, like I'm the only one who's done that. Right.

I probably chipped my finger again, so it's kind of hard to knit because I curl my middle finger in around the needle, and there's not too much finger curling to be had right now. The last time I did something like this, during the landscaping madness of 2003, the hand specialist told me to soak my hand in warm, soapy water and simply wait for it to stop hurting. He suggested that I might accomplish this by washing dishes in the sink. I suggested that he might go soak his sexist head in that same sink, and we had a good laugh at each other's expenses.

That's what I get for wanting to celebrate my clean garage with a Sam Adams Summer Ale, I guess. I should have taken pictures of the garage. It looks spectacular. I've rearranged all of my craft supplies so that they fit in the cabinet that used to hang in my kitchen.


That center cabinet is on my garage floor, now. I keep all of the beading, knitting and craft supplies in it.

Oh, yes. We've done some work on the kitchen. I haven't talked about that at all, and since I'm being fueled by too little sleep and an extra-strong cup of tea this morning, I feel like talking about it now.


We went crazy a few weeks ago and did a little work on the bland kitchen. We tried out a couple of colors before deciding that we'd already found the one we liked, and it was all over the walls of our old house. "Why do we keep trying to make it different? We know what we like." Now we have another gallon of paint that we know we don't like sitting out in the reorganized garage, but never mind about that now.


You know the really crazy part? I'm actually starting to like this kitchen more than the old one. It's bright, even though the color on the walls is called Burgundy Black. The electric cooktop is easier to use and clean that the gas. I'm actually finding that I don't mind the tiny oven. It heats up fast because there's not much room for air in there. I can't roast a very big turkey, but I only try to do that once a year anyway. It'd be nice to have better cabinets and countertops, and maybe a vent fan, but we're doing alright without those things.

The paint and new lighting were less than $250, even including the gallon of Celestial Yellow that we're never going to use. The kitchen remodel at our old house cost about four hundred times that much. I think we might be getting smarter.

Maybe it's the caffeine talking, but I'm in a good mood about the whole thing. I feel like it's finally becoming our house now that we have the time and energy to put our stamp on it. I love having everything organized and clean, no dead spaces for spiders and vermin to hang out. Next up? The hedges along the side yard. Me, the broken finger on my trigger-squeezing hand, the two-foot blades of my electric hedge trimmer, and dangling power cords. What could possibly go wrong?

The Working Hour

"I be mighty amused, miss! Why would'ye be wearing that fetchin' rag on yer head, then?"

"Oh, hey, Pirate Skull Planter. I'm feeling kind of glum, actually. My vacation wasn't long enough, and I'm losing my big, roomy cubicle, and I'm just generally out of sorts. By the way, the 'fetching rag' on my head is the back of my fisherman's rib tank. Thanks for the kind words of encouragement."

"And here I be thinkin' it your new jack. Lustrous and shimmery, like a piece of silver half buried in a keg of powder."

"Yeah, thanks, it is kind of...wait, what? I can't tell if that was a compliment. Oh, whatever. I just wish it were done. I've lost all desire to knit it, but I don't want to start anything else until it's complete. I don't have all that much in the way of summer clothes, so I have to knit faster if I hope to still be appropriately covered come July. I could end up wearing the Fluffy Angora Menace on a 100-degree day with the way things are going now. It almost happened today.

And I'm not kidding about the move. We'll be up in a hovel on the fifth floor by the end of the month. We're losing thirty square feet, including the rainforest corner I've set up over there. I don't know what I'm going to do with my trees."

"Ha! Fine bit of hilarity there, lass. Ye're pullin' my non-existent leg."


"If only I were, Pirate Skull Planter. If only I were. It's a third smaller, and the group that sat there before us were animals. They unscrewed half of the overhead lightbulbs because they wanted to work in the dark, and I think there might actually be graffiti on the cube walls. It's scrubby.

Ah, maybe it won't be so bad. If I had to pick any cubicle in the building other than my own, I'd pick that one. It's in a sunny corner, set back from the main aisle. The plants that I manage to fit in the space will be happier, and I've always wanted to sit near a window. You'll like it up there."

"Aye. One berth be pretty much like another for Pirate Skull Planter."

"That's the spirit! And I'll finish this sweater and it'll be stunning and appropriate for even the hottest summer day, and then I'll start in on something more exciting."

"Easy there, me little bowspirit. Ye don't want to engage in too much optimism all at once."

"I am still feeling a little grouchy about my vacation. F&%king short, expensive vacation, and now I'm not going to feel right about going on another one this year because we screwed up the budget with this one, and...hey, thanks, Pirate Skull Planter! I now feel perfectly balanced between cheery optimism and the kind of frustration that makes me want to punch people in the throat."

"Yar! Glad I could keep you on an even keel."

"Arr!"

"Oh, hey there, Pirate Skull Planter. What's up?"

"I feel that my charms have been sorely underrepresented in these waters, and I'm lookin' to remedy the situation, if you take my meaning."

"Pirate Skull Planter! Don't I frequently feature you in WIP and swatch pictures? Haven't you been mentioned independent of knitting in this blog at least twice?"

"Not good enough! I've bad news for you, lassie. I'll be takin' over your enterprise."

"Pretty tall order, considering you don't have hands. Or a body. And that you're made of resin. And that you have air plants hot-glued to your head, which require me to dunk you upside-down in a mug of tepid water twice a month. You don't exactly call the shots."

"Yar...I be powerless in the face of your mobility."

"Be happy with your lot in life, Pirate Skull Planter. Let's show off the swatch now, O.K.?"

"Ay. Fer now. Ye've not heard the last of me."


Fisherman's rib ho! Big needles, few stitches, wearable in summer, from the stash. I've got a good feeling about this one.

Professional

If you came by my desk and saw this little arrangement, what would you think of me?

My whole cubicle seems strange to me today. Turning only ninety degrees to the left of my monitor, I can see the multiple memento mori, a toy jacktrabbit wearing the baby rattlesnake vertebrae necklace, the tape dispenser and stapler that were so often stolen that I painted my initials on them with White-Out so that I'd be able to track them down, my 1988 Outstanding Service Award plaque from A&W Restaurant, and my plastic spider collection. My bookshelf contains two programming books, Ian Flemming's 'You Only Live Twice', a translation of the Popol Vuh, and 'Stiff'.

I begin to wonder if it's not time to straighten things up again. I am, after all, about to be under new management, and there is renewed interest in our deparment now that there are so few of us. We used to stay tucked away for weeks without seeing anyone from any other part of the company. That's different now. Important People come around. How do I want them to see me?


I'm still working on my spur-O-moment bulky cardigan, and I've run into a tiny snag. I knew that Limari didn't have dye lots, and I knew how different my five skeins were when I wound them up. What I didn't count on was that I'd be at a pivotal point in the project with the three most heterogeneous skeins still in front of me. I don't want the arms to be different from one and other, nor do I want the body to be wildly different from the arms at the point where they'd align when I wear the garment. Complicating things further, I do not want to have to split the balls up because I don't want to weave in additional ends. This thing's bulky enough already. I think two of the skeins are close enough to each other that I can knit the arms from them. Maybe I'll just deal with the more muted colors of that fifth skein on the body. If it's wrong, it's only a matter of ripping back and redoing it. It has taken me longer to debate the issue with myself than it would have taken to knit the rest of the sweater. It's not like I'm knitting with fingering weight yarn or anything. This should be an easy, stash reducing, worry-free project. Why have I spent my lunch hour staring at it instead of knitting?

That's just me. It's who I am and it's what I do. And now that I think about it, that's why I'm not going to take down any of my tchotchke.

Winging It

I've got a swatch, no pattern, 1200 yards of yarn, and approximately a month and a half before the weather turns too warm to wear an angora sweater. This ought to be fun.

Everything Zen

Remember how I was going to work on something really easy after finishing my Disasterous July sweaters? Remember how, in a fit of rage and disgust, I decided to knit something made entirely of stockinette? And it was going to be Coachella? And it was going to take me approximately four days? Yeah, so that didn't work out too well. There's nothing to show for it, because I frogged it. Too slippery, too open, too much of my back showing. I'd wanted to have at least one top done this summer, one little top that I could wear proudly while exclaiming, "I made this!" That dream was fading fast.

"Hey, I remember the last little summer top I made, and it was pretty easy! I could make another one of those. I've even got the recommended yarn for it!"

Look what I've gotten myself into now. What I hadn't accounted for was the differences between yarns. The first one I made was knit in a wool/silk blend. This yarn, Berroco Zen, is not so smooth and luxurious on the hands. It is horrible to work with. I'm lucky to get one cable repeat done every two days, because I get tired from working with it and give up. I don't mean that I get bored or frustrated. My hands literally lose strength after seven or eight rounds, and I have to put the project down. Maybe it'll get easier after the separation for the front and back. I'm halfway there.

It's going to be pretty when it's done, which is the only reason that I keep working on it. I'm trying to get it done by Saturday, the last day of summer.

Trinket

Betcha can't guess what this is. Here's a hint. Rattle-rattle-rattle. Here's another hint. Ssssss... Here's another hint. It's a necklace made out of turquoise and baby rattlesnake vertebrae.

"Why, Suzanne? Why? Why has that necklace of baby rattlesnake bones been pinned to your cubicle wall, just under your calendar, for three years?" Well, I'll tell you. I don't know. I know where it came from, but not why I can't seem to get rid of it.

My friend, let's call her TechBarbie, received it as a gift. Her future father-in-law gave it to her for Christmas in 2003, and she accepted it graciously instead of doing what I would have done, namely laughing and handing it back. "It's pointy, Suzanne! It pokes me in the throat when I wear it. And it's kind of, um, strange. I can't throw it out, because it was a gift! What if he asks what happened to it? What do I do?"

Without a moment's hesitation, I replied, "Give it to me."

"You can't throw it out!"

"Who said anything about throwing it out. I want it. Tell your future father-in-law that I loved it even more than you did, and you didn't know how you could NOT give it to me. Every word of that is true. Problem solved."

I can't tell you why I wanted it, maybe just because sometimes I'm contrary. The fact that she found it so horrifying made it that much more appealing to me.

It was far too small to fit around my neck. Fortunately, for the necklace at least, I was going through an angry phase at work. Stuck in the same job for the fourth straight year, no glimmer of promotion-based hope on the horizon, I decided that the new year was going to be themed "The Death of Fun". I took down every bit of tchotchke from my desk and replaced it with somber, serious office supplies. No cartoons clipped out and taped to my monitor, no trade show toys to play with, and only one sober little photo of Accountant Boy next to my phone. For about one week, I could have shoved everything that mattered to me from my workspace into my purse and walked away. "No more fun. I bring no joy to this job, since it gives no joy to me." I dressed in grey and black every day.

The necklace played into that theme. "Hey, what's that?"

"Dead rattlesnake."

"Uh...why is it there?"

"To remind us that we are all bound for the grave. The flesh hanging on our bones is temporary and we will all disintegrate to dust. There is not point to levity. Can I help you with something?"

I couldn't keep that up forever, mostly because I think they would have had the security guard escort me to my car if I'd gone any further with my death soliloquies. Besides, as with my recent Scottsdale experience, at some point my own ridiculously bad attitude started amusing me, and the act of laughing at myself, to myself, shook me right out of the foul mood. The grave desk decor morphed into something more pirate-themed, because the skull-shaped pencil holder and planter worked with either motif. Job got better, manager got fired, new manager promoted me, clutter reappeared. Fun crept back. There might even be a Slinky around here somewhere.

The baby rattlesnake necklace is still here, though. It's been hanging in that spot for so long that nobody even asks about it anymore. Why can't I take it down and throw it in the trash? I kind of get the heebie-jeebies when I think about tossing it. We're moving to a new building in a month or so. I wonder if it'll have to move with me?

Now, this guy? I know why he's here. My best friend gave him to me. He probably cost about a buck fifty with Happy Meal purchase, but I think she had to go to a couple of places to find him, and she held onto him until she saw me again, which was probably quite a while, given how often I get down to my old hometown. He's my favorite Muppet, and she knows it. We're going on a quarter-century as friends, this year if I remember correctly, which I probably don't. She'd know if I asked her. That, dear readers, is friendship.