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Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Perfidy

–noun, plural -dies.
1. deliberate breach of faith or trust; faithlessness; treachery: perfidy that goes unpunished.
2. an act or instance of faithlessness or treachery.


So today I feel like life is conspiring against me. I'm in the Raleigh/Durham area of North Carolina. I work at A Southern Season and they had asked if I could work on the 9th, the day before mother's day. I said sure. The next day, my mom told me she wanted to spend Mother's Day weekend in GA visiting my sister at Fort Gordon (is that the right fort?). Anywho, she decided to push the trip to the following weekend. This coming weekend. That's all well and good.
Today, my calendar reminded me that the YarnHarlot, who hasn't ever really been near here, is gonna be in Atlanta on the 16th! That's the closest she's been in and will be for quite a while. That would have been some darn good luck if 1) Raleigh weren't 6.5hrs or so away from Fort Gordon, 2) Fort Gordon weren't in Augusta, 3) Augusta weren't another 2.5hrs away from Atlanta, 4) the YH is gonna be in Atlanta, 5) my mother didn't hate driving already, and 6) my mother didn't think I am unreasonably obsessed with knitting. None of those bode well for an impromptu trip nearly 3hrs out of the way. Never the less, I do intend to put it on the table.

Clicking around the interweb, I recalled that the Durham Bulls StitchNPitch game is coming up. I clicked over to the calendar. It's the 16th. Yes, the same day I'll be in Augusta, not seeing the YH in Atlanta and there isn't another one for a year.

Talk about your perfidy. I've lost faith in the randomness and/or justice of the universe.

Sunday, May 10, 2009

A Series of (Un)Fortunate Events

I told a good story the other day and, as it's about knitting, I thought I'd write it down. Then I remembered that I sometimes write about knitting on this blog, so here it goes...

A few weeks ago, I wanted to start some socks. I really like bamboo needles generally and I had some leftover Shibui Knits Sock yarn (in Sky) so I bought some 0's, 1's, and 2's in bamboo. It was the first time I'd used smaller than 2's, so I struggled through more than half of the Absinthe foot chart before I realized that I was having a hard time because the yarn was sticking to the needles (I knit tightly) and they were too flexible. I decided to buy some metal dpn's. This is where the story really begins:

I went to Michael's in Cary (near where I work, about 30mi from home) to find some inexpensive metal dpn's (I'm on a super tight budget these days). I craft a lot, so it's really been my go-to craft store. They didn't have any sock needles. NONE. I left, disappointed. It suddently occurred to me that there was an AC Moore nearby and I thought I'd give it a shot. I got there and found a lovely set of 4 sets (of five, of course. Michael's didn't even have ONE set of five) Bates sock needles in a pack (not to mention a vastly superior collection of needles in general) for $10.99. I took them to the register and proceded to pay for them with my ATM/Debit card. They were having a bit of a sale and rung up a 25% off coupon for me. However, my card didn't work. They said that happened sometimes and I should try another time. Sure, I thought. I'll just head home after work (did I mention I should have been at work?) and go to the AC Moore in Chapel Hill and buy them. I stopped by Michael's in Chapel Hill first, thinking I might find something else there, but with no luck. Back to AC Moore I went and found the needles easily (again, vastly superior needle collection), went to the counter where the cashier used a 30% coupon, ran my card, then told me I couldn't use that card. I gave in (because I really wanted to finish the socks and could NOT knit with the bamboo another torturous minute) and got cash out of the ATM. When I got back, I picked up my needles, and the newest cashier rang me up with a 50% off coupon. I paid, left, and went directly home to knit. It was SO much better. You know what was the best though? An entire day of searching for needles, four stores, five times and I ended up paying FIFTY PERCENT of a price that I thought was crazy reasonable in the first place. What a fabulous day!

PS: Just a note, I could have easily found the needles at my LYS, Yarns, Etc., but they don't take my ATM card (I don't have one with a credit card logo on it and I don't use a credit card), I was really trying not to take out cash, and by the time I leave work each day, they're already closed.