Breezy Brighton

Here I am on Brighton beach, with my newly knitted socks. Full knitterly details like yarn, etc on ravelry, this post'll explain why I knitted them.

The bobbles running up each side are organised to represent the word "yakawow" in braille. Back in mid-April, the Times published an interview with controversial scientist, Baroness Greenfield. She'd said all a whole host or objectionable and/ or funny things in this interview, and people were chipping in with their favourite bits. "Crowd reading", if you will. Someone quipped "She's right abt 1 thing: we don't want "load of breezy people who go around saying yaka-wow". Cos that would be MENTAL". Another replied with "Yaka-wow must used more! Dunno its meaning but ace phrase".

They were clearly onto something. I logged into twitter a few hours later, after a very serious evening discussing the role of science communication in the developing world, to discover a @yakawow account was now following me. (I still don't know who is behind this account, though I have my suspicions). There were also tshirts for sale, a youtube video, various photoshopped images and facebook page.

It turned out Greenfield didn't coin a new term. It was a transcription error of "yuck and wow", a phrase Greenfield has often used to describe the way people act online, running quickly from one sensation to another. Greenfield is (in)famous for her concerns that computer games and social networking sites are damaging our brains, leading to short attention spans and an inability to empathise (e.g. see this news piece). This makes more sense than "yakawow", but Greenfield's views on computers is not without its critics (short version: all very well as an idea, but it lacks evidence).

The yakawow meme kept running. It was Boing-ed. Quick to celebrate the new word they had invented, the The Times wrote about it (see also this cartoon, from print version). The New York Times vocab blog picked it up and apparently it's in the latest edition of Wired, though I haven't see a copy yet.

One of my old students challenged me to knit yakawow. It had to be socks. Greenfield famously referred to twitter as "reminiscent of a small child saying "Look at me, look at me mummy! Now I've put my sock on. Now I've got my other sock on". I also thought the word would provide an opportunity to play with knitting braille, something I'd been thinking about trying for ages.

I worked three panels of the word, loosely reflecting the streams of code in the poster for the Matrix (a play on Greenfield's suggestion that computer mediated communication is somehow not real). I knitted them one at a time, rather than two-at-once-on-a-huge-circular to mirror Greenfield's point about people on twitter saying they'd put on one sock and then another. They were also from the bottom up: read something into that if you want, I can't be bothered to extend the symbolism any further.

When I wear these socks, I will wiggle my toes inside them and celebrate my belief that interacting online is not without its tangible consequences. Social media sites, not least knit blogging and ravelry, provide real relationships with real people doing real things. Imaginative and clever people who get together to collaboratively discover, develop, teach, learn, critique and create. As the Times' piece on yakawow concludes:

Baroness Greenfield, take note. These people’s brains haven’t atrophied yet. They have taken your interview and created a whole new universe. I think, therefore I yaka-wow.

Still, it can be nice to have a break from it all. Which is why although this photo was taken on Brighton beach on Monday, I didn't blog about it until today. I've been away from the internet, reading a book and knitting a legwarmer. I also took those socks off and went for a bit of a paddle.

demi-done

I've taken ages to post about this. I finished in March. It's been hard to find a time when me, a charged camera battery, a photographer and light have all be in the same place, but it's also because I haven't entirely decided whether to give it a thumbs up or down.

Its Demi, from Rowan Vintage Style made in Cash Iroha bought half-price in the John Lewis sale. All details in the ravelry page. I'd been wanting to make demi for years. Faced with a sweater's worth of aran weight yarn after the sale, I was desperate to demi-it.

I checked through ravelry for other FOs in the yarn, and again and again the same line came up "Oh, Cash Iroha, how you do grow!" I knew demi shouldn't be loose, so I asked around and was told it didn't grow that much. And I was good. Not only did I swatch properly, but I washed and seriously blocked it before taking stitch and row measurements. I went down several needle sizes and it all seemed to be on track. But, you can guess. It grew.

The pattern does work as a baggy jumper. The side-shaping and twisted rib keep the looseness of the yarn in check, meaning its still reasonably comfortable and (relatively) flattering. Most people seem to use the hourglass sweater patten with Cash Iroha for the same reason. Still, it's not the image I had of the pattern in my mind. Demi is a tight, fitted and nipped in smart garment, not a big softy-sack. And you have to remember that I've had that image in my head for years.

In conclusion, it's a thumbs up of an FO. But my craving for a demi is not sated. Next autumn I'll make another one in a more conventional yarn. It'll be re-gauged to dk, and as a top-down raglan. Because life's too short for all those back-to-front purls on the WS of the twisted rib, and I think the shoulder button detail will look cute on the raglan angle.

In the meantime, I'm looking for a stitch pattern with virtually no stretch. Any ideas?

belated v-day post

EDITED to add: bobble = pompom (for those not familiar with English-English).

A few months ago my boyfriend and I had a minor disagreement over a bobble hat. We were on a boat, it was cold, and we'd just spotted another passenger knitting a stripy hat, surrounded by her family members wearing identical ones (all with bobbles).

Marcus: Ooo, you could knit me a hat.
Me: [suddenly quite elated] Knit? You? A request? And you'd wear it??
Marcus: Yeah, you could knit me a hat, I'd like that. Keep my head warm. Go on, knit me a hat. Please.
Me: Of course my love! [starts to mentally add to her ravelry queue]. I could do cables, or fair-isle, you know some really complex patterns...
Marcus: [interrupting] Ye-es. But, you know, with a bobble.
Me: [pause, then imagine the next word like Lady Bracknell says handbag] A bobble?
Marcus: [smiling, goodnaturedly]. Yeah, a bobble, I like bobbles.
Me: But bobbles are horrible and childish. I don't like bobbles. I want to knit cables, or fair isle, and a bobble would just ruin it [pouts].
Marcus: [misjudging my attitudes to bobbles slightly, trying to look cute and and taking on the voice of some kids tv show character] Bobble, bobble, bobble, bobble.
Me: [looks in another direction in disgust].

Now, a few months passed, I'm over not being able to knit him something more technically challenging. Deciding the most romantic presents are always those based on a fight, I swallowed all pride and made him a bobble hat for valentine's day. Project ravelled here.

I started as a basic top-down hat, planning ear flaps and a garter-rim. Then I realised this was basically the same as brooklyn tweed's modification of thorpe to dk-weight, but with stripes. I lengthened the odd bit here and there (and added the bobble) but basically its the same. And, I have to admit it, I think the bobble actually adds to this pattern. It lifts the eye at top of the piece a little, and so stops it from making the head look a bit flat.

I used Rowan Scottish Tweed (a ball of each) because I wanted to see how he'd react to 100% wool. I'm going to knit him a jumper for next winter, and I thought this could be a good test of his skin sensitivity. I figure I can always line a hat, but it's harder with a jumper.