Patterns and Disturbing Trends

Today’s date is pretty cool.  10/11/12.  Maybe you’ve already had that date if you’re in America, I’m not quite sure, where numbers start getting meaningful is where they also start getting too complicated for me.  I guess it would have been even cooler if I could have pressed publish at 08:09 or something but that would have required a little too much organisation, coordination and forethought from me.

I remember way back when I was in school, a teacher pointing out a palindromic date (I can’t even remember what it was) but I’ve always loved patterns.  Although I drew the line at spending so much time studying them in Middle School Maths.  Palindromes and the Days of the Months poem are all I have to show for four years of mathematics at that school.  Worrying?  Probably.  Did you know that the first words Man said to Woman were palindromic?  (And courtesy of the internet, I’ve finally worked out to spell that, however, it isn’t how I’ve been attempting to say it all these years).  Oh yes, apparently he said (before English was even invented however, akin to that same terrible premise of sci-fi films):  ‘Madam, I’m Adam’.

(Although they clearly hadn’t invented punctuation either at that point though.  That can be such a pain, although it does have its uses, I guess).

A slightly more disturbing trend also was established today.  Do you remember that about year ago I burned my bonce?  It was a particularly unpleasant and at times, painful, not-a-good-idea.

Today it wasn’t my bonce but my bounce.  This possibly was also more painful.  I’m not sure.  Time has at least done some healing for the previous occurrence (although I am still excessively cautious about pouring boiling water).  This morning I fell out of the loft.  Yes, you did read that right.  My grip totally and utterly failed.  And that is what I was most upset about, I may not always have the oomph to hoik myself into the loft but I can usually rely on my grip.  Not today.  I was painfully reminded that I, yet again, haven’t been as well as I would like this week.  I broke nothing except my fall which considering the tiny hallway and the hazards present was pretty successful.

I’m sure that I will survive but I now have a very good excuse for buying a new, reliable, stay-put-able loft ladder.  (Now to cough up the pennies!)  I’m also likely to now be very cautious what I do in the month of November, well, at least until next year.

Bring on the Cake

Although I don’t have much of a sweet tooth, no honestly I don’t, I don’t see why the world seems to have united against cake and other puddings.  Sin may be unfashionable but the last remaining one is pudding, sweet stuff.  Cookbooks no longer have dessert chapters.  Healthy eating fanatics frown on anything but fruit and veg and whatever else their creed ordains.  Maybe I’m too liberal.  I don’t think eating sweet stuff will kill you.  I don’t think it’s virtuous to deny a major food section.  If you enjoy it, eat it, if you want it, eat it.  In moderation.  In balance.

So I was rather surprised when a national charity fundraising project themed on sport kickstarted its annual campaign with a celebrity bake-off.  One of those Americanisms that are a rather useful addition to the vocabulary.   And then urged viewers to hold their own.  Hang on?  Sports?  Healthy living?  Bake-off?  I’m confused.  They’re not exactly synonymous in popular culture at the moment.

Maybe it’s simply because baking has become fashionable.  Cute cupcakes don’t have calories.  Cool things generally don’t.  It’s only when something is unfashionable that it becomes laden with more toxins and calories and deadliness than you can possibly imagine.  Stuffing your face on baked treats plainly isn’t as unhealthy as eating a portion of pudding after your main meal.  Logically.

Cake has featured elsewhere in my life this last week too.

Remember that pattern I was waging war with and how I was attempting the daunting mathematics somewhere in the middle?  I roped in the husband.  Who has been to numeracy classes and is now hailed genius.  (Only when it comes to numbers that is, I wouldn’t want him to have an overinflated ego).  Nope.  In the end it came down to cake.  If I have two types of cakes (demonstrated by the counter and a knitting needle), invite thirty guests and want each of them to have both cakes, how many cakes will I end up with?  Sixty.  We were pretty confident about that.  Having mentally lined up two columns of thirty counters and thirty needles.  Alright.  So if I need sixty cakes (which equals rows in this disturbed example), I need to add sixty to eighty.  A slightly harder mathematical challenge.  We made it 140.  (Which to my mind is confirmed by 7+7).  So I need to get to 140 before starting on the decreases.  We think.  I think.

This beastie is growing at an alarming rate.  I’ll let you know what happens!

Can You Guess What it is Yet?

(If the rest of the international community of bloggers don’t recognise the expression, it’s a popular catchphrase).

I’ve got a new project on my needles.  Yes, those very expensive, luxury needles I talked about before.  And yes, it’s in acrylic.  An expensive acrylic too.  My sweet husband chose it because research on Ravelry shows that although this pattern indicates a plain yarn, a variegated yarn really looks best.  Thank you to all those wonderful knitters who share their creations with the rest of the world.

The first problem that I encountered is that all my stitch/row counters are in use.  I have two fun clicky ones.  (Yes I do have too many projects on the go.  Ask my husband).  So I had to use a twisty one, you know the type?  They require you to put your knitting down at the end of each row and give it your undivided attention.  You also have to remember to increase the tens after every nine.  I forget.  Then I get confused when I’m ten rows behind where I thought I was.  Or worse, twenty.  I read the numbers backwards too, which means I can get very confused sometimes.  The very first row becomes number 6.  Huh?!  Oh.  I twisted the wrong one.  That’s a nine.  Sigh.

I thought I was doing quite well with it, might even have it done by the end of the week.  Ah, unbridled and foolhardy optimism.  If I don’t put it down and forget it about of course, which is why it’s very brave of me to declare that I have a project on the go here. I had of course read the pattern through before casting on, you know, as you do, the kind of read through which means casually skimming over it to make sure that there’s nothing too alien or scarily complicated happening.  Does anyone read the pattern through religiously before they start?  Am I meant to?  Hmm.  Oh well.

I did notice, whilst knitting not skimming, that after row 80 it stopped counting.  Now 80 rows is quite a lot when your counting skills and attention span are as limited as mine.  Not a problem.  I mean most patterns don’t count all the rows and you just have to knit until a mysterious ‘work measures X cm’.  That scares me, I’m never quite sure if I’m stretching it too much or too little.  I’d rather have rows actually at least then I know that I’m in the right place, roughly.  So even if after doing 80 rows of increasing you have to do the same amount of decreasing, that’s what?  Not too bad probably, not too different to working until a certain measurement, you’re just counting the rows instead.  Different sort of counting.

I was coping.  Making good progress, keeping optimistic.  Keeping an eye on the devious behaviour of my counter.  Then I saw a little instruction.  You know, just after that all important row 80.  Optimism flew away faster than you can say ‘bullet’.  Wheezy breathing commenced.  Just a minor detail.  Between the increases and the decreases, there’s a ‘Rep rows 79 and 80 30 more times’.  Yes, THIRTY more times.  This thing is going to be a lot bigger than I was planning.  It looks kinda small and cute in the photos.  Now it’s a monster.

Oh wait.  I’ve just done some more maths.  Hang on, just need to try to breathe.  If it says that about TWO rows, then I need to do them BOTH THIRTY more times, which involves multiplication.  That’s SIXTY rows.  OK, definitely not breathing.  Definitely not going to have it finished by the end of the week.  Sigh.

If and when I finish this project I’ll let you know but here’s what it looks like at the moment at row 63 (or 39 when I look quickly):

Can you guess what it is yet?!

It’s All Make Believe

The most disturbing thing I learnt this week was that IMAGINARY numbers land your plane.  Nope, I’m not kidding.  They use IMAGINARY numbers.  This doesn’t sound particularly reassuring.  I’m just glad that I didn’t find this out whilst sitting in a plane approaching a runway.  That wouldn’t have made me feel very comfortable.

Now I’m not in a position to explain anything about imaginary numbers, real numbers are something that I’m not completely au fait with at the best of the times.  It appears to be an abstract concept to deal with sums that the clever boffins want answers to but that real numbers won’t let them get there.  Or something.  I just remember seeing i + i = -1.  Scary stuff.  Then they applied it to landing planes.  Big huge planes.  Full of people planes.

Maths quickly takes on an aura of black magic to me.  I can do four basic functions.  With a calculator.  I can even attempt percentages.  With a calculator.  It still means precious little to me.  It just SCARES me.  And that was before it all became make believe.