Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Stitching my way through college...

One advantage to attending school online is that I can knit during the lecture and no one knows. Better yet, I can attend the lecture via recorded session and pause and back up if I missed taking a note because my hands were busy with yarn and needles. The disadvantage is that I must post 12 times a week to discussion threads (3 times per week per thread x 2 threads per class x 2 classes in a full time load = 12) and, unfortunately, "HI, I'm working on a pair of socks for myself made of Tofutsies 2 at a time on size 4 circ" does not count as a quality post. Go figure. Somehow I must find a way to express knitting and crocheting in ways that apply to statistical probability equations or programming logic pseudocode in order to get points for the post. Let's see - the probability that I will finish the socks before I complete the degree taking into consideration that I spend 15x more minutes studying and completing assignments than stitching is _____. That would be 1/10E5, I think. The probability that I will drop stitches due to trying to type and knit at the same time is ______. 99/100 is my guess. And so on. The pseudocode might be easier:

start
define variables
num needleSize
char yarnBrand
num castOn
num knitStitch
num purlStitch
....

on and on. I could finish the socks before I finish the code at this rate. I've knit to the instep (toe-up) and I refuse to let the fact that I only got this far because hurricane Ike hit and knocked the power out for 3 days. No power = no school. The make-up for those 3 days has been a pinch, though. Kids in the area missed 7 days of school (some still aren't back on campus) and DD thought that was a hoot until I explained to her that by law she must attend x days of school each year and those 7 days would come out of in service days, summer and other holidays. Talk about a burst bubble!

Okay, quick list and then I must study more:
crochet dishcloth (ugh! that sounds so boring) worked while electricity was out last week
knit homeless hat, navy , top down - the only way I knit hats now - finished Monday
toe-up Tofutsies socks for ME - at the instep, not expected to complete by Christmas
Charity Log Cabin Blanket (K) "Victoria" - in the mail
Charity Log Cabin Blanket (K) "Pat" - in progress
Embroidery (machine) emblems on polo shirts for Guatemalan school - in progress
Pocketbook slippers for Mom - not started, but the yarn is wound for doubling.

That's about all I can stand to look at right now. Of course there are many more projects lying about, patiently awaiting my degree, but I just cannot stand to look at all of them right now.