Tosh Merino Light and the Three Hours I'll Never Get Back

Look everyone! It's a blog Laura wrote back on June 26th and forgot to post! It just sat there all lonely in draft form for all this time. Let's read it, shall we?

A few weeks ago, Rachael came to knit night with a bag of yarn. Upon setting down her knitting, she pulled out two hanks of yarn and handed them to me.

I was immediately paralyzed by their beauty. Struck speechless, I gazed at them longingly until the other knitters around me forced me to relinquish my--Rachael's--Precious(es).

One was Madelinetosh Tosh Merino Light, in this color (I think).

The other was Three Irish Girls. Rachael had bought that after being asked to test-knit a sweater. But she was concerned that the sweater would need to be finished before the yarn would arrive, so she made other yarn arrangements. This was what she sent me (I found the exact quote) via Ravelry mail:

Anyway, in the “probably not a possibility because it would take to long to arrive” category, we have the Three Irish Girls, which I may buy anyway because it’s too stinking lovely. http://www.threeirishgirls.com/catalog.php?item=231

I had followed the link, oohed and ahhed over The Pretty, then promptly forgotten my examination of it.

When Rachael handed it to me, I fell in love with the sheer perfection. I vowed to buy Three Irish Girls yarn, because it was so perfect.

Then she told me she'd use her Powers for Good to find me Tosh Merino Light on Etsy, so I became hugely distracted.

A mere day later, she'd found me TML, and it was coming. Then it came, and we terrified the Muggles (non-knitters) by winding yarn into center-pull little yarn cakes at the coffee shop, and I tried to photograph them but failed due to a missing SD card. And it would have made such a funny picture.

That night, I went home and planned to wind all four hanks of my TML into balls. It didn't work out that way.

This is what three hours looks like:


Yeah. I said three.

There were tangles, knots, snarls, and Problems. But I ended the night with a lovely yarn cake and a new understanding of Life. One becomes philosophical after two hours of winding the same hank of yarn. After three, sharp objects should be removed from the area.

Luckily, Paul spent some of the time I was winding on YouTube, and he found me some absurd videos to make my mood...lighter.

*WARNING: TANGENT ALERT*

Here is the first:



I don't even know what to say about that. Except that he has a fly on his forehead, and should have swatted it away prior to filming...clearly they weren't too worried about doing more than one take while filming that movie. Trolls 2, if you were wondering. Because Trolls 1 wasn't bad enough.

Next up was this:



This was much funnier at 2:00 a.m.

And this:



This is listed on YouTube as both the "Worst Movie Fight Scene Ever" and "Best Fight Scene Ever." It is the worst. I will warn you, only watch the first half. When the woman walks in to fight with her arm in a sling, it becomes very gross. Very. Gross. The words "Catastrophic Blindness" come to mind, as does the phrase, "It's all fun and games until somebody loses both eyes."

I'm making you link over to the clip so you don't accidentally watch the whole thing. Don't do it. Stop when Sling Girl walks in.

And then we saw this, which is famous for being the worst TV fight scene ever.



When Paul and I spend time together, we watch horrible fight scenes, soccer accidents, and stupid anime moments, like this one.



*TANGENT ENDED*

Okay. Done with the clips. After watching these, Paul went to sleep, and I couldn't because there was yarn everywhere.

The next day, I did the rest of the winding, and it took a grand total of 30 minutes for the other three hanks.

This is what ten minutes looks like:


And here are more gratuitous shots of my yarn, TML in the Calligraphy colorway.





All the pretty yarn made me want more pretty yarn. But instead of buying the Three Irish Girls yarn, I waited. I didn't need two sweaters-worth of fantastic beautiful awesome yarn, did I? No. I could do without.

But then I found myself driving home with the pattern book I'd wanted AND the yarn to knit the tank top I'd wanted to knit from it. This was due to yarn fumes.

I knitted away on the tank top, certain now more than ever that I didn't need MORE yarn. I had plenty.

But then I thought about the Three Irish Girls. Then I walked through a yarn store and saw myself walking out with even more yarn. I fled the store. I decided in that moment that the Wise Choice would be to get the yarn I was craving, so I wouldn't keep buying Substitute Yarn.

I went online, found the website, looked at colorways. I was so happy. I asked Rachael what weight she'd gotten. I planned on the same weight, you see.

Filled with glee, I scrolled through the color choices. I looked at pictures on Ravelry, I had a happy time. It was wonderful. Then I picked.

The exact same colorway Rachael had chosen.

Of course, this is after the Malabrigo Lace incident and the We're Knitting the Same Pattern Incidents 1, 2, and...I'm pretty sure we're up to 3 now? Maybe. The Malabrigo Lace Incident could also be referred to as the Same Sweater Incident, except that neither of us has even started knitting the geodesic cardigan, and therefore we don't have same-sweaters quite yet.

I have come to a conclusion. Actually, several.

1. This freakish tendency has nothing to do with either of us intentionally going out and saying, "I want my sweater to be just like so-and-so's" and everything to do with the fact that, for two very different people, Rachael and I like a great deal of the same things. Like books. And yarn. And styles of clothing. This is a good thing, because we always have someone to tell us what is the best new whatsit and where we can find it. It has to do with us being Awesome People with Really Good Taste.

2. If, by chance, Rachael and I ever are divided by time, we can rest easy, knowing that when we retire, all we'll need to do is look across the retirement home's common room and we'll see that we've each chosen the same place to spend our sunset years, independently. It's bound to happen. And whatever retirement home it is, it will be Yarn Adjacent.