I had a full day of good bad luck recently.
The brakes in my car went out while I was driving…
…out of the state car inspection garage.
(Moments later, I’d have been on the highway, instead, I coasted into an uphill parking spot just outside the garage – and still passed the inspection!)
I had many other errands planned that day, but had to wait for a tow truck instead.
But I’d brought some knitting along at the last moment, so I had something to do while waiting.
I’d just downgraded our automobile club membership from the longest towing allowance because we hadn’t used it in years and the yearly fee is much higher now than where we used to be.
But it was still enough towing to get me back to my town.
I didn’t wear a coat when I’d left the house that morning because it was sunny and I would be running in and out of places.
But when I started the long walk home from the garage, it dropped 15 degrees and started snowing.
But I had inexplicably put on walking shoes instead of my usual clogs that morning, so at least my feet were fine.
The garage called to say my entire brake line was rusted out and my car would be in the shop for days.
And N had just left town for a three-day weekend with his.
So I was stranded in the house, which is where I’d normally prefer to be most of the time, but I was unmoored and annoyed to not be able to do the stupid running around crap I’d planned do, so with my thoughts on autos, and mood bend on frustration, I ripped out the van sock and removed the offending skein to overdye it.
I only had violet and yellow food coloring gels and a smattering of stinky drink mix on hand.
I wanted the neon to go away, and I was still going to knit it with the other burgundy/cranberry/orange yarn, so as long as I could turn it into some form of purple or brown, or a favorite of mine, purpley-brown, or at least just all toned the hell down, all would be fine.
I started off with just the violet, but it turned the yarn very dull and almost grey – acceptably muted, but surprisingly unpleasant (I usually like muddy, dull, muted colors). So I jabbed in some yellow and liked that it was heading to a brown. But then for entirely unknown reasons, I tossed in a packet of grape drink mix.
I decided that fake grape is the only drink mix stink I can somewhat, just barely, not quite really, tolerate.
But I got something acceptably purple-ish.
And rinsing the whole shebang was fun – the colors broke in the wash, so at first the rinse water was pink, then cyan, and then green when I remembered to pick up the camera.
There was still some color left in the pot so I tossed in some natural white (not quite cream) roving for shits and giggles.
And it cam out an intense orchid that I would hate to wear alone, but will be a nice occasional addition in a spin.
The yarn came out mildly nasty on its own, and has a bit of that lifeless dullness that comes with food color dyeing…
and you can see the areas I jabbed in the yellow vs. the violet…
but it’s just what this pair of socks needed for me to take off with them again.
(While I’m waiting to get my car out of the shop… and on the water treatment equipment repair guys, and my new tooth, and now possibly the washer repair person or new delivery, and the lumber delivery that we planned before everything else went to hell… this is becoming a helluva expensive month.)
ASTITCHMATISM 