Not cowed by cowls

I love cowls.  I don’t knit nearly enough of them.  But since I also love lots of other knitted items, I can’t be an exclusive cowl knitter.

I haven’t been able to discover how the  word “cowl” came to be used for the knitted or crocheted item that we know today.

From the dictionary:

The cowl (from the Latin cuculla, meaning “a hood”) is an item of clothing consisting of a long, hooded garment with wide sleeves, worn by monks.   Originally it may have referred simply to the hooded portion of a cloak.

OK, so many knitted cowls can be worn as hoods.  But in today’s fashion it is usually worn more or less loosely around the neck, often as an alternative to a scarf.  It can also be used to describe a type of  neckline on a sweater or coat…  But that doesn’t seem to be reflected in many modern definitions or discussions of the word.

Did you know that the top of Batman’s cape, or the thing that covers his head, is referred to as a cowl?  Not a mask.

 

Cowl is also the name of parts of chimneys, cars, and airplanes…  Yet although the fiber arts definition of cowl is not easily found when researching just the word itself, most images connected with it show our amazing range of knitting and crocheting talents!

I just finished my fourth cowl this year.  Castanho, by Mamã Martinho.  Lots of dropped stitches for a rustic look.   It is meant to be shorter, knit flat and seamed, but I wanted a longer cowl so doubled the cast on and joined to knit in the round.  I tweaked the repeats to fit.

 

The yarn – Winter Flamme by Americo Original – was perfect for the look.  Super soft alpaca & wool, and thick/thin ranging from a heavy sport down to lace weight.

Kidlet is insisting that we share this item.  Hm.

Earlier this year, the Sallah cowl by Bristol Ivy was the ideal pattern to show off the Unique Sheep Verve yarn – I love the pooling!

Interesting knit – the RS and the WS are knit with two different sized needles.  Like wildly different – 3.75mm and 6mm!  Kept me on my toes.  I also love the applied i-cord edge, it smoothed out the edge and was great for hiding the ends when I changed yarn.

My Rainbow Volcano – aka the Lava Flow cowl  by Dixie Norton – was a pattern that had been sitting in my queue for a very long time.  Knitted with Ornaghi Filati Cross, a wool blend.

Simple rib, but those 24-stitch cables can be tricky.

Biggest cowl challenge was a test-knit for leethalknits, Lee Meredith.  The Mikkey cowl uses Lee’s amazing colourwork in a different shape and construction that had me scratching my head for most of the project.

Strips that join up to the body of the cowl…that will match holes knit into the body… and that are later grafted onto the other end of the body…

And it ends up as a fantastic double-looped cowl that can be two loops the same length, or one long and one short…

Oh, and Lee’s adventure KAL project that I’m working on now will also be a cowl.

Because, as I said, I love cowls.

Catch that Cootie! …and knit?

Remember that game we used to play as kids?  Where you fold up a piece of paper in what is actually a traditional origami model, add colours, numbers, names, whatever, then flip the corners back and forth according to a number, or number of letters, until you end up  turning over a flap and learning your fortune, getting a task, or whatever else was written there for you?

The most common names in English for this game seem to be Fortune Teller or Cootie Catcher.  From looking this up, it doesn’t really seem to be a regional thing, as both names are found all over.   I made dozens – if not hundreds – of these throughout my childhood – and I can’t for the life of me remember what on earth we called it.  If anything.  It’s driving me crazy!

It still seems to be very popular, after a history of almost 100 years in English-speaking culture.  Kids are still making them!  They are used as party favours:

One can find hundreds of templates for theme fortune tellers – for birthdays, holidays, weddings.  The Country Chic Cottage has a Dr. Seuss template.

This one has a mandala of the seasons, and on the flip side different meditations:

Amazon has whole books of different cootie catchers

 

Why the sudden interest in a children’s game, you ask?  You didn’t ask?  I’ll tell you anyway.  It’s simple.  The Leethal Adventure Knit Along  2014.  Much much more about this KAL later, but Lee has provided us with a custom-made fortune teller to help randomize the stitch patterns we use in the first section of our project, to make each project truly unique.  Printed out and folded, we got this:

Using various methods in the KAL, we flip away:

Until at last our next stitch pattern is revealed!

It is a lot of fun, and has sparked quite a lively discussion in the KAL group.  So far the names (other than or in addition to cootie catcher or fortune teller) the knitters in the group have for this game are clackers, flutter book, whirlybird, salt cellar, 4 cups, chatterbox or scrunchie (in Australia), consequences (in Britain), Heaven and Hell (in Germany), crow (in Finland), and flea (in Sweden).

The Origami Spirit blog compiled this list a couple of years ago:

• Catalan: cuatre sabates
• Danish: flip-flapper, farveskifter, farvevælger, nip-napper, rap-rapper, spå, spå-maskine”, rip-rapper, lusefanger,  saltkar
• Dutch: knip-knap, peper- en zoutvaatje
• English: fortune teller, cootie catcher, salt cellar, chatterbox, whirlybird
• French: coins-coins, salière
• German: himmel und hölle or himmel oder hölle, salz und Pfeffer
• Greek: Alatiera (Αλατιέρα)
• Hebrew: qua-qua
• Hungarian: sótartó
• Italian: acchiappanaso,  inferno-paradiso
• Polish: niebo-pieklo
• Portuguese: inferno e paradiso, quantos queres
• Spanish: adivinador, sacapiojos, salero, pollito, comecocos, sapito, cielo e infierno, día y noche, piquito, cuatrobocas, cumpleaños, el poto de doña María, juego de la fortuna, aguaderas, estafador de sueños

So…   What do you call it??

I honestly don’t recall if this ever had a name when we played.  Now I guess I have to go search out my childhood friends and see what they remember.

(Well, at least I still remember how to fold it…  There is that.)

Spring, Sprang, Sprung

Spring is being its usual muddled self around here.  Mucky hazy weather, then a heat wave, last night it poured rain and today has been chilly and overcast.  But Spring it is, nevertheless.  I caught this intrepid bud poking its way high into the air yesterday.

Soon it will bloom, as so many flowers are doing, to the sound of the sneezes of hay fever sufferers.  Partner never does well during April.  It used to be that we couldn’t go out into nature for the month because of her hay fever…now it’s that plus my hip.  And I seem to be sneezing lately, too – either I have the seasonal-change sniffles or I am developing a late-blooming allergy. (Pun intended.  So sorry.)

Oh, I checked out the word “freshet”.  You knew I couldn’t let that slide, right?  Seems it means a small flood as a result of heavy rains or spring thaw.  More often spring thaw.  Which makes it appropriate for this time of year.  (Round these parts, that means the run-off of our often lone snow covered Mount Hermon into the Jordan River.)  And the word has actually been used, too, at least in this New Hampshire county in the 19th century:

 So.  Flowers are blooming, and my vocabulary has been enriched.  I wonder if “freshet” is acceptable in Words with Friends, our current scrabble substitute. 

Who’s up for a game?

Freshness

My first post of 2013, and it’s April 1st.   I hang my head in shame.   I have let life overwhelm me.  (Well, that and the fact that my computer died…)  ‘Tis time to take control back.   I will have to balance moving forward with backblogging, there is so much to catch up on.  Knitting.  Reading.  Life.

NaBloPoMo’s theme for April blogging is “Fresh”.  Fresh air and fresh starts.  From the site:

Green fields, yellow daffodils, and red strawberries: spring is here in the Northern Hemisphere, and it brings with it a burst of colour. It’s also a time of fresh starts, hence our theme for this month: FRESH.

Fresh air…   A bit ironic, given that the air pollution and haze is at an all time high here at the moment, and alerts are out for folks with asthma and other respiratory ailments to stay inside.  Visibility is minimal.  Looking across the street from out of my window:

Yuck.  That’s dust and sand there, not fog.  Accompanied by a strong wind.  To quote a favourite detective, pfui.

That aside,  a look to the definitions of fresh.  The American Heritage Dictionary gives us

adj. 

1.  New to one’s experience; not encountered before.

2.  Novel; different: a fresh slant on the problem.

3.  Recently made, produced, or harvested; not stale or spoiled: fresh bread.

4.  Not preserved, as by canning, smoking, or freezing: fresh vegetables.

5.  Not saline or salty: fresh water.

6.  Not yet used or soiled; clean: a fresh sheet of paper.

7.  Free from impurity or pollution; pure: fresh air.

8.  Additional; new: fresh evidence.

9.  Bright and clear; not dull or faded: a fresh memory.

10.  Having the glowing, unspoiled appearance of youth: a fresh complexion.

11.  Untried; inexperienced: fresh recruits.

12.  Having just arrived; straight: fashions fresh from Paris.

13.  Revived or reinvigorated; refreshed: I was fresh as a daisy after the nap.

14.  Fairly strong; brisk: a fresh wind.

15.  Informal Bold and saucy; impudent.

16.  Having recently calved and therefore with milk. Used of a cow.

17.  Slang Excellent; first-rate.

adv.

Recently; newly: fresh out of milk; muffins baked fresh daily.

n.

1.  The early part: the fresh of the day.

2.  A freshet.

 ◊

OK.  Positive for the most part.  I think we can possibly ignore #16.   My favourite is definitely #15.  And I can honestly say that I have never heard or read the word “freshet” in my life.  I can’t even imagine how to use it in a sentence.

So.  A fresh start.  Fresh material.  I’m fresh out of excuses not to come back to what I so love doing…  BLOGGING.

Oh!  And did you know that today, besides being April Fools’ Day in many countries  (Happy April Fools’ Day! Did you get fooled??),  is the start of National Sleep Awareness Month? This month highlights the importance of getting enough sleep and the consequences of sleep loss.

Take a nap every day this month!

Now there’s an idea…

Elen sila lumenn’ omentielvo *

*  A star shines upon the hour of our meeting. – Standard Elvish greeting

I had an acquaintance at university who was a bit of an odd duck.  (OK, many of my acquaintances and friends were and are odd ducks, wanna make something of it?)  He was a tall, thin fellow with a very wispy blond moustache and goatee beard and long hair in a ponytail, and rode his motorcycle everywhere so he was always carrying his helmet (or wearing it – even when not on the bike).  I  am ashamed to admit that I cannot for the life of me remember his name.  What I do remember is that he took his love of anything Tolkein to a new level, and spent endless hours studying the Elvish language, reading, speaking, and writing it.  For a year he wrote me letters in Elvish at least once a week, and left Elvish notes on my dorm room door.  (Alas, when I moved out of the dorm we drifted apart and I rarely saw him except for the occasional coffee/tea on campus.)  Over the year, I began to recognise Elvish words and phrases, although I never mastered the alphabet…and now  that scant knowledge is long gone.  I was pretty fascinated by it, but as a linguistics major I was already juggling studies in alphabets, phonetics, semantics, etc, not to mention researching five languages.   So I didn’t tackle another that I wouldn’t be taking exams for.

I hadn’t thought about this guy for years.  Decades, even.  Until last week. Author and former teacher Stephen D. Rogers has published The Dictionary of Made-Up Languages: From Elvish to Klingon, The Anwa, Reella, Ealray, Yeht (Real) Origins of Invented Lexicons.  

This very cool book  includes thousands of words in more than 100 languages pulled from history (such as 19th century Volapük, Esperanto), literature (like Parseltongue, or Hardic, Osskili, and Kargish from Ursula Leguin’s Tales From Earthsea), and pop culture (Dungeons and Dragons).  There are pronunciation and punctuation guides, numbering systems, as well as must-know conversational terms.   How do you say “Where is the bathroom?” in Klingon?  Or “Open the door!” in Vulcan?  What about “I apologize for this moron” in Avatar’s Na’vi?    Find out here.

This book was clicked onto my wish list so fast I may have scorched the keyboard.

A fun book to peruse, and a great addition to the reference shelf!  A wonderful buni*.

* Gift in asa’pili, as spoken by the people of  bolo’bolo.

Language exerts hidden power, like the moon on the tides.    ~ Rita Mae Brown

Hipster? How deck.

I have knitted the Ironic Hipster hat.  (And I love it.)   I used Hungry Hungry Hipster yarn to do it.  But how hipster am I?  Geek, yes.  Hippie?  Yep, once upon a time.  But hipster?  The term has changed over the decades, yet it’s pretty clear that it describes a very particular phenomenon.  Much has been written about the hipster “subculture”.    Hipster is a state of mind, and also a fashion.  (Anti-fashion fashion?)  And a definite image.

The urban dictionary has a definition:

“Hipsters are a subculture of men and women typically in their 20’s and 30’s that value independent thinking, counter-culture, progressive politics, an appreciation of art and indie-rock, creativity, intelligence, and witty banter.”

(According to this definition, I’m out by virtue of my age, or just not typical.  Which is typical.)

In the 1940s, Jack Kerouac described hipsters as

“rising and roaming America, bumming and hitchhiking everywhere [as] characters of a special spirituality.”

In the 1950s, Norman Mailer wrote of hipsters as

“…American existentialists, living a life surrounded by death — annihilated by atomic war or strangled by social conformity — and electing instead to “divorce [themselves] from society, to exist without roots, to set out on that uncharted journey into the rebellious imperatives of the self.”

Time magazine had an article in 2009 about hipsters:

“Hipsters are the friends who sneer when you cop to liking Coldplay. They’re the people who wear t-shirts silk-screened with quotes from movies you’ve never heard of and the only ones in America who still think Pabst Blue Ribbon is a good beer. They sport cowboy hats and berets and think Kanye West stole their sunglasses. Everything about them is exactingly constructed to give off the vibe that they just don’t care.”

In his 2011 book HipsterMattic, author Matt Granfield described hipster culture this way:

“While mainstream society of the 2000s had been busying itself with reality television, dance music, and locating the whereabouts of Britney Spears’s underpants, an uprising was quietly and conscientiously taking place behind the scenes. Long-forgotten styles of clothing, beer, cigarettes and music were becoming popular again. Retro was cool, the environment was precious and old was the new ‘new’.  Kids wanted to wear Sylvia Plath’s cardigans and Buddy Holly’s glasses — they revelled in the irony of making something so nerdy so cool. They wanted to live sustainably and eat organic gluten-free grains. Above all, they wanted to be recognised for being different — to diverge from the mainstream and carve a cultural niche all for themselves. For this new generation, style wasn’t something you could buy in a department store, it became something you found in a thrift shop, or, ideally, made yourself. The way to be cool wasn’t too look like a television star: it was to look like as though you’d never seen television.”

Whoops!  It seems this last entry is using the wrong terminology.  According to the Hipster Handbook:

It is no longer recommended that one use the term “cool”;  a Hipster would instead say “deck.”

(Yes, there really is a Hipster Handbook.  An oxymoron if I ever saw one.)

And yet… and yet….a true hipster would deny and defy any definition.  As illustrated so well by this handy hipster flowchart posted yesterday on HappyPlace.com  (Thanks, Bev!):

snort

A Doofus and a Geek walked into a bar…

Many times I have defined myself as a geek.  On occasion,  a nerd.  Not a dork.  Definitely not a dweeb.  And I hope that I would never be perceived as a doofus.

Yet I often see these terms used interchangeably.  I don’t know why, they’re not synonyms.   But lots of folks do seem to lump them all together.

I headed over to the Urban Dictionary.

Geek

The people you pick on in high school and wind up working for as an adult.

The term “geek” originally referred to the carnival performers whose act consisted of biting the heads off chickens and eating glass. Over time it came to be applied to anyone who got paid to do work considered odd or bizarre by mainstream society.

The term now enjoys a special status within the technical community, particularly among particularly knowledgeable computer programmers. To identify oneself as a “geek” indicates recognition that most people still consider programming computers to be a bizarre act, along with a certain fierce satisfaction in being very good at their inglorious profession.

That most software geeks now easily earn twice as much as the average laborer just sweetens their defiant embrace of the term.

Note: Unlike the word “nerd,” which is always pejorative, “geek” often carries a positive connotation when used by one of the group. The use of the term by outsiders is considered insulting.

This doesn’t quite fit in with the “Beauty and the Geek” concept…

Nerd

A person who gains pleasure from amassing large quantities of knowledge about subjects often too detailed or complicated for most other people to be bothered with.

An individual who does not conform to society’s beliefs that all people should follow trends and do what their peers do. Often highly intelligent but socially rejected because of their obsession with a given subject, usually computers.

Non-nerds are often scared of nerds, due to their detailed knowledge, and therefore seemingly high levels of intelligence – and subsequently denigrate them as much as possible as often as possible.

Nerds exist covertly within the fabric of society, often choosing to ‘nerd it up’ in private or in the company of fellow nerds. It is for this reason they are feared the most – unlike geeks, who are easily identified, nerds can only be found out when casual conversation reaches a subject that they like nerding.

Is this really negative?

Dork

Dorks are typically more noted for their quirky personality and behavior rather than their interests or IQ which may or may not be on level with traditional geeks or nerds. They tend to be more humorous and extroverted and don’t mind laughing at themselves or with others at themselves, as the case may be.

Someone who does things that are kinda silly and not necessarily cool but often cute.

The character of “Kelso” comes to mind…

Dweeb

An awkward, ineffectual person; specifically connotes physical inadequacy. Often equated with “loser”.

Doofus

Someone who hasn’t got a clue!

They live in blissful ignorance of the world, fashion, personal hygiene and social skills.

Everything all clear now?

If not, the Great White Snark (Geek Life with Bite) has kindly provided us with a Venn Diagram to explain it all.

(Doofus hasn’t even made the scale…)   He also claims that he is a geek, not a nerd, the difference being that he likes Star Wars, but not Star Trek.

Ahem.  I like both.

What about the obsession part?   Can a geek be obsessed with something other than techie stuff?  Can one be a knitting geek?  Or perhaps a knitting nerd is more appropriate?

Elsewhere on the net I found this hierarchy:

Well.

To sum up the above:

To identify oneself as a “geek” indicates recognition that most people still consider [fill in the blank] to be a bizarre act, along with a certain fierce satisfaction in being very good…

[“Nerd”]  An individual who does not conform to society’s beliefs that all people should follow trends and do what their peers do.

 

Being outside the mainstream.   Not being a muggle.

Hey, I can deal with that.

How about you?