Monday, November 16, 2009

A tale of two needles

Sometimes I am too smart for my own good.

On Friday, Tom delivered my KnitPicks order (yes, I do know my Canada Post Parcel Delivery Friend by name - doesn't everyone?), releasing me at last from my Addi Clicks and their not-sharp-enough points.

But I didn't have time to change to my new Harmony needles before leaving the house on Saturday, so I stuffed them into my knitting bag and switched over on the road. When I got to a series of decreases, it occurred to me that having both sets meant I could do a less inconvenient version of Magic Loop once I had too few stitches for just one circular needle:



I was feeling a little less clever about this fix when things bogged down, Saturday night, while I watched Saboteur. It took me almost the whole movie to accept that I needed actual dpns to finish my project, and then I cursed and rummaged for a while in the needle stash to piece together a too-long set of 4 metal and 2 plastic ones.

SO depressing. And how is it that with all my ridiculous numbers of needles, I don't have a proper 4mm set?

As it turns out, I do. I bought them last July; they are beautiful and I adore them and just last week I put them into the knitting bag specifically for the decreases in question. And somehow I managed to forget they even existed until I was unpacking said bag, at midnight.

I must really need more sleep.


* Sadly, I am less in love with the Harmony interchangeable set than I anticipated. I know that KnitPicks, being wonderful, will replace my defective cord without question, and I know I can tighten the tips to keep that one side from constantly unscrewing itself, and they really are more seamless and sharply-pointed than my Addi Clicks, but... the cord is just not as flexible as the Addis, and I'm spoiled. I think I might have to save up and buy a few more Addi Lace circulars in fixed-length form.

2 comments:

Kathleen Taylor said...

I wonder if the Knit Picks fixed-length circs are more flexible. I don't care for interchangeables, so I don't have any. But I do have Addi and KP circs, and find the KP cables to be nicely flexible- and not different from Addis.

Mary Keenan said...

I was thinking too that heating them might help a bit - but when you try the pinch and pull-between-the-stitches thing for Magic Loop with what I've got, wow, the Addis are easier! Fortunately such a situation does not often arise, especially if you remember the dpns parked safely in the needle tube at the bottom of the bag...