Knit One, Purr Too

What lurks below

I have determined that there are invisible creatures out there who lurk in the homes of knitters. Specifically, they lurk in the homes of knitters who do cables. And their sole purpose in life is to lie in wait until the knitter has done a significant enough amount of a particular cable that it would be extremely inconvenient to have to rip it back, and then they strike. When the knitter is distracted - by cats or the need for food or a particularly gripping moment on Lost, for example - the creatures creep out of their hiding places and rearrange the cabled stitches, all the while cackling evilly in a range too high for the human ear to hear. And suddenly, without warning, the knitter will look down at what she has been working on, which seemed to be turning out perfectly fine for the past 30 rows or so, and realize that something went horribly wrong. And these creatures never make tiny little errors - the type that you might be able to cover up with duplicate stitch, or by claiming that it is a design feature. No, they delight in great big obvious errors - the sort that any idiot should have seen within a row or two of them occurring, instead of waiting thirty two rows to be noticed.

There may be swearing. Oh yes. And there may be moments when the knitter has to put the cabled work aside and walk away to avoid flinging it across the room (to the utter disappointment of the wool-eating cats). But the clever knitter does not give these nasty little creatures the benefit of sinking into sobs of dispair. No, the clever and resourceful knitter heaves a big sigh of determination, resolutely rips out huge sections of her hard work, and declares that redoing it is better because she can now add something even better, like being able to mirror the outer cables, or add that extra selvedge stitch she had been thinking would have been a good idea if only she'd thought about it sooner.

Or in other words, progress on the FLAK cardigan has been coming along well (back and front sections only need a few more rows each before I can start the sleeves), but it has not been without a few stumbles along the way.