Les Affaires de Coeur: January 2008 Archives

When it comes to sexy yarns, Malabrigo may well be the rockstar to end all rockstars. Purely on touch alone, it would be among the top three, and I include cashmere in that running (if you ask me, sometimes a really velvety merino can feel better than cashmere). But if you add in the amazing colors (and their beautiful, often lyrical, names), well, there's almost no contest.

I have been hunting far and wide (well, as far and wide as the Internet will take me) for the right yarn for the fair Snow White. It is a challenge. It must be affordable, because I am not replete with cash, and because I shall need 740 yards of it. It must not be fussy to work with, because the pattern is going to intimidate me enough as it is. But above all, I think, it must be dreamy; it must have enough allure on its own to keep me encouraged and jazzed, because I have a feeling there will be fits and starts and bouts of discouragement involved, and I really, really, really want to finish this pattern.

Malabrigo is, of course, far too pilly and too dear to use for this. But an alternate merino might be the way to go. Alpaca is out, I think, because I may be slightly allergic to it. Last year, I made a scarf from a blend with just 20% alpaca, and I find that I don't wear it that often, because though it feels soft in my fingers, it also tends to prickle my neck. So merino or merino with a bit of silk in it (if I can find something affordable like that) would be ideal.

I considered Queensland Kathmandu Aran Tweed, but was dissuaded from it by Shan, who was skeptical of the suitability of a tweed for the sleek Snow White (and I think she's right). Also, I read a blogger's review of it, who noted that it has a tendency to stick to itself and be fussy. Not the right sort of behavior for a long-project yarn.

I also considered Knitpicks Swish Superwash Worsted, which is nicely springy to knit with, but I just can't get excited about any of the colors, and I think I need to be excited.

So tomorrow - or more likely Sunday, since my dad is visiting tomorrow - I am gonna do the rounds of the downtown yarn shops. Probably just here, here, and here, since these are the ones in my usual trajectory. Even though the prices are better online, I think I need to see the yarn to feel the love.

Wow, what a completely prosaic and knitting-centered post. Instant passport to Dullsville. And really, I meant to list some other sexy things, but I got all hung up on Malabrigo (and that is what a truly sexy yarn will do to you). But let's continue with the original program for a moment, just to diversify a bit.

Things That Are Sexy, According to Lizbon*

1. Malabrigo
2. Vin Diesel, particularly in Pitch Black
3. dark chocolate, especially in a liquid state
4. Beaujolais in a short round juice glass
5. The color orange, in the right light and circumstances
6. Hot boys on track bikes. Long-legged blonde boys on track bikes get rated extra super sexy and then I have to leave the room for several minutes.
7. Dusk
8. The smell of lavender
9. Cool rain on a warm day
10. Bare feet
11. The smell of sawdust
12. Deep voices, particularly those of men of African descent
13. trombones
14. The freedom to stay up late for no reason other than that I am not ready to be done with my day yet
15. The occasional scary, but not too scary, movie
16. oils
17. The color silver, again in the right lights and under the right circumstances
18. old, soft cotton sheets
19. old, worn leather coats
20. big black boots
21. campfires
22. a good pair of hands

*This is by no means an exhaustive list and is reflective only of what I am thinking at this very moment. Tune in for further installments at irregular intervals.

What makes your list of sexy things? Yarns (in both senses of the word) welcome, of course.

What does it mean, I wonder, that I was so convinced that today was Friday that I actually told a client I'd stop by his office "early next week," when what I meant was "tomorrow or Wednesday"?

It's not that I didn't have a good weekend. I had a really quite swell weekend, in which the forecast changed from "blank grey horizon" to "it's raining men" in the blink of an eye.

Again, I am going to refrain from giving my usual obsessive (or obscene) level of detail because - well, it's private, and this forum ain't - but let's just say there was one point at which I found myself in a crowd of 50 or so men, about half of whom were cute, a quarter of whom were eyeing me in friendly fashion, and one of whom had his arms around me. Sigh. I think I want to live in that bar.

Then I came home to emails from three new guys, and I have a date tomorrow with a fourth who actually comes recommended by a friend. I am looking forward to that. He is really nice on the phone, and has a deep (translation: sexy) voice.

Everybody sing it with me: "It's raining men! Hallelujah, it's raining men!"

The feline princess, of course, is less than pleased with the situation, and is being fussy and demanding and clawing me right on my tattoo (long-ago healed, but I really don't want any claw-mark scars on it, thankyouverymuch). She's also refusing to pose for photos. So that blur up there was the best I could do. Pretty crappy, eh?

But I haven't got a finished knitted object to show you, and I have been very lax about toting cameras with me the last few months, so 'twill have to do. Must remedy that soon. After the date(s). And all that rain. ("Every time it rains, it rains pennies from heaven.")

I hate to post without a little eye-candy for you, but I haven't managed to get my camera out in the daylight in a while, and the cat refused to sit still for long enough to let the autofocus do its thang, so here we are. It's Tuesday night, I am washing woolens in the sink, I had dinner with friends, I watched a parade of cute boys walk and cycle down the streets outside the bar, I drank one Guinness. I came home.

I called Boywich and discovered he's off to vegas to meet with a woman he expects to sleep with. I suppose that is the proper place to do that, particularly since she will be cheating on a spouse. But it is a depressing sort of thing to hear about when one has spent the evening watching boys who are not particularly watching me - or if they are watching, are not doing anything other than look. And then there is the whole lack of boy email and nothing doing on the online profiles, and while it is all very good for knitting, it is not very good for the ego and general outlook on life.

And then I think, I oughtn't to complain, since some people have real problems on their plates at the moment. But there you have it - this is my blog, and that is what is on my mind.

My hands smell like Kookaburra, which I always want to call Eucalan because it is so redolent of eucalyptus.

I got an interesting email today from the fair Juno speculating that the older we get, the more flexible our possible relationships with people are. And though I wrote back to her that I think I was more flexible about such things when I was in college (when everybody seemed to sleep with friends and think nothing of it), I now think that maybe I was too hasty to brush that notion aside. I am certainly more willing to entertain a larger spectrum of involvement than I once used to.

I put it down to having developed my own notions of what I want from a man (in my case), rather than operating entirely on received expectations about what love is, means, and ought to give me.

I realize I am being exceptionally wordy, even for me, and I suppose it is because I am finding this hard to describe. Perhaps some specificity would help. I no longer expect - or even want - to find one true love whom I will marry and live Happily Ever After with. And yet, I used to imagine that was what I wanted - and perhaps would even find, eventually.

Of course, experience has shown me that men who are even approximate matches for me don't grow thick on the ground. Okay, they don't exist at all. Don't get that sad little pity face on, now. I am not bemoaning this, believe it or not. At the moment, all I really want is some chemistry, some fun, some playfulness, some exuberance, with someone who is trustworthy and yet daring enough to be the right sort of playmate for me. I have plenty of soulmates to keep me company, and they are called friends.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, our heroine was making technicolor soup (that photo is completely unretouched), sitting on the couch with a sleeping kitten, and watching a lot of MASH reruns. Oh, that Alan Alda. I can never decide whether in his youth, in that role, he belongs on the list.

Carl Lumbly, though, he's a definite.

After two weeks off from work, I find that instead of feeling recharged, I am feeling like I need another two weeks. I recently met some Australians who were in the middle of a month-long tour (or maybe it was three weeks) of the US, and who have done similarly long trips to various corners of Europe in the past few years. And it made me realize how stupid I have been.

I quit my day job some years ago, in part, to have greater control over how I spend my time, and I've been completely squandering that control for the last year. I have gone nowhere and done nothing. Sure, I have been somewhat hemmed in by financial pressures and the fact that I haven't had a traveling buddy available when I did have the money and/or time. But really, there is no earthly reason why 2007 should have passed me by without my taking a single vacation. I am the boss of me, and I have not given myself the breaks I needed. Periods of unemployment (also called looking for new gigs) do not, unfortunately, have the same psychological effect as actual time off. I know that in theory, but I forgot to put it into practice.

Or rather, every time I considered doing so, a gig came up that was too good to turn down. For which I am duly grateful.

Enh. What a boring-ass topic for a blog post. I have another one in mind, but it is one of those personal things, and it has to do with boys, and it was brought on by having gone on another date and ending up feeling lukewarm afterward.

Which all made me realize that there's a very good reason I have been hung up on the blonde. I felt passion for him. Actual real live impossible to resist or even think clearly about passion. And that, my friends, has not come along very often in my life. Really altogether rarely. So rarely that it makes me sad just thinking about it.

I think that I have, in the past, settled for something that seemed sort of nice at the time, or that I fell into. Like a hole. One should not be describing past loves as sinkholes. (Don't take that turn of phrase personally, Boywich, please. You know what we had, and there was a lot of it that was good.)

Anyway. Back to the passion. Having had an all-too-brief taste of that recently, I find myself unwilling to settle for anything other than a repeat. It's ineffable, and impossible to tell by looking at photos or reading online profiles, or exchanging emails, or even talking on the phone. And I wasn't even sure about the blonde when I first met him. After the first date, I thought, well that was fun, and I'd see him again. But I didn't know if there'd be chemistry. And then the second date, I felt like I'd been hit over the head by a flaming ton of bricks.

Yeah, that's what I want. Bring on the flaming ton of bricks. Stat!

My usually healthy lifestyle seems to have left me unprepared to handle a week of nefarious debauchery. In other words, I have been one hungover puppy, especially today. I went to a party last night, and after some ungodly quantity of wine, I barely made it home without making a public nuisance of myself. (No, I did not lose my dinner on the subway, but that was primarily through sheer force of will.)

Today I was supposed to swim. I was supposed to run some errands. I was supposed to do something fun with my remaining vacation day. Instead I spent the whole time moaning and groaning, holding my head, trying first one hangover remedy, then another, and wondering why in hell it was taking me so long to return to equilibrium. All I can say is, I am perhaps too old for this. Or too accustomed to taking good care of myself to tolerate its opposite for too long.

In any case, at 10pm, I still feel yucky.

On the other hand, I had a lovely time dining with my stepsister this evening, and I feel absolutely no pining for something more fabulous to do for the rest of the night other than what I am currently doing: watching Stargate Atlantis and knitting these here brighter-than-bright mittens for Miz Fury.

Stepsis and I had a nice, and rather helpful, conversation about the rigors of dating NYC men. There were some eerie parallels between her own recent experience and my time with the tantalizing, yet perplexing, blonde. It was, in truth, delightful to have someone to commiserate with. My other friends are either in long relationships or not currently wanting to date, which is, perhaps, why the subject ends up taking up so much space on the blog. I mean, it's not that I can't talk to my friends about it - I do and I can, and Annabelle is particularly sympathetic. But it's a different sort of conversation when you're both having the same kind of experience at the same time. You do more than sympathize; you relate.

So there was that.

In other news, I think I have some post-holiday blues going on. Chalk it up to a couple of recent letdowns in the boyz in the 'hood department, and the fact that I now have to scale back on all the irresponsible spending I've been enjoying for the past few months, and, oh I dunno, the fact that I haven't been able to run very much lately because one of my legs hurts, and when I went to the doctor, she said, "If your leg hurts when you run, stop running," just like that horrible old joke. Bitch, bitch, moan, complain. Here cometh the long slow slog into spring, in other words. Wish I had a fireplace to cheer up the joint.

Eleventy zillion glasses of champagne, a New Year's Day stroll through Chinatown, an impromptu birthday party, and a solitary sixty-block hike (I needed a walk after all that booze and food) later, here I am with Sex and the City and a floor-sprawling kitty.

It was all pretty fun. I called Boywich all drunk and flirty at about 5 am. I got a very good fortune at a Buddhist temple. I bought some pretty printed silk lipstick cases. I came home and marveled at the fact that, 4 hours later, I am still kind of tipsy. (It was really, really good champagne.)

I have to admit, though, that last night I kept looking around at every tallish male to see if the blonde had walked in. And I was disappointed not to see him.

I guess I miss having a playmate. And this dating thing takes some getting used to. I was talking to Miz Fury about it the other day, and she said she'd felt much the same way when she began dating again after a long absence from it: very up and down. One gets surprisingly discouraged, given that these are people one doesn't really know at all.

And one tends to go on and on about it on one's blog, until one's readers are ready to go off and read anything else: a fashionista blog, a straight-knitting-and-crocheting blog, a news blog. Anything.

So instead I'll tell you about the trees I saw on my walk. I don't think it was just the champagne bubbles still flitting around in my head that made it special...there was a small double-row of naked-limbed trees strung with little white lights (which always look yellow to me, in the dark), and I stood at one end of it, looking into them. I squinted and let my eyes blur, and they became an uneven sea of yellow stars, like sparks jumping out of a campfire.

And then I was looking into a galaxy, and hoping/feeling that maybe this is what I will see when I die. It was lovely, and I was aware of looking, perhaps, like a small poetic figure there on Third Ave., with no one around to see it. I guess what I would like is to have someone around to see those kinds of things. That's all I really want. And a (cholesterol-free) cookie.