Conflict

Woe is me--my hobbies/obsessions are all conflicting with each other.

A couple of weeks ago, it was biking and knitting, when I kept going on bike rides with Kevin instead of going to SnB. Last week and this week, it's rowing and knitting, since I have a boat safety class both Tuesday and Thursday nights both weeks when I'd rather be at SnB. That long run I did on Wednesday would have been much easier if I hadn't already rowed that morning. And over the weekend, I worked on our new dock instead of going to spinning. Then took a nap, watched TV and knit instead of biking... sometimes, my resolution fails me.

The boat safety class is funny--it's the most basic safety class for people who want to sail, use small powerboats, or ride personal watercraft (curse them!), and I'm taking it so I can learn to drive the small power launches the rowing club uses for officials during races. It's a bit like drivers' ed, in the sense that it's not really enough instruction to drive/sail without any other lessons (it's all taught in a classroom, for one thing, and reading the directions for docking is a bit like reading parallel parking directions... you need to actually do it to learn it--fortunately, after the safety class, there will be practice sessions with club members who can already drive a launch). It's also like drives' ed in that one of the main goals seems to be convincing us that boats can be dangerous, and we shouldn't do anything stupid or stop paying attention to what we're doing. So it's valuable, but not thrilling enough that I wouldn't rather be at SnB. Also, I think the class would be significantly improved if another goal were added: teaching everyone who plans to operate a powerboat or personal watercraft on the Housatonic, particularly between 7 and 9 on Saturday mornings, that speeding by the crews to make as much wake as possible isn't as funny as they think, or as impressive (engines are for wimps).

As a result of all these conflicts, my knitting is progressing slowly. I'm inching through a sock (possibly for you, R!) and a shawl, and trying to dash through a birthday gift for my niece. Fortunately, she's only turning one, so there's not much to dash through, because it's not very speedy dashing.

I did manage to dash through some Easter chicks, though, before my athletic hobbies staged a coup d'etat and overthrew my fuzzy hobbies.



(The pattern is called Lil Birdie. Very speedy--each one took an evening of not very focused knitting--and not very yarn intensive--I used scraps.)