In training...

I love the Olympics. It's like an excuse for me to watch as much sports as I can cram into 2 weeks. I don't know why I enjoy watching sports so much, maybe because I am so unathletic... During the Sydney Olympics I decided that I would be in the Olympics some day*. I told my friend Dawn this and she volunteered to be my trainer. I figured I had time to figure out what event, and decided on Diving. I figured, I like water, I can swim, Diving is largely gravity, right? This became a long running joke for us, with Dawn asking me how my training was going at random intervals.

Sadly, I didn't ever make it to the Olympics. I don't know what went wrong. Maybe it had to do with the fact that I don't really know anything about diving other than the basic dive. Or maybe I just didn't train hard enough at all. Or the fact that I was almost 30 when we had the plan to get to the Olympics.

So, imagine my delight when I saw that the Yarn Harlot was proposing a Knitting Olympics. (I learned how to put buttons over there on the right! Yay me!)(okay, so it's really simple, I just didn't figure it out before).

The rules/guidelines/challenge are all there at that link. Basically you have to cast on for a project during the Opening Ceremonies and be done it before the Closing Ceremonies. The project has to be a challenge for you, but other than that there are no restrictions on the type of project. Sign up by commenting or emailing (again, details at the link).

I plan to try Alice from MagKnits. I haven't done a whole garment with Fair Isle before and it looks sort of vaguely Winter Olympic-y. (Mine won't be red and black, I hope they don't revoke my Canadian Olympic Team watching rights).

I finished Knitty's Blackberry. I'm not 100% sure how I feel about it. It's really cozy but I think I maybe should have used a sturdier yarn. I knit it in Red Heart Cozy Wool (which lives up to it's name. The "Cozy" part. I'm not so sure about the Heart and how Red it might be).


See there at the bottoms, just above the ribbing? It seems a bit stretched out. It seems to be a bit fussy, which is not my favorite thing in my clothing. I love the color though...

I started the sleeves in the cable from the pattern, but I had big gaping spots on cable rows (it was a 6 stitch cable beside a 6 stitch cable). So I changed it to be 4 columns of 4 stitch cables going in opposite directions.


As for the haircut. Well... Let me tell you. (LONG STORY WARNING)

I went by the hair salon and asked if they had time for a walk-in. The woman at the counter hesitantly said "Well. Yes. Okay, come on back." Perhaps I should have left then. I didn't.

First the stylist (I am resisting the urge to put quotation marks around that word) picked up the bottom of my hair and said "It's really dry" with a sneer. (It wasn't, it was just the grown out lighter color hair). Then she said it again. Then she asked me what I wanted, so I said that I wanted the layers cleaned up, and I wanted to keep it fairly long but it could go a bit shorter. I asked her what she thought and she just blinked at me like I had asked her if she could do a quick nose job while she was at it. She said again that it was dry and then she said "Oh, it's really long. You LIKE it long?" (imagine a massive sneer there). I said "Well, yes. I like it long." So then I told her that a friend from work had told me to ask for "chunky layers" but I wasn't sure what she meant. The stylist (again with the not putting the quotations) picked up some of my hair again and finally said "Okay. We can do that."

So she put the gown thing on me and put my seat back to wash it. She turned the water on full blast, aimed it at something in the sink and turned to gossip with the guy cutting hair beside her. I was getting soaked and she didn't seem to notice. Finally she turned back to me and washed my hair. Then she put conditioner on and continued gossipping with the guy beside her (again soaking me). Then my hair got caught on something she had in the sink, so she just pulled it out of my hair.

Then we started the cut. It all started okay. She showed me how much she was going to take off (2 inches off the back at the bottom and about 1 1/2 throughout the layers), and started cutting. It was all going okay until I realized that what she was doing to cut the layers was lifting my hair up as high as her arms would go and then just cutting at whatever point her hands got to. (Did I mention that she was at most 5 feet tall. Did I mention that I am 5'9"?) So she was cutting at the point that she could reach to, which happened to be 3 (THREE) inches from the ends of my hair!!! I didn't realize she was doing this until she had already done this at least twice, so there was no point in saying anything.

When she finished, she asked me if I wanted her to style it. I declined, as it was late and she had been looking at her watch the entire time she was cutting my hair. So, instead of even drying it a little, she said "Okay. You're done." I was too stunned to say anything and figured I would just put it in a ponytail (if there was enough left). As I was putting on my jacket she said "And now you don't need to come back."

Huh? I have been trying to figure out what that meant for several days. I still have no idea.

So, my hair is alot shorter than I had thought it would be, but it isn't "short". I think it will be okay, it looks okay, I think the whole experience was just so startling that it took me a bit to process it.

Did I mention that she rang the charge up at the counter and hovered over me while I used the debit card pad (where it asks how much you want to tip)? Yeah. It was interesting.

*You know I was never serious about making it to the Olympics, right? I mean, if the Canadian Olympic team comes calling and offers me a spot, I'd totally go, but I just don't really know if I can find the discipline for the training...