Yesterday’s visit to the halls of jurisprudence was at the same time, quite dull and quite interesting. Although I was not among the impaneled and got to leave early, watching the process up-close-and-personal was enlightening. I metthree other knitters among those waiting in the jury pool, and got lots of edging done in the hours I sat there:

Two of the people I chatted with were quite nice. Both were women who had knit years ago and who were thinking of getting back into it after reading that the hobby has grown in popularity. Both mentioned "fancy scarf yarn," so I’m guessing that the scarf craze hasn’t exhausted the pool of late adopters yet.

The third was a pain, a pest, an annoyance, and I spent part of the morning trying to dodge her. The problem was that she insisted that what I was doing couldn’t be knitting. It was crochet because it was white, lacy looking, had holes, and wasn’t being worked on long needles with buttons at the ends (I was using two DPNs). After all, everyone knows there’s no such thing as knitted lace.

She wandered over and gushed a bit. I kept working, giving short but (mostly) patient answers. "Gorgeous crochet!"
"Thank you. It’s knitting, not crochet."
"It can’t be. It’s crochet. I can tell."
"Sorry. As you can see, I’m knitting."
"Thats not knitting. I know knitting and you aren’t doing that.
You’re making holes. You NEVER make holes in knitting.
It’s wrong. This is crochet. Don’t tell me what I know."

This went on and on, all in a voice that the entire room could hear. I excused myself, picked up and resettled in another waiting room. After a little while my tormenter followed, commencing whereshe left off. I moved again. She followed. I was ever so grateful when they announced the lunch break. I watched to make sure she left the building, then popped down to the cafeteria for a stale tuna sandwich and a half-hour of relative quiet.

On the edging, I’m about 85% sure that I won’t run out of yarn. I’m also not entirely pleased with the two corners. I did try to miter them, but wasn’t able to manage it in the face of constant interruption. They are more or less symmetrical in stitch count and pattern iteration, but they look clunky to me. I’m also not entirely sure that this project will be successful enough to make it to the write-me-up-for-wiseNeedle stage, or to deserve a name other than its current generic descriptor. So it goes.

If any lace mavens out there can offer up advice (or sympathy for ripping back), I’ll listen with eyes wide.