A shiver of fear ran down my spine when I saw this picture on menwhoknit.com. This handsome fellow is my SOCK WARS assassin!

What is my sock killer doing in MY town? Has he come to kill me in person?

And to think… I’m headed up to his town at the end of the month.

Quick, get this man a sweater pattern so he’s not knitting my death socks.

Finally, I’m getting around to posting these pictures. It’s hard working 10-12 hours a day, commuting, knitting obsessively and walking the dog.

Thank you, Yarn Monkey, for putting Sock Wars together. So far, I’ve made it through the first round. The pattern was a joy to knit and the gauge and DK yarn make it a speedy knit. A pair of socks under a week? We’ll see if I slow down once I get my target’s next target’s socks.

I know who my killer is from his listing on MenWhoKnit.com. No word on his progress. Brother, why can’t we all just get along?

Tonight I graft the first toe and rally down the cuff. I have a long train ride home, the boyfriend’s out at a meeting and I plan on killing you by Wednesday morning… to arrive in MN by Friday.

I realize I may die trying, but I wanted to thank you for being my first target. Assassination is more fun than I thought it would be.

Your Killer

First pair, first sock. Gotta go finish it so I can start #2.

Janie Sparkles would kill for that sock.

Don’t want to be killed without first killing.

I’ve just turned the heel and started the gusset on my first killer sock for Sock Wars. Didn’t get yarn until this afternoon. I even swatched a few inches to be sure I got gauge on 5s. My target’s socks should be in the mail by Tuesday at the latest. I wonder how my killer is doing.

On Friday, my only knitting accomplishment was writing about it. I spent the morning and early afternoon struggling with my work computer, the VPN and trying to map the network so I could clean out my inbox. Alas.

Photos to follow of killer sock progress, Betsy’s sleeves and the massive stash of yarn she gave me to finish the sweater, the remaining clog. If my hands start hurting, If you’re lucky, I’ll try to get a pic or two from Folsom.

…means a day of knitting?

Two years later and I’m still in love with the sticks and the strings and the sticthes. It’s what I look forward to doing whenever I have a moment. If I had the money, I’d buy tickets for long international plane flights, just so I could have uninterrupted hours of fiber joy.

Two stitches or two hours, it’s all good. For the first time, I’ve found something that is about the process, or the journey, not the finished product. Obviously, there’s some enjoyment derived from training for my athletic stuff, but usually, it’s about the competition or the bragging afterwards. I’m not a natural athlete. I’m quite content sitting on the couch, never running a step, pushing a pedal, swimming a lap, moving through poses, bending deeper, or lifting a heavy object. Ballet, skateboarding, acting, academics, art and such have come and gone. Knitting is something I crave. The passion is deeply rooted in my heart. I wouldn’t want to try to earn money by the act of knitting, but I’d love to dedicate all my hours at work to it.

Today, I’m finally taking a Friday off. We have an 80 hours in 9 days schedule at work that allows you to take a three-day weekend every other week. I’ve been working throught them lately. Although I brought my laptop home, I don’t NEED to do any work this weekend. I will sort through archived email, but that’s not going to be the focus of my weekend. Between swim practice, getting my car checked out, researching a new car (hybrid or biodiesel?), working at Folsom Street Fair (leather-clad flesh behind that link), and working the Massive Attack/DJ Shadow show tonight, I plan on some hardcore knitting time.

Although the Trek-a-long was a bust blog-wise (though I love the resulting socks), I’m giving it another go with Sock Wars. Let’s hope that I figure out a means to post more photos. As I’m awaiting the pattern (to be sent today), I could use my time off to shoot last weekend’s knitting bonanza. Stay tuned…

No offense, Jesse/Yarnboy, but at first, I didn’t appreciate the beauty and simplicity of Halfdome. Now, with two under my belt, I’d like to thank you for a great-looking, speedy and soft addition to my repertoire. Heck, I want to shave my own head just to enjoy one myself!

Intitally, I thought I didn’t need anyone’s pattern for a hat. Hats are simple enough, especially a stockinette roll-edge cap. That said, I did pause to glance at the pattern, as I always want to support my knitting bretheren—and a local one at that! Seeing that it was knit on 5’s, I moved it below the many other items on my to-be knitted list after I finished all the other works in progress, as well as knit through my entire stash.

That said, a friend’s break-up inspired me to take another look at Halfdome. At least once a week, my manfriend and I eat at Walzwerk, a kitchy and tasty East German restaurant, just a few blocks from our place. Our favorite waiter—yes, bald—was lamenting the end of his long-distance relationship with a fellow in Atlanta. I felt compelled to give him the literal warmth that Halfdome can provide.

Earlier that day, I read Jesse’s post about Sean/Woolgatherer’s trial and error of knitting Halfdome in the round. I revisited Knitty and started thinking about the yarn… I’d never knit with a cashmere blend before. You can see where this is going, right?

So, on Saturday, it was off to Urban Knitting Studio after swim practice. With gift certificate in hand, I bought four balls of Rowan’s version of a merino/microfiber/cashmere blend and cast on that afternoon. Sunday night, the last stitches were knit and ends woven in at breakfast Monday AM. It was so enjoyable that while still in-progress, instead of wisely knitting through the skeins upon skeins of to-be-knit yarn, I bopped over to ImagiKnit to grab some of the recommended yarn… because I didn’t have enough color choice in the Rowan.

One week later, the manfriend has a simple black and silver on. The waiter, who has been in Atlanta on a previously scheduled visit, has yet to receive his blue and charcoal. And, I’m trying to stop from knitting one for myself, say, orange and charcoal with a pinstripe of blue and silver?

Finally, I’ve gotten ’round to uploading photos of my shades of gray Trekking XXL socks. These guys were started back in June and finished by the end of July.

Sadly, I missed the outdoorsy point of this knitalong – trekking outside whilst knitting. Most of the trekking done while knitting these wasn’t traditional hiking—it was mostly the urban variety. They did do a fair amount of traveling, from following me camping at Bonnaroo music festival in Tennessee to being finished in downtown Chicago while swimming at the Gay Games.

Based off of Cat Bordhi’s simple sock pattern in Socks Soar on Two Needles, I knit them on a single needle. Instead of a fabulous braid, I went with a simple x-o cable, since I’d never knit one. There will be other socks in the future. As I posted previously, my experience with the magic loop wasn’t the greatest. I blame that on the joins of the needles.

It was great meeting a new yarn, as well as cementing my interest in the simple round-and-round meditation of socks. I’m almost finished another pair (orange split-toe Mega Boots Stretch). And, just in time for the fall, I’ve already bought another ball of Trekking XXL, in the rather woodsy greens and brown of color #69. Not to worry, I also bought a new #1 Addi-Turbo, too.

Much knitting done this weekend—both the act of and the shopping for. Get ready for recaps of my Trekking XXL socks and a fast and furious Halfdome. Photos are forthcoming as well.

One of the reasons I don’t write here often is the misguided impression that I should limit my posts to just knitting. Along with that, I judge my photo-less posts as inferior to those with pretty pictures. Therefore, my precious few loyal readers have an erratic and inconsistent document of my going-ons. For that I apologize. I’m sure something is better than nothing. Heck, some of my favorite reads, knitting and otherwise are text-only. With that, I’m giving hizknits.com permission to contain more non-knitting stuff and photos will be a bonus, not a manditory.

It’s been a week since my return from Canardia (silly joke from last year’s Poland trip). My thoughts are no more collected, nor are my (by which I mean Chris’–link doesn’t show swim pix) photos sorted. I realize that life’s just going to keep chugging on, whether I compose witty words to describe it or not. I am caught up in hanging with the puppy (sometimes even in bed!).

The best sporting part of Montreal was deciding to swim a solo. I went planning just to swim a duet. When I originally signed up, I did so as a solo, as it looked like no one else from my team was going, since we agreed to swim at the Gay Games in Chicago. There, I swam a team of 6 and a trio. One third of our trio happened to be from Montreal, so she decided to visit her family and we became a two-some. They still had me down for a solo as well, so all it took was some friendly support to convince me to swim alone. In a competition. For my first time. Ever.

I spent a couple of hours today editing all the video onto a DVD for our team meeting tomorrow night. If you beg nicely, I could be convinced to edit a few short movies together and toss them up on YouTube. How badly do you want to see me in a Speedo with pointed toes?

Beyond the sporty stuff. hanging with people was the best part of the two weeks away. Swimmers from Quebec, Paris, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Toronto, and even Sacramento, not to mention the Canadian National Team! My sister and her new girlfriend. A long-lost friend from college and his boyfriend. My duet partners mom and her many draq queen friends. A co-worker’s recent friend and the source of the best eating recommendations in all of Montreal. A fellow knitter and his fellow, Nigel (who commented on my last post) and Geordie (father of knit designer Holly), who we followed to Quebec City.

Knitting-wise, I finished the last sock for the Trek-Along while in Chicago. I’ve worn the socks twice, and they are so much softer after washing. I’ll definitely be buying some more of that yarn. The sock that I was knitting coming out of the the Metro when spotted by Nigel is finished, and I’m well into the foot of its brother. It’s a simple sock with the split toe from Knitty.com’s latest issue, no intarsia or mock-button back. No need to design one myself, now. We’ll see how that yarn (Lana Grossa’s Mega Boots Stretch in orange with green and maroon varigation) wears. I don’t like the toe-up sock for one reason alone: the cast-off edge of the cuff is too tight, no matter how large a needle and suspended cast-off method. No need to design my own, Tricky.

One sunny day, I’ll get around to photographing a bunch of stuff. There’s still the Artfibers Mammoth raglan sweater that needs a collar and to be sewn together. Speaking of things that need to be finished, the cycling aran I made still needs a zipper, but remains one of my favorite things I’ve made. (Micah, I used a Rowanspun Chunky found on ebay.com.)

That’s all for this Sunday evening. I was supposed to do some work for my day job, but it was so much more fun writing to you. Hopefully, more words and pictures to come.