Blog Action Day is October 15

Getting to yarn, finally and with all due insanity

Visiting a new local yarn store is always like the first time you work out at a new gym. There's no way to know the rules, who is cool with eye contact, and it is always either way too hot or way too cold. Also there is that unshakable feeling that when you leave everyone there will bust out laughing because you have absolutely no chops and oh my gosh how did that loser even find the place.

This irrational fear has only been confirmed in one non-Indiana LYS and zero gyms, but that hasn't stopped me from completely over analyzing the following question, posed to me during a recent first visit:


"What do you knit?"


And this was the first thing the shop manager asked me. Not how long I've been knitting, not what my current projects might be, not even what I was looking for. Is it a nice way of asking all of those sensitive questions? Like, if I said "scarves," she could assume I was a beginner in need of lots of attention and if I said "lace sweaters that I design myself," she would ask me to teach a class? Or is she just addicted to socks like all those cool kids I hear about and assumes that everyone kind of finds their niche? Was she trying to determine how much money I would probably spend? Does a sock-knitter spend less overall than a sweater-knitter?


Of course I was a nervous wreck to begin with, so I just spat out, "Uhhhhh texture... different things with texture," and didn't explain it very well. So that's my next post. A manifesto of all the reasons why texture work is better than color work. Because maybe some LYS employees in Greater Indianapolis will eventually find this blog and not think I am so stupid I should be euthanized.

the big picture

While I was savoring the election this morning, a thought occurred to me. Accusations of all sorts of prejudices have been floating around the media and campaign trails. I wonder, which ones will be judged as valid concerns by history and which ones will be totally embarrassing to talk about with my future grandkids?

Like, was all that scrutiny of Clinton's wardrobe based in social reality or manufactured by a bored and sexist media? Is it acceptable to objectify Palin's body now if she did it first in past pageants? What if there are more than cosmetic concerns involved? (P.S. Thanks to Bryan for that last link.)

How are we going to justify to generations after us that in 2008, a good number of United States citizens and journalists were still so racist that they actually believed that Obama = terrorist business? What's it gonna take to get us to a point where we can laugh at that?

And how about the matter of McCain's remaining life expectancy? Is it ageist or a legit numbers game? Would it be more ageist to bring this up if there weren't concerns about Palin's qualifications?


I suppose we'll see.

It's hard to work I'm so excited but I promise I'm on lunch right now.

The hardest part of being a VISTA for me right now is abiding by the Hatch Act. I committed to this service year completely aware of the financial hardship that comes with it. I was totally willing to deal with the budget realities of the living allowance because I value service and love my community and country. I'm sure there are ways to say that with less fromage, but whatever.

It is freaking killing me to not be able to use this blog to externally process my thoughts about candidates. I am hyped about this election. Just totally stoked. It is a Thing in the Main. (Of course, it can be dangerous to get excited.)

SO! We've been digesting the announcement that Sara Palin is John McCain's running mate around bull pen here at work. My solution is to make some neutral questions out of the more interesting back-and-forth I've been overhearing. I like questions and lists. Don't you?



If Palin was chosen primarily because of her sex, does it mean she's being exploited by her party?

Or should we instead interpret the fact that a woman was judged as the most viable Vice Presidential candidate as progress?

Is it both? Is it possible that even if she was chosen for exploitative reasons, the net result will be positive for feminism?

If former Hilary Clinton supporters flock to McCain based on Palin, does that reflect the state of American feminism or the nastiness of the '08 Democratic primaries?

And I'm sure everyone's talking about this part of it (which is good), but what are the implications of her for the McCain campaign's characterizations of Obama as inexperienced?

Of course, Biden's extensive experience can reasonably be assumed as a factor in Obama's VP choice, so are McCain and Obama both in glass houses when it comes to experience attacks?




We've got more, but I need to sharpen my creativity before I give them a shot. This is fun.

My morale is down.

No, literally. I tried to add my Morale-O-Meter to the side, but I have absolutely no idea what I am doing with html so it was all cut off and strange. (Really? The chick with the totally default blog layout doesn't know her way around html? Crazy.) So it's down at the bottom of the page until I figure it out or find someone who can help me out.

Oh, and using the meter means that I had to sign up for a 43 Things account. The only way I can think to describe 43 Things is as a Turbo-List. We'll see how these sites work out for me. I figure that in six months I will either be a far more productive person or have completely lost my memory.

promises, promises

I need to formally write here what I promised myself about a week ago: I am going to update this more often. At least three times per week. I told myself I would blog more, and then I just wound up spending more time reading blogs. That and installing and obsessively checking Google Analytics. (And guess what? Nobody freakin' reads this when I don't freakin' update! Eesh!)

Anyway, at least some good has come from that because I have a new obsession: Finding crazy ways to collect and visualize data. Seriously, dudes. I love playing with weird data collections like Julia Styles loves acting in Shakespeare remakes.

All hail to Jason Kottke for getting me hooked.

For example:

I dig Name Voyager because at work lately I have spent lots of time preaching the gospel of unobtrusive data. Look at how effective that is!

I've also been playing around with the practical and ethical issues associated with piloting journals as more serious measures of outcome achievement. I figure we can learn at least as much about the girls as we do about the state of blogging about breakups circa 2005 or the current state of online dating. Look!





And personally, if Daytum doesn't get back to me about beta testing soon, I may explode. I am also seriously considering using the free part of this software even though I am fully toilet trained. (Fact of the day!)

tub time!

I got my tub! To explain why this is exciting, I have to back up.

(Elevator Speech Alert!) Most Girls Incorporated affiliates own club locations where girls meet after school or for camp. Because of issues that cropped up in the past few years like new expenses, local schools' new busing rules and gas prices, we at the Indianapolis affiliate closed both club buildings. We now deliver programming through partnerships with local schools, parks, churches, and libraries. Partners within a two-mile radius are grouped into what we call "hubs." The schedules are such that girls can attend school-day programming in one content area during the day, and then perhaps walk to another hub partner after school or on the weekend for different Girls Inc. programming.

In order to expand programming but keep overhead relatively low, we've started using volunteers as program facilitators. Volunteers get these huge storage tubs full of all the information and supplies they need to run program sessions.

To better understand what I am here to evaluate in the first place, I'm leading a school day program this fall. I WAS excited when I started typing this because a coworker brought over the Media Literacy tub for me to use in a program where they needed a last-minute fill-in, but one paragraph in she came back to let me know that they found a different volunteer to take my place. :(

How am I supposed to spend my afternoon now that all those issues of Tiger Beat are gone?