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A Plain Sock By Itself Is Terribly Boring, But It Could Score Points By Having A Clever Stitch Pattern, Or Maybe By Being Made Out Of A Very Beautiful Yarn That's An Enchantment To Work With. (sadly, It Is Still Infuriatingly True That Being Beautiful Without Being Clever Is Almost Worth More Points Than Being Clever Without Being Beautiful, But Such Are The Rules Of Life And Knitting-they Are Cruel, But There Anyway).

-Stephanie Pearl-McPhee

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A Plain Sock By

Stephanie Pearl-McPhee

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A Plain Sock By Itself Is Terribly Boring, But It Could Score Points By Having A Clever Stitch Pattern, Or Maybe By Being Made Out Of A Very Beautiful Yarn That's An Enchantment To Work With. (sadly, It Is Still Infuriatingly True That Being Beautiful Without Being Clever Is Almost Worth More Points Than Being Clever Without Being Beautiful, But Such Are The Rules Of Life And Knitting-they Are Cruel, But There Anyway).

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In The Nineteeth Century, Knitting Was Prescribed To Women As A Cure For Nervousness And Hysteria. Many New Knitters Find This Sort Of Hard To Believe Because, Until You Get Good At It, Knitting Seems To Cause Those Ailments. The Twitch Above My Right Eye Will Disappear With Knitting Practice.

When People See Me Knitting, I Tell Them I'm A Knitter. Not The Sort Of Knitter They May Have Run Into Before, But A Passionate, Constant, Deliberate Knitter. I Knit Everyday, All The Time, Everywhere I Go.

...the Number One Reason Knitters Knit Is Because They Are So Smart That They Need Knitting To Make Boring Things Interesting.

With Great Effort Comes Great Gratification.

You Know You Knit Too Much When ... You Will Check Out A Book From The Library Just Because You Heard That One Of The Characters Knits.

I Do Know That There Isn't Ever Going To Be A Time When There Aren't Any Knitters.

I Explain At The Parties That I Believe Knitting Is A Transformative And Intriguing Act That Can Change The Life And Brain Of The Person Doing It, And That Knitting Is A Perfect Metaphor For Life And Insight Into Some Better Ways Through It.

I Will Not Let The Non-knitters Of The World Decide How Normal I Am.

I Recognize That Knitting Can Improve My Mood In Trying Circumstances

Just Because Something Is Fun Doesn't Mean It's A Waste Of Time.

I Will Resist The Urge To Underestimate The Complexity Of Knitting.

The Best Reason For A Knitter To Marry Is That You Can't Teach The Cat To Be Impressed When You Finish A Lace Scarf.

When Confronted With A Birthday In A Week I Will Remember That A Book Can Be A Really Good Present, Too.

The Rules Of Canadian Engagement Say That If We Encounter A Celebrity, We Have To Pretend We're Not Encountering A Celebrity.

You Know You Knit Too Much When ... You Take Knitting To A Wedding, In Case There's A Little Time Before The Bride Comes Down The Aisle. Double Points If You Are The Bride.

Your Average Knitter, Obsessed As We Are With The Art Form, Is Quickly Going To Begin Producing Far More In The Way Of Warm Things Than Are Needed By Even An Arctic-bound Knitter. Knitting Breeds Generosity, True...but Perhaps In A Hurry To Avoid Burying Ourselves In Hand-knits. There Are Only So Many Scarves One Knitter Can Use.

When You Are Knitting Socks And Sweaters And Scarves, You Aren't Just Knitting. You Are Assigning A Value To Human Effort. You Are Holding Back Time. You Are Preserving The Simple Unchanging Act Of Handwork.

Everybody Tells Me That They Would Love To Knit, But They Don't Have Time. I Look At People's Lives And I Can See Opportunity And Time For Knitting All Over The Place. The Time Spent Riding The Bus Each Day? That's A Pair Of Socks Over A Month. Waiting In Line? Mittens. Watching Tv? Buckets Of Wasted Time That Could Be An Exquisite Lace Shawl.

Waiting In Line

Achieving The State Of Sable Is Not, As Many People Who Live With These Knitters Believe, A Reason To Stop Buying Yarn, But For The Knitter It Is An Indication To Write A Will, Bequeathing The Stash To An Appropriate Heir.

I'm A Knitter. My Projects Are The Ultimate In 'some Assembly Required.

The Twitch Above My Right Eye Will Disappear With Knitting Practice.

The Chances Of Running Out Of Yarn On A Project Are Directly Related To The Difficulty That You Will Have Getting More.

The First Time You Find Yourself Having A Conversation About Moss Stitch With A Group Of People Who Aren't Desperately Trying To Escape You ... It's Like Coming Home.

The Only Difference Between An Experienced Knitter And New Knitter Is That The Experienced Knitter Makes Bigger Mistakes Faster. Be Bold; There Are No Terrible Consequences In Knitting.

It Is A Peculiarity Of Knitters That They Chronically Underestimate The Amount Of Time It Takes To Knit Something. Birthday On Saturday? No Problem. Socks Are Small. Never Mind That The Average Sock Knit Out Of Sock-weight Yarn Contains About 17,000 Stitches. Never Mind That You Need Two Of Them. (that's 34,000 Stitches, For Anybody Keeping Track.) Socks Are Only Physically Small. By Stitch Count, They Are Immense.

The Essay Is One Of My Favourite Forms Of Writing, And I Feel Like What's Inside Is Really Personal, More So Than With Shorter Pieces.

It Is A Little Known Fact That Much Like Birds, Who Can Always Find North, Knitters Can Always Find Yarn.

100 Years Ago, Buying Something You Could Make Was Considered Wasteful; Now Making Something You Could Buy Is Considered Wasteful. I Am Not Convinced This Is A Step In The Right Direction.

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Since I Became A Knitting Humor Writer, I Seem To Be Understood A Little Better - At Least For The Purposes Of Social Discourse.

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I Will Continue To Freak Out My Children By Knitting In Public. It's Good For Them.

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As Usual, The Sock Yarns Have No Idea What Is Going On.

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