tag:www.sunidesus.net,2011://7 2011-07-25T01:26:21Z Welcome to my Home Page! There's a bunch of separate blogs involved here, but they're all me! The last ten entries across all the blogs show up here. If you want a specific section click on it under categories. Everything here does get updated, some areas just get updated more often than others! Contact Movable Type Pro 4.21-en tag:knit.sunidesus.net,2011://3.2649 2011-07-15T17:12:18Z 2011-07-25T01:26:21Z

This started out as a desire to give some knitterly presents to the w00tstock guys. My original idea was something smaller (like hats) but once I figured out what I wanted to do for the pattern I knew that wouldn't work. They will be (or have been, depending on when this is read) delivered at the San Diego w00tstock on July 21. So... the pattern. The large chunk of colorwork is the lyrics to the song "The Captain's Wife's Lament" by Paul and Storm converted into binary. If you've ever been to a w00tstock you know why. The 0s are color, the 1s are black. There's a little two row stripe near the top and bottom that says "w00tstock 3.0", also in binary. The code starts at the top and goes around and around and around. Because it's a bit hard to tell which end is up the next photo is a close up of the front/top. The following photo is a close up of the back/top. My gauge swatch was a lying liar (shocking I know) so these ended up a little bit longer and skinnier than I thought they would. However, considering the song... it's actually kind of appropriate that they're a bit long. If I ever do this pattern again I'd go up one needle size for the colorwork section. I'd probably also adjust the meat of the colorwork so that each row would be 8 "characters" long instead of 7. That would make each row 64 stitches instead of 56 and would solve the "slightly too long and skinny" problem. To be clear, I'm very happy with how they turned out, there are just a couple things I would adjust slightly. Each scarf took about two weeks to make and used 4 and a third skeins of the black. Each scarf used either exactly one skein of the color or just a teensy bit more than one skein. For some reason the North Woods scarves used exactly one skein (with maybe a yard or two leftover), but the Midwinter skeins ran out with about 5 rows left and needed just a little bit of a second skein. The Stats... Needles: 6's (4mm) Yarn: KP Wool of the Andes - Coal & KP Chroma - Midwinter (purple/grey) & North Woods (orange/green) Pattern: my own Sizing: 7'11" long, 4.5-5" wide SPI: black - 5 spi, color - 5.5 spi Started: 4-17-11 Finished: 7-5-11 Extra info because these are presents... The black is 100% Peruvian Highland Wool; the color is 70% Wool 30% Nylon. If it needs washing it'll have to be hand washed gently and then laid flat to dry. It will felt if it's put in a washing machine. Edited 7-24-11 to add: The scarves were delivered very late Thursday night (or very early Friday morning depending on how you look at it) at w00tstock 3.0 and were very well received. Which made me very happy! There's nothing quite like having one's knitterly presents be appreciated. Left to right (not counting the photobombers in the back...) that's Storm, Liz, Paul, me, Adam, & Wil. ]]> tag:books.sunidesus.net,2011://5.2778 2011-06-27T15:00:16Z 2011-06-28T01:06:05Z

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, by I thought I had finished all the Next Gen books, but then when I was checking my list of what I've read against my master list of ST books... I discovered a few that I had somehow missed. So here I am back at the beginning. Novelizations are always a different kind of reading experience. Scenes that were in the script, but didn't make the final cut, are frequently in the book. As well as ones that are added to make it a decent length. The pacing and structure were a little weird but it's been a while since I've actually watched Farpoint so I'm not sure if that's a product of the episode or something that happened when it was turned into a book. There are a couple places with conflicts that are in progress, but the focus suddenly shifts to something mundane. Which in general I understand, but when the characters involved in the mundane stuff should really be part of resolving the conflict... it just feels off.]]> tag:books.sunidesus.net,2011://5.2688 2011-05-27T14:00:44Z 2011-06-25T02:11:51Z

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, by I wasn't originally planning on reading the Titan books in my ST:TNG re-read. But then while reading the Destiny series and the Typhon Pact series I discovered that there were some characters on Titan that sounded interesting. This takes place just after the events in ST: Nemesis. Riker finally accepts command of a ship and leaves Enterprise behind. The original plan had been for their mission to be exploration, but they end up being sent to try to help the various Romulan groups deal with each other instead. There is a lot more diversity in the "aliens", they aren't all just "humans with funny noses". Which is a lot easier to do in a book than a TV show! The dynamics of those kind of differences are always interesting to me. However, there's a bit of a "soap opera" feel to me. There's a lot more of an emphasis on who's doing what with whom than I've noticed in previous ST books. ]]> tag:books.sunidesus.net,2011://5.2695 2011-04-20T15:05:11Z 2011-06-28T02:51:50Z

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, by Third in the ST Destiny series. Everything comes to a head in this one. Including finding out where the Borg actually came from in the first place. I did see the Borg origins coming from a ways off, but it seemed fairly obvious so I think it was probably supposed to be figured out fairly early on. And it was good to finally have an answer to that particular question. The massive amount of devastation is heart-breaking. Entire planets that have been part of the Trek universe for a long time are gone or severely damaged. There's generally been a "status quo" kind of philosophy to ST books. Major things don't change. It's really interesting seeing that philosophy change. ]]> tag:books.sunidesus.net,2011://5.2696 2011-04-14T15:37:25Z 2011-06-28T02:52:18Z

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, by The second in the Destiny series. In this one Enterprise and Aventine have hooked up and are exploring a bunch of subspace tunnels that they think the Borg are using to get around. They want to close the whole network to prevent that. Titan has ended up stuck on the same planet as Columbia was. They start learning about what happened to that ship and her crew.]]> tag:books.sunidesus.net,2011://5.2697 2011-04-10T16:15:00Z 2011-06-28T01:40:02Z

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, by The first in the Destiny series, and I'm back to my ST reading after about two months of other books. There's been a run up to the Borg being active again in a major way and this series is when they make themselves known. The action jumps around between the Enterprise, Titan, and Aventine, with flashbacks to a very early NX ship the Columbia. The Borg are attacking in large numbers and they aren't assimilating people any more. They seem to have decided to wipe out the Federation instead. The Enterprise is mostly focused on fighting back and Picard is starting to get a little bit "Ahab"-ish again. Titan is following what they think might be the Borg's travel method and are investigating that. While Aventine is trying to figure out what they can learn from the wreck of the Columbia. In the flashbacks Columbia has encountered an incredibly powerful, and secretive, race. All the story-lines do eventually start to show their connections. I haven't read any of the Titan books so there's a number of new characters there, as well as a couple familiar ones that I'm glad to see again. There are a number of them that seem really interesting so I think I'm going to have to add those books to my list.]]> tag:books.sunidesus.net,2011://5.2699 2011-03-31T14:40:13Z 2011-06-24T20:12:08Z

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, by This is one of those books that I have pulled off the shelf at the library and book stores I don't know how many times and just didn't quite get around to reading. It was originally published in 1994 so I've been thinking it looked interesting since high school. Finally got around to it and quite enjoyed it! The imagining of how what is essentially the internet works is really cool and reminds me a bit of Hackers. Except that I always thought the Hackers world was how those kids imagined what they were doing, while in this book the people really do travel into a virtual world. Or at least their minds do. It's something that I think is really attractive, the idea that there could be a pseudo-physical representation of lines of code. That security features would be actual walls that could be breached instead of just code. It's certainly much more interesting that way! Character-wise, there's a couple main characters and a lot of it has to do with friendship and loyalty. Reconnecting after a number of years and figuring out how to rebuild that relationship. There's also a lot of interesting legal and government/law-enforcement stuff that I think remains very relevant. Who exactly has jurisdiction over what happens in a virtual space? What happens when countries can't or won't agree on that issue? ]]> tag:books.sunidesus.net,2011://5.2700 2011-03-25T15:40:04Z 2011-06-28T00:20:05Z

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, by Third in the Joe Pitt series by Charlie Huston. Joe is now working for one of the clans instead of going it alone. Which is how he ends up having to deal with a war between a couple of smaller clans in New Jersey. His girlfriend is also not doing well and he ends up having to finally make a decision regarding infecting/saving her or letting her die. For some reason this one struck me as a lot more violent and crude than the previous two. There were a number of parts where the language and events bothered me, which isn't something I remember happening in the first two books. I have no idea if the series has actually escalated or if I'm not remembering the previous books accurately. ]]> tag:books.sunidesus.net,2011://5.2701 2011-03-23T14:15:09Z 2011-06-23T01:34:56Z

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, by I so badly wanted to like this book. I see it being raved about constantly, it's hugely popular in sf/f circles, and it's by Neil Gaiman for crying out loud! But I just didn't. I hate it when that happens, I always feel like I've failed somehow. Meeting all the different gods and learning all those myths was interesting. And being from Wisconsin I liked all the Midwest bits (and really need to go to House on the Rock someday), but unfortunately that's about as far as it went for me. It just never really felt like it was going anywhere. Lots and lots of back-story and exposition for all these people, but I had a hard time finding the purpose in all of it. It felt like I was waiting and waiting for the book to get going, and then it was over.]]> tag:books.sunidesus.net,2011://5.2703 2011-03-09T08:02:11Z 2011-06-24T20:27:58Z

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, by This is the second Fuzzy book by H. Beam Piper. The issues I had with the first one remain, which is unsurprising. But again, the story itself is good and enjoyable. There is a bit of a paternalistic attitude towards the Fuzzies, which grates on me personally a bit, but the Fuzzies themselves seem to want to be taken care of by the big people. And there are people who want to take advantage of them so some degree of protection does seem to be necessary. Plot stuff... Fuzzies are being kidnapped and the good guys need to figure out who's behind it and why, as well as rescuing the Fuzzies of course.]]> tag:books.sunidesus.net,2011://5.2704 2011-03-06T18:32:54Z 2011-06-23T01:21:22Z

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, by I hadn't read this before, but with John Scalzi's Fuzzy Nation coming out I wanted to read the original. The story itself is really cute, it's fun to imagine intelligent stuffed animals. It's really easy to care about them and want things to work out for them. Also, the reactions from the corporate world in the book make complete sense, as nasty as they are. However, it is very obviously a product of the time in which it was written. The rampant sexism is a little hard to overlook and tends to pull me out of the story. The technological anachronisms are also a bit glaring, but for some reason those don't bother me quite as much. They're still very obvious, but don't bother me as much as the sexism does.]]> tag:books.sunidesus.net,2011://5.2705 2011-03-04T15:23:26Z 2011-06-23T01:06:14Z

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, by This is the sixth in Patricia Briggs' Mercy Thompson series. I love this series. The characters are well done, the various relationships work and make sense to me, they end up being people I care about. This one felt a bit different from the previous books in the series, but I think that's because it was more focused on Mercy and Adam for the majority of the book, and they were off on their honeymoon away from the rest of the pack. Much as I love the two of them, I found myself missing everyone else. Reading this series I've really enjoyed the way the various magical groups have been explored. Each book has focused more on one specific group which I think has worked really well. This time it's finally Mercy's turn. Since she doesn't really know that much about her own origins it was quite fun to discover them along with her. I'm personally not as familiar with most Native American legends so I found all of that really interesting. It made me want to look up the stories, particularly since there was quite a bit of teasing about which version of specific stories was told. General plot stuff... Mercy and Adam end up spending their honeymoon near a specific river at the request of the Gray Lords. People have been dying there and they think a fae is responsible. So Mercy and Adam have to deal with that and end up getting help from Mercy's magical side of the family.]]> tag:books.sunidesus.net,2011://5.2706 2011-03-02T15:33:58Z 2011-06-23T00:35:32Z

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, by This is the first in an urban fantasy series by John Levitt. It has a lot of the "normal" urban fantasy elements... people with some amount of magic ability that are unknown to the general population and they have some way of policing themselves. The main character, Mason, has a "pet" sort-of-dog (Lou) that is somehow tied to his magical talents. The "pets" (Ifrits) are rare and something that only a few practitioners have. We start out with someone or something trying to kill Mason. He, of course, manages to escape with help from Lou. After some investigating it turns out that another practitioner has been stealing power from others and is getting up to all kinds of mischief. Mason then has to stop him. All in all it's a pretty decent book. Not up there with my all time favorites in the genre, but still good. ]]> tag:knit.sunidesus.net,2010://3.2643 2010-12-25T00:29:40Z 2011-07-12T00:57:39Z

These are my dad's Christmas present socks. He is incredibly difficult to shop for so I ended up swiping some sock yarn from my mom's stash (with permission, and it has since been replaced) and making him socks. He liked the other pair I made him quite a bit so I figured it'd be a safe present. They're my basic generic sock pattern with a cable whacked on the front. I'll have to check my stitch dictionaries later to figure out exactly where the cable came from, but my notes say it was called "rhombus". Because I don't like purling I did it over a stockinette background instead of purling. I've done that before and I really like the way it looks. It ends up having a more subtle look than is normal for a cable. The Stats... Needles: 0's (2mm) Yarn: Stroll - Basalt Heather (from Mom's stash) Pattern: my generic with Rhombus cable up front Sizing: 14 to 32, 6.5" to gusset start SPI: forgot to check (probably 8) Started: 12-21-10 Finished: 12-24-10]]> tag:knit.sunidesus.net,2010://3.2642 2010-12-21T04:50:22Z 2011-07-12T00:43:57Z

These are my brother's Christmas present socks. They had a couple techniques I'd never tried before (stranded colorwork & mosaic patterns) and I'm very happy with how they turned out. And it's always nice to try out a new technique and be successful at it! The pattern is Maze from Sensational Knitted Socks, but I modified it to be toe up. I did m1 increases on the gusset instead of the kfb increases that I usually use. That way I could start each new stripe with the correct color a bit more easily. I did unfortunately have a couple false starts. I had originally intended to use orange for the color, but once I was halfway up the foot I realized it was looking like Halloween. Which really wasn't what I wanted. The next attempt used the green and the orange, but that was too busy. When I finally tried the black and green combo it all worked much better! My one snag was when my brother tried them on. They were too long. I ended up unpicking the cast on at the toes, ripping out about half an inch, and then kitchenering the toes back together. It worked, but they aren't the best looking toes ever. I also didn't anticipate quite how much the pattern would affect the horizontal stretch of the socks. They're a bit tighter than I intended and don't slip on quite as easily as I'd like. Once they're on they're fine though. I am blessed with family and friends that appreciate knit gifts. The couple weeks before Christmas my brother was pestering me to know when it would be his turn to get socks, and then was very happy when he opened the box on Christmas! The Stats... Needles: 0's (2mm) Yarn: KP Stroll (Forest Tonal & black) Pattern: Maze from Sensational Socks (modded to toe up - m1's on gusset) Sizing: 17 to 35, 7.5" to gusset start (should have done 7") SPI: forgot to get this Started: 12-13-10 Finished: 12-20-10]]>