my delicious lunch, ugly yarn, and more!

All is well in my world. Fall finally seems to be here, thank goodness, and I just finished the most wonderful, delcious, appropriate lunch - oden at Menchanko-Tei (yes, I know it was closed by the Department of Health and that the reasons why weren't innocuous. But I love oden and theres no place else to get it around here!). It was one of those lunches that just plain hit the spot and made my whole day better. At lunch, I get the oden teishoku, and they choose the items for you. Today they gave me grilled tofu (yakidofu, and it was so good), ganmodoki (a cake made of tofu and vegetables, all chopped up and then reformed. They say they deep fry it, but it doesn't taste like it. It has a spongy texture that really soaks up the broth and it is so, so delicious!), mochi kinchaku (my absolute favorite - a mochi stuffed in a fried tofu pouch. Soft and indescribably tasty), and of course, daikon and egg. No fish cakes today! I don't know why. Of course you can order oden by the piece and make your own, but I like seeing what they serve me. To tell the truth, this is a pretty typical set. I wouldn't have minded a chikuwa fish cake in there. Here is a really cute page that describes oden ingredients.

But I digress. There is knitting to discuss.
I started swatching some sock yarns from the many types I bought for gifts, but since I didn't swatch in pattern and I'm NOT knitting all those socks plain, I guess that was mostly pretty useless. I'm on the fence about the patterns. I guess it would help to pick who is going to get which socks, so I could decide based on personality, but I haven't done that yet either.

I finished the goofy spiral scarf. Dang that yarn is ugly (Berrocco Trilogy). They have plenty of great yarns, for sure, but this one is ug-lee. But it looks nice in the spiral scarf. When you get to that 1600 stitch row, wow. Its like climbing knitting Mount Washington or something. I'm still binding off (I do a little every morning while I watch my favorite show) but it is spiralling along nicely and appropriately, resembles seaweed. Even though its blue. I think the recepient will appreciate it, though.

And mom's sweater is in full swing. I'm almost to the armholes. I've really only been working it on the subway, and considering that I have a no more than 20 minute ride, I'd say thats pretty impressive (well, I usually do two rows when I get to my desk. Can't resist). I am feeling quite uncertain about the color and the pattern. It looks beautiful, really, but I'm not getting a "my mom is going to love this" vibe from it yet. Its just the back, so I'm still plugging away. I'm actually considering showing her the swatch and getting her opinion of it when we are in MI at the end of this month. What to do, what to do? Either way, I love working the stitch pattern and the twisted stitches do go really fast.

Thats about it. I guess I'm off to look for more sock inspiration so I can do some relevant swatching tonight.

Oh, and too bad about the Yankees, right? I have my fingers crossed that Joe Torre will stay. I can't imagine having a crazy boss who only focusses on the few negative things I've done, when I've actually done so many wonderful things (like taking the team to the playoffs every year since he's been there, after his first??? Hello, Steinbrenner?????).