Clearly, I'm out of my mind...

Let me demonstrate:

Exhibit A: I signed up for this.




Sure, it's my first KAL, and I'm planning on doing my first garment. I'm pretty sure that's enough to send me to the nut house as it is, but just for good measure, read what I did yesterday.

Exhibit B:
On Saturday night I was working on my Grandfather's hat and it occurred to me that it might be getting a little big. The plan was for it to be 22" at the crown and then be a nice stretchy fabric. I had it figured and I come to needing 42 sts on each needle. Sound a bit much to you? It should. It would have made a 32" hat. Good math skills, huh? Ofcourse, I didn't bother to check my math until I was up to 40 sts. a needle and realized that there's no way that I should exhaust the length of 4 7 1/2" long needles and have the hat be the right size. I do my math again, this time with a calculator instead of scratching numbers into the couch armrest, cuz that's, well, the smart-and-not-lazy-dumbass way to do it. Not that I would be that foolish. *ahem* Sooo, after typing in my gauge and all that, over and over, because clearly I was right on the couch and the computer MUST be wrong, I realized that I might be fault. Knowing there was no freaking way to tink back, I just riiiiipped back to 32 sts and proceeded to put it on my circular needle. Ofcourse, silly me thought that you could put a 22" hat on 24" needles and not have issues. Wrong again. So after working the specified 3 rounds before pattern, I gave up and decided to go to a LYS on Sunday. Two were open from 12-5 so I figured one of them would have it. Now, it would have been too bright of me to call first and see if they had the needles, but I had never been to Stitch DC before, so it was a good excuse to go. Plus it was close to our house. Sure bet, right? I can put it off and do stuff around the house instead of going early and getting what I needed, right? Or not. Ofcourse they had had an end run on needles like you wouldn't believe, AND the shipment that should have been there Friday wasn't getting there until Tuesday. Did I mention it was 4pm already? And that the other store was on the opposite side of DC? Did I also mention that I figured I could make it? *Sigh*

So, while I would have like to stayed and looked around more, I bolted instead. It was a lovely store, but packed full of knitters. People were in every room, even sitting on the floor. I wouldn't have been able to really see anything, anyway. So I leap into my car, fly onto the highway and floor it to the other side of DC. It should only take a half hour, right? Or not. I get to the location who's parking lot consists of 8 spaces that they share with Starbucks, no less. Needless to say that I've never even seen a space open there. Oh, and there's a big mall right up the street that has pretty much no parking. Do you see the problem? But I figure I can get a space. Did I mention it's 4:45 already? So I circle the block trying to figure out what to do. I'm one car late for no less than 2 parking spaces and start freaking out. I'm thinking of double parking, or illegal parking, or, can I get my car to circle the block for me? No auto pilot - foiled again. Then I see a spot "for customers only" for a tiny beer/wine shoppe that's on the other side of the building and I pull in. Hoping that no one sees me in the store and gets angry that I don't become a customer, I scurry through the drive thru atm lane of the bank to get to the other side of the building, dash up the stairs, and into the shop. Thankfully they didn't close 10 minutes early or I would have been out of luck. I grab the needles I need, lament that they are more than I thought they would be, purchase, shove them in my purse, dash out the door, and hop in my car hoping no one at the shouldn't-even-be-allowed-to-be-open-on-a-sunday-liquor-store sees me. Merrily I get the hell out of DC and go home. I am slightly annoyed about driving all over trying to get a set of needles, but relieved at actually attaining them against the odds. After I get home and take care of the pup I pull the damn Holy Grail of needles out of my purse and think 4.25mm, is that right? I thought it was 4mm....hmmm.
Well, I guess it depends on who you talk to. If you talk to Addi or Brittany, they will tell you that it's 4mm, if you talk to Crystal, she will tell you a US 6 is 4.25mm. On a side note: why do the needle companies sound like strippers? Is this some sublimal message thing? Anyhow, at that point I just gave up. There will be nothing even about the gauge on this hat. The top is knit on 4 dpns at 4mm, three rows are knit on Addi circs at 4mm, and now the rest will be knit on 4.25 circs. I'm thinking this project might be doomed, but I'm going to continue forward and pretend like everything is okay, and when it's not, I plan to actually find out my Grandfather's hat size and knit something correctly for him.

I'm pretty sure eithe rone of these is enough to put me in the nut house. We won't talk about the implications of what they mean together.