Dentist knitting

I had started the pair of socks that shall be known as humming to take to the dentist yesterday. Unfortunately, I'd knit more on the plain part than I should have. I realized that it was NOT going to carry me through the dental work. So I grabbed cotton yarn and needles on the way out the door and cast on for another Tribble. Started knitting away. And knitting. He needed to do a lot of work on that poor tooth.

I learned the following things while knitting without a chance of seeing my knitting (non-knitters, ignore all but the first one):

• trying to pass the ball of yarn through the last stitch requires grabbing the CORRECT ball of yarn. You see, there was also another TWO balls of yarn in my little bag, and I carefully lifted the wrong one through that stitch and started pulling. And pulling. Finally gave up and stuffed the rotten thing in my bag. You know that cotton can make a mess when it isn't corralled, don't you? It did.
• I can do an SSK, but it takes more thought than a k2tog;
• I counted stitches to tell which row I was knitting. Counting helped me concentrate on knitting instead of the dentist, and if the row was coming up short a stitch, it meant I was on the pattern row;
• a normal bind-off didn't take much effort, in fact, it was looser than my normal one;
• my fingers are smarter than I think they are!

Another rotten mess straightened up last night. I am not good at winding a center pull ball on my own. Isabel tried a couple of times. I understand the theory, but seem to fail practicum. I rolled up a skein while at Nathan's. When I started knitting it I realized I made not been successful again. sigh I wound up as much as possible on the ball winder, then broke the rest and called it quits. Last night I sat down with it and untangled. Remembering WHY I don't like to untangle messes like this. But it needed to be done. And it now is in a tidy EXTERIOR pulling ball. That last little bit that might be needed for the socks, it would be terrible to run out!