Karmic Retribution

On Friday, I promised to work on being patient and staying positive. I got the night off from work-- sweet! Worked Saturday, and was a paragon of positive attitude and general helpfulness. Sunday, woke up at 2:30PM and went to see Avatar with Eric. I should say, Eric woke me up at 2:30PM. Our movie was at 3, and we were supposed to meet a friend at the theater before the show.

Well, hell if I didn't bitch the whole way to theater because I was worried we would be late. And about the perceived crappiness of our seats. And about missing our friend. I bitched until Eric actually told me to get over it-- and he puts up with a lot, as I've mentioned before. I did get over it. The movie was awesome, we ate delicious pizza afterward, and I apologized on the drive home.

Karma, as they say, is not a nice lady who bakes cookies and watches your cats while you are out of town. Apologies are not good enough for Karma. Today, Karma decided I was going to pay for my little promise to be a better person.

First, a major gauge mishap. I have still not recovered from the aftermath. More on this later.

After the gauge mishap, I went looking for some yarn to swatch for a new project. Positive people don't cry over spilled milk, they just go get more milk! I promised a pair of mittens to Eric's cousin in the annual Christmas Yankee Swap-- what better time to get started?

These will be no ordinary mittens. Said cousin requested black and white patterned mittens. Bring it on! She will get black and white patterned mittens with HOT PINK linings. I bought some yarn-- Louet Gems Fingering-- to get started, but it is a substitution for the yarn called for in the pattern. Since I am both frugal and clever, I decided to make my swatch with some of the same yarn I had left over from another project. If it doesn't suit, I can exchange the unused, newly bought yarn.

Having just set aside the gauge mishap, I went to find the leftover Louet Gems. I keep my yarn stash in a cardboard box. It's not much of a stash, really. But there's some nice stuff in there, including some discontinued Diakeito Diarufuran that Vickie gave me for my birthday, and yarn recycled from two J.Crew cashmere sweaters.

About here is where Karma comes in again. I found the leftover yarn and headed off to play. I got some fabulous toys for Christmas this year-- an umbrella swift and ball winder. It's really really fun to play with these toys. I started winding the leftover yarn on my ballwinder, having fun and thinking happy, positive thoughts in spite of the gauge mishap. About halfway through winding, a tiny little speck of something flew off the yarn and landed on the table. A tiny, wriggling, distinctly larval speck. Mother of God, it was a moth larva. In my yarn stash.

Fuck.

Now, a positive person would probably be thinking that said moth larva was in my yarn stash before I promised to become a better person and then failed two days later. A positive person would also consider that had the gauge mishap not occurred, the moth larva would not have been discovered today. A positive person would inspect the damage (none that I have seen so far), quarantine the affected yarn (in a Ziploc in my freezer), take precautions against future yarnivorous insects (bagging the rest of my yarn in separate Ziplocs, throwing around lavender sachets), and give thanks (on my knees) that the problem was discovered early. Finally, a positive person would revel in the opportunity to organize her yarn stash and tools, make a neat pile of books and patterns that were previously scattered about the apartment, and play more with the ball winder. Whee!

I hope you're watching me now, Karma. I'm staying positive! I'm being flexible! I'm thinking positive thoughts. Positive, moth-murdering thoughts.