Productivity at the Cost of Productivity

First off, I must comment on my titling skills: I don't have any. I've been on Blogger since December 03, and this is the first blog I've had where I title my entries. My lack of practice is showing. The title of this entry is decent, but "I Been Workin' on the Cathode"? Hideous. Blargh.

I should have spent today reading. I'm taking 2 grad-level lit courses, so you can guess how much reading goes along with those. I've done maybe 1/16th of the stuff I need to finish by Tuesday. Instead, I spent all of my time knitting, and quite honestly I don't feel like reading even now that I've knit for 8 hours in a row.

I began my Olympic training by swatching for Aimee:



My gauge is significantly smaller than the recommended gauge. I can't decide if I'd rather go up some needle sizes, playing that estimate game, or just rework the numbers. I'm leaning toward the latter. Math doesn't scare me, and swatching/blocking/measuring bores me.

While staring lovingly at my Aimee swatch, I noticed something:



The lace pattern forms little Ks. I tried to emphasize it in orange. Apologies for my crappy photo-editing skills.

More work on Cathode.



It adds 15 pounds. This photo doesn't even do justice to the fattening qualities of my sweater. It makes me look heavy. I'm thinking about putting that sleeve back on a stitch holder and putting this sweater away until I
1) lose 15 lbs.
or
2) decide to rip it out and start anew.

Here's something:



Knitty's Pasha. Or, as the 2-year-old Kerry would have called it, Pagaya. I think I like the name Pagaya better. I started this with my dad's cousin's baby in mind, although I don't know how suitable it'll be for a newborn. I don't know why this pattern is categorized as piquant; maybe the short rows? My rule of thumb is if I can do it, it can't be too hard. I use that rule for pretty much everything in life. Lace? Piquant. Short rows? Mellow. Fair Isle? Extraspicy. Recalculating gauge? Mellow. Actually finishing something? Piquant.