Two Things on My Mind Right Now

1. My Sockapalooooza socks, which are supposed to be easy and fun, are requiring more attention than I'd planned. Look, here I am turning the heel:

But here's the issue. This is a short-row heel that you work by attaching the other end of your ball of yarn. It says in big bold letters, DO NOT cut the main working yarn. Okay, okay, I get it. But then how am I supposed to avoid this?

This yarn (Vesper sock yarn in colorway Aqua Melon) has the world's worst proclivities to tangle on itself. It was a bear to get into a ball (and took a heroic assist from Elspeth), and I've really had to be conscious of what it's doing. I've used Vesper before with no issues (for the mom-and-baby socks), so I think it's just this particular skein that's being really persnickety.

It's to the point where I have 16 rows left to finish the heel, and I can't free enough yarn from the tangles to do so. I may have to CUT the yarn to continue on -- I spent about 40 minutes earlier trying to untangle it, and made essentially no progress.

I'd give up, but I refuse to let the yarn win. Besides, the socks are really cute and I want to finish them!

2. My ever-growing to-do list. I've finished up my job of many years and have taken a new one that should work well with the master's degree I'm pursuing, but I have a few weeks between gigs. I have house tasks and knitting tasks and school tasks and I'm starting to feel a bit paralyzed that I won't be able to do all those and accomplish some of the between-jobs relaxing I need as well. So be patient if posting here is scattered, or is not related to knitting at all.

So far in my 2 days of virtual unemployment, I have done some yard work and spent some time with friends and made pineapple sorbet (my favorite!). I also went to a great Decemberists concert and as luck would have it, had seats just in front of Lolly and her husband. What are the odds?! It was a very fun night!