I wanted to buy a ball winder. I'm finally moving beyond Red Heart and similarly mass-produced acrylic yarns that come in pull skeins, and I'm going to need to wind yarn. (And there are all those collapsed, partially used pull-skeins of Red Heart that could benefit from rewinding.) There was a ball winder on Jo-Ann's two days ago, and today a 20%-off coupon from Jo-Ann's arrived in my e-mail. So I went to order and...yeah, Jo-Ann's is out of ball winders.

So I checked out Herrschners, which has more expensive ball winders. And bigger shipping charges. Winder-plus-shipping was going to be close to $50. So I went to KnitPicks. Ball winder for $39.95, and free shipping for orders over $45. So I ordered a 440-yard ball of laceweight Shimmer (alpaca/silk) yarn for $5.99. (I got the Turquoise Splendor.) I'll get ball winder and yarn for $45.98.

But the ball winder is an imperative. The ballband for the yarn I'm using on Jacey's sweater has torn off. Without that restraint, that pull-skein of boucle yarn has blown up to something the size of a basketball. It's now impossible to take this project with me when I go out. I'm hoping the ball winder arrives soon, before this plum-colored tumbleweed rolls around my living room and scoops up both dogs. Frankly, I'm a little afraid to finish this sweater and tackle Sam's, for fear that ballband will break and I'll have warring tumbleweeds...

I spent a small fortune today on "necessaries": A new tire, oil change, emission inspection (which my 14-year-old car passed with flying colors), and tag-fee/ad-valorem tax for my car. The inspection costs more than the ad-valorem tax. And one tire cost more than both of them. And I shopped at Costco to stock up on Diet Coke and get a few Christmas presents for those people you don't know how to shop for. (Chocolate-covered Belgium cookies for the brother-in-law's brother. Stuff like that.)

While I was sitting in the Pep Boys' waiting room--since I couldn't take Jacey's sweater-plus-tumbleweed with me--I worked on the socks I started knitting back in October, then put aside. After the frustrations of working with boucle yarn that hides all your stitches, it actually was satisfying to work on the socks, where I can see what I'm doing. I'm hating those socks a lot less, now. I'll probably use them as my take-to-work project for a while. I'm on the cuffs--they're a top-down pattern--and I can work on them at lunchtime as long as the pattern stays easy.

In other news: I've reread Harry Potter 1-4, and now I've finished #5. (The fifth movie comes out here on DVD in less than two weeks.) I also watched Macbeth--the Sean Pertwee version--from Netflix. And I've watched Elizabeth I with Helen Mirren; I have to look away from the execution scenes.

I'm going to sit up tonight and work on Jacey's sweater while watching DVDs--maybe Monsters Inc., Shrek, Howl's Moving Castle. Non-bloody, non-nightmare movies. Between Elizabeth I and that babycake video I just posted, I've got a brainful of gore and icky images.