An update about my morning after today’s post is in order, I think. Apparently just casting on with the Calmer was enough to leave my mind in such a blissful haze that I did something I’ve never done: I locked myself out of the apartment. Really, it’s a miracle this has never happened before in the three years I’ve lived in New York. I can count on one hand the number of times we’ve locked the doors of the house I grew up in – it only happened if we went on vacation for ten days or more. In college my friends were always berating me for forgetting to lock their cars. I did occasionally lock myself out of the house I lived in my senior year of college, but getting back in again was merely a question of hoisting oneself up the drainpipe to the little roof above the door and then climbing in the living room window. Since I’ve come to live in the big city, I’ve done a pretty good job with the keys, locks, etc. But not this morning.

It wasn’t until I’d walked halfway to the subway that I realized I had my knitting bag (of course), but not my handbag. Okay, I thought. The people in the restaurant on the ground floor will let me into the building, and then I’ll use the roof access door and swing down to my own balcony – I hadn’t locked the back door. But the roof access door is plastered with signs reading “EMERGENCY EXIT ONLY: ALARM WILL SOUND”. I didn’t think it would improve my morning to explain to the fire department and the police why I was attempting to break into my own apartment rather than calling a locksmith like all normal people. But still no worries. What would MacGyver do? He’d pick the lock using whatever was on hand, and failing that, he’d build some mechanism using pine cones, chewing gum, fishing line and an old car battery that could lever the door open or reach underneath to turn the knob from the inside. We don’t even have a deadbolt – how difficult could it be?

So I set to work with the tools at hand: the knitting bag yielded up a number of promising items, including a small safety pin and a tapestry needle. Mingus voiced his enthusiasm for my efforts from the other side of the door and waved his arms encouragingly through the crack. Twenty-five minutes later, I had to admit defeat. I have no street skillz, people. I used to open the crotchety door of the laundry shack where I lived in the Bahamas with a knife blade, but our apartment door has a metal guard on the frame. Clearly I’m just not good enough with manipulating the hairpins (or tapestry needles, in this case) to pull off a career in low-tech cat burglary.

Off I went to work without keys, subway card, office ID, money, ATM card, or any of the other necessities for navigating a day in the city. I had to jump the turnstile in the subway station, prompting a glare of the sternest disapproval from the policeman on duty. “I’m sorry! I’m a law-abiding citizen! I just locked my bag in my apartment! I have an unlimited metrocard anyway!” I called over my shoulder as I dashed down the stairs and hopped the train before he could nab me and toss me in the clinker. At work, my pleas to be allowed upstairs fell on deaf ears. The security people have watched me walk in and out of this building for two years now, but they could not be prevailed upon to bend their rules. And since most members of my department were already on vacation for Memorial Day or don’t arrive until 10, I couldn’t find anyone to come down and vouch for my identity. I had to wait until a coworker arrived and could escort me upstairs.

Thank goodness for Calmer. Just being able to knit a few rows on the subway helped me keep the pieces together. That stuff really lived up to its name this morning.

Okay, I lied. Maybe it is what it looks like: Rowan Calmer in “calm”, with 66 stitches cast onto my most luxurious Lantern Moon US #9 rosewood straights. But look how pretty it’s going to be:

Let’s zoom in a little:

Yes, it’s true. I’ve wanted to knit the Apricot Jacket from Rebecca 27 ever since Becky made it last summer, and when Ingrid pointed out that it could be made in Calmer (which I’ve been dying to try) instead of GGH Java, I caved. The Calmer is more luscious and seductive even than I’d been led to believe by others’ raves. It’s like knitting with perfectly risen bread dough. I had to go up two needle sizes to get the gauge Apricot Jacket demands, but that just means I get to use my favorite pair of needles. A yarn as perfect as Calmer deserves rosewood. It’s like putting a beautiful woman in an Alfa Romeo (in the driver’s seat, of course!). Hopefully the knitting will be just as fast and smooth.

If this title seems cryptic, try exclaiming it with the volume and feeling you’d use if you’d just slammed your finger in a door. I think you’ll catch my drift. It was bound to happen: I got cocky about the Baltic Sea Stole, and the knitting gods punished me. They do not suffer hubris lightly. So last night, just as I was feeling pretty confident that I was going to finish the stole with two weeks to spare, I looked more closely at it and saw this:

Yep. I worked half the lace chart twice in a row, so last week’s work had to come out. Adam tried to convince me that no one would notice. His intentions were unimpeachable, but the poor misguided boy just didn’t get it. So out it came. And let me tell you that everything negative you’ve heard about frogging mohair is absolutely the gospel truth. After cursing the little goat that donated it as well as most of its forebears, I did successfully tear back to the error and, more importantly, I got the thing back on a needle. Good thing I left myself a little time cushion. All other projects must now move to the back burner while I try to make up the lost week. Lara’s right front is almost finished, and I really want to dash off her sleeve and seam her up, but she’ll have to wait. I’m itching to start playing with my sock yarn, but that will have to wait, too. Sigh. Okay, Mohair, you asked for it. Now you shall feel the full measure of my determination.

It’s not quite done, so I’m not going to give you the project notes yet, but I’m debuting Clapotis today all the same – I just can’t wait any longer!