I must be stopped.

Some people drink when they are gloomy. Some people exercise obsessively. Some can't stop cleaning their homes. (Oh if only I were a cleaner or exerciser!)

I. buy. yarn.

Copious amounts. I can't stop. Let's just say that "some" laceweight is on it's way as we speak from the super delish handpaintedyarn.com and also "some" of the 50% off Rowan yarns from their quarterly discontinued colors sale.

Didn't I just buy supercool yarn last weekend?? Plus. Hello? My MDS&W purchases are barely cool. What is the matter with me?

Clearly something needs to be done: I need to learn how to knit even faster.

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Despite recent evidence to the contrary, it's not all buy-buy-buy all the time around here. Sometimes knitting occurs.

Witness the nearly complete black gauntlet #1:


Click for sans-thumb close-up.

These babies are super soft in Debbie Bliss' Cotton Angora. They go a little less than half way up my upper arm (I feel it would be false advertising to actually refer to it as my "bicep") and will be perfect with tanks and Ts this summer when its a thousand degrees outside but only 22 degrees in the office building.

You, too, can have your very own. The pattern is a freebie at Crystal Palace. And on size 7s they are a relatively quick knit when one applies oneself.

I have finished up the pesky thumb and am into the third cable of the second glove.

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What about the vacation?

I thought you would never ask.

Clue one:

(New rain gear and goofy-ass mosquito netting - Click here for the intrepid explorer)

Clue two:

(Fields of ice. As in, not the tropics)

Clue three:

(Some random hiker. In ALASKA.)

Four reasons why this is awesome:
1. Times I have been on a vacation on my own: 0
2. Times I have been out of the contiguous US (not counting a drive to BC when I was, like, 7): 2
3. Times I have wanted to see all the amazing sites in Kenai, Denali, and Chugach: at least a million
4. Times I have bitched and moaned about how much I hate hot summers: at least a million-five.

I will be spending 10 days of August in Alaska, touring the Kenai fjords and wildlife refuge, both Denalis, and Chugach forest. I will be camping, hiking, riding, and maybe even a little kayaking (see biceps, above). With 10 other folks and the wonderful people at Alaska Outdoors. I can't really believe it is real yet.

I have my raingear, my netting, my requisite convertible pants, and my compass. Now. What will I take to knit?