YO

Making the second Pomatomus for the third time, I tried something different with my yarn overs. Not right away, but after half of the first chart, I realized that there was an easier way to do the YO into purls. Instead of wrapping the yarn all the way around the right needle (yeah), I left it in back and brought it over the top and into the purl. This makes sense, yes? Well, it took me a sock and a bit to figure it out. I'm not good at "thinking outside of the box" or even just "thinking" on some days. Here's the problem: I really like the way this looks. If I wasn't such an impatient knitter, I'd frog the whole sock so that the top inch of the pattern matched the rest. (But really, who sees the top inch of a sock?) This sock, while it will look great when I'm done, doesn't match the first one now. The first one is chock full of the unnecessarily yarny YOs, and I've never been happy with the way it looks. So open and sloppy. Like, ew. But I don't think I have the heart to completely reknit it. It's taken me so long to get anywhere near finished on these socks -- I just want to wear the damn things. Oh, and here's something else that's ew: the way the yarn dyes my fingers. I've gone to the grocery store like this (the photo was taken after I'd washed my hands) and gotten dirty looks from old ladies as I pick out tomatoes. I'm sure they're eyeing the line of black stuff under my fingernails and thinking that this little blonde girl doesn't really look like a coalminer.