So suddenly my email is inundated with requests, questions, and frantic pleas for help, largely from new knitters. Now don’t get me wrong, I want people to ask me for help. Especially if you paid for a pattern (please, god, ask me for help then). I have an Excellent rating from my students at the community college where I teach digital publishing and interactive media, so I like to imagine that I’m a pretty good instructor (I am so, shut up). So now I’m going to tell you the biggest, most important point in learning something new: Don’t. Panic.

It’s okay to struggle. Stop beating yourself up and thinking you’re stupid. We all feel stupid when learning something new. I think this is the single worst thing we do to ourselves when learning—or even worse, we avoid learning new skills at all to head off the Stupid Curve. Just stop it.

Here’s a story to make you feel better. Until a couple weeks ago, I had a “feature” phone (it’s a dumb phone, but it had the coolest keyboard ever, fabulous for texting). Finally did a major upgrade to the new iPhone. I already have an iPad, so the guy at the store says, oh you already know the system, I don’t need to teach you anything! And I happily went on to class and proceeded to show off my new phone to my students. And then, it rang.

Turns out I forgot a crucial point—an iPad is not a phone. Sure, I knew the iOS system, but I didn’t have a clue how to use the phone features. It took me a minute to figure out how to answer the damn thing. So, there I am, in a classroom where I teach technology, asking my students how to use a freaking phone. And let me assure you, they thought it damn funny. But I didn’t panic, or try to hide my idiocy. I unfurled the stupid for all to see and asked them questions, and they reveled in the chance to tell me what to do. And I listened, and didn’t worry about how stupid I looked.

I made a point of studying up on the iPhone system, and by the next class I was showing some of them the triple-finger tap, a hidden iPhone feature for zooming. But that wouldn’t have happened if I was so worried about looking stupid that I tried to hide or avoid it. In fact I wouldn’t be able to teach at all if I didn’t constantly push myself to learn new apps, features, and techniques. I feel stupid a lot, but I think it’s actually good for you.

So, back to you (though I do love talking about me). If you don’t know, ask. And stop feeling bad for asking, or not knowing already. Try to calm your panic when something doesn’t appear to be working. You might be making a mistake, or maybe it’s supposed to be that way and you just need to keep going. Maybe there’s a mistake in the pattern (but don’t jump to that conclusion, it smacks of “I’m new at this, but I think I might know more about it than you do!”). The panic is an indicator that you’re being too hard on yourself. It’s okay to struggle a little. If this was truly easy, everyone would do it and no one would ever be impressed at your work.

Oh, and don’t try to knit Christmas presents. I’ll tell you another story about that some time.

Let’s back this on up a bit. The week before VKL, I came down with shingles. If you’re blissfully ignorant of that like I was, it’s revenge of the chickenpox, when the dormant virus comes back and attacks your nervous system. And let me tell you, this disease has it all: incredible pain, disgusting rashes, the association with it being an elderly person’s disease, a stupid name that’s embarrassing to say, and heavy drugs that mess you up as bad as the disease itself.

So up to VKL. It was great, by the way, and I’ll do a whole blog post later about the awesomeness that is Franklin Habit. But I missed a lot, including all the demos I wanted to see, and I didn’t get to hit the marketplace as much as I wanted, either. You know how you start feeling better again, and then you try to, like, function normally, and it kicks your ass? Yeah, that.

To add to the fun, they had put me on prednisone. By the time I was actually in LA, the prednisone and the shingles were having a fine ol’ time together. Turns out the side effects of prednisone are very similar to the effects of shingles—great planning medical community, thanks a fuck of a lot for that one! And since I’m so freaking short—5′ 1.5″—and I only weigh 130 pounds, the dosage I was given was, oh, just a little bit more than I really needed. But no problem, right? It’s only a steroid, and if you stop taking it abruptly you’ll only go into anaphylactic shock and maybe die. So, oh, you’re having severe side effects? Well don’t stop taking it, you’ll just have to tough it out! Thanks again, medical community! (Fuckers.)

Now here’s a little demo of how tough I can be. On Saturday, at the conference, I’ve got vertigo so bad I’m starting to get dizzy, and my right eye and ear are kind of, going out. For the record, you need your eyes and ears to see and hear, so, you know, they’re kind of valuable to me (I bet you feel the same affection for your eyes and ears, too). My face was tingling all day, and it starts to move into active pain. I’m not a doctor, I don’t even play one on TV, but I know that’s all pretty bad. So I go sit in the hotel lobby and wait for my sister to be done shopping so she can take me to the ER. It’s bad enough that I’m going to make her do that, I can’t stand to insist she leave early, too. Huh, in retrospect, I am a freaking idiot. Which, actually, isn’t news to anyone who knows me. But damn, I do have teh pain tolerance.

In the ER: after dealing with the asshole nurse who tries to force me to admit that I’m just anxious (that’s the first thing they do in the ER, screen for overreaction), and talking to the doctor, I’m put on an IV. There’s your sign that the doctor did not think I was overreacting. The nurse giving me the IV blows out my vein on the first try, so I instruct her in how to hold the vein straight in the back of my hand so she can get that one. Wow, nurses really fucking hate when you instruct them like that. Hey, I gave her a chance, but she screwed it up, so then she gets the instructor treatment. I bet—other than doctors—teachers make for the most irritating-as-shit patients. Which somehow I find highly amusing.

Bloodwork and several other tests later, doc concludes that it must be side effects of the prednisone, and not actual damage from shingles. Did I mention that shingles can cause blindness and permanent nerve damage? Which is why the doctor and I were legitimately concerned (pay attention, Asshole Check-In Nurse). Doctor also says he thinks I was overprescribed on the prednisone, which I kind of had figured out by now. But don’t stop taking it! Remember there’s that possibility of death and all. So, oh well, sucks to be me.

So, this week I’m back home in Austin. Hey, you know what else is fun? Standing up in class and helping students with Flash and InDesign while still dealing with vertigo. Because I’m still on the prednisone (in the tailing-off stage), and I still get vertigo when I stand for too long. And the insomnia! That’s a real hoot, too, I haven’t had a full night’s sleep since this all started.

So what’s the lesson here, kids? Once again, be a bad patient. I should have questioned the initial prescriptions I was given; they actually gave me a maximum dosage, which is way too much for me. But it’d been so long since the last time I dealt with prescriptions I’d forgotten about the dosage thing. And don’t think you can trust your doctor to remember that shit for you. Remember the last time you made a mistake at work? Exactly. They’re only human, you gotta be your own biggest advocate, it’s actually not fair to put it all on them.

But, um, Vogue Knitting Live was fun otherwise. And my sisters are pretty damn cool. The people who will take you to the ER and sit with you, cracking jokes the whole time, those are the people who make life worthwhile.

Oh, and maybe you did great work and all and it used to be worse, but, fuck you, Arthur Nobile. Sorry, that’s just how I feel about you right now.

If you aren’t familiar, go read this post from his blog. If you don’t love him at least a little after reading that, then I just don’t want to know you.

One of the things I love about his work is his interest in vintage patterns. Here’s an overview of some of his designs on Ravelry.This image cracks me up:

And if the designs aren’t enough for you (well la dee da, don’t you have the high standards), he’s also an illustrator and photographer. There’s just nothing to not love about the guy.

And, one more time I’ll warn you, I hate that scarf. Actually I think it’s the yarn, that stupid tencel yarn didn’t block well so it curls, and it fuzzes like crazy. Really I think it’d be a great pattern if only it was a fair bit wider, shawl-width instead of a scarf, then the curling wouldn’t be an issue no matter the yarn, plus I think it would show off the leaf pattern better. Ooo, or an afghan, that’d be cool. Maybe I’ll actually do that one of these days, but in the meantime if you’d like to try it yourself, there’s the new chart!

Yeah yeah, it was supposed to be humorous or something. Personally I think it’s only entertaining in a mean holy-shit-that’s-so-awful kind of way. And generally this is what happens when someone tries to turn granny squares into clothing.

Now check this out, from Christopher Kane’s at London Fashion Week:

This just proves a friend of mine’s point that color makes the difference in how good granny squares look. I still don’t love in a I-must-make-this way, but I can appreciate the geometrics and color here.

Of course, the biggest problem with granny squares as clothing is the complete lack of drape that they’re going to have. These dresses are only going to look good on a runway, or on someone who’s so damn hot they could grab a blanket off the couch and wear that. Which is kind of what they did there.

The funny thing is, I don’t hate this. I can tell it’s some good knit work, and there’s something cool about how the scarf part is twisted around on itself. It’d be awesome on a fashion runway. But, seriously, can anyone pull this off in real life? I’m not sure even in NYC or Paris that this would be a good look out on the street. Especially not with the electric blue spandex pants (nice camel toe!).

The price is a deal breaker, too, it’s $200. Now I know—oh god, do I know—that’s a fair price for the amount of time that went in to knitting that piece. But the cold, hard truth is that you can’t always charge for your time, things are only worth what someone is willing to pay for them. And hey, if they can get people to pay $200 for that, more power to ‘em. But I kinda doubt that’s happening.

So this:

is not a good thing. It’s really hilariously awful.

But wait, there’s more. This pic is for a pattern—a pattern for sale. That’s right, they’re selling this pattern for $5 AUD.

Okay okay, I suppose I can get the appeal, you could use up a bunch of scrap yarn and knock together an essentially free sweater in the time you spend watching TV, and it could be a nice cozy house sweater. But aside from the taste/aesthetic issues, it’s freaking granny squares. Who needs a pattern? And who would expect anyone to pay for that pattern?

The worst part is, they’re probably making a fortune from it.

Once it was clear that the site was seriously screwed, I did what you always should do in that case—I moved on to something else and tried to not think about it. Trying to fix something in the heat of temper isn’t wise, and dumb as I am I’m smart enough to not cause even more damage. So this evening my hubbie sat down with me, we carefully went over it, and finally decided to try the backup I had made right before the upgrade attempt (see, I have learned a couple things over time). (why not try the backup first? Because, don’t add more screwups on top, you gotta know you’re making the right move and not just piling on more problems.) The backup worked, the site is not only fully restored, I now have a second duplicate site which I will keep and from now on run tests on that one first.

On the off chance anyone else actually uses Joomla, I’d highly recommend the Akeeba backup extension. Though I think I might be alone in using Joomla, it’s complex enough to not be suitable for causal users, much more so than WordPress. I kinda like it, though, it’s easier for me to put up new files than if I used Dreamweaver for it all, and I’ve created this custom template that I’m rather fond of (I wrote every scrap of code in that template myself, too, even the php).

So, end result: I’m stupid, but not irrevocably so.