Monday, April 10, 2017

The Day My Brain Went Pffft

It was a day like any other - well, if that day starts with a dog whining in his crate at 3:10 am.  I got up and let him outside, then didn't reward him for waking up so early by letting him go sleep with me - nope, back to the crate for you, Paco.  I went back to bed and played Words With Friends - brain was obviously functioning at that point - until it was time to get up to run at 4:45 am.  I ran four miles, I had coffee and a quick breakfast, and got myself ready to go work at the gift shop.  So far, so good.

We were really busy at the gift shop with customers, plus we were restocking things, and rehanging all the clothing onto new black flocked hangers (so things will stop falling to the floor so easily).  In the midst of all of this, I went looking for one little earring display for a new pair of earrings, and that opened up a can of worms and the short version is that I couldn't take the chaos of all the Fossil watch tins that we had stored in several spots, so I decided to pull them all out and stack them in the back of the jewelry case for display (and also so our customers could choose their box whenever they bought a watch).  Nearly 60 tins and three shelves later, I was finished with that part; I also stacked over 100 Fossil jewelry tins in the locked storage bin under the jewelry display.  WHEW!  That was a lot of work but it looked great, so totally worth the effort.  Here is where I should be showing you a picture of the display, but do you think I thought to take one?  Of course not.  Brain was still functioning, although it was probably at 95%.

Anyway, our shift was nearly over when the computer froze up, which was stressful as we had several people in line waiting to buy their afternoon snacks.  Finally we got it working again, processed everyone, and Rosalie and I left for the day.  I got home, ate a late lunch, caught up on some blog reading and Facebook, and suddenly felt very tired - no wonder, it'd been a busy day.  Paco, Henners and I laid down for a little nap.  Energy and brain function recharged fully.

Because I had such a late lunch, I wasn't very hungry for dinner so I heated up some frozen broccoli tots that I'd impulse-bought earlier in the week.  Hey guess what?  Broccoli tots are pretty gross.  I'd rather eat fresh steamed broccoli than mushy tots.  A big glass of water and a couple of Dove dark chocolate Promises washed away that taste.  I'd say brain was still functioning properly at that point, although it is questionable where my brain was when I bought those tots.

I sat down to knit and decided to work on my throw.  Every so often, I have to knit a square on the edge, because otherwise the edge keeps working its way inward, like a triangle:
See the right side?  I've been neglecting it.

This involves picking up stitches on one side of a square and doing an additional cast on of an equal amount of stitches.  This isn't my favorite part, because the way I was casting on the extra stitches (doing a backwards loop) was creating a long string of excess yarn between the new cast on and the picked up stitches.  I finally asked Debby how she was doing this, since she's also making a mitered-square throw, and she said she was using a knitted cast on, so I did a quick tutorial search from my favorite online knitter and was ready to start.  I did the knitted cast on and went to pick up stitches, but my working yarn was on the wrong side.  And also, it didn't feel like I was picking up stitches correctly - which was weird because if you look at that throw, I've been doing a lot - every square has two sides of picked up stitches!

I tried switching to the left side of the throw with those knitted cast on stitches, but still couldn't make it work.  I pulled up the pattern for this throw, which I haven't had to refer to since the first week that I started knitting this, and nothing was making sense.  Obviously my brain capacity was shutting down, but it the part that made me realize that shutdown was imminent had already shut down, so I kept muddling along, trying to figure this out.

Since adding a new square to the side wasn't working, I decided to stop trying that and simply knit a new square between the green and brown squares...and that was when my brain went pffft - it just shorted out.  I've been working on this throw nearly every day, adding a square or two, and suddenly I could not remember how to pick up stitches.  Which side do I start on?  Which hand do I hold the needle in?  I sat there, with yarn and needles laying in my hands like they were foreign objects, and I had no earthly idea how to use them.  Brain function was negative ten at that point.

I set everything aside and watched something on TV, but to be honest, I don't even remember what I watched.  Apparently my brain had declared itself done for the night.

It's been a long time since my brain powered down right before my eyes; luckily I was only trying to knit instead of doing something crucial, like operate heavy machinery or raise children.  And it's not like I had an intense day of doing quantum physics - OK, it's not like I've EVER had a day doing quantum physics, intense or not - I was just doing my normal Thursday stuff.  Luckily my brain rebooted overnight and has been operating at near-capacity ever since.

I still can't make that knitted cast on work for a side square, though.

16 comments:

  1. I'm going to say I envy that brain shut down where you are able to nap. I used to nap all the time and I swear I can feel exhausted and I'm not able to nap because my brain won't be quiet.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh honey, when my brain finally goes, it GOES. ;)

      Delete
  2. I can't believe you were up that early, ran 4 miles and STILL had a somewhat productive day!

    ReplyDelete
  3. My pup wakes up that early to go outside, but fortunately my hubs gets up with her! He gets up for work at 4, so it seems to be the right thing...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That's convenient, having your puppy and your husband on the same schedule!

      Delete
  4. Oh man! You still can't figure out the square?! Maybe this week?!

    I am not surprised trying to figure that out it was finally caused the shutdown. Trying to process someone else's instructions for knitting is a lot of work!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm hoping to tackle the cast on again today. Fingers crossed I can turn my throw back into a rectangle again instead of the triangle!

      Delete
  5. I was tired reading about your day. When I don't get enough sleep, I feel like that.

    One day, I started driving to my old job in the morning - brain mush.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. OMG, I can totally see that happening, driving to your old job - it's just autopilot at that point!

      Delete
  6. The throw is looking really neat....even though you had a brain malfunction while working on it last time making you walk away!

    'My brain totally malfunctioned on Saturday morning. My work combinations that I've had 10 years.....I couldn't remember them. 8 couldn't remember to go right or left...I knew the numbers but not the correct order. It was mind bloggling and honestly a bit scary!!!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I know what you mean - it's baffling when you can't figure out something you know you should know!

      Delete
  7. What a day! I would have been so tired, I think I would have just sit there with my knitting in my hands and fallen asleep (haha, like I did yesterday when I sat down.) Your throw looks SOOOO pretty. Much neater than mine, because you are using all sock yarn, I think. I have a variety of yarn gauges in mine.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I've done that, fall asleep mid-stitch. Always give me a bit of panic when I wake up, to see if I've managed to drop any off my needles during that surprise nap.

      I do like my throw, but if I'd seen the rainbow throw before I started, mine would look quite different. TOO LATE NOW...is what I keep telling myself. No restarts at this point.

      Delete
  8. Those brain shutting down things happen to me and I find them disturbing. I'll be practicing guitar pieces from memory that I've done 100 times and then I just cannot remember a passage to save my life. I have to get the music out and look at it. We watched a show on Alzheimer's a couple weeks ago and I think it made me a little paranoid.

    Can you show pics of your Fossil display? I love that brand of watches.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Thank goodness you weren't operating a fork lift! Sometimes a good night sleep is all you need to reboot :D

    ReplyDelete

Comments are now moderated to prevent spammers from leaving, well, spam - but rest assured that as soon as I read a real comment, I will publish it. So please, comment away, even though the blog is officially closed. Thanks!