I needed some mindless knitting for my travels, so I pulled this yarn out of the stash. I’d made a pair of socks from this yarn before, so I knew it would be too busy for any pattern to show up. It’s a knitpicks handpainted stroll yarn in the watermelon colorway. This is just my standard sock pattern.
I would have gotten way more knitting done last week, only I’ve been told not to knit at conferences. I used to knit through all my classes in undergrad and grad school, but the current job sees knitting in a negative light. I’ve been told that I’m unapproachable when I’m knitting, and that people take it as a sign of disrespect. I was also asked if I really wanted to be known as the person who knits, implying there are some negative connotations going on with knitting. Because of this I have been instructed not to knit where people can see me at work (i.e. meetings/talks outside my small group (my group being forced to make allowances for me), which includes conferences). Since I really like keeping my hands busy, this makes meetings and talks way less fun to attend, and I feel less good about how I’ve spent my time when I do go, since there’s always the thought that I could have been more productive doing something else instead. When I can knit through those meetings I’m able to console myself that, if nothing else, I at least made progress on my current sock. I see this knitting restriction as one of the serious downsides of this job, though I am still allowed to knit at my desk and while doing experimental testing, at least.