And now for something completely different. 2kcbwday5

Good morning everyone. This is our brief for today:

experimental blogging day to try and push your creativity in blogging to the same level that you perhaps push your creativity in the items you create.

Well, I thought of doing a video but I ran out of time, so I wrote a poem instead. It is the Ballad of The Lonely Plastic Knitting Needle. This one was starting to rival the Aeneid but I have got it down to a manageable length hopefully. What more can I say? I wrote a poem about a knitting needle. Even I think this is a bit peculiar.

How did that loose thread get in the photo???

The Ballad of the Lonely Plastic Knitting Needle

I am a plastic needle.
My life, it is so tragic.
Yet once, I was in constant use.
How did I lose my magic?

Though some needles were metal
Most once were plastic too
Like me. We nothing knew then
Of perspex and bamboo

When I was young and vibrant
And knitting DK till it
Formed wild and stripy jumpers
In lovely bright acrylic.

I got a lot of use then.
I knitted things for babies.
Sturdy moss-stitch cushions.
Lace cardigans for ladies.

I whipped through static Fun Fur
And giant balls of aran.
I never dreamed that one day
My purling would be barren.

But winds of change were coming
To wool shops through the land.
What once had been de rigeur
Now seemed a little bland.

First came a certain Zimmerman.
My gloom’s been incremental
Since she persuaded everyone
To switch to continental.

Yes I know whose the fault is.
Do not think I do not.
It’s people on the internet.
It’s Ravelry and that lot.

It’s those newfangled patterns.
I blame that Debbie Stoller.
And Drops, Knitpicks and Knitty.
One Claps and they all foller.

I blame the knitting bloggers.
I blame the top-down raglan.
No-one loves straight needles now.
They pretend they never had them.

My mate, he took it badly.
Despair, drink, drugs then rehab.
Now he’s staking runner beans
Behind some old darling’s prefab.

I can’t get on with circulars.
I snubbed a couple once.
I thought they were peculiar.
Now all I meet are tons

Of circulars and doublepins.
And snooty Malabrigo.
I’m oppressed by natural fibres.
I think they are all ego.

Begone, handpainted yarn.
I am so over qiviut.
I disapprove of Knit Pro circs
Because I am not with it.

I want giant balls of aran.
Pink double knit for babies.
I want boring stocking-stitch
On v-necked vests in navy.

Moody men on patterns.
Of acrylic I want oodles.
I want seams up backs of socks
And cosies shaped liked poodles.

Because those fickle winds of change
Could blow the other way.
The world might tire of Addis
And I might still have my day.

I’m a plastic knitting needle
And I hope my future’s brighter
Filled with wool, fun, life and patterns.
It’s a good job I’m a fighter.