Eulogy and an FO

It's been an odd little day. My alarm clock went off at seven this morning and the first thing I heard was one of those chirpy radio voices announcing that Luciano Pavarotti died today. Or yesterday, depending on the time zone. It is truly a sad day for the whole world when it loses a voice as majestic as this one.

I spent a good twenty minutes watching old Youtube videos of Pavarotti's performances and crying like a baby. I'm not sure why I'm so affected by this, but I think part of it has to do with the fact that I grew up listening to him. My mom is a huge classical music buff and I often woke up in the mornings to her CDs of arias and symphonies.

The last time Pavarotti performed "Nessun Dorma," the big, grandiose aria from Puccini's Turandot, he was in his home country and singing in front of millions of Olympic visitors:



Pay attention to his face at 1:40. I often feel that true passion (the constructive kind, not the destructive kind) gets overlooked when things like business and money and exposure get in the way. But despite the millions he made as a singer, that expression is priceless. That is passion for the art itself. It's not the most technically impressive of his televised performances, but I think he's at his most honest. A lot of experts say he knew his voice and body were giving out then. I like to think that his face shows how much it meant to him that he got to sing his signature piece one last time in his own country.

Now, on to happier things: Finished Charades!

Marlena & Rosie Charades
Pattern: Charade Socks
Yarn: Claudia Hand Painted Fingering in Pink Cloud
Needles: US 1.5 circulars

I named these after the circus performer and elephant in Water for Elephants. Seemed appropriate, given the grey of an elephant and the pink sequins that Marlena wears. The pattern is super easy and the results are quite pleasing.

When I first posted photos of the yarn here, I briefly mentioned some worry because of the discrepancies in cake size. I started the first one with the smaller cake and made it to the end with normal leftovers, which got me to wondering if the other one was really much bigger or if the yarn was just fluffier...

The leftovers. Ahem. I think that one of the skeins I purchased was a greedy monster skein that ate half of its brothers or something. I think it's almost enough to knit a whole third sock. What a bit o' weird! The photo reminds me of Shel Silverstein. Maybe The Missing Piece and the Big O.

Now, just to prove how much these socks actually look as though they've been printed with clouds, here's a slightly fuzzy/blurry photo I took:

And here's a beautiful photo of a pink, lavender, and grey sunset:

This photo was taken by Flickr user yorksgalSue and she generously allowed me to post it here to show off the similarity between sock and nature. You can check out more of her photos here.

Now I just need to figure out what new projects I can start!