Author: Karen

Thinking About Sounds

Karen

I found an archive post from Kottke talking about how loud the Krakatoa volcano was–apparently loud enough to burst the eardrums of people 40 miles away. From the article linked in that post:

The human threshold for pain is near 130 decibels, and if you had the misfortune of standing next to a jet engine, you’d experience a 150 decibel sound. (A 10 decibel increase is perceived by people as sounding roughly twice as loud.) The Krakatoa explosion registered 172 decibels at 100 miles from the source. This is so astonishingly loud, that it’s inching up against the limits of what we mean by “sound.”

The Kottke post also talks about how loud a Saturn V rocket is–“At very close range, the sound from the Saturn V measures an incredible 220 db, loud enough to melt concrete just from the sound“–and then finishes with an incredible fact that sperm whale calls reach 174 decibels?!

Thinking About Bright Stripes

Karen

Who else spends a not-negligible amount of time thinking about GAP’s holiday collections of 1999 and 2000? Just me? It was all so good, though. I didn’t own this sweater–I think it sold out before I could scrape together $48–but it haunts me.

 

Sewing/textile influencer Martha Moore recently posted about the third striped sweater she’d knit. They’re all giving 1999 Gap Crazy Stripe Sweater and that gave me Ideas.

 

The pattern Martha used is from PetiteKnit, the designer whose pattern gave me such a gorgeous finish on my green vest. It’s called the Aros Sweater (yes, you can make a dress; I won’t, I just liked the stripe colors in the dress more).

 

Thinking about what colors I’d use in my stripes is, of course, the best part. Every time I use the hot water bottle in its stripey cover, I get happy. So what if I used that as a jumping off point?

The only impediments are my unfinished summer sweater, the pile of sock yarn to knit up, and finding a yarn that isn’t the least bit itchy (but not spending $480 on hand-dyed cashmere; I have more money than I did at 19 but not that much).

Tuesday Project Roundup: The Most Karen Fabric There Ever Was

Karen

I’ve been sewing up the block print fabrics I found on Etsy into Bonnet Shirts/Dresses and this fabric in particular brought me so much joy.

 

It is pink! AND orange! At the same time! AND has fierce tigers all over it! Perfect for all your Desert Aunt wardrobe needs; that tunic length will also be ideal for a swim coverup.

 

The fabric is also really forgiving to sew–it’s not a tight or fine weave so things just relax with steam, and it doesn’t get the wear creases that a real shirting fabric does. Naturally, I want to buy even MORE of it. (I don’t need more fabric.) (Put that on my headstone.)

Happy Birthday, Alan

Karen

My big brother is 48 today! I look back on previous birthday posts to make sure I get the ages right (easier than math) and it struck me how lucky I am that my brother is good people.

Last year I wrote he was “utterly convinced about right and wrong,” and only reading it this year did I realize that also describes me. Two siblings with Convictions could be a recipe for disaster, but he has a Harris/Walz yard sign. I remember how upset he got hearing about Matthew Shepard long ago. He’s never liked cops.

We fundamentally agree, because we’re fundamentally the same–same parents, same memories, same genetics. He remembers what made me spit my milk out at dinner 35 years ago, I remember what upset him in our 20s. There are jokes online about “the mortifying ordeal of being known” and let me tell you, that is a sibling relationship in a nutshell. I’m just thankful to be known by a good person, who loves me, whom I love. Happy birthday!

 

Another Poem

Karen

I try not to post too many poems from week to week, but it’s almost fall; it’s a poetic time. I saw this one on the Poetry Is Not a Luxury account. “This test again” sure sums up how I feel about sunset at 7:30, ha.

 

September
by Joseph Fasano

And now the first winds
purr what they’ve been learning
like a children’s choir
flipping through their hymnals.

This test again, this wintering,
this bite.

Summer, Summer’s roads are over-

And all these leaves,
this foliage on your shoulders-
like all the ghosts of childhood’s
wild silence
laying on their hands
as though to guide you.
It is time to fall into your life.

The Lost Labyrinth of Egypt?

Karen

I follow Stephen Ellcock, an author and “renowned image collector” (according to his publisher), on Instagram. He’ll drop a slideshow of art and images, loosely related by theme, which is how I found out about The Great Lost Labyrinth of Egypt (!).

Image from Stephen’s post, captioned “The Great Lost Labyrinth of Egypt, (said to be more impressive even than the pyramids) as described first by Herodotus. 1670s engraving by Athanasius Kircher.”

 

I went right to Wikipedia, as one does, and read about it (emphasis mine for the cool parts!):

There are also double sets of chambers, three thousand altogether, fifteen hundred above and the same number under ground. … We learned through conversation about [the labyrinth’s] underground chambers; the Egyptian caretakers would by no means show them, as they were, they said, the burial vaults of the kings who first built this labyrinth, and of the sacred crocodiles. …

But I really wanted more artists’ recreations! I want more info! I also want either a current expedition to discover more of the ruins or a movie about such a thing, I’m not picky.

I did a brief wider search and found “Virtual Harawa,” plans for a research expedition, and, uh, a TikTok from a cosplayer claiming there were LIDAR scans? But not much more! Get moving, scientists, I want my National Geograhpic special/summer movie.

Lesson: Just Use The Good Fabric

Karen

After I posted about block prints and dresses a few weeks ago, I finished my muslin of the Bonnet Shirt in the dress view. I used shirtings I had in my stash (the last of my order from Sultans a couple years ago); in my mind, a mix of classic stripes could be preppy and cool.

Except it turned out more “Founding Fathers slumber party” than “cool preppy dress”:

The pattern was fine but I could not get over the nightshirt vibes, so I cropped it to the tunic view. Much better!

 

I DO think that I’ll like this pattern as a dress–just in a print that feels like me. I’m not preppy! I love colors and patterns! So it’s a good thing that my block print order arrived: