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May 23, 2005
Tossed and Found: A Good Yarn
My advance apologies for 1) the bad puns in the title and 2) another post devoted entirely to yarn.
Derek and I took a walk around the neighborhood this evening and made an interesting discovery. It's that time of the week when large trash items -- cabinets, tables, chairs -- are on the sidewalk, so we were keeping an eye out for any salvageable items. I checked out an iron-wrought bench and then checked out some boxes near 7th Ave and 15th St. On closer inspection of the boxes, I found old tapes, a vase, and ... bags and bags of fabric and yarn. I noticed one circular needle and some decent yarn and got excited (good yarn can be pretty expensive). I found a needle measurement thing and probably squealed. I started grabbing skeins I thought I could use. Eventually I grabbed one entire bag. I thought, if I can't use it I can donate it all to Church of Craft.
Since Derek knows what I'm like in a yarn store (or any store, really) -- I stand in one spot for minutes on end, staring at two types of yarn, paralyzed by indecision -- he suggested picking up all the bags and sorting through it at home. The stuff looked pretty clean and dry so I agreed. There's always a hazard to bringing other people's junk home, but if we hadn't done that I would probably still be hunched over the pile on the curb. On the way back we speculated that someone had probably died and the person's yarn stash and fabric had ended up on the street after no one was interested in it.
At home, I unloaded hank after hank of good wool yarn. The labels are pretty dated -- everything seemed to be at least two decades old. The knitter clearly had a tweed phase, and some interest in Norwegian wool at one point. There were also some unfinished projects -- the start of a pretty odd-looking (though impressively knitted) cardigan, and the front and back of a child's sweater. The fabric was a combination of some godawful retro patterns (almost cool in their 70s ugliness) and some good quality tablecloth stuff. There was some complicated red silk fabric that could work as an elaborate kimono, and a mishmosh of shiny nylon and felt.
As the pile of usable yarn (in other words, the yarn that wasn't involved in the huge primordial knot I found in one bag) grew, and a number of "moth proof" labels appeared, I considered the worst possible explanation: the whole treasure trove was moth-infested. Since everything looked like it was in good shape, though, I repressed the thought and charged ahead. Still, the threat to my current, expensive yarn stash isn't something I was comfortable with.
Eventually I took a break and sat down somewhere. When Derek came over to see how I was doing, we both noticed something deeply disturbing on my wool sweater: a moth larvae casement. A yellow one (no, I'm not posting a picture). I'm still in a state of shock. From what I hear from other yarn hoarders, moths invade your house, eat all your clothes, cause tremendous heartbreak by destroying handknit objects and NEVER LEAVE. There are things you can do -- boil, freeze, bleach, dry clean, iron -- but they're not guaranteed.
I immediately headed for the computer -- after carefully removing the disgusting little thing -- and looked up moths. Since the casement is not white, it may not be the type of moth that eats wool, so I'm settling into a kind of mild denial. I'm hoping it's the food kind -- a kind of moth we've come to know and kill regularly in the kitchen. The food kind doesn't even like wool. So we're good. But the timing was a bit too coincidental. It appears on my sweater right after I sort through five bags of yarn?
So all of the found yarn is back in bags and may be carted back to the curb tomorrow morning. Someone else can take the risk, damnit. I mean, the yarn wasn't THAT great. Ugh. Then again, it may just stay in quarantine for a while.
Posted by csageday at May 23, 2005 12:20 AM
Comments
Hmm. I think that if it were all moth-infested, there would have been more obvious evidence -- like moths flying out of it, or moth casements visible in the yarn itself. The freaky, yucky, sticky little white ones. But I can see why you'd be paranoid, since I would also be paranoid. The non-wool stuff (measuring tape, needle gauge, etc.) is all fine, of course.
Um, if you're going to throw it out, can I call dibs on the Donegal Tweed? (^_^)
Posted by: Rose at May 23, 2005 11:40 AM