ply on the fly, unplanned projects and hot sox

First, I am getting caught up with spindolyns, and should be able to get back to making specialty spindolyns by next week, yippeeeee!!!! Thank you all for your patience and encouragement  ; )

~the evolution of a random knitting project~

When you are laid up, you sometimes get so discouraged that you almost  don’t even feel like playing with fiber…almost. At these times, I find that starting a random, unplanned project that has no deadline, no commitment is a no pressure way to slide back into getting your serious spinning and knitting groove back. Working on perfecting my “ply on the fly” technique on the spindolyn™ sounded like an entertaining task. (first incidence of randomness)

In a sort of  sulky mood  I looked around for some fiber to spin using this variation on the Navajo three ply technique that I wouldn’t feel destroyed over if I, well, destroyed it. But I didn’t want to have to gather up my crutches and hobble in to the living room cupboard where my main stash of fiber and spindles live. Day to day living, and making my way too and fro out to the shop is enough hobbling for each day (hence the sulky mood.)

Peaking out of a basket in the corner of the office I spied this plastic bag of great, fluffy roving that I got from Susannah at SAFF last year. It is a hairy, cheery blend of bright yellow, orange and hot pink. I like how the colors look together, but the hot pink is a bit hot for me, so I  separated it out from the other colors, thinking it would be a good fiber to sacrifice on some “risk taking” sort of spindling. (second incidence of randomness)

I commenced the ply on the fly, taking a few minutes to get a rhythm  and technique going that seams to work best on the spindolyn. (I will get a video up of this some time soon) It was pretty mesmerizing and in no time, I had this much spun and plied and ready to knit. I could have packed more onto this “melody” size spindolyn™ but it was starting to slow a bit from the weight, and I was anxious to get to knitting, because it seemed “ripe” to knit.

That is the whole fun of “ply on the fly” it is ready to knit, right off the spindolyn™ and that is a pretty instant gratification! But how much can you knit from this amount of spindling? and what to knit? It is a pretty hot color and it occurred to me, that I am going to probably need something “hot” on my poor toes of my broken foot, as it will probably be extra cold this winter, and a sock toe would make a good swatch (third Incidence of Randomness; or I will call this 3rd I. R.)

So I decided that the hot part of the color should be on my toes, and toe up socks would probably be the way to go. I could see how far one spindle of Navajo plied yarn would get me in knitting a sock. Next step, see what size yarn we are talking about. 24 wraps per 2 inches. Now this was pretty silly step, because once again, I didn’t want to go look for needles, and the nearby ones were a set of US size 2 double pointed bamboos. Those’ll work. (4th I.R. )

 

I cast on using “Judy’s Magic Cast-On” and started knitting a toe.

And this is when I really got excited about ply on the fly. It does seem slow when you are doing it, but then, like magic, you are ready to knit!!! that will keep me going while I am recouping.

And this is how far that the this amount went in the knitting…

 

And now that I look at it, I think I will spin the next spindle full with a bit more of the orangey, then ending with the yellowy (5th I.R.)

And this is how an unplanned project full of random decisions has turned into a planned pair of hot sox.

New Year, New Spindles, New website, and reflections on gift knitting

Welcome 2012! I wish for everyone plenty of time for all their fiber projects this year.

New Spindolyns...
I have finally got the new spindolyns up on the website. After much experimentation, I decided on 4 different sizes,

from smallest to largest; the (new) soprano, the melody, the concerto and the harmonic.
The mezzo has been enlarged a hair to hold a bit more, and the weight removed from the center so that it spins faster and then renamed the soprano (a recycled name, but it just made more sense)
The concerto is a bit fancier and a special thanks to Mary (FleeceFriend on Ravelry) for helping me with the name.

New Website
oh yes! (almost forgot) for some strange reason, folks in Germany get a 404 when they try and visit the www.knittinganyway.com website, even though it is up and running here..
So while I figure out whats up with that, I have put up a blogger page for them at
http://www.spindolyns.blogspot.com/
    It could be that it has been up on the web since 1999 and was originally designed in Microsoft Frontpage, which of course now is totally outdated.
I have been "afeared" to learn a new software, but I think the time has come to start over, so if you are visiting and see anything weird, it is because I am trying to rebuild the original knittinganyway from scratch (wish me luck! : 0  and let me know if anything is totally wacky while you are browsing)

On Gift Knitting
Much has been written about knitting for others and the spiritual benefit it is for the knitter and the recipient. There are chemo caps, and prayer shawls, and afghans for afghans, and many, many other ways that knitters can contribute of their time and talent.
I was thinking as I knit a few dishcloths for giving away this year the difference between knitting for those we know and those we don't.
One of the intended recipients of a dishcloth that I was working on happens to be a "modern" young woman (an old fashioned phrase, I know, but I can't think of another way to say it) I had found some unknown, unlabeled, cotton  in my stash that was a perfect match to her kitchen curtains, and short on time, I wanted to do something personal for her.
 I was thinking of her while I knit and it occurred to me, that unlike me, she mostly eats out, and if she rarely cooks, it would be to microwave something out of box, which she would serve most likely on a paper plate, or pop the dirty dish into the dishwasher.
 With this dawning realization, it occurred to me that she might not "get" her gift. Oh, maybe she might recognize it as a dishcloth, but probably not that it was handknit, in a special pattern and in yarn that matched her curtains, and I kind of doubted that she would immedietly recognize the scrubbing value and niceness of a handknit dishcloth.
For just a bit I set it aside and worked on something else.
I thought of all the knitted things that would suit her better, for which I had neither the time, the yarn nor the money.
And that is when I realized, that sometimes, knitting for someone else is just because you are thinking of them, and it doesn't have to "fit", it is the thought(s) that count, the loving thoughts of that person that are looped into each stitch, whether they know it or not.

Autumn Spinning, Knitting and gee, time to get out the woolies!

I believe I mentioned that I bought some lovely rainbow roving  top last year at SAFF, and it took me almost a year to get around to spinning it, should have started sooner, as it is a super-wash merino, not at all compacted, spins like a dream and is my current favorite thing on the spindolyn.

 

Actually, I should have bought more of it, but although I can remember the location of the booth of the talented dyer at SAFF last year, I lost the card that came with the fiber, and can’t remember her name. Finding her (hopefully) again this year is one of my quests for this year.   I leave in about 29 hours…am I ready? Nah, still polishing spindolyns and packing…so why am I blogging? .needed to put my feet up for just a bit, and am just too excited to be quiet.

It really is a fun fiber festival, all that inspirational wool walking around, not just in the booths, or on the backs of the attending fiber animals, but being worn by talented attendees, lovely work every where you look. Sweaters and shawls and hats and vests, oh my!

What was I saying.. oh, so I divided this top into by splitting it in to two equal strips.Weighing them to make sure.

I have spun the first half up on the harmonic spindolyn and have a good start on the second one already…

but you know how when you are spinning and daydreaming about what you will knit, you get a hankering to go ahead and knit…this little lust was dancing around in my head while passing through my LYS and I couldn’t pass up this merino singles, so soft, so yummy and with those autumn colors…and so I started knitting this basket-weave something or other….(I think it is going to be a cowl)

And now that I have gotten that going, I can merrily go back to spinning!

If you come find yourself at SAFF, do come by and say howdy!, Susannah and I’s booth is near the front door, across from the restrooms.

Hot Weather Knitting

We are not daintily perspiring here, we are dripping.
Frequent cold cloths to the face have been necessary in order to not just flat out keel over.

I have hit the age where my facial skin is now "tender" (awww)

I am also at the age where I found myself griping like an old grouch when I went to pick up a couple of new wash clothes to replace my old, holey wash (face) cloths...."sheesh! they don't make them like they used to!"

 The wash cloths I found were either too thick and heavy to ever dry out in our southern humidity, or they were just plain scratchy.

I ask you,  how does cotton get scratchy? I think there is more in that cotton than just cotton..

I guess labels these days lie, just like politicians

On the very day that I picked up a ball of cotton to knit my own washcloth, a knitting friend of mine emailed me, saying she wished people would knit something more challenging than dishcloths. 

Unbeknownst to her, I felt duley challenged.

 I made it more difficult on myself by promptly misplacing my yellow dishcloth yarn, found an alternative (but ugly) brown, cream and green ball of peaches and creame, and scoured Ravelry for patterns that offered some spicyness of language when you loose your place in them.

I picked 4 patterns from Ravelry, and present 3 here in order of most challenging to least.

   I began with the pattern called "vortex six" by Rebecca Hudson..she has a series of neat vortex dishcloths..meditative, but I admit, a bit more challenging in the heat than I was looking for, I stopped mine after 5 rounds, instead of 6, cause the yarn was ugly (photo A) and I was hot.

Mine does not look like hers, I will go back to this pattern in cooler weather and with two colors of yarn at a later date.

photo A

Next, I decided that some thinner cotton in a bit more open stitch would dry quicker in the terrible humidity, and got this yellow varigated mercerized cotton purchased from my LYS Traditions in Lafayette, TN, for which I promplty lost the ball band or I would tell you the brand....I like the way it knit up, but the varigation had lovely orange, yellow, white and ....gray??  this would be very pretty if they left out the gray varigation, as it makes the cloth look "pre dirtied" However, the mercerized actually does make a nice, soft, quick drying wash cloth.

The cloth is smaller than it looks, because the rubber ducky is actually a "mini ducky" The pattern is the Petal Dishcloth by Susan Esser, it is knit list archived. It was a little easier to follow whilst one is daintily dabbing ones forehead with the previous cloth.



I totally screwed up on this last one, but it is a great pattern, easy peasy, it is the Starfish Cloth by Dione Reed of Sew Funky. I intentionally used a little bigger needles, thinking quick drying again, but I went a little too far and it flops around like a jelly fish rather than a starfish. I also decided that I wanted it to be anatomically correct (to a starfish, that is) and so only made 5 arms rather than the 6 the pattern calls for, so fudged the rows a little randomly to accomodate than, and one of the arms looks like it was whacked off and grown back, which is also biologically correct to starfish, so that made me feel closer to the ocean, which just the thought of those breezes has a cooling effect, so that was worth it.

 It is also not as big as it looks in the photo, as the hat is very small..You could, however, soak the cloth, squeeze out most of the water from the middle, drape it over your head and let the drips come down the starfish arms for a cooling effect....?

Heart Chart (for knitting, that is)

Had this heart ready to post for a month, wanted to get it out in time February, but work got in the way. It is the chart that I used for the Machine Knit version of the Heartwarming Aromatherapy Keyhole scarf (coming soon)

The larger version to print out is Here It is 24 stitches wide so will work with the Magic Needle Selector wand, or punchards.

Making time and space for Machine Knitting

    Repairing a thoughtless error in my calculations on a knitting pattern this afternoon, I noticed I was neither hunched over nor hurried as I sat at the knitting machine.
     The greyish light of the winter afternoon rested softly on the needle bed and I felt happily contented, mistakes and all, and wondered why I had waited so long to set up the knitting machine this winter right in front of the living room window.
     Since fall, it had nagged at me, this desire to move the knitting machine to somewhere warmer, but not in the way. This house is too small for both of those criteria to be met, so I finally decided that "in the way" is not so bad, after all.
     In the summer, the knitting machine resides in the office, which is actually a poorly insulated enclosed portion of the original back porch. I can bundle up and assemble spindolyns or pack orders, but I simply can not abide being cold while knitting. It is somehow counterintuitive, and I operate on a 50/50 mix of intuition and logic. This winter has defied both of those, averaging way below normal in temperature and above normal in gloom. I have been doing more spinning and handknitting and just plain missing my knitting machine.
    So now, it is finally crammed into the living room, with 3 warming dogs, two cats, JB and his music studio, the wood stove, the tv, the stereo, the books, 3 computers and so on. Funny thing how that kind of winter intimacy either makes you want to kill someone, or drives you into a personal space that is actually more productive. The latter is working for me, with the mk right there at the window, every time I look out the front window to check on the sheep and goats in the pasture or the birds at the feeder, I sit down and knit a few rows (or more) the same way one might casually pick up their hand knitting.
      I was originally worried that the sun coming in the window would be a problem........ha. what sun?

What is funny about this photo? I am repairing my mis-calcuation by adding more on to the knitting on the machine, by knitting it on by hand. When the table and the chair are nice heights to each other, this is as comfortable as lounging at the kitchen table reading seed catalogues and knitting.

The shoemakers wife~the sockmakers husband

       As an old school feminist, the terms "husband and wife" leave me a little uneasy, but hey, when you are searching for a title, sometimes you have to stretch.
      But the point is still valid, even if convoluted. In this household, we are experiencing a serious sock deficit. ( insert horrified soap opera music here)
       Some winters in sunny Tennessee, just a few pairs of warm wool "home knit" (hand or machine) socks will get you through...this winter has been a frigid exception. Need---more---socks! feet are cold, socks are dirty.
        Will get on to that, as soon as I get these current spindolyn orders done, locate some more hay for the sheep and goats, find some dry firewood,etc, but in the meantime, will share some photos of socks that were kindly forwarded to me from a customer, Kay, (EarthKat) Thanks Kay for sharing!



Great job! her first Machine knit socks. The colors really move me.
She knit them using the pattern in my book Sock Options for Machine Knitters, and wrote some nice and head swelling stuff about trying other patterns and really liking the book but (blushing) I wont go in to that, other than to say it really makes me happy to think of happy feet,and inspires me to get cracking on some socks for my poor cold feet.

new year a comin’

and now, back to our regularly scheduled programming….
I refuse to make the list of resolutions, instead, I am just going to start doing them..like every little design thing that pops into my head I will sketch, no matter how silly.

magical power of the knit stitch

Like many people, I enter my internet world from a google homepage that I have jammed pack full of feeds; environmental news, knitting, photography, farm stuff, spinning blogs, and a smattering of politics and poetry.

Tellingly, I no longer feed my horoscope and never have cared about sports or pollen count. One feed I do watch and enjoy is the “how to of the day”. One day this week, the title was-

“Today is Magic Day...How to Make Smoke Come Out of Your Fingers”

Forgive me, but the first thought that came to the top of my head made me burst out laughing…it just seems to define the entire US attitude toward problem solving right now.

Anyway, I wanted to post this knitting mandala that reminds me of magic, I fiddled with it some more in Lightroom, it is a sock heel, “kaleidoscoped”of course. When I see a close up of a knit stitch it just magically makes me want to run knit something, now, right now,and damn the dishes!

pixie takes a hike (or, samplings of samplings)

I have a spindolyn sitting by almost every place I sit down in my cabin. I call them my little “head clearers”
They are “in progress” testing of two things, a sort of sampling and sampling. Some are sampling the spindolyn prototype itself, some are sampling the fleece or blend.

I like to make blends, blends of fiber even more than blends of color, and that is a lot. I am very blendy, I guess, and so could call my spindles “mind blenders”

Anyway, sometimes the samples become part of a big project, sometimes they become part of the little balls of fibery goodness sitting around in baskets, calling out wistfully as I pass my glance over them, “if there were only more of me, you could make a shawl or a sweater”.

And sometimes, I hear them singing in soulful voices “all of me, why not take all of me”

hmmmm.

So when all of me is not very much, you have to think small. Pixie size small.

So, here is a sampled blend of cotswold and jacob rump fleece for pixie hair and beard. A sampled blend of space dyed merino and nylon for the hat and a sampled blend of gray romney and overdyed gray romney for the little sweater.

This pixie himself is a hiker pixie, I carved his little face, and body (the body is cedar) and his arms and legs are a bendable wire armature and tennessee river cane. The problem is, he lost his hiking stick, so as time permits, I really need to take him out into the woods to find a new one.

pic-a-nic, spin-a-nic and a knit-a-nic surprise

So several weeks back (well before the independence holiday) we decided that what we badly needed was a getaway, a quick overnight vacation. Camping, on the Cumberland River, and a day of rest, relaxation and kayaking. We threw tent, food, bedding and the inflatable kayaks in the back of the station wagon, checked the availability of our chosen campground from the Army Corp of Engineers website and headed out.

I did not have any particular spinning or knitting project in progress that I was emotionally involved in, and didn’t know what to take, so spur of the moment, I distractedly tossed in some stuff off of the shelf of my office into the closest available vessel, which happened to be an insulated cooler/picnic tote and tossed it in with the lifejackets and snorkels.

.

I won’t get in to the horrors of bureaucracy, ill mannered people and corrupted campground hosts, but the bottom line was that the hosts were illegally saving all the “good spots” for friends of theirs and even though we had chosen a “no reservation, walk in only, first come first serve day” to camp, we did not end up staying.

It was all for the best, as we spent a leisurely afternoon kayaking in an isolated cove, bird-watching, instead, and we were able to get back home and get up early to start back to work refreshed, which was the point, anyway.

Just as quickly as we packed, I tossed all of the camping gear back into the barn and the small stuff back into the corner of the cabin, and there sat the cooler with the fiber supplies in it, forgotten. Until yesterday. While looking for my tall, snake and chigger deterring rubber berry picking boots, I noticed the cooler and said to myself…hey, maybe I could pick blackberries into this, wonder if the stains would wash out…

Imagine my surprise upon opening the zipper only to find this great stash of fiber fun possibilities!

I set the cooler beside my evening chair, and last night, I had this lovely toy box all ready to dive into.

Maybe I should hide my projects intentionally from myself (instead of accidentally) because I got a lot of “cheap thrill” mileage out of the re-discovery of the contents.

Cherry Blossom Knitting

It was actually the cherry blossoms blooming that reminded me of the color of that spray dyed yarn, and made me hunt it up and start knitting on it..they way so one thing leads to another, when you are not knitting with a plan, but just “comfort knitting”

I started another spindolyn bean bag pouch, out of the cherry blossom colored yarn. It is a spiral hexagon, but to really match the cherry blossoms, it should have been a pentagon spiral..but as usual, I just picked up needles and started knitting and didn’t think it through first.

I am up the sides now, and it is a little poochy for a pouchy, yes, I should have made it a pentagon…next time.

But I love cherry blossom time, never-the-less.

Here is a picture a week back, before the tree was in full bloom, in the background you can see one of the hills that flank the holler, and my shop, before Saturdays storm blew the storm door clean off of it (silly pun, but kinda too bad, because a storm door is the only kinda door it had)

And of course, I had to try and get a lamb with cherry blossom picture, to go with the mule with cherry blossom and goat with cherry blossom….

Cherry blossoms last a full 2 weeks, the honey bees working them over while you work to get your taters and onions and sugar snap peas in the ground, if you are late with them.

Then the bees leave and they drift to the ground in showers of delicate petals, clinging to tools and wheelbarrows and car windows and by then, bright green baby tree leaves will be everywhere and then it will be really, truly, spring. But right now, the bees are still buzzing, and last night was pretty good frost.

Knitted Finger Ringers and Wrister

(scroll down to go directly to the pattern and skip the background)
Over the years I have worn out my hands. 'Tis true. I could blame it on arthritis, or poor circulation, or candida or even bad genes. But the truth is more likely that I started life with delicate small hands, and over the years did "big guy" work with them.
Farming, wood working, gardening, tree climbing, furniture making, plumbing, milking, firewood splitting...that is on top of spinning, knitting, wool carding (you know, drum carding is harder on your hands than you might think) weaving, rock wall building, basketmaking (now there is another real joint stresser) and computer typing.
So, a few years back, I started taking them seriously, treating them a little kinder, being more conscious of their needs...Perhaps I am supremely naive, but I prefer to figure it is never too late for redemption.
My hands spent last winter in fingerless gloves, keeping them warm really helped.
This winter, fingerless gloves are just "too much" And wristers are not enough.
I have graduated to "Finger Ringers with Matching Wristers"
The first set was hand knit (as in, gee, this is fun, and look how quickly it moves along! One, two, three fingers, snap! your done)

Then it happened. As soon as I could try on one set in delight, I was both happy and bored. The same syndrome as "second sock syndrome" has set in.
So, the second set, I plan to knit on the LK 150.

Here is the handknit version (with commentary) This is a very quick project, I had a ball of Better Buny Blend spun up that was perfectly soft and warm for this project.

Hand Knit Finger Ringers with Matching Wrister Warmer
Finger Ringers are knit on two needles with the double knit (or tubular) method of knitting. There are of course, many ways to make glove fingers (circular, icord, etc) but tubular works quick for these little ringers.

• Yarn: Soft "Sport Weight" Wool (illustrated in my handspun "Better Bunny Blend"® dyed with pokeberry years ago so that by now it has already faded)

• Gauge: 5.5 st/inch US #3 short needles (or size to obtain gauge) I used 3 flexible US #3 needles from a 5 needle set that is coincidentally missing the other two needles)

The Set Up for Tubular Knitting

CO 12 stitches with long tail cast on.
Slip half (6) of these 12 stitches on to a second needle, fold this cast on row so that you can hold these two needles with their respective 6 stitches on each needle side by side.
Using the third needle, first slip one stitch from the front needle, then one stitch from the back needle. Continue alternating in this way, until all twelve stitches are back on a single needle.
Now you are ready to tubular knit.

• Row 1 - Knit the first stitch, slip the second stitch as if to purl. Continue across row.
• Row 2 -Turn and Repeat row 1

What you are doing by slipping every other stitch, is knitting only across the front side of the tube, when you turn, you will be knitting the back of the tube and slipping the front tube stitches.8

• Knit until your ring is the width you want (my rings are 8 rows tall)

To bind off, you have to get the ring back onto two needles so it will be a tube shape. Just pull the needle out of the knitting and the stitches will fall to the front and to the back. Then pick them up onto two needles...or, if you don't feel brave, you could carefully use two needles to slip the first stitch onto the first needle, and the second stitch onto the second needle.

• Bind off with a crochet bind off, or other stretchy bind off of your choice.

Wrister Warmer is knit circularly on dpn (you could also knit it tubular if you want, but it is big enough to knit comfortably with double pointed needles)

• CO 32 st (for narrow wrists) with long tail cast-on.
• Knit 9 rows
• Knit 1 purl row
• Knit 9 rows
• Bind off with stetchy bind off of your choice (I used a loose crochet cast off)

Stress knitting and self policing

A leaf a day keeps the doctor away.


This is what I told myself when I started this leaf edging; that I would sit down and knit one leaf each day and finish this neckline in a timely manner. That having set a goal, I would be forcing myself to give myself the needed "me time" that has been missing from my life lately and causing me some stress and performance reduction. The times we live in are stressful enough and focus and concentration on lifes beauty is easily elusive when we don't slow down.

Oh it worked great for the first two leaves, and then it started to feel like pressure, instead of the stress reduction that it was supposed to be.
This got me to thinking again about our motivations to knit and what aspects of knitting actually bring us the satisfaction we receive. It is a three part thing, I am realizing. The drug like satisfaction from knitting is comprised of 1) the actual act-the relaxing, repetitious meditative art itself, 2) the joy of learning and discovery when we incorporate a new technique and 3) the rush of accomplishment when we finish and hold up a three dimensional, functional object or art statement.

Having written that off the cuff, I realize there are probably more than three main aspects, its just struck me suddenly, and I like "threes"
The real point I am trying to get at is anything you do to yourself to stand in your own way of one of these aspects (like policing your progress, "cheating" on the pattern because you dont' want to have to read "complicated" directions but you really do want to learn the technique, or leaving mountains of unfinished and unsatisfying projects around, diminishes that fullness of your satisfaction in your knitting.

the other hand

Well!
The second wrister has been done a long time, I have worn them on every cool day since my last post, and yet, I left it hanging on the blog.
Knitting notes...even though I know that this is normal, I freaked when I took the second wrister off of the machine, it was 2 1/2 times as long as the hand knit one. I went to bed thinking that it would have to be re-knit, but by morning, it had relaxed itself up into the same length.
Machine knitting is a lot about faith. If you did the swatch, ran the numbers and cast on, no matter what it looks like when it is hanging there like it is on a torture rack, the knitting most likely will look better after a good nights sleep.

springtime free chart

So I had this chart ready to post before Easter, but got busy trying to cope with the cold weather (let me tell you children, it is miserable in the shop making spindolyns because I had already taken the plastic down off of the back wall, and danged if it didn't snow(!!!) this morning!)
Anyhoo, I thought it was going to be for a sock top, but am wearing wristers alot right now for the old arthritis, and so am knitting this pattern into the wristers, instead, will post the pic when done, and hopefully have the dangling threads snipped off.
haven't gotten to that point yet, but plan on having three color on the middle rows of the chart, three color is easier for me on the machine than by hand.

photo measuring for knits?

Oh man! I want this software mentioned below.. well, the price tag is out of the question for me, but just imagine the knit design implications of this, or around the farm, measuring for chicken fencing, etc! or how about spindle specs, etc, etc!! the scientist in me just drools....

Kevin C. Tofel writes "Using a simple concept, iPhotoMEASURE software can measure any objects you can take a picture of. Include a printout of a 7.5- or 15-inch sqaure in the photo and the software can measure any distance or object in the pic to within 99.5% accuracy. Although geared towards contractors, there's any number of consumer usage scenarios as well. Enough to justify a $99 price tag? Jury's still out on that."