Recently I discovered I was ahead on my saving schedule and though the night of debauch yarn-buying at the Socktopus launch ought to have cured that, it did not. The loving arms of my stash have since welcomed 4 balls of Debbie Bliss Cotton/Angora in baby blue, 10 balls of Lavish Alpaca in sunshine yellow, 2 balls Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Aran in deep wine, 1 ball Malabrigo Worsted in bright sapphire blue, as well as a myriad yarny delights for my SP11 pal. (The latter, of course, is not technically part of my stash but a girl can dream, can't she?)
After the panic set in and I decided I was under no circumstances allowed to buy more yarn until KSS at the earliest (and even then only if it was absolutely necessary), I checked my bank statements and it turns out that I'm still ahead of schedule and eBay rules. What could have been stupidly costly turned out to be a mere dip in the budget, hurrah!
All the same, the stupid spending karma continues to haunt me, so today I decided
to do something worthwhile with this magical mountain of cash: I made a donation towards Fairie Knits Walk for Lupus. Normally, I prefer my donations of this kind to be done anonymously however this I felt deserves advertising.
Aimie, or the funfairiegirl, has Lupus, a disease which can be as silent as it is debilitating. She is raising money to sponsor
her walk for the cure. Her goal is to raise $5000, which I think we can
help make happen. If the helping to find a cure for a horrible disease
or doing a good deed aren't incentive enough, Aimie is also running a contest. For every $5 you donate your name will be popped into a raffle, and the prizes are sweet. They've been donated by various people throughout the knitting community and are documented in her blog, so go check them out. The deadline for donations is 6 October 2007, which leaves only three days to let the beautiful exchange rate make your money work for a cure.
As she says in one of her podcast episodes, Lupus is not something everyone knows about, like cancer. Particularly in the early stages of it, often when one tells another they've got it the immediate response is 'Well, you look healthy' and leave it at that, whereas the very word 'cancer' provokes a much more profound reaction.
That's not to say cancer isn't awful of course, just that the general public has an image of it. You think cancer, you think the effects of chemotherapy, the hair loss, the physical signs of fatigue. You think Lupus and, well, actually most people don't. When I think of Lupus, I think of lupins, but that's because I grew up in a home of rabid Monty Python fans. (Although, interestingly, there is a connection between the two, at least in terms of lupus, the Latin for wolf, from which they are both derived.) The assosication between Lupus and lupins is such that I have a very
strong memory of Lupus Canada used lupins as
their flower, as part of their fundraising campaigns, though I may have created this memory due to the Monty Python skit.
Now, after you go and make your donation, take a look a these links. I found them while researching whether or not the Lupus Canada did ever use lupins (it seems they like everyone else just use the image of a butterfly):
A particularly fine collection of words derived from the Latin lupus.
If you like your etymology a little more mythologically based, Cloudline will cater to your every whim. (This is particularly interesting if you have any interest in Eastern European folklore and the migration of lingual ticks.)
The obligatory Wiki entry, fascinating and seemingly well-researched, but really who can tell.
However, these links will very likely clear up any discrepancies caused by Wiki woes.
Lastly, a hilarious exchange on Owl Fantasy Forums wherein they clearly get off topic.
