Astrogirl

I took a picture of the inside of my fridge, partially prepped for Thanksgiving.

It turned into a really long explanation, what with links and the notes on the picture. It should count as a blog entry!

So, I’ve made a coat and two pair of leggings. I have no pictures of the leggings as yet. I used the now TNT Kwik-Sew 3455 for those.

I do have a photo of the coat, but I neglected to snap a picture of the lining (it’s plum, and a pretty standard lining fabric). Also, one of the sleeves isn’t hanging right which I of course did not notice when I took the stupid picture. Lately, all my pictures are stupid, which is why this one isn’t of me wearing the coat. I figured that would just be a photgraphic disaster.

This took me about 16 hours of sewing, which is absolutely atrocious in my mind, but I could not *buy* a coat like in my size. Matching the plaid took FOREVER, and it was still difficult to actually get it to match while sewing. The most important matching at the color and center front is right though, so PHEW!

I also have some nice long gloves to wear with it (black leather). I’m not sure if it’s clear here that those are 3/4 length sleeves. The other advantage of the coat is that I could use one of my vintage singleton buttons.

The color is quite accurate in the photo, and man, this plaid goes with anything. The pattern, generally, was quite easy. The collar went together perfectly, which is some kind of a miracle for me.

Here’s the pattern:

I can’t say I’m surprised that giving the U.S. Treasury $700 billion to spend any way they want has turned out badly. They don’t seem to have any idea how to fix the problem. The reason? I think they have misidentified the problem itself. It’s *not* liquidity, but solvency. If the treasury “invests” in banks, what are banks going to do with the money?

I suspect that Henry Paulson expected investment banks to keep doing what they were doing before they got the Fed money (lending money indiscriminately against inadequate reserves), and they decided instead to shore up their books and make sure they had the reserves for their current book, figuring that some day, possibly soon, there’d be an accounting. As a result, the bailout did not have the desired effect.

They now claim that their efforts are directed thusly: “Mr. Paulson said Washington will also try to directly increase the amount of loans available to students, car buyers and credit-card users, and possibly homeowners threatened by foreclosures as well.”

OK, but when more money is made available for students to spend on college tuition, tuition simply goes up (look down the page a little for the appropriate bit). As for car buyers, people either can’t take on more debt or simply do not *want* a new car right now. Stopping foreclosures *might* keep home prices up, but is that what we really want? Won’t that prevent first-time homebuyers from jumping in to the market just when fresh money is needed? Furthermore, I heard a piece on TV (no link, sorry) that 40% of people offered mortgage work-outs in lieu of foreclosure don’t want them. Either they can’t afford *any* mortgage, don’t want to live in their now failing neighborhood any longer, can’t maintain such a big house or have simply decided that the whole thing was a huge mistake. 40%! You can’t *make* people stay committed to their mortgage if don’t want it, and you certainly can’t make them start on a new one.

I heard more today on CNBC regarding credit card use. The retail numbers came in ugly (worst since 1992, blah blah blah), and some of these retailers have pointed out that credit card use has actually dropped more than sales. This seems to indicate that people don’t want more debt. After the media hammering at economic doom for most of this year, they have apparently gotten the message and are saving for a rainy day, or at least saving that bit of remaining credit limit for Christmas gifts. So, Paulson can lead a horse to water, but he can’t make it drink. Big shock there.

The way to fix the markets is to let them fix themselves. Excesses must be worked out. Banks and companies that can’t make money need to be allowed to fail, yes, even GM. GM wouldn’t just disappear — the assets would be sold off to people who might see their way clear to using a factory to make a car that consumers actually want to buy. Handing GM a vast pile of taxpayer money is just going to perpetuate more of their stupid, unworkable ideas. Furthermore, I don’t know if anyone at GM has noticed, but gas costs about 1/2 what it did a couple of months ago. This doesn’t encourage people to take a bath on something that guzzles gas to lay out money on a new something smaller that uses less.

Regarding a Detroit bail-out, Megan McArdle sums it up well here:

What bothers me is twofold. First, after the unions have put companies into an untenable position, they come to the rest of us looking for a handout to continue the unsustainable levels of pay and benefits. Almost everyone I know makes less than an autoworker, and has a whole lot less job security. Why should they pay autoworkers for the privilege of making cars no one wants?

(my emphasis) The whole article is worth a read.

I got off on a bit of a tangent there, but I just can’t figure out why it’s the government’s place to eliminate the business cycle. The trillions of dollars of taxpayer money (and new national debt) are only serving to confuse the markets. Traders find it all uncertain and unknowable as the government could pop up anywhere and mess up their bet. This means they don’t really want to get back in and chase a moving target. Regular investors are going to continue to sit on cash instead of “picking up bargains”, as the TV bubble-blowers like to say because they don’t believe they’ve seen a bottom. Certainly, the volatility index seems to indicate that the wild gyrations will continue a bit longer.

I find it hard to believe the bear market is over. First, we’ve only got the leading edge of the bad set of economic numbers coming our way. Second, the market contrarians have always said that a bear market is not over until no one is talking about buying any stocks. They must be completely repudiated as an investment to come back from the bottom. I think they’ve got that right, and I’m just not seeing it yet.

Ultimately, what the government and the Fed are trying to do is prevent deflation. This is the famedhelicopter money. of story and song. Oil’s price has crashed to nearly half what it was just a couple of months ago. Agricultural commodities have followed. Gold is doing really poorly — something that makes no sense considering the continual debasement of the dollar. Sure looks like deflation to me, but only time will tell. If they do manage to kick off inflation or worse, hyperinflation, what comes after that? A deflationary collapse.

To my way of thinking, treating markets like something that can be controlled is utter folly. They are a force of nature. Mucking with them in a half-assed way will only make the inevitable disaster that much worse. And yes, anything government is doing is half-assed. A couple of trillion dollars is a lot of money, but it’s nothing compared to the global derivatives market.

I wonder if Bush and Paulson cooked this thing up thinking that either a) it would work or b) it would fail, but so spectacularly that no one would ever try this bit of nonsense again.

I do have some sewing going on.

Not the most wonderful picture, and I messed with levels so that you could see *some* detail. There was really none with the light in there. I’m on a roll of crappy pictures, which is why it’s on the dress form and not on me.

It’s a knock-off this American Apparel skirt:

My AA skirt is black, not blue, but this one is a bit easier to make out in the photo. I made the new version out of a dark chocolate leather that’s about 1.5-2oz. weight (this translates just less than 1mm in thickness). This brown is very dark and looks black until you put it next to something black. This leather pretty easy to sew on my machine, provided I use teflon covered feet. Without teflon, it’s just hellish as the material won’t feed correctly through the machine. I have worked with leather enough that I also have a teflon covered zipper foot, something that’s very useful. If you’re thinking of combining leather + zipper, get one.

People claim you can sew up to a 3oz. leather on a home sewing machine, but I find this nearly impossible as it’s *much* too thick to top stitch seams, and curves become a real challenge. Also, you can’t cross over another seam, like you would for the crotch seam in pants or the underarm seam on a top with set sleeves.

The right needle is also important, of course. I used a Schmetz leather needle, size 90/14. I always use that brand and always have, and they work well for me. I have a range from 90-110, but the 90 is generally best for my projects. Leather needles wear out faster as they are actually punching through every stitch, so if stitches are skipping, toss it and use a new one.

I’ll get a photo of my version up soon, but it’s really dark in here today due to the rain, and the flash will look yuck, so…we wait for sunlight.

The original skirt was only three pieces (and a perfect fit), so it was very easy to copy from the AA Denim version. This is not the first commercial garment I’ve used to make a pattern. I think it’s easy, but I’ve been sewing for nearly 30 years, so maybe I’m glossing over things, I don’t know. I have picked very simple garments to copy — generally because the fit is absolutely perfect. The commercial copy of a pattern that I use all the time is from a pair of Gap capri pants. They are stretch, though I have made them out of non-stretch as well by adding seam allowance. No darts, so this is quite easy. Really, the pattern is all about how it exactly copies the curve of my hip and my ginormous thighs.

Anyway, for the skirt. I laid it out very flat with the front and back seams to the sides. Since this has no side seams, the two pieces to the skirt are exactly the same size — another thing that made this eas. I then used tailor’s chalk (you need something like charcoal or conte — something soft) on slightly transparent paper (in my case, wax paper) to mark the outlines and the waistband height and seam. I then removed the skirt and trued up all the lines and corners with a pencil and ruler. I then added 5/8″ to the top, front and back seams. I added 3/4″ for the hem (the original had a rolled hem of 3/8″ inch, I wound up with a straight hem since leather never frays).

For the waistband, I did the same, but this did not work out quite right. As a result, I wound up cutting a third waistband piece and having seams where darts or princess seams would go in the front. The top stitching makes this kind of a design element. The waistband was now too long, of course, but after I attached it, I cut it down. It’s much much easier to have too long a waistband than too short!

I used a standard polyester/plastic zipper — the original was metal. I wound up with two snaps, one on either side of the zipper. The original had one, straight above the zipper.

The final product came out quite well. The original in denim is stiff and sticks out at the sides, and the leather hangs more or less exactly the same way. It’s currently on my dress form so that the glue in the waistband can dry. Yes, there’s Fabri-Tac involved. I top stitched all the seams in this garment, except that I could not stitch-in-the-ditch to finish the waistband as it was too much thickness, so it’s sewed at the top to make the fold-over, and then glued on top of the seam allowance to keep it permanently in place. I have also glued seams flat/open with this stuff when I did not want to top stitch or when it wasn’t practical, say for inside the seam on pant legs. It’s essential to working with leather, I think.

I have another project going on as well. I have made a muslin of Simplicity 3165 from 1959(ish):

I’m using View 4 with the long sleeves from View 2, and I have made the turtleneck part a *lot* shorter in height. I brought the neckline down a teeny bit, maybe 3/8″ at the center and not at the back at all. I made the front darts bigger and moved them outward because the bust points didn’t match mine. I also re-curved the waist and made it smaller. All told, I probably took 4″ out of the waist. I’ve already disassembled the muslin, so I can’t take a picture of that.

I will be making that awesome hood, probably out of wool, but not necessarily for wearing with View 4.

The day dawned bright and beautiful, and since I’d stayed up late enjoying all that hiker companionship, I got started quite late. I slept well, but I had a lazy morning.

In this short 4.3 miles I was really grateful for my map. There were many junctions with woods roads and trails and the foliage seemed to conspire to grow over blazes making it hard to find the trail. In this, the map really helped.

I had a wonderful break in a high meadow before I headed to the road. The descent was rugged and rocky including some fine trail work of rock stairs. My shuttler was on time and a very nice guy and we had a great deli lunch on the way back to Sheffield. My car was, of course, right where I left it but was now unbelievably dirty.

Just like the drive here, I made great time going home, though the GPS sent me via a completely different route.

The walk out of Williamstown was long and long. It really wasn’t longer than the previous day, but since none of it counts and it’s first thing in the morning, it *seems* longer. The trail north was actually straight up someone’s driveway. They had blazes *on* their driveway. I’ve never seen that before! The walk from there to Congdon Shelter was 14.1 miles.

The day was sunny and pleasant, but the climb up the creek was buggy. I inhaled a bug, actually. I *hate* when that happens, and luckily, that is not often. I noted that ahead of me was a bad weather by-pass. I certainly wasn’t taking it as the weather was delightful. Usually, these are for very exposed areas that might be risky if there’s lightning. This was not that — it was a vertical boulder field! It was interesting and fun, and I really enjoyed the challenge. What I did not enjoy was trying to figure out where the trail, the boulder field and the by-pass all came together at the top. I walked/climbed around up there for a good long time looking for the northbound AT. I think I actually finished the rock climb the hard way and missed the last blaze. Anyway, on I went. That was by far the most interesting part of the day.

In pretty short order I reached the Vermont Line and the start of The Long Trail. I had now completed Massachusetts.

I crossed a couple of ponds, but no where I wanted to get water. This would eventually become a problem. All the streams appeared to be pond overflow. That just didn’t seem like something I wanted to drink. Towards the end of the day, I traveled next to a big noisy creek. At this point, it was getting dark and I was really wondering where on earth the shelter was. This is a pretty common experience for me though, so I wasn’t actually worried. Eventually, I was hiking in a stony, shallower version of the creek. Yikes.

When I finally made it to the shelter, there was a big friendly group there, all southbounders. One group had been there all day (Razor and two really nice guys from Kentucky: Lt. Dan and … damn it, I can’t remember) and had explored there area and gathered a LOT of firewood. There was a lot of companionship and a huge bonfire. I enjoyed all of this as much as the peaceful night alone at Mark Noepel — the opposite experience.

Tomorrow, I would hike down to VT9 to catch my ride.

I hiked from Mark Noepel up and over Greylock and down into Williamstown. The distance to the road was 9.6 miles and I think I walked about 2 miles into town and then out again in the morning. I walked in to town as far as the Howard Johnson’s. There was a Chinese restaurant across the street, and that was good enough for me. I was really looking forward to a shower, but while the bathroom it was permanently dirty and dingy. Appearances were not aided by the fact that the fixtures were that disgusting rosy brown color. I did manage to get a partial refund on the room. That place had really seen some hard use.

As I mentioned in the previous entry, my digital camera battery had given up the ghost at some point and I couldn’t get panoramas or movies from Mt. Greylock. I got a couple of images with my iPhone. This one was taken from Mt. Greylock:

I watched a couple of little planes land from here — this is the view from Mt. Prospect. I walked past the airport on the way into town.

North Adams was actually closer than Williamstown, but it had fewer options all together and no where to sleep. When I chose to do the longer road walk west, I thought that if I had any energy that night, maybe I’d take a cab in to the town proper and have a beer or something. HA! After showering and eating a pile of Kung Pao Chicken, I don’t think I moved from the bed until the next day.