Ironically, we did go out and do things at non-chain stores today. First order of business (after Cody got some sleep after working until 7 this morning making sure the wireless network for the lottery was up and running for New Mexicans’ late night powerball and roadrunner ticket purchases) was hitting Albuquerque’s local yarn store, Village Wools.

My last (which was simultaneously my first) visit there hadn’t gone very well. I found the people to be kind of insular and rude or only vaguely polite in a clipped yankee way which is the same thing to me. I found out that I wasn’t alone in finding the staff to be, well, not particularly helpful. But I’m also fully aware that I was very new to knitting (and still am) and while I was doing my best to not ask stupid n00b questions I probably was anyway. They still could’ve been nicer.

But this visit was great. It was about 4:30 and I think we were the only customers in the store. There was a lady, I believe she was Swiss, who was incredibly nice and even the other women working there didn’t make me feel like I’d interrupted their coffee break to check out my purchases.

I had my list and wanted to do a little skein-fondling but no plans for anything very specific other than the size 1-4 double pointed needles which was the original reason for the trip. I’d really liked working with the plastic ones I’d bought there before and haven’t seen them anywhere else. I’m definitely seeing the appeal of bamboo needles, though, since using a pair of Crystal Palaces for the zigzag scarf!

I wanted to check out some lamb’s pride worsted to see if I had any inspiration for a purse I wanted to make for a certain person’s birthday next month. On my list was a note for five skeins of lamb’s pride or noro kuryeon with maybe in parentheses.

Otherwise my only plan was to get Cody to pick out yarn for my first attempt at making socks. After looking around a bit I went to the back shelves where I’d found some good bargains last time. He picked out some debbie bliss denim then I looked in a small basket on the floor and, holy crap, found Noro Kureyon going for 5 dollars a skein! Ok, so they were different colorways - all sort of dark which is handy. But what a bargain and they’ll make a funky fun felted bag. I know it’s beautiful quality wool from Japan but it’s still cheap enough that if the birthday girl didn’t want to use such a random artistic thing with bursts of bright colors in public, at that price, I certainly wouldn’t be hurt. I wouldn’t recommend going and looking for them though..I grabbed them ALL mwahahaha! I also found a few cute stripey girly cotton yarns to make myself some socks. And a fun fur because I’m a n00b and easily distracted by shiny glass objects. And I got the new Interweave Knits!

Then we went over to chain store CompUSA for some geek shopping where we didn’t really get much except a case of bawls. And a car charger and desktop dock for Isabella the pink ipod mini. We spoil her.

THEN we went to Cafe O where I introduced Cody to boba tea and cold spring rolls. This cafe is a weirdly delightful little Asian deli built inside a comic book store. And the dining room tucked away in the back reminds me of the kinds of odd back rooms you’d see in small restaurants in New York or in the quarter in New Orleans. Cody summed up the green/red/walnut with stone and chrome-accent decorating scheme as Korean Gatsby.

The rolls I’d ordered (The O rolls with O sauce) were too spicy for me in that ‘burning the front of my tongue’ way while the ones he’d ordered (The Tsunami Rolls with wasabi cream sauce) were too hot for him because of the wasabi. It’s funny how our differences in regional backgrounds affect our heat tolerances. I can totally handle the wasabi horseradish type of burn while, even after living here twelve years, chile can kick me in the ass when I’m not looking. On the other hand, Cody can handle some seriously hot chile but the cocktail sauce at Felix’s in New Orleans totally kicked his ass. So we traded spring rolls. Then got more boba teas to go. (Mine was the Vanilla Mango Hurricane O flavor (not very original today was I?) and he got Cantaloupe with Honeydew)

Then we went on our merry chain store way and went to Best Buy so Mr Man could scope out games. Then to JoAnn fabrics so I could buy buttons, snaps, and seed pearl beads for the zigzag scarf’s fringe. And more novelty yarn.

Fun day. I’m kind of bummed no one complimented me on my adorable pink kitty punk mary janes though.