Wordspinning, or the sixteen minute sonnet

A comment on Making Light, at 5:41pm:

All I have ever spun is merino and silk, so my spinning instincts are not finely developed.

The closest comparable silk to merino was my rovings. I found them about the same level of stickiness (with, of course, completely different hands). They were certainly about the same difficulty to spin to an absolute beginner.

The tussah was much slicker, but I actually found that easier to draft than a stickier fibre.

In the end, you’re just going to have to try it. Have you got a good source for rovings nearby? If not, do you want me to send you some, just to get a feel for it? Since I’m thread spinning, and since I use less than a meter to headband a single book, I can certainly spare a few grams here and there…

Email me at abi at my domain name if you’d like some and I’ll pop it in the post over the next week or two. It’ll get caught in the Christmas flurry, no doubt, but then you’ll have something to do when the presents are unwrapped.

– o0o –

And at 5:57 pm:

Although I mainly spin in roving silk
(And rove it did, the time the spindle dropped!)
I tried merino and its woolly ilk
A little bit, before my wool phase stopped.
I found them much the same, at least in stick
(Each fibre has its own distinctive hand.)
The reasons I chose silk when I could pick
Were not from ease of use, you understand.
But words cannot convey the turn of thread
Nor writing substitute for spinning wood.
You’ll have to try, not reading what I’ve said
But learning for yourself what feels good.
So if you haven’t got the silk to try
Then email me. I’ll send it by and by.

Recording risks (Sonnet in a test completion report)

Recording risks is done in PlanView now.
The forms have changed from what we used in PRIME.
This briefing tells you what to say and how,
The basics, anyway, for when you’re short of time.
Use wording as sugested by this sheet
And in your action plan record details
Of what you’ll do, and when, and whom you’ll meet,
With fallbacks if your first intention fails.
Remember as you write that those who read
Your text may not be technical or see  
Details of your project. They will need
Plain terms, not TLAs. Be jargon-free.
In time these practices will be the norm.
Till then, this sheet will help you with the form.

Originally written for my office at the time.  Posted on Making Light.

Remembrances Expanded

A single one of us has passed away
Affecting every thread on Making Light.
We stagger at the impact. All we say
Is dimmer in his absence. He shone bright.
Imagine, if you can, a million lost
Or more: the good and better, bad and worse.
Each death its own immeasurable cost
Each grief deserving vivid, timeless verse.
We lost a friend. It’s cost us all so much
In future joy and present pain alike.
That price is paid by all that death can touch
They all were missed the way that we miss Mike.
The mind cannot encompass so much grief:
They lost a forest, we mourn a single leaf.

Originally posted on Making Light, in honor of Remembrance Sunday and John M Ford.