Cosmic Smack Down

So I was knitting along happily on my new sweater and finished the body and hood, and then I hit a snag. Not a major snag, but one that required me to take a little break. Feeling the need for a little mindless knitting, I pulled out the Noro Log Cabin blanket that's been waiting patiently for a while. If you recall--as I did--I had finished all the squares and assembled them into strips. No mean feat, that, since it required miles and miles of garter stitch and grafting. But I persevered and conquered and all that, and I distinctly recall the relief with which I put all those assembled strips away in a basket to await the final assembly, requiring more miles and miles of garter stitch and grafting. At some point, I even got the first two strips put together, with three left to go.

All this I remembered, and I pulled out the blanket with some sense that, if I couldn't yet see the light at the end of the tunnel, at least I was beginning to believe there might be a light at the end of the tunnel.

I knitted and knitted and knitted, with a growing concern that the ancient and discontinued yarn I was using for the assembly might run out before the blanket did. I grafted and grafted and grafted, and finally the third strip joined the first two on the blanket and it was good:

At this point I paused and assessed the yarn situation. After some thought and some calculating and a little bit of unwarranted optimism, I decided I just might have enough to finish the assembly and put on a border. Maybe.

With a renewed sense of purpose, I reached into the basket to pull out the fourth strip and found this:

Those are not strips.

Those are individual squares.

I distinctly remember strips.

This not only means I have to invest god-only-knows-how-many-more hours in assembling these b*&!^%$s into strips--it also means there is no-freakin'-way I have enough ancient, discontinued yarn to finish both the assembly and the border.

*&%!