An -ity bitty post

Some musings of late: Synchronicity: Now it's understandable when similar themes are found in different blogland locales (say, several people posting a link to the same economic analysis of a particular yarn brand) - cross pollination is endemic online. But on Saturday I was listening to DNTO while driving, and I heard Sook-Yin Lee interviewing Heather Mallick about the sinister term that online commentary can take. Heather mentioned a female blogger who had very sinister threats/photoshop images in response to a discussion about erasing online comments (and it is interesting to note the tone of most of the reader feedback notes given the content of her article). On Sunday night, when I finally had a chance to check bloglines, I saw a post that was discussing the same female blogger which had been posted on Friday. Since I usually don't read the newspaper, watch TV (other than far more CSI episodes than is healthy in the last 3 months, as well as innocent bystander exposure to whatever "sports" show The Gambler is watching), or listen to commercial radio, my 2 windows on the world are generally the Internet and CBC Radio One. So it always surprises me when I come across the same themes in the different spheres. Serendipity:I made it to Thursday Night Knitting at my temporary LYS last week. The owner had ordered volume 5 from some pattern book line, and ended up getting Volume 5 of an Elsebeth Lavold pattern book instead. I thumbed through it, and there are several patterns that I like, and I have some Hempathy yarn, as well as some Jaeger Trinity that would work perfectly for the patterns. So I am going to buy that pattern book for future use. I have less stash guilt when stash yarn is actually "assigned" a potential project. Granted, many of these potential projects have been sitting around waiting to be knit for quite some time... Anonymity: The Gambler has joined the Facebook world. It works well for him, because many of his classmates from high school are on it, and he's made contact with many of them (plus, he is one of those people who likes to mantain stong ties to people from his past, even if it is at the exclusion of making new ties with people from the present). I joined facebook, but really don't plan to spend much time on it (partially because I do not have the urge to chat about things that happened when I was a teenager, and because there are very few people from my past with whom I have any great desire to reconnect. When my life changes, many of my aquaintances fade away, and I focus on finding new connections.). I like blogs and blogging better. Part of the reason that I prefer blogs to facebook is the fact that you can maintain the illusion of anonymity. Now I realize that I do post pictures of myself and The Gambler, and that I discuss enough details about my life that it's possible to track me down, but it's not the same as posting my name, my high school, job, university degree etc. It's interesting to see the degree to which people maintain their privacy while blogging. Some use their first names, some have pseudonyms. Some people won't publish photos of themselves or their families, others will post photos of themselves but not their families, and others will post photos of anything/anyone in their circle. I sometimes wonder if I should be asking permission to post photos that I take of others - granted, about 95% of the photos I post are cats/scenery/knitting, or some combination of cats and knitting. Confidentiality - part of the reason why I think about things like asking for permission to post photos on my blog is because maintaining patient privacy has been a hot topic in the last few years. Some rather silly situations can arise based on new legislation - for instance, I technically have to ask permission of a patient to send a note back to the doctor who originally referred them to me. I was thinking about this the othe day when I had to order an HIV test on a patient. I need to get permission from a patient or his/her representative in order for an HIV test to be done. The result is then mailed to me, and is not to be a part of the person's permanent chart. There are no such constraints on other infectious diseases that can be sexually transmitted. Test for Hepatitis C, syphillis, herpes, gonorrhea - no problem; I can do that without saying a word to the patient. Granted, 20 years ago, getting a diagnosis of HIV infection was a) a death sentence and b) could make someone a social pariah. But it's a totally different environment today - we can't cure HIV infection, but therapies are much more successful in controlling the manifestations, and I read an article in a woman's magazine about a young woman "living with HIV" which named her, featured several photos of her, and mentioned the city she lives in and the type of job she holds. (Not saying at all that fear and misunderstanding about HIV infection don't exist - sadly, they do) Yet still we treat HIV testing with kid gloves. And I doubt that will ever change. Anyways, more photos next post. I promise. Ruth: You asked about the sock pattern - it's my own design, based on a cable pattern that I found in my Harmony Guide to Aran Knitting. Short row heels and toes.