Post-Action Report

The title is a clear sign that I listen to my husband too much: when I start to write a post about what we did Saturday, and the first thing that pops into my head is "After-Action Report".

Before we went to the Goose Festival, we went to an estate sale, and I bought me this:
A very nice old Brown & Sharpe micrometer, because sometimes a knitter wants to measure her needles right down to thousandths of an inch.

We walked around the house and didn't find anything we wanted, then I walked out into the garage, which turned out to be a machine shop. The first thing I looked at was a workbench with about five or six or seven different micrometers on it, with prices of ninety dollars, seventy dollars, twenty dollars. There were caliper micrometers, outside micrometers, digital ones, analog ones.

I opened and closed the wooden box on the ninety-dollar one and said, "Ohhhh, she wants it!" When I spotted this one for ten bucks, it was mine.

A brass sheep needle gauge is fifteen dollars, and it only measures needles that fit into its holes -- I wanted a micrometer because it can measure any needle I can fit between the anvil and the spindle.

I've seen micrometers go for less on eBay, but usually the postage pushes it right back up to the ten dollar mark again.

So now I can tell you that the two pairs of old Bucilla knitting needles above the ruler are 0.038" (about 1 mm) and 0.044" (about 1.1 mm). And which of my US size 3 needles are 3.125 mm (about 0.123"), and which are 3.25 mm (about 0.128").

Sorry about that, I was swooning over my new tool. Where was I?

Oh, yes, at the Fennville Goose Festival!

We got there in plenty of time for the library book sale, and walked out with two bags of books for $1 a bag, and an old computer. Then we walked uphill for the parade. I ran out of the house without my camera, so you will have to imagine firetrucks, the high school marching band, old cars of all vintages, floats, people throwing candy, and the Muskegon Regional Police Pipes and Drums.

We were right at the beginning of the parade, and I don't think my son has ever had so much candy thrown to him. He got to the point where his pockets were full, and he wouldn't even pick up the Tootsie Rolls any more.

From there we went home with lots to read. I peeled the price sticker off my micrometer and measured some of the needles I've been wondering about. My son sorted through the candy and gave away the things he doesn't like.

Soon my head got sucked into the bag of books. So if I vanish for a couple of days, I'll be off reading Connie Willis and Vonda MacIntyre.