Post of Shame: Hair Sticks or Chopsticks?

Today, while web window shopping, I found this wonderful posting for a pair of "hair sticks".

The Etsy shop's selling this wonderful pair of hair sticks for $5, with a US domestic shipping price of $6.

I mean... really? REALLY? This shop claims to have made everything "in the USA".


Well, as someone Chinese and who's into "BIFL" items, stainless steel chopsticks happens to be plenty available in my house, so I definitely know a pair of stainless steel chopsticks when I see one.

In fact, after searching on Google for about two seconds, I found this exact pair of "hair sticks" for sale from two different distributors on Amazon, see here, and here. One link is selling 4 pairs for $6.9 including shipping, and the other link is selling 5 pairs for $10.13 including shipping. It appears I can turn a quick profit if I order some and sell them for a whopping $11 per set.

Heck, maybe I should dig through my kitchen drawers and put some on Etsy for sell. Mine are also decorated, and two sets have special good luck phrases etched in, they must be worth more?

Also, just what part of those chopsticks were "made in the USA"? Is that some kind of joke? Last time I checked, People's Republic of China and the USA were still two different countries, and I only checked about a second again. Let me check again now, yup, still two different countries.

So, as a Chinese with long hair, from a culture that invented hair sticks, I admit these two items are very similar, and I don't doubt they first came up with it because they have chopsticks and it's an easy way to put hair up. However, modern day hair sticks are at least decorative! Not to mention, these stainless steel chopsticks measure about eight inches in length. My shortest one was seven inches (and square at the tip yay!!). However you look at them they don't work that well as hair sticks because they are just a bit too long. (Believe me I tried.) Also, since when do hair sticks have markings at the tip? Those marks are to help people grab FOOD. FOOD!!

It sickens me when sellers try to rip people off. Also, if you happened to really want to use chopsticks as hair sticks, just get them from an Asian store. A set of 6 is probably going to cost you 3 dollars instead of the ridiculous $6 per pair some people are charging.

Surf City Marathon 2013

I'm collecting the Surf City medals, so I do this race every year. This year I got injured in October, trained for Nov and Dec, then caught the flu and bronchitis in January, so I guess I really shouldn't have gone, but I went anyway because god darn it I paid for it!

As you can see in the picture below, it was a beautiful day yesterday. I did this race for three years already, and yesterday was the warmest it has been. It was around 60 degrees when we got there at 6:30 am, and when the race started it was near 70 degrees. It was clear, sunny, and running next to the clashing waves was rather pleasant.

2012 GLASG Dye Festival: Follow Up Post 2

I realized I haven't given an update about how the rest of my Dye Festival yarn turned out after the last follow up post.

NFL Chicago Bears Logo

Mr. Tako LOVES the Bears. Did I say love? Since the day I picked up some needles and yarn he has been hinting here and there that he wanted a Bears team scarf. I think he meant a scarf like this or this, but I think both he and I know I just can't do that... so, instead, I mapped the Bears logo I'm hoping to replicate a commercial fleece design. Before I finish the pattern for the entire scarf, I figured the logo itself may still be useful for some people, so here it is on (imgur). :) 

The gauge is my gauge. Hopefully your's is fairly close so it doesn't come out funny. 

Gauge: 8-inches wide and 11-inches tall = 1 in
Yarn: Cascade Yarns Heritage Solids & Quatro Colors 5623 Navy, 5646 Pumpkin, 5618 White
Needle: US 0 - 2.0mm

I also mapped the BEARS logo, but I haven't digitized it yet. I'll put it up here along with the scarf.

(Can someone teach me how to upload PDFs onto the Ravelry shop? I can't figure it out for the life of me.)

Raspberry Soap Saver

I wanted to make my own soap sack for a while now. My mother-in-law gave us 24 bars of soap and I've  been making my own soap at home, so I've been trying to transition my husband to soap bars. My husband's big issue is he only likes washcloths and nylon loofahs, and he's not very receptive to a soap sack because then he has to have an additional washcloth in the bathroom, so I got to thinking. I originally searched on Ravelry and made a soap sack out of kitchen cotton, and IMO, the result was horrible. The soap sack never dried, and my soap became a mushy, dirty, gross mess. I ended up remaking it with crochet cotton, which worked wonderfully, so now I'm addicted. This soap sack will dry completely within 24 hours (in California), works great as a washcloth, and helps with lathering.

This is the first crochet pattern I wrote up. I borrowed a simple shell pattern, and also the Raspberry Stitch Pattern.

Shown here with my handmade goat milk lavender tea tree soap. 

Materials: 10 g (55 yards) of No. 10 crochet thread in mercerized cotton
                   1 piece of ribbon

Hook size: D 3.25mm

Finished size: 1 inch x 2-1/8 inch x 3-1/8 inch without the lace.

Base: 

• Chain 13, hdc in 2nd chain from the beginning, then hdc the remaining of the chains (12 stitches)
• hdc row 1-5
• sc in each hdc, then do 6 sc on the border, sc in each of the chain, then do 6 sc on the border (36 stitches)

Body: 

     Work raspberry stitch for 18 round by doing this: *work sc, dc, sc in the first stitch; skip two stitches* then repeat *~*to the end.

Edging:

     Round 1-3: sc in each stitch around.

     Scallop edge: *skip sc; dc, dc, trc, dc, dc in 3rd sc; skip sc; sc in first sc* around.

Finish: Weave in ends, then weave the ribbon through the last row of the raspberry stitches.

Note: This soap sack will stretch once it is wet, but it does not affect it's awesomeness. When it's dry, it'll stick to the soap. Just peel the soap sack off the soap before you shower and it'll work great as a lathering agent and also as a washcloth.

"Chinese Yuan"

Every time people say "Chinese Yuan" I cringe.

What is "Chinese Yuan"? Or "Chinese use Yuan." Really? Do Americans not use "Yuan"? Everyone uses "yuan" because "yuan" is not a kind of money. It's a counter. 

Money in PRC (People's Republic of China) and ROC (Republic of China) actually have names. In PRC, the name is Renmingbi, or "People's Dollars", and in ROC, the name is Xingtaibi, or "New Taiwan Dollars".

TIL from The Skinny on Obesity

I know I owe this blog a post on the LA County Fair (which I placed first place in the Intermediate group, yay!), but this post is about The Skinny on Obesity.

I just found this awesome program today and it's addicting enough that I finished all seven 10-minute episodes in one sitting. I highly recommend the entire series to anyone who's interested in why they battle with weight issues and why they can't lose weight. As a person in this modern era, I struggle with food and weight like everyone else, and I feel like I learned a lot from this series. The series does not talk about diet or losing weight, but it does give you tips on how you might go about losing weight without dieting.

The link to the program is here: The Skinny on Obesity

I will post my TIL and tl;dr from the series after the jump.