It's not as dire as it sounds.  The title may give the impression that I've been having a series of not very good days -- luckily that's not the case.  It's actually quite literal.  I have just finished a pair of brown colored projects. 

The first is my first yarn from the new spinning wheel (totally smitten with it I am)  (write like Yoda I will)



I have to say plying with a spinning wheel is fast (as you would expect, being the motivation for its invention and all) and a lot easier on my back.  When I ply with my spindle, at the end of each arm length I have to bend over to snag the spindle an pick it up off the floor.  With one of my arms stretched out comfortably above my head, it's a span of about 7 feet and with about 230 yards in a hank that's about 98 times I bend over and stand up again.  (Yes, there probably is an easier way.)  Anyway, after a good wash and dry the yarn turned out remarkably balanced and doesn't coil back up on itself.  Oh, you in the back row wanted to see a close up?

 
 
There you go.  There's about 95 yds of a bulky yarn there, I'll have to spin a bit more but I think it would make a lovely hat. 

I also finished Aidan's fisherman sweater just in time for a 75 degree day.  But with a bit of coaxing, he did try it on.

 

But not for very long



Details:
Pattern: Chino Knits 2 (the vaguely named) Sweater Design D
Yarn: 2 balls of Sirdar Supersoft Toddler Aran  (100 g each)
(certainly no itch factor as it is 100% acrylic but super soft, that's a bit generous 
Needles: US 6 and US 8

My comments: The pattern was error free and well written though a schematic would have been nice.  The yarn was the yarn called for in the pattern and is a very nice acrylic -- no plastic feeling though, not surprisingly it still doesn't feel like a natural fiber. I have one more ball of it but I think it will be removed from my knitting stash and go in the school craft bin. 

On a non-brown related note, this was a major large-type headline on the front page of the local section of our newspaper that gave me pause. 



Now, what possibly could be the problem here.  Immortal chickens?  The students keep trying but the chickens just won't die!  Now there would be a headline.

After reading most of the article, I found out the college students take this ecology class as an elective to learn how to farm chickens.  New York State did not grant them a waiver to slaughter the chickens at the end of the class.  So rather than "can't" meaning "unable", I believe they meant "not allowed" as in "barred" or "blocked". An aside:  Not my idea of a fun class, but as I eat chicken I can't muster up too much distaste, someone has to run chicken processing plants.