This is a Guest Entry posted by Amanda
I am currently dating someone who is very into physics (think: aerospace engineering). I earned C- and D- in my college physics class. I understood the theory, hated the application.
So a few weeks ago I was lounging around on his couch, working on my lace vintage sweater sleeves (a 1940 pattern called "Tea Time" ) while he was playing with my Addi Turbos size 4. He kept making loops and flicking the loops around my eyes. "If you keep that up I'm going to break up with you or stab you with my size 5 needles."
"I'll choose the latter not the former, thank you. Do you know what the equipartition of energy theorem is?"
I stopped clicking, turned and looked at him. "No, I don't think I do."
"Well, it's the theory that energy is equally partitioned along a space..." He explained how this related to minimum energy shapes. "It's why telephone lines hang as they do, it's why these needles are creating this loop." He held the needles in front of me. "If I turn one needle like this," he started twisting a needle, "it changes the end point, so the filament twists like...like it is...which is still its relaxed energy point. In mechanical physics..."
When he was finished, he started asking if I ever use straights, and I explained the physics of the weight of the project distributed over a cable rather than on straights. Then I started explaining how needle diameter affects stitch size, showing him on my Tea Time sweater since I'd worked on 4s, 5s, 6s, and 7s.
"Well I've been watching. You've been knitting and purling..."
"Yarn overs," I showed him, "and knit two togethers," I showed him. "One makes stitches and the other gets rid of stitches."
"But I don't understand how you can talk and knit at the same time. Don't you lose track or do you count in your head or what?"
I smiled slyly, "It's not rocket science..."
Who knew the physics of knitting needles could be so hot? Perhaps if I'd known him years ago I would've done much better in my college physics courses. Those hard science men, too damn sexy-smart and too damn easy to fall hard for...
Flown by Amanda at 07:19 PM on March 30, 2005
