Hosed

I have me a problem. I was going to make some thank-you socks for someone with some of my socks that rock from Blue Moon Fiber Arts, using the Monkey pattern from designer Cookie A. This was going to be awesome because I not only had the pattern printed out from Knitty.com, I also had saved the episode of Knitty Gritty where Cookie A. made this sock. Also, I have more STR in the stash than is decent to confess.

The expert knitter who happens to use the same resources as me will have already seen the problem. Cookie A.'s Knitty Gritty socks are not the same as Cookie A.'s Monkey socks. Two similar, but different patterns. One is toe-up. One is toe-down.

Cookie A.'s Knitty Gritty socks are STR heavyweight. All I have is lightweight and mediumweight. I have no sock yarn in a comparable gauge. None I tell you. If you saw my sock yarn stash dumped out on the sofa right now, you'd find that hard to believe, but it's true.

Cookie A.'s Monkey socks are knit in something I don't have and can't recall ever seeing. I think I have something comparable, but I may have to diddle with needle size and rip it back a few times before I get gauge. Sending an incorrectly sized pair of socks to this particular person is not an option.

Upshot: I cannot just pick a color and begin. I have to either (1) BUY MORE YARN (and wait for it to ship) or (2) DO SOME MATH and some experimentation. These options suck. There is no point to buying one skein of sock yarn and my stash is already huge. Although.... We do have a new shed that came with the 1.8 billion dollar landscaping. I could hide it in there. No! Bad Bunny! Economy Plan, remember?

But, math? Whine? Gauge futzing? Whine. No fun.