January 24, 2006

• This is the fabric of the 1912 nightgown — I’m sorry for not giving details before.

  
  

  It is a woven check, all cotton. It doesn’t show to best advantage in this squashed-against-the-scanner shot, but it is a wonderfully soft fabric in a subtle red and beige. Unfortunately, unlike yarn, fabric doesn’t come with a nice little paper reminding you of the name and manufacturer, and I don’t remember those details.

  
  

  In answer to knitsteel’s question, I will certainly wear it, supposing I ever manage to get it finished. I’ll probably make another in flannel, too. This is my bedroom –  it’s a nightgown kind of place, isn’t it?

  
  

  On the subject of creature comforts, there is something rather sad going on chez fibermom.

  
  

  Every morning I get up and look in the tea caddy, poking down to the bottom in case there is hiding in there another bag of Yorkshire Tea. I have been doing this since I ran out over the weekend, as though the tea fairy might have brought me just one more bag of it.

  
  

  It didn’t, frankly, seem all the special while I had it. A good tea, certainly, and it made a stout pot with just one tea bag. But I did not anticipate that, when it was gone, I would pine for it in this pathetic way. I am drinking my Earl Grey, and enjoying it well enough, but — it isn’t quite the same. It seems now like an afternoon kind of tea, not the kind of tea you want first thing in the morning. No, in the morning you want some Yorkshire Tea.

  
  

  The trouble is, I got the stuff at T.J. Maxx, a sort of liquidator place. It is not sold at my local grocery stores. I cannot just go and buy another box. If I could, there would be no difficulty. I would go pass my $5 over the counter and go on my way rejoicing. No such luck.

  
  

  If I am to have more Yorkshire Tea, I must order it online. And I have already ascertained (at Pokey’s sensible IM suggestion) that it is sold in many, many places on the web. And so I have fallen victim to the scourge of online comparison shopping.

  
  

  This stuff is available at all different prices. So I had to go look at Froogle. And it is available loose and in bags in many different quantities, making it difficult to compare the prices in a meaningful way. And then, a light, inexpensive item like a box of tea bags will cost more for the shipping than for the item. So I have to calculate the various costs with their associated shipping costs to see which one is really the best deal. And, once I find that the shipping is only reasonable if I order some other items along with the tea, I have to see what else the various places offer, in order to determine which has the best balance of cost with items-that-would-also-be-useful. At which point mysterious British confectionary that we have read about or heard mentioned on the BBC comedies enters the picture. Walnut Whip, Jammie Dodgers, even Chocolate Hobnobs can be had along with the Yorkshire Tea.

  
  

  And I am not supposed to eat sugar or spend money on frivolities. So, really, I may not ever get my tea.

  
  

  Why isn’t there a shop which sells the tea with books or yarn? Then at least I would feel that — while I would still be spending money on frivolities — they were my favorite frivolities, and worth it.

  
  

  Really, though, it is the time-wasting compulsion to comparison shop which comes over me when I buy things on the internet. When I was getting ready for my daughter’s wedding, I made charts. I realize that — even if I end up saving seventy-four cents per box on the tea after counting in the shipping — this is a silly thing to do. I don’t waste my time in this way in real life. It is something that happens to me when I shop online. It seems that there is always one more place which might be still better than the eight I have already seen.

  
  

  The result is that, after I have done this idiotic surfing around once for an item, I stick with the purveyor that I determined was best on that occasion. I have two places for buying soapmaking supplies, two for yarn, two for books I cannot get at work, and so on. So I suppose, once I have used up the time I should spend on hemming my nightgown by chasing down the perfect, the philosopher’s purveyor of tea, I will be able to consider that task finished. I might as well get on with it.

  
  

  Later: While I have not yet found a book or yarn merchant which sells this tea, I have found a bicycle parts store in Louisiana which does. We are getting more practical by the moment.

  • 7:13 am
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