Finally Back to Knitting

Above: my next project, Some Like it Hot from Annie Modesitt's Romantic Hand Knits
I bought a short-sleeved black cloth coat early last fall and had intended to buy long black leather gloves to wear with it, but I couldn't find any for less than $300. Knitting to the rescue! I bought this yarn back in December:
It's Rowan Calmer (in Plum), which I've never used before. It isn't the recommended yarn for the project, but I wanted a pop of color with my black coat and couldn't find a shade of the recommended yarn that I liked. I'm currently working on a gauge swatch and Calmer is absolutely the sproingiest (yes, I made that one up) yarn I've ever used, so I'm not quite sure what to do with it. I have my fingers crossed that my gauge will be the same as the pattern.
I saw a preview for the film of Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day on TV this morning. I first heard of the book from this post on Yarnstorm but I couldn't justify the cost of a Persephone book. Thankfully, a new paperback has just come out and is only $10 from Amazon, so I ordered it along with the last book I need for my nationalism seminar.

I really love when different things I'm doing overlap. I'm currently reading A Room with a View and have gotten past the part where Eleanor Lavish deprives Miss Honeychurch of her Baedeker guide. Coincidentally, the reading for seminar this week includes a chapter about the importance of Baedeker's guide to Germany in relation to German unification and nationalism. I felt so special because I knew what a Baedeker guide was and how ubiquitous they must have been. Thank you E.M. Forster!