{"id":2380,"date":"2013-02-22T03:00:18","date_gmt":"2013-02-22T08:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/elainesmithwrites.com\/wp\/?p=2380"},"modified":"2014-02-09T15:08:01","modified_gmt":"2014-02-09T20:08:01","slug":"tie-a-knot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/elainesmithwrites.com\/wp\/2013\/02\/22\/tie-a-knot\/","title":{"rendered":"Tie a knot"},"content":{"rendered":"

and move on.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

The Duke of Wellington<\/a> (of Waterloo fame) said of the French, “They planned their campaigns just as you might make a splendid set of harnesses. It looks very well; and answers very well; until it gets broken; and then you are done for. Now I made my campaigns of ropes. If anything went wrong, I tied a knot and went on<\/em>”<\/p>\n

I think of that quote often when things are not going just as planned, but philosophy is not really the point of this post.\u00a0 I just thought I’d throw it in there.<\/p>\n

Today, I want to talk about actual knots, because I found this really cool website that shows you how to tie them in a way that you can actually understand.<\/p>\n

Animated Knots<\/a><\/p>\n

Now, you may ask yourself why this is important.<\/p>\n

Maybe it isn’t.<\/p>\n

You may get through your entire life without having to tie a knot.<\/p>\n

But I spent 19 days on a boat once.\u00a0 It turned out to be useful to know how to tie up to a dock.\u00a0 And an anchor.\u00a0 If it had been a sail boat, I’d have needed a lot more knots\u2014and probably a lawyer.\u00a0 Sailing involves a lot more judgment calls than power boating, and the MotH* and I would probably have killed each other\u2014after we ran into a lot of things.\u00a0 I might get a Windpaddle<\/a> some day (when I’m feeling flush) and just try it, but that’s another post, too.<\/p>\n

The thing about me and knots is roughly the same thing about me and Gin Rummy.<\/p>\n

I have had Gin Rummy explained to me countless times.\u00a0 I’ve played Gin Rummy.\u00a0 If you asked me to sit down for a game right now, you would have to explain it to me again.\u00a0 I cannot retain the information.<\/p>\n

I don’t really understand that, because I can remember how to play poker and Old Maid and even Piquet (which almost nobody knows how to play nowadays).\u00a0 I can’t remember how to play Mau-Mau, but that doesn’t count.\u00a0 I’m convinced my brother was making up those four thousand rules as he went along.<\/p>\n

Anyhow, me and cards\u2014that’s probably also a post for another day (lots of diverse post ideas in this one, and I still haven’t gotten to the point!).<\/p>\n

The point is I have trouble remembering how to tie knots.\u00a0 Even the Square Knot that comes with a mnemonic (right over left and left over right<\/em>) causes me trouble.\u00a0 Is right always <\/em>right?\u00a0 Or do you switch hands when the rope crosses?<\/p>\n

But I’ve found animatedknots.com,<\/a> and I am going to master some things.\u00a0 I’ll probably never know how to play Gin Rummy, but this time next year, I am going to know how to tie a bowline!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

* MotH = Man of the House<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

and move on. The Duke of Wellington (of Waterloo fame) said of the French, “They planned their campaigns just as you might make a splendid set of harnesses. It looks very well; and answers very well; until it gets broken; and then you are done for. Now I made my campaigns of ropes. If anything […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[84],"tags":[48,162,290,291],"class_list":["post-2380","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life-in-general","tag-friday-finds","tag-boating","tag-knots","tag-cards"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/elainesmithwrites.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2380"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/elainesmithwrites.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/elainesmithwrites.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elainesmithwrites.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elainesmithwrites.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2380"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/elainesmithwrites.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2380\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2427,"href":"https:\/\/elainesmithwrites.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2380\/revisions\/2427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/elainesmithwrites.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2380"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elainesmithwrites.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2380"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elainesmithwrites.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}