Did you know there are people in this world that still weave on looms? Like, I mean real-life people. People that are not reenacting 1898 at Cracker Country at the Florida State Fair. I ran into 5 of them tonight at Cafe Kili where I had a meeting with my business manager.
That’s Todd, by the way.
He likes the baby. Hates music on blogs. Doesn’t read blogs. Doesn’t drink pina coladas or like getting caught in the rain. And is really smart. I don’t even have to pay him. He and the Informinator are free to me. Somehow they just put up with it all.
Back to the whole weaving conversation. There were 5 of them with a subtle, yet elaborate setup, right there in the coffee shop. By subtle, I mean that the loom wasn’t the size of an elephant, like the ones I remember from field trips I took 30 years ago. But elaborate in the sense that, well, come on! It’s a loom. In a coffee shop. With a lot of sandwiches. So many sandwiches. And those needle things that you use to crochet things. What are those? I just toggled over to Google to try to find out the name and sound slightly more 1905. I didn’t find the name. Looks like I’m sticking with needle thing…it’s about 8 inches long, not sharp. OK, I need to move on from this. Anyway. There’s not a lot of information out there about weaving here in 2011, since most people now use the modern Target store, or if you are rich–Gap– for the shirts on their backs. But I did run across this on a handy little website:
WELCOME TO THE LOOM ROOM:
A Website Built For and A-“Round” Knitting Looms
& The People Who Love Them!
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! Right? What does that mean? The “round” thing is obviously supposed to be a cute play on words. I’m so anti-loom that I don’t even get it.
On a side note, but ever so slightly related…I played Monopoly with three of my four children today. I found it funny when Mamasboy handed me the thimble as my playing piece and said, “You have to be a trash can! Ha ha!” It’s not a trash can boy. It’s a thimble. For weaving. And looms. And those things that look like large blunt needles. Never mind. I beat them bad by the way, but my-four-year old owned Boardwalk and that cost me a ton of rent. How many times can you land on one spot?
Anyway.
I found the whole sandwiches, looms thing intriguing until I realized there was a sound scraping on my brain like a turkey call at 2 a.m. It was the loom. I looked up from Facebook and muttered under my breath: Oil.Your.Loom.
And I realized.
I’ve never said those words before.
Ever.
And in 2011 of all things.
Snappshots.com 
From the land of left-over hippies and old grandmas:
(Disclaimer, I am neither of those, just a regular misfit!)
We still have looms with shuttles, the little thing that goes back and forth with the thread. We also still have crochet hooks (the long non-pointy things that people crochet with). Amazingly, I belong to a group of women that spin (not like my 25-year old daughter at the gym on a bike). These women actually get wool from a sheep, wash it, spin it, then knit it. I am not one of those spinners (bike or spinning wheel). Knitting is as close as I ever want to get to a sheep again after having a field full of them for years.
Rhonda,
Thank you for weighing in. I have been LOVING your comments. Getting wool from an actual sheep, washing it, and then knitting it into something could not be farther from my experience. I must put that on my life’s to-do list, though. I did not have a field full of them, so I’d like to try this!
In a coffee house in Tampa, FL, though, this whole loom thing was just a crazy sight!