So, there’s this thing. I used to think it was just an unpleasant part of my personality, but it’s a real thing! As in, I can’t control it and there are others out there!

It’s called Misophonia, literally, “hatred of sound”. The most common trigger for misophones* (misophoniacs?) is the sound of other people eating. This isn’t just an annoyance to misophones – it can actually send us into a rage. Usually just an inner rage, but a rage, nonetheless.

I learned about this recently at my knitting group. I said something about how I always play music when I have people over to dinner, because I can’t stand the sounds of people eating. My friend Steven piped up then, and mentioned a New York Times article he recently read about Misophonia. I pulled the article up on my iPad and lo and behold! I thought it was just me and my sisters with this problem!

Since then, I’ve talked about this discovery with others, and I’ve found that I have two close friends with Misophonia. It’s funny, because this is a disorder, but we are always delighted to share how much we hate certain sounds. I suppose this is because we’ve been keeping it mostly a secret our whole lives, and now we get to “own it” because it’s actually hard-wired in our brains. Like being right or left handed, and not just being a weirdo.

Turns out that my Misophonia is pretty run-of-the-mill. My triggers are the sounds of people eating (smacking, crunching – geez, I can barely type out the words for it), the sound of liquid glugging out of a bottle, the crinkling of plastic food bags, any sound that is made by styrofoam, the sounds of the letters “S” and “P” together (like the word “s-o-u-p-s”, ugh, don’t say it), and the sound of dogs cleaning themselves.

Apples are the worst.

I also have a problem with any song by Creedence Clearwater. It might just be that I really dislike the band, but now that I think about it, it’s probably a Misophonia trigger because of the rage I feel. I find myself running to the source of the music and quickly turning it off whenever I hear the first couple of bars of one of their songs.

I’m writing this post in the hopes that another misophone will read this and get the same jolt of excitement I got in learning that this is a real thing. There is no treatment for it or anything, but maybe just knowing that this is a named condition will let us share stories and even laugh about it.

So, what sounds send you into a rage?

*I realize that I probably made up this word.

Local Austin knitters – this hardly ever happens, but there are a few spots open in Knitting University this quarter! (EDITED – THIS CLASS JUST FILLED. Sorry, no empty spots left. Please drop me a note if you’d like your name on the list to be notified if there are spots available in upcoming quarters – staci@verypink.com)

Knitting University is a small class I teach here at my home. We meet for six classes per quarter, every other Thursday. We are starting up again on October 20th. I keep the class really small, so that each knitter gets as much one-on-one class time (and email questions answered) as they need.

Ike is the only one looking at the camera in this photo!

Besides all of the knitting help, it’s a really fun group. And there is always wine available.

Spots are filled first come, first serve. Drop me a note if you’d like more details – staci@verypink.com.

I just heard that a new restaurant here in Austin, called El Arbol, has abruptly shut it’s doors for business.

That’s not really such a big deal, since restaurants come and go. But I know why this one closed. It’s because it was CURSED.

El Arbol (The Tree) is named for the magnificent oak tree that was the center of the restaurant. There were three floors of luxurious indoor seating, and three floors of patio seating around the big tree.

This place was, without a doubt, totally beautiful. Each floor a different design.

So now you understand that the place was awesome. Great wines, great food, great service, beautiful place. My love for patio dining drew me to this place like a moth to the flame. Now back to the curse.

Over this summer, I went on six dates here with six different men, and after each date, I never wanted to speak to the man again. (Mind you, I’ve been on dates this summer at other places, but this place stands out as a disaster.) Let’s review –

Date 1: I honestly can’t remember this date. Oy. But someone introduced me to the place.

Date 2: He invited me here (to my surprise, since I had been here a couple of weeks prior). I told him that I had already eaten and I just wanted a glass of wine, and he ordered two appetizers for himself. We ended up having two glasses of wine each. At the end of the date he asked me to split the bill with him, which is weird anyway, BUT I DIDN’T EAT ANYTHING. This would make more sense if it was a jilt on me, but it wasn’t. He wanted to go out again. He was just a cheapskate, and a bore to boot. I paid half of the check, but declined further dates.

Date 3: We met here, and El Arbol was closed because it was a Monday. We went somewhere else instead, but the curse had already touched us. His raging ex-girlfriend appeared over the next few days, and scared me away from ever seeing him again.

Date 4: Normal and charming guy. We enjoyed a glass of wine and nice conversation. Sometime during the second glass of wine, he started to get really drunk. Then he picked up his pace, and ordered two more glasses. He was a very unpleasant drunk. He went on a long rant expressing his hate for modern culture and literature. He went on a second long rant telling me how corrupt home inspectors are. I ended the date as quickly as I could, and got out of there. Even after my “thanks but no thanks” email, he continued to send me drunken emails at 2am for a couple of weeks.

Date 5: This is a nice place right? And anyone with an internet connection can easily see that this is a nice place. Date 5 showed up in a ratty tshirt, cargo shorts, and dirty flip-flops. I could have forgiven that, but I spent the evening learning about every single thing that his daughters do and do not like to eat. Wow. That was really boring.

Date 6: WHY AM I STILL GOING HERE? While enjoying an antipasti appetizer, and I told my date that he should try the cheese, because it was SO GOOD. He said, “I would rather eat the shit from your dog than eat cheese”. I threw a piece of cheese at his stupid face. (This isn’t the whole reason I stopped seeing him, just the El Arbol part. And English isn’t his first language.)

Date 7: It is entirely possible that there was a seventh, forgettable date.

See? I know why this place closed. It was built on some ancient dating burial ground. But it still makes for good stories. Things can only get better now it’s closed and I have to go somewhere else, right? 🙂

Yes, the air is different. It has a strange, “not-sweaty” feel to it. I believe we have survived another Texas summer.

The dogs feel it, too. This is their favorite morning sunning spot, but it’s too hot in the summer. They collectively decided that today was the Grand Re-Opening of the Futon.

Tippy looks very dramatic here.

And here’s a very lumpy and bumpy shot of my current project –

This is a new design for a men’s sweater that will soon become a pattern + video tutorial. Keep the requests for videos coming! Now that the weather is cooling, we can get back to a regular shooting schedule.