Nobody paid the slightest attention to any of this for seven years. Then one fine day there appeared on the WorldWideWeb a new knitting website, called the "International Upper Slobbovian Ladies' Knitting Circle." It was a cheap, knock-off sort of a site, but it had cheerful jingly music on its home page. And lo and behold, there on the new website were the old, traditional Upper Slobbovian patterns -- but they had been thoroughly mixed up with patterns from Lower Slobbovia! Some of them were actually mostly Lower Slobbovian patterns, although they had the same names as the traditional Upper Slobbovian ones. There was no sign of the new pattern from Old Slobbovia, though.
The Upper Slobbovian Ladies' Knitting Circle thought all that was distinctly odd. They had once had a fine website of their own, years ago, which had featured all the traditional patterns as well as the new one; but they had hosting and maintenance problems and took the website down. (When they did, a few sly troublemakers said, "The Upper Slobbovian Ladies are dead!") Before they could decide what to do about any of these events, they received an invitation for one of their Circle to speak at an "International Upper Slobbovian Knitting Symposium" to be held at Slob Mountain in Lower Slobbovia, supposedly for the purpose of "discussing the unity and uniqueness of Upper Slobbovian Knitting Patterns."
Posted by jjeffrey at November 4, 2003 08:36 PM