It's All Lady Sybil's Fault

So it's a Monday night, and I am all snugged up in an armchair with a fresh episode of Downton Abbey (the infamous Series 3, Episode 4) to watch, and The Last Block of Viola to stitch up. I've overcome the frustration of a missing square (knitted another one), I've found a much quicker way to block blocks; it's literally all coming together, and after this last little job and a round or two more of blocking, it will be time for some real gratification in the form of putting the blocks together and watching the grand design of these abstract parts begin to emerge. Thrilling times.

And then this happened:

A pair of squares sewn in upside down right in the middle of the emerging block.  I couldn't believe it. How on earth could this have happened when I've been so careful and meticulous through the 17 previous blocks? I was distracted, dear reader. Something Happens to Lady Sybil (not saying what, get your spoilers elsewhere) in Episode 4, and my knitting concentration slipped. Imprecations and obscenities were muttered, I can tell you.

And then came the quandary of what to do about it. I tried very very hard to forget about it and believe that it would all blend in as part of the abstraction. But, see, that orange stuff is all supposed to come together to suggest the edge of a flower petal, and that just couldn't happen in the current configuration. Rats.

So maybe it wouldn't be too awful to unpick the two offenders (they are in correct orientation to each other, just not to the rest of the whole friggin' blanket), turn them around and sew them back in the correct way. Reader, I tried. But such is the wonder and efficiency of mattress stitch sewn in matching colors that the stitches are in-freaking-visible. Really invisible. Believe me, I looked. I pulled and pressed and separated, but still could not confidently locate the right place to cut and sever the sewn stitches but not the knitted stitches.

With a heavy heart and much gnashing of teeth I realized that the only thing I could do to correct this error would be to cut the offending squares on their side of the seam, pick out the remaining bits of the knitting plus the seaming yarn, reknit the two squares and put them back in the right way around. This called for another deep think about what the harm would be from leaving this mess the way it was. But the weight of 17 correct blocks and 204 correct squares was against it. Maybe (probably) nobody else would notice in the grand overall assembly. Certainly I would run afoul of no Knitting Police. But I just couldn't live with coming this far so successfully just to knowingly leave a big blooper in there. So it's snip, snip, pick, pick, and knit, knit those bad boys all over again.

Damn you, Lady Sybil!