Spinning: A Rant

So, I showed off my spinning a while back.  I've been trying to do the whole ten minutes a day plan in order to both spin consistently and consistently spin.  If that makes any sense!

This morning I watched a few videos on Andean plying, which seemed a far better method for my fine singles than plying from a center-pull ball, which was disastrous the time I tried it, all tangles and fuming and swearing.  It went well.  Tricky at first, but by the end, I think I was okay with the method.

Then I really looked at the yarn.

I don't like two-ply yarns!

It's not that I think mine is bad-looking.  It's not.  On a rational level I understand that.  A little uneven here and there, some places that despite plying are still a bit overspun.  I just don't like it.  I've sometimes looked at other people's handspuns and thought...sure, it's pretty, but it's two-ply. 

I like singles.  I like multiple plies.  I'm really not sure what I don't like about two-ply, but I just...don't.

On top of that, it gets worse.  The yarn I plied this morning that I should be so proud of?  Twenty yards.  Yep.  A bobbin that took me longer than I'd like to admit to spin got me twenty yards of yarn.  That I don't like.  Multiple-ply yarns seem to me like two (or three or four or five) times the work!

Clearly, trying to be a process-type spinner when I'm so obviously a product-type knitter is a terrible plan.  Clearly, I need a wheel.

Except that I've never used a wheel, I know nothing about wheels, wheels are expensive and you have to maintain them and know how they work and I don't know how they work!  (Yes, I know, find a spinning guild and learn.  I don't have a car and live in an area with no public transit.  It's just not going to happen right now.)

Either that, or I just keep slowly spinning my singles and (gasp!) not plying them.  Every beginner spinning resource I've researched puts the kibosh on knitting with singles.  I understand why, to a certain extent.  Singles aren't balanced.  Singles will distort your knitting.  Singles will twist and sag and bunch if you look at them funny.  Singles will blight your crops and murder your firstborn.  (Well, no one actually comes out and says that last part....)

So I'm not supposed to knit my singles.  Too bad I like them better and can get twice the yardage!

But other spinners have knit their singles and the sky hasn't fallen....what am I missing?

After measuring my meager little skein, I am very tempted to box up all my spinning gear and forget about it for another few years.

I think I'm going to spend the afternoon on my newest design project, which, unlike my spinning, is going very well.  That will show my spinning who's boss!