Thank you, Theresa

If you use the long-tail cast on method, you know the intense frustration of casting on 90% (or 80% or 70% or all but one) of your stitches and running out of "tail." Rip it out and start again. Aaaaaargh!!! Try doing it with a pattern that begins with "cast on 501 stitches." After 3 attempts, I finally gave up and joined another ball of yarn for the last 40 stitches... it still remains to be seen whether it will show when the sweater is finished.

Then one day recently I discovered a solution while browsing the Techniques section of knitty.com. An article by Theresa Vinson Stenersen on "Casting On" says:

Another good way to avoid this problem is by using two balls of yarn -- or both ends of the same ball of yarn -- joined at the slip knot. Just cast on one extra stitch and unknot the slip knot when you're finished casting on.

Why didn't I ever think of that??? It seems so obvious when somebody points it out! I don't even know why I was reading the article, since I have done a long-tail cast on since my grandmother first taught me how to knit, but I will never do it another way if I have to cast on more than about 30 stitches. Thank you, Theresa.