Being the guy I am, I offered to help untangle it, as she looked tired. No, she said, she'd just cut the thing out, no big deal. Well, I couldn't let that go...I suggested she get ready for bed, and I'd handle this, shouldn't take but a few minutes. I sat down and began to futz with it. On and on and on I worked, untangling, pulling, trying to figure out how the Hell this went together.
20 minutes goes by. It's gone quiet upstairs, meaning that she's probably already asleep. That's good, I think, since this is taking longer than I thought. She usually takes her crochet with her to work, as it gives her something relaxing to do on her lunch break, and I wanted this to be available to her, so i couldn't just put it down and work on it the next day.
Then, a light at the end of the tunnel. A couple of deft maneuvers had resulted in a clearer picture of the tangle, and a few more pulls showed that the end was in sight. Another yoink here and there, and I was down to just a slipknot. Well, now it's easy, just gently pull this one here, and it'll pull through and result in a clean, unknotted strand. Slowly, slowly, closer, closer...finally, it's just at the knot, and of course, it's tightened up. It's so small that i can't get my big fingers in there to loosen it up for the final bit, so I just hold the yarn and apply steady but increasing pressure to pull it free.
You see this coming, don't you? The fucking yarn broke.
Yep. After all this, it snaps in two. I could have just let her cut the thing free in the first place. Ah well, I saved her about 20 feet of yarn, so it wasn't a total loss, but, damn, did I feel like a chump.