Start-itis sounds much better than Starti-itosis

So I finished my fair isle sweater, down to the lack of blocking (which I will consider doing only after soaking a handful of the trimmings into both hot and cold water, and then eyeballing to ensure I can still pick out "white" from the group). And my Francis Revisited is truly, TRULY chugging along due to the huge gauge.
And the huge needles I required to get gauge.
And the constant remeasuring really wants bigger needles, but I have my limits. I get nervous the farther away from the original designer's needle size I get. It's like walking down parallel hallways. Everyone else took that hallway, but I have to go on this one, and I can't see to judge if I'm getting close to where they ended up or just headed straight to the boiler room door.

But now I have to decide what to knit for Smiles [K]! It has to be portable, for maximum sister time, and it has to be awesomely absorbing, or I'll lose interest hundreds of miles from my stash of other yarn. And it should also be...simple? So I can take a few brain cells away from holding the plane aloft during the flight to knit it without puking on the passenger next to me.

(Why did you think planes stayed in the air? Physics? No! People like me who use the entirety of their brain power to keep the plane in the air!)

I'm thinking of using the time to knit Krefto's socks. In a manly grey. With limited design? I'll ask what he'd like before I start, if I remember.