Sweater woes

I don't have enough paint to apply a second coat of green so tomorrow I will boogie over to Canadian Tire for another can of my colour. Since no further painting could be done today, I decided to sit down with Ben's sweater. From talking with my mom and Barb I was sure I was supposed to cast off some stitches for the armpits of the seater before I could work whats left of the front and back separately. Eventually i got it all straightened away and was working on my second row of the front but something was nagging at me. Something about this just wasn't right. My original intention had not been to cast off armpit so it was still niggling that something wasn't right about it for this sweater. I pulled out the pattern that I am basing this sweater upon and sure enough..no casting off for armpits..body pieces are straight. ARGH!!!!!! It took me almost an hour to get back to where all my stitches were on one circular needle again, in the correct number and none dropped. Then to knit back up again to where I can work the front and back separately I had to laborously go through a first row of twisted wonky stitches from the frogging and pick up. Finally said row was done and all stitches were smoothed and straightened. I did another just to feel better. NOW I am ready to knit half of my 180 stitches onto a pair of straights to work the front while the back is held waiting on the circs.
Why am I doing this the hard way??? one might ask, and to be sure it is a good question. I have a pattern, why not follow it? The answer is just that I wanted it done in the round rather than in parts (because I hate purling and if I can avoid it I will) and I wanted it made to fit the wearer, not just to the dimensions of the pattern. So by combining the independence of Elizabeth Zimmerman's techniques for making sweaters in any size and the shape of the sweater in the pattern, I am hoping to create a sweater that is uniquely Ben's.