Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Mama Told Me There’d Be Days like This

Actually, she really didn’t, but if it good enough for John Lennon, it is good enough for me. I am having one of those days. I need a day off, except I am trying to save my vacation time for when the baby comes. Sigh.
Work has been crazy and it makes me crabby. I really should just go home and knit or something before someone gets hurt. I am sick of being a worker bee. I know I have said it before, but it seems extra true today.

Weather
I know you all get very excited when I discuss the weather… It has gotten cold here. Not liquid in your eyes freezing cold, rather ice starting to form on the pond cold. It has been interesting to see the path I take everyday submit to the chill of winter’s onslaught. The cold does not bother me so long as I am bundled up sufficiently. Taking the bus has made me realize I need a better scarf. I have hand knit hat and mittens, but I have an acrylic scarf I bought at the thrift store. Why? You may ask. Why would someone so obsessed with knitting not have made herself a scarf? Because I hate knitting scarves. They are long and tedious. I have not bought myself a new scarf because the one I have is the right width and length. It is very wide and long. It is hard to find a scarf of such a great size. I have seen one at Macy’s, but it is a Hugo Boss and expensive. Sigh.

Movie Review
A week and a half ago my husband and I went to see “RocknRolla”. It was awesome. It was a fun, violent romp through the underbelly of London. It was directed by Guy Richie and very much in the vein of “Snatch” & “Lock, Stock and 2 Smoking Barrels”. If you did not like those movies, you will probably not like this one. I however, loved those movies and I enjoyed “RocknRolla” a lot. Gerard Butler was fabulous. Actually, everyone was really good. I am thinking about going and seeing it again. There were no hand knits, which is of course always a little disappointing. However, I am still giving it 3 knitting needles out of 4.

Knitting
I have not downloaded my pictures of my knitting in forever, so I do not have any currently. I have been knitting though. I should be able to finish the 6 hour throw tonight. Last night I went out with some friends and did not really do any knitting.

Strange days indeed – John Lennon

Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Ahhh The Good Old Days

My life used to be dull. Really, it did. Big excitement was going down to visit my mom and dad. They lived in my home town about an hour away. We used to go down every other weekend. That became every weekend when my dad got sick. Sometimes we would go hang out at the MOA (Mall of America), not to shop per se, as were did not have much money, but to look around. We would poke through shops and maybe have a little lunch. We lived in an apartment, we had a couple of cats, and life was boring. God I miss that life! Now, everything is chaotic, too many things and people in my life. I really would like to go back to just my husband and me. Of course, that doesn’t seem likely at this point.

Pain
Yesterday I fell. When I got up in the morning, I managed to trip over a step stool near my bed. So, not only did I fall, but I fell on top on our floor fan. It was very painful. I have a huge bruise on my breast. I have never seen a bruise this color, it is dark blood red. My breast plate hurts, my hand hurts, and my knee hurts. It is miserable. I know that if I was old and frail I would be busted up badly and maybe even dead. That is scary. Obviously I need to clean my room!

The Girl
I just looked over my last few blog entries and realized that I am not totally up to date on info on The Girl.
1st – we have found out she is having a girl. We found out last Tuesday. I am sort of excited just because there are a lot more baby girl patterns to knit.
2nd – The Girl’s boyfriend has moved in. The Thursday before Halloween she went up to visit The Boyfriend and it ended with his uncle (whom he lived with and worked for) trying to strangle him. So now we have yet another mouth to feed. He is looking for a job and is willing to pay rent. Plus, he is helping around the house some. We will have to see how this goes.

Yesterday, The Boyfriend was driving over to pick up The Girl (in OUR car) and he was pulled over. It is somewhat unclear what he was pulled over for, but regardless, the police pulled up his name and it appeared were warrants out on him. They were not actually on him, but his father (he is a Jr.), but he still had to sit in the cop car for 45 minutes and The Girl did not have any one there to pick her up and DH did not have any way of knowing what was going on or to be able to pick her up. Eventually he got home, without The Girl and DH had to go pick her up late. Drama!
Later in the evening, there was a fight between The Girl and The Boyfriend. It was bad. The Girl stormed out of the house, followed by The Boyfriend. They came back in about an hour and everything seemed okay. More Drama!

Knitting Crap
I have been working on a Noro Kureyon hat. I am almost done. It is not for anyone. I love to knit hats and sometimes I just have to make one. It is really quite pretty. I also knit a baby hat out of sock yarn for a baby shower today. I took a picture, but I do not have it with me. It was a big hit with the recipient so I am happy. People are very impressed with baby hats made out of sock yarn. I recommend you make one for the next baby that comes into your life. They are easy and they look impressive to the uninitiated.
I was also knitting a baby bib to go with the hat, but the cotton hurt my hand too much to finish it last night. Hopefully my hand will feel better in the next couple of days. Wool does not seem to bother it too much so I can still knit.
I have started the “right” side of the front of L’illo. Who knows, maybe it will be done before the baby comes. I have not been working on the Opera Stole at all. Plus, I have to start on Christmas gifts. The Stole might have to wait until after Christmas.

Regarding Good Old Days
I know that logically, my early days with my husband were not all wine and roses. There were a lot of stressful things going on. Because life is stressful. I did not have my depression in control, we had no money, my family caused me a lot of grief, etc. However, I miss having time with my husband where we could just sit around naked in bed and watch TV and not have any reason to get up. I just miss the two of us. There just seems to be so many people in our house…

It will all be fine. To quote a former boss, “It is ALL good!”

Tuesday, November 04, 2008

Election Day

My husband and I got to the polls before they opened, about 6:40 or so. There was a small line, nothing too serious and when 7:00 came around, people started heading in and it took us about 15 minutes or so to get through the line. And I was able to make my 7:30 bus. A successful voting experience all round! I love voting. It is so powerful and I truly feel it is the job of every American to go out and have their say. To me, if you do not vote you lose bitching rights. I do not care who you vote for, write in yourself if you want, but always take advantage of your vote.

It is hard to SSK on the bus…
It is also hard to purl slippery rayon on the bus. I have been working on my Opera Stole on the bus and it is going well. I am about half way done. Obviously I did not finish it before our opera outing on Saturday. Oh well. The company Christmas party is going to have a cocktail party theme, so I think my stole will be perfect for it.

I am also knitting L’illo on the bus. I am alternating depending on my mood. I am almost done with the extended collar on the one side of the front. It says it is the left side, but the pattern is wrong and it is going to end up being the right side. But that’s okay. I do not figure a newborn is going to mind.

At home I was working on the Aran slippers for my mom for Christmas. However, I have run into a snag. First, I can not read the adult chart to save my life. I tried to write it out, but it is a very convoluted cable pattern. So I decided to use the child’s version instead. I am using a bigger needle and added a stitch on each side. The second problem, I lost one of my needles. They were the lovely birch needles my sweetie bought me at Shepherd’s Harvest and I am very sad. I do not know what happened to it. I hope it turns up. Regardless, I am stopped on the slippers. They are sort of irritating me so I do not know if I will actually finish them or not.