It’s weird. I look at those skeins of multicolored, multihued yarn and they seem like a riot of colours, although the colours do sort of flow into one another smoothly. Still, I look at them and think “Wouldn’t that just make a loud, dizzying garment?” But then I see it worked into something and somehow it seems to be transformed into something that my eyes can make sense of. I won’t even pretend to understand how that is accomplished as my knowledge of knitting is limited to “knit one, pearl two,” and I really have no idea what that even means, but some of that stuff looks purdy. The Sea Wool stuff has an interesting sheen to it, not dull and fuzzy like most wool I see.
My grandmother on my mother’s side used to love to knit. As a kid and therefore the recipient of some of her projects, I never really appreciated them all that much – what kid likes socks and toques and sweaters for Christmas? – but I’d probably like them more now. Except some wools make me itch – usually the coarser-feeling stuff, whatever that may be. Never could wear that stuff. Still can’t. I have sensitive skin I s’pose, so whatever I put on has to be nice 'n soft without too many long fibers hanging about.
So, it’s snowing in T-Dot again, fairly significant stuff despite being pleasantly mild out. Makes the trek in uncomfortable though, but I can’t complain too much when it’s nice enough out that I don’t need gloves.
Yesterday the wife and I were cleaning house when, in the middle of doing the vacuuming, the vacuum gave out. And by “gave out” I mean “burned.” No flames and there didn’t look to be much smoke, but that lovely stench of ozone, melted plastic and fried armature coils was unmistakably wafting about the place for the next 10 minutes. It also took a fuse out, creating a distinct lack of power in the bedroom. And we were out of fuses. Cute. (Yes, my building still uses fuses. Why they haven’t switched to breakers yet is beyond me.) So I had to dash downstairs and pick up a couple of 15A fuses, then spend a couple of minutes cutting power to everything else in the house before I found the fuse that belonged to the bedroom. (I couldn’t tell which fuse was burned out) This is actually the first time I’ve ever had to replace a fuse in this apartment in the 8 years we’ve lived there, so I guess that’s not bad.
But now we need a new vacuum cleaner. Murphy was probably involved in this somewhere because we’d just been talking about that a couple of weeks prior. We were looking at the Bissell Healthy Home as a cheaper alternative to a Dyson that hopefully works about as well. Looks like we’ll have to look into it a bit harder since we’ll be needing something quite soon.
Great OP, Jah! Beautiful yarn. Wool makes me itch. I can only wear it if there is an undergarment that is NOT wool. I don’t mind the smell of silk either and my preferred knitted material is cotton. Not all that soft but does not itch.
My mother taught me to knit when I was young. We got around the lefthandedness by sitting across from each other. I learned how to make mittens. We needed a LOT of mittens with six kids in the family. This was long before we had a dryer so the mittens would need to hang dry before they could be used again after an outing in the snow.
She tried to teach me to crochet but I never did get the hang of that. My grandma taught me to embroider. I taught myself to macrame in college. I don’t do any of that stuff anymore.
Good vibes going out to tigs for her surgery.
Nothing exciting to report about the Anachi weekend.
Wow, check out Jahdra’s thread! And her yarn is nice too.
It’s Monday. I have run out of food. No cereal, don’t know what to have for breakfast. Maybe toast. Don’t know what to take in for my lunch today. I’m lucky I’ll be able to make dinner tonight. Bleh.
Here’s today’s pun, inspired by … well, I’ll let you figure that one out:
As I told Haze last night, apparently I was productive this weekend. I looked up yesterday evening and 2/3 of my quantum mechanics assignment was done. Go me! Plus, I still have two more days to finish it, and I don’t anticipate that the last two problems will be difficult. This will leave more time for TA related stuff. One girl had to miss lab last week because she was just getting out of the hospital (for what I don’t know, but if they released her she’s obviously going to be fine, at least for now). So I promised to allow her to do it later, but that needs to happen soon, as in before the next lab gets set up. Ah, the life of a TA.
Hi everyone - just a drive-by post.
I’ve been working long crazy hours and haven’t had a chance to post lately. I’m still teaching preschool part-time, and am working full-time for the private ambulance company.
My firehouse annual banquet was Saturday and I got an award for being in the Top Ten responders for 2006 - a great new job shirt (one of those nice heavy firehouse sweatshirts) with the maltese cross and our company name and number, and “Top Responder” embroidered on it.
So, what have I missed? Any big news with the MMPers? Catch me up.
Hello (with the suspicion that y’all are moving the party on me, 'cause I looked for this thread and couldn’t find it, so I posted in the old one…)
Still need to go do lots of stuff. Guess I better go do it. (don’t wanna)
Shame on you, Jah, for making a poor unemployed girl want to buy yarn!! Not fair. I’m not certain, but it’s entirely possible that my mother was there–did you see a lady that looked like Kathy Bates and was probably yawning most of the time? She loves those conventions and classes and stuff. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’d been there.
I spent the majority of yesterday playing Evidence: The Last Ritual. For those of you who love computer games–just don’t do it. It’s so damn hard. But I’m really enjoying it. The entire game is based almost entirely on doing internet research and actual e-mails the game itself sends you as you play … but the part where the serial killer e-mailed me to say “I know where you live” was kinda creepy. Roomie locked the door when I started yelling about that.
And then we watched the Oscars. I don’t know why I bothered when I didn’t see most of the movies this year, but if nothing else, I like the pretty dresses. But I’ve noticed that Nicole Kidman and Gwyneth Paltrow seem to pick the ugliest dresses they can find every year. Nicole looked like some giant red bow-monster was trying to eat her head.
We’ve got about three inches of snow this morning, but it doesn’t bother me. Roomie is home yet again because of her propensity for vomiting–we’re thinking that maybe she has an ulcer. Hopefully, her doctor will call back today. And also hopefully, she won’t get fired when she returns to work.
I was smart and stuff and bought a newspaper yesterday for the classifieds. And there was nothing but crap. Unless I want to be a substitute custodian in an elementary school. I’ll pass on that one. Though I do look cute in coveralls.
Pretty colors, Jahdra! I’m always amazed by people who knit - I’ve knit one scarf in my life and it was a sorry affair.
Best wishes and prayers, MamaTigs.
yawwwwwwwwn I got so little sleep last night… good thing I don’t have any classes today. Still need to drag self to school and get some work done. Have a tolerable Monday everyone!
Morning, all. Thanks for the good wishes. I have to leave for the hospital in about an hour, so needless to say, since I couldn’t have anything to eat or drink (except ONE swallow of water to get down my morning meds, but not less than 4 hours before my surgery time), I stayed in bed and fast asleep until not long ago. I just have to toss a few things in a bag and I’m ready to go. I have to bring my own clothes to wear starting tomorrow – they want us to dress in normal clothes instead of hospital wear, which I appreciate since we’ll be doing PT as a group and I really don’t want the show-and-tell that would be hospital gowns with a mixed bunch of men and women doing exercises together! :eek:
I WANT CAFFEINE! pouts
That game sounds creepy, Drae! I think I’d be calling 911 when I got that email, even if it is from an imaginary character in my game!
Congrats on your award, LibKitty!
Okay, I guess it’s time to get off my ass and get ready to go. I’ll make sure Palebunny posts an update. She also will have my camera to take incriminating pictures of me all drugged up. Don’t have too much fun while I’m gone, and y’all be nice!
Sending best wishes for surgery and recovery, Tigs!
Jah, nice OP. Boy, those yarns are BRIGHT!
The party we went to on Saturday was great! We had the best time and the hubby and I had the craziest wigs. Many pictures were taken, and one of the photogs said that as soon she posts them to Snapshot she’ll let me know. Then, I’ll share some with you all!
Well, time to slog through some more projects. Have a good day all!
What a great post. I can’t wait for fiber fests up this-a-way. I’m learning to spin (I love my double treadle Babe production wheel) so I have rovings and a great big bag of alpaca fleece waiting patiently for me. The alpaca’s unprocessed, so it still smells of barn - but to me, it’s a good smell. I guess that stuff washes better once it’s in a skein anyhow. Fine by me - it spins up like a dream!
I’ve also been having fun dyeing a bunch of old rovings I’d had on hand for felting. They were either too coarse for felt, or funny colors I’d never use. So I overdyed them with Jacquard acid dye and spun em up. The results here: http://flickr.com/photos/kimhotep/368192450/ Now they have become a long stripy scarf, but I haven’t shot that yet.
A Good Thing to report: my apple trees are budding, and during the brief period of warm temperatures yesterday, I could hear frogs croaking in the nearby swamp. C’mon, Spring!
We got snow here over the weekend. Somewhere between 10 and 12 inches. I put my car in the garage Friday night and didn’t move it again until this morning. We went walking in the snow Saturday night, but otherwise stayed inside. I baked bread, which was really good. I should do that more often. Ooh and we had cream of garlic soup! YUM! And that’s the extent of the excitement at chez Taxi/Keith.
Good wishes to Mama Tigs. Let’s hope you’re back updating us soon.
I think that ‘Socks that Rock’ is one of the best names I ever heard. When I went into uniform for my new job I decided to wear only stripey socks with it. I held to that for a while but gradually I’ve drifted into single-coloured or non-striped socks. I really should get back into buying stripey socks but it proved surprisingly difficult to find stripey socks which are thick enough to be comfortable with my DMs.
I have a great week ahead. I think the person who works out our shifts accidentally confused me with an established person instead of the n00b employee that I am. I had yesterday and today as my weekend and I have two four-hour shifts and two where I’m spare so I’ll probably get to leave at least one hour early and I have one shift on Saturday which is pretty decent too! Essentially I’m going to be feeling as though I’m only scheduled to work one day this week.
I’m currently sitting here trying to nurse my mimosa back to health. I am not very good with plants but I bit the bullet and planted some mimosa seeds and some sundew seeds a number of weeks back. So far I’ve had exactly one mimosa plant appear. It was doing not bad but I forgot to water it for a couple of days so it’s having a lie-down to collect its thoughts. I gave it a nice little drinkie earlier today and I’m letting it sit under a lamp in the hope that it might feel better soon. I won’t be impressed with myself if my one and only plant dies before it’s a centimetre tall.
In other news, I’ve finally managed to put lots of photos into my picasa webalbum. I’ve been out with my camera lots lately but I’m always too busy to sit down and edit and arrange pics. I got some lovely shots during the Chinese New Year Celebrations in Trafalgar Sq and later on the South Bank. This was the first time I’d gone out and attempted to take pictures of people and I’m very pleased with how they turned out. I’ve done lots of stuff with London architecture but I really enjoyed the whole process of getting people.
I have a friend who makes clothing. One day when her not-yet-husband was my flatmate, I came home to find her in the middle of our living area, waving her hands in the air. Swatches of brightly-coloured fabric were whirling around in the middle of the room, assembling themselves into clothes.
At least that what it looked like on first impression. She was making Halloween costumes. Her skill is amazing. She does in minutes what would take me hours, if I even knew how to do it.
A week ago, I was at their house helping move furniture. One room being rearranged was her sewing room. The sun was shining on stacks of folded fabric in almost every imaginable colour, there on the wood shelves. It was warm and beautiful. It was difficult to put down the fabric as I helped move it.
I love colours. A really beautiful colour is at least as good as sex or chocolate or a good book or a really good landscape for me. When I was little, I would spend hours just looking at the rainbow spectrum from a prism. And laser light fascinates me: it’s so pure.
I wish I could see in ultraviolet and infrared as well. What colours are there to discover beyond the ones we see? What shimmers and deep glowing tints are there just waiting to bring joy to some brave explorer?
But I’m really enjoying it. The entire game is based almost entirely on doing internet research and actual e-mails the game itself sends you as you play … but the part where the serial killer e-mailed me to say “I know where you live” was kinda creepy. Roomie locked the door when I started yelling about that. 
Don’t have too much fun while I’m gone, and y’all be nice!