Reporting Live From.....A Tell-All MPP

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
41

Hmm, I have much to tell, but I would have to kill all of you if I told it.

Bobbio, I fully understand your frustration and anger with yourself. I know you’ll ace it next round.

It’s freakin’ *coooooold *outside. When I left my house for work this morning it was 16 degrees outside. However, the wind, my god, the wind, is making it feel like it’s below zero.

I-5 was a solid sheet of ice from Hwy 512 to the exit I use to go to work. Not a fun commute!

It’s so cold, I don’t even want to go out for my after lunch cigarette. That’s cold folks!

Soapy, I’m still thinking of you and your family. More hugs and thoughts for peace and strength.

Rigs, hugs to you as well. I don’t know how you’ve restrained yourself and not throttled your MiL.

42

IL does have the death penalty (on moratorium, but still) so there’s that…
What is up with Soapy? I seem to have missed something (typical).

Haze gets NO sympathy for hangover and snowboarding soreness. I only give sympathy to those who are sore due to helping others etc. Sorry, it’s in the rule book. There is no ombudsman on this one.

Whoever it was upthread whose mother is a clean freak (the Qtip and the furnace bit) has my sympathies. I would have stuffed her IN the furnace/water heater.

I am now looking at 3 pm and asking where my day went. I am off to snuggle under an afghan (or an Afghan, if I can find one cute enough*) and knit.

Please someone tell me that the knit stitch is also called the garter stitch. My basic for beginners book(s) do not clarify this salient point. Still can’t purl. Don’t care. Brownies are made. Still cold here. Now I’m working 0530 tomorrow, instead of 0800–which is OK, because I get out early. But which is bad because then I can’t stay later which means I don’t make as much money. Job interview on Wednesday as well. Lots going on ovah hyeah!

*as in human. No interest in Afghan hounds. My mother had one that she named Khyber and it hated me. I mean hated me–it always growled at me and would stalk me. She found this cute. My mother sucks at dog training and obedience and I lay my distaste for my family’s dogs at her door (I like dogs I can visit; I just don’t want to own one). But I have digressed… back to the couch and the Afghan, I mean afghan. :wink:

43

Knit is also called Garter. Don’t ask me why. When I get home, I’ll look to see if I can find the instructions that made purling click for me. (I knit for more than 10 years before I had the :smack::smack::smack: moment of figuring it out.)

44

It is a rainy afternoon in Charleston, WV. It was warm and sunny when I came into Hell…erm, work today, but over the past 6 hrs or so it’s gotten cooler and the rain has arrived. It may or may not freeze tonight depending on which way the current weather front goes/

I’d love to telecommute but alas, I am a clerical slave and for some reason am needed her at the office. I guess it’s for the entertainment value.

45

Building on what mmouse9799 said, garter stitch is just knitting every row, on both sides. No purling involved. That flat, smooth knit fabric you see sometimes is knit on one side and, once you get to the end of the row and turn the piece over, purled on other side. Garter stitch is knit going and coming, to and fro, making ridges on both sides.

(Who, me? I read you folks – I’m rarely brave enough to actually speak up, though. This time I actually knew an answer!)

Okay, to pay my dues for posting to the M[M|P]P, here’s my tell-all for the day. I got prior permission to work from home today, seeings as how (as SmartAleq noted) this storm’s arrival was well documented.

I figured I’d knock out the writing I brought home and then, oh, knit. Or wrap presents. Or finish the casserole for tomorrow’s potluck. Something not-worki-ish. (I’ve got the hours banked to allow some slacking.)

Not so! It’s almost 1:30 and, other than sneaking in to read the Dope whilst chewing my pbj, the writing isn’t finished. I have, however, answered a ton of email, returned phone calls after checking voicemail, coordinated meeting schedules, and been all sorts of productive. Darn it!

Now I’ll go back to writing…

46

waves to all the new Mumpers

Since when do you have to know something to post in the MMP? I know nuttin’ about nuttin’, but that never seems to stop me from stopping in and doing a brain dump. :slight_smile:

(of course, that might explain why most people ignore me… hmmmmmm)

Anyhoo, it’s after 5pm, which means I’m getting the hell out of here. It’s gotten cold, but at least it stopped raining, so there’s no ice. That’s a plus.

47

Well, now.[sub]I didn’t understand this. No matter, my scarves look just fine…[/sub]

I went to knit etc, but the phone rang. Twas a friend of mine and we needed to catch up so no knitting/nap/waste of time for me. I’ll knit after dinner–and now I have to get up at 0400 tomorrow, so no Daily Show. Damn this need for money!

48

No, nononono… that’s not how it works!
Must be caffeine deprivation; you ain’t thinkin’ straight! :stuck_out_tongue:

This is how it goes – there are specialists, and there are generalists. Specialists know a lot about a few topics. Generalists know a bit about a lot of topics.

So, the ultimate specialist knows everything about nothing. While the ultimate **generalist **knows nothing about everything.

There you are…

49

Pictures? Would pictures help? Look here. (I have no affiliation with the site, and don’t know anything about it other than the pictures at the bottom of the page match my mental image. Which may or may not say anything about my mental images…)

Hooray! for fine-looking scarves! BOO! for getting up at 0400!

50

:smack:

51

Rigs, if you have a sweater around (one that’s not in a fancy patter - no cable knit sweater or ribbed fabric or anything like that) look at the main part of the body. That’s how it looks if you knit one row and purl the next row. Compare that to the scarf you made where you knit every row. See the difference? The knit-purl pattern is smooth. The knit-knit pattern is bumpy.

The outside of the sweater is stockingnette; if you look at the inside, that’s reverse stockingnette. The knit-purl pattern results in a fabric that has a definite front and back. The knit-knit (garterstitch) pattern looks the same on both sides. That’s an advantage for a scarf, but not so much for a sweater.

Now look at the cuffs of the sweater. Usually the cuffs are ribbed. This is done by knitting one or two stitches (as opposed to rows) and then purling one or two and then knitting and so on.

I found it was really helpful to look at sweaters and other knit items I had to see what the different patterns are.

52

Carrot, that was quite impressive, thank you! I like Latin, I’m probably one of the last public school attendees who actually took it in high school, not that I remember squat about it now–but I do like to read it out loud sometimes just for the sound of it…

Rigs, perhaps this will help–when you knit you have a loop around the needle in your left hand, you put your right hand needle through that loop pointing away from you then loop the free yarn around and bring it back toward you, right? Then when you get to the end of the row and all the knitting is on your right hand needle, you turn the whole thing around by putting the right hand needle into your left hand, then go back through knitting the same way, right? So since a purl is just a backward normal stitch, you’d bring the right hand needle through the BACK of the loop, so that the needle is pointing TOWARD you, then loop the yarn and draw it through by pushing AWAY from you. So if you think about it, when you do a normal garter stitch since you turn ALL the work around and go back the other way, one row is a knit stitch and the next is a purl stitch, relative to each other. Clear as mud, right? Oh, and you could catch up on the Daily Show tomorrow on Hulu, except that it’s on hiatus until after the New Year so you ain’t missing a thing.

I had a very nice brunch with the family and I’m again being very thankful that my dear son did not marry into a crazy family. DIL’s mom is a total sweetheart, I love her to pieces and I’m glad we’re family together. I’m very blessed in my family, with only a few notable exceptions they’re quite lovely to be around.

I took the crazy dogs for a walk and we did very well until less than a block from home, when Bear pulled at juuuust the wrong time when I was on a very slick patch and yanked my feet out from underneath me, I hit the pavement with my butt, shoulder and the back of my head, ow! I’m very happy I was wearing my heavy felted wool hat and a scarf or I’d have a big old goose egg! So I have a bit of a headache right now and I’m kinda sore. You wouldn’t think a 45 lb dog could pull that hard, but you’d be wrong. I’ll sure be glad when he learns some leash manners! Technically speaking it’s Himself’s responsibility to teach this stuff to Bear but he’s not stepping up so guess who gets the fun part, like getting her head whanged? Grr, I say.

I think it’s oh-nap-thirty, because five hours just does NOT cut it!

53

Hi everyone. Heading out to St. Louis for the funeral tomorrow.

Everyone at work has been great- covering my classes this week and taking care of meetings that I have. Final grades are due next Tuesday at noon- and it’s a hard deadline. At 12:01 everyone gets incompletes for the semester, if the grades are not in. Sooo, my lab tech will get all the exams and research papers and drop them off at my home Thursday, so when I get home Saturday I can furiously start grading.

The reality is, for most students, the grade on the last exam will change their final grade not a wit. :smack:

{{Bobbio}} you’ll nail it next time.

**Echod, mousie, haze **et al. Thank you- it’s amazing how virtual hugs and kind words over a message board do actually help.

54

Travel safe, Soapy, and we’ll be thinking of you and your family. .

Don’t beat yourself up, Bobbio. Everybody had off days, and it sounds like you had many reasons to have an off day. Wet trout slaps for VWife, however! Doesn’t she realize that what you’re doing is good for her as well as everyone else in your community? I truly don’t understand her attitude. I’m sure she has her reasons, but she still needs a couple wet trout slaps to get over it!

It’s a good thing I decided I really needed to work today; I got contacted by two separate people from the office asking about this job. Since one of the two was the person who’d pulled me off my regular work to do various rushes last week that totally screwed up my body clock, not to mention my work schedule and my immune system, I did appreciate the offer to send it back and have someone else do it. But what the heck, I’m half done, and even though it’s a stupid piece of shit job, it’s not that hard. Just stupid.

It actually got up to 70° for a while here this afternoon. In December!!! Isaac thought it was perfect Kong-chasing weather, of course, although he thinks any weather is perfect Kong-chasing weather. Labs! It’s already dropped 15 degrees, and tomorrow’s high is projected to be lower than today’s low, so apparently our weather is as screwy as everyone else’s.

And speaking of labs, ouchie! on that fall, Smarty. I’m glad you had a heavy felted hat on, too. Do you teach the Cesar Milan heel walk, or just basic leash manners? I wish I’d taught mine how to behave Cesar’s way; to this day Isaac forgets himself on the leash far too often.

I see others have answered your knitting questions, Rigs, in greater detail perhaps than you wanted. My personal favorite site for learning how to do various knitting stuff is www.knittinghelp.com – she has all kinds of little videos that show as well as explain what it is you need to do. I highly recommend it. And assuming that you hold the yarn in your right hand when you knit, you’ll want the videos for English style as opposed to Continental (where you hold your yarn in your right hand).

And speaking of knitting, I got the yarn wound off the skein for Papa Tigs’ secret scarf and hat, and seeing how much of it there is, I suspect I can get a matching pair of gloves or mittens out of it, too. We shall see. 200 grams of worsted makes a big ball of yarn!

Okay, animals are fed and I had lunch late enough that it’s not my dinner time yet, so back to work. Tomorrow, I hope, I’ll have time to do some work around the house. Today I could only spare the half hour to play with Isaac, plus the 20 minutes to wind the yarn while I had a cup of caffeine, before getting back to work. My life is so exciting sometimes. :rolleyes:

55

But maybe I’m the ultimate specialist in generalisation? Just sayin’… :slight_smile:

Travel safe, Soapy, and take care. It’s good to hear those around you are pitching in to make this a little more bearable for you.

56

Why are Christmas trees like bad knitters?
They both drop stitches.

Sorry.
It got up to -4F today - should be -20F in the morning. Poor pups keep freezing their paws before they can pee!

57

I’ve nothing to tell, but I’ll tell it all.

The alarm went off at 5:55, the cat started kneading at 5:56, I ignored both until 6:17 (not an easy task, mind you - the radio was easy to ignore, Smokey not so much.

I stopped for DD coffee and breakfast sandwich and continued to work.

I arrived at 7:56, fiddled around until my shift started at 8:30, worked straight through until 5:30 almost forgetting to eat the lunch that was still in the fridge from Firday.

I stopped at Walgreen’s on the way home to get a few seasonal items and was home by 6:45pm

I expect I’ll be crawling into bed around 9:00pm, at which point Smokey will surely resuming kneading me. I’ll probably watch TV until midnight or so, dozing for 10 minute intervals until I finally turn the TV off.

Tomorrow I do it all over again.

58

Dang, after a quiet last MMP, you folks are going nuts today - I just now finished! Granted, I’ve done other stuff along the way.

Because of the mild weather that **MamaTigs **described, **FCD **decided to clean the gutters before our week of rain descends upon us. As he cleaned, I watched - just in case he fell. But he didn’t fall and our gutters are empty and ready for winter. Then we came in and I ordered a mattress for the kids - it’ll be delivered after they head to Orlando, so it’ll be a nice surprise when they come back.

Work was somewhat sucky. I found out first thing that I’m not on my new team after all. Even tho last week I got a “welcome to the team” email, today my boss told me I’m going back to the old section. Which means I have to move and lose my window seat. And apparently I’m being assigned to study yet another country. That would be the 6th or 7th in the last 4 years. Sheesh. I’ll never develop any expertise.

But I did have one high point. The super-short-turnaround project I’m on gave me a chance to dazzle the project lead. He’d asked about 3 specific facilities, and this morning within about an hour, I gave him a pretty comprehensive answer on all 3. Go me! I guess if this leads to a longer-term project, I’ll be on that. Maybe. I don’t know. But I need to add this to my running brag sheet.

Oh yeah, and the other bad thing about having to move, besides losing my window - this mouthy, irritating woman who I managed to escape with my last move is being moved to the same office where I’m going. Kill me now!

Nothing else to tell for now, but as soon as something comes up, I will share.

Happy Monday.

59

Wow…such entertainment. And, yeah, that MPP was on purpose of course. :wink: I like Muppet’s decoding the best so far.

More hugs for Soapy and family. Glad people are able to step in to make things a bit easier for you at work. Safe travels.

Glad you were able to check on FIL, rigs. As for MIL, well…I imagine the fact that you’ve failed to make her the center of your universe is punishment enough. (Oh, and to answer your question upthread: Soapy’s BIL passed on Saturday. Aneurysm. :frowning: )

Shelli, tell all can have any definition you like. The MMP lets you share whatever you’re comfortable with.

Which for me, right now, is that :eek: has less to do with clean than with making sure the space will tolerate 5 people for several days without any of us breaking anything or tripping or otherwise causing injuries. I have the world’s smallest house (OK, I exaggerrate, but it’s small, really) and it takes some planning to make it tolerable for all of us. And I’m not there yet. :eek::eek:

I notice doggio hasn’t made it in here to tell all. I suppose he’s working, or something. Harummmmmmph. :p:D

I have so many more things to say about what everyone wrote. If I’m good and get enough done, I’ll be back yet this evening.

Hugs.

ETA: FCM are you allowed to wear headphones at work? Just sayin’. Sorry about the bad day.

GT

60

:confused: Or did you just feel like hitting yourself over the head?

Thanks for the knitting advice, all, although what MamaTigs said was funniest:

Although a glimmer of light did show through on what Smartie posted re the all knit stitch being alternating knit/garter relative to one another… (the rest of your post washed over me like a foreign language tape).
See, I get that my right hand needle “goes” through the loop “backwards” (needle then pointing at me, relatively speaking), but I don’t get where to loop the yarn after that and I don’t get the push through vs the pull through. I will have to look at the site given and try it. Not tonight, though. I only learned the knit stitch via watching, again and again and again some disembodied hands online…
This is the kind of thing that Granny would have taught me in about two seconds back in the day except for my grannies didn’t knit and didn’t live with us (thank god). I can tell you this: some knitting books rival VCR programming booklets in “clarity”. One on just scarves never explains ANYTHING–and it’s not a pattern book. I checked it out BECAUSE it said it was a beginning scarf book. It jumped right into lace patterns and fan patterns and as-translated-from-the-Japanese instructions. Ugh. I do have a stitch and bitch book, which is amusing as well as helpful, but even she does not bother to explain that garter stitch=knit stitch.

Fetchund–Xmas trees don’t drop stitches, they drop needles. :confused:

Off to take a loooooonng bath. and then maybe some knitting before bed. I am behind in my Daily Shows, but will do the Hulu thing–thanks!

ETA: oh, that is terrible re Soapy’s BIL. I am so sorry.