Friday, September 30, 2005
Call 1-877- SOS-KNIT
Ambition
I thought “I’ll knit for Christmas, that’s the thing that I do best.”
A mitten or some underwear, a sweater or a vest
I went into the stash to find a yarn that called my name
But all that I encountered were small fuzzy balls of shame
The Manos, the alpaca and the Koigu and the yak
They went to live with others and they won’t be coming back
No matter how I scrabbled through the tubs and tubs of string
The only things uncovered were acrylic and some bling
Some slippers and a fuzzy scarf, some mittens and a yurt
I’ll knit these all by Christmastime and no-one will get hurt
My mother needs a fun-fur bra, my brother needs the same
My husband needs a hat with ears, for unnamed acts of blame
I’ll knit my child a pony; it’s a simple thing to do
Oh look! I have some yarn of brown; I’ll even knit some poo!
My supervisor down at work, she needs a brand new scarf
I’ll knit her something lovingly from clown-hued strands of barf
This much and more I can complete in time for Yuletide glee
I’ll make the knittens catnip toys upon which they shall pee
I know I can complete this for The Harlot told me so
She’ll tell you too, upon the phone, don’t hesitate, just go!
Thursday, September 29, 2005
Does This Post Make My Ass Look Fat?
Because really, dudes, I keep getting spam inviting me to join the "big friends site".
Between that and my apparently-miniscule penis (which I allegedly am having problems keeping erect) I'm starting to get a little paranoid.
Wednesday, September 28, 2005
Ooh, Pretty Pictures!
My Man in Japan takes good pictures. Go look.
Damn, I know a lot of talented people. I keep expecting to be called out as a complete and utter faker ... and yet I persevere.
Such is the joy of being The Village Idiot! (No, I'm not feeling down about myself, just admiring others, so don't send me encouraging words or I'll just be mean to you).
Tuesday, September 27, 2005
Knitting, At Last!
Oh yes, this was supposed to be some sort of knitting blog, or at least something fibre-related, wasn't it? It wasn't meant to be an endless rant about The Babysitter from Hell (to whom I am not related, for those who wondered). It's just ... well, sometimes a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do.
And, other times, a girl's not gotta do what a girl's gotta do and then that girl gets her large wobbly ass blogged about by the girl who still had to do what she had to do even though you thought it was ok to not do what you had to do you irresponsible twat please break your leg.
*koff*
I'm ok now.
Really.
And yes, I know it's an act of bad Karma for me to wish a broken limb on her but really, the way she lives her life it's almost inevitable that she do so some time (again) in the near future, at which point I will not be taking her a Care Package.
Blogger hates me, so I can't post any pictures of what I've actually been doing but in between all of the ranting please rest assured that knittage and other fiberly pursuits have been ... um ... pursued. Any and all pictures in this post are therefore recycled from at least one earlier post. Anything current will have to be imagined until Blogger gets its shit together again.
Several of the vile green dishcloths have been completed and a couple have been dispatched to their new homes, with apologies.
I have been working sporadically on Oliver's Wool and hope to have it finished tomorrow. (Better finish it as I have to card outside and it's going to start raining on Thursday).
All of this wool will be going up for auction, and I shall dye a second lot to spin for my friend Smee, as she has developed an inordinate lust for this particular shade of yellow, and satisfying lusts is what I'm all about, baby.
Fibre lusts. Get your minds out of the gutter. She's not that kind of girl.
The Big Pink Shawl has been made even bigger, at the request of Melanie who, despite being of non-towering stature has said she likes her shawls expansive, and will be finally off the needles tomorrow (pre- and post-blocking pix to be proudly displayed when technology is again on my side) and a big bright red stole (in ACKrylic and Hair of the Mo) has been cast on, to be featured at a craft table I'm sharing with my friend Sara at the end of November.
And speaking of inordinate lusts, my buddy Lee Ann has developed a weakness for the lascivious little purple skein and has asked me to try to match the colour so that she, too, can spin with pure wickedness.
It's actually far less spectacular than it seems in the picture. My camera picks up blues for some reason. The Yarn Harlot (we all know Steph, right? I don't need to put another link in here?) will tell you it's far more plum than that photo would imply. I, of course, kept few records of what the hell I did, apart from the documentation here on this blog, so I don't know what I'm doing, but there is a big pot of Cheviot on the stove right now and I'm about to toss in a lot of purple and blue and cook it up for a bit and see what happens.
If Lee Ann hates the end result (or if it's too horrible to send to her) I'm sure I can find something to do with it. There ain't no accounting for taste ... I've had two or three people tell me already that they think the clownbarf is gorgeous. (I'm of the same opinion but don't tell anyone.)
Off to get up to my armpits in vinegar, dishwash soap, sheep poop (no, really Lee Ann, that's all washed out, honest) and easter-egg dye and see what I can come up with.
Hopefully pictures to follow fairly quickly.
Monday, September 26, 2005
Seven Years Ago Today
It seemed like a good idea at the time.
The champagne helped.
Or was it shampoo?
Happy anniversary, assmonkey.
Well I Used To Love Her ...
... but it's all over now.
Bitch is fired. Very fired. Possibly, should time and resources allow, out of a cannon.
7pm: Her: I've got a ride home tonight, I don't need your van. See you at 9!
8pm: Phone rings, her roommate is calling, to tell me her mother is in hospital and she won't be showing up tonight.
a) There's no reason for her to have phoned her roommate, who didn't care if or when she came home, to tell her she wasn't coming home. This was done purely to avoid having to talk to me.
b) I work at the hospital. I checked. Her mother wasn't there. In fact, to give her full benefit of the doubt, I checked three hospitals and checked by last name, first name, age and description. Not there.
Fortunately I had hired someone responsible just a few hours before Ms. Flake-o-Matic cancelled on me. I've got every night but Sundays covered, and a friend of mine will take the kidlet in a pinch if I can't get someone else.
This being Sunday, I had nobody else to call at the last minute, so my daughter had to go sit in the break room at my husband's work until he finished his shift at 11pm, not getting home until after midnight. She's five years old, and this was a school night.
Guess how happy she's going to be when I wake her in about 15 minutes.
Guess how happy I am right now.
Guess who I really hope is stupid enough to use me as a reference for work (a distinct possibility).
No prizes this time. I'm going to go get the cattle prod and get my child out of bed now ...
Edit: Yes, this is the same retarded chimp who ran over a huge nail so I had to replace my tire, then ran over a huge bolt so I had to get the new tire repaired, then left her dog here with no warning, who broke my stove, who lost the gas tank cap and who has jammed out on me repeatedly for childcare before, including on the ONE night my husband and I both had off in December. The stories are endless. Well, that's not true ... we've reached the end, haven't we? At the age of 23 she really needs to get a freakin' grip.
Sunday, September 25, 2005
Three Guesses
Who would be stupid enough to lose the gas cap off my van when gas is at $1.169 a litre? ($3.79 a gallon for our friends south of the border).
a) a garden gnome***
b) a retarded chimp with a bug zapper up its ass*
c) my babysitter**
Just worked a graveyard shift. I managed to get a gas cap that almost-fit for free from the local gas station (thank you nice lady at Chevron!) that someone else's garden gnome had left behind there. I am going to go for six hours of well-deserved sleep before venturing out into the world of assmonkeys again.
And then I'm going to kill my babysitter and eat her.****
* this was my husband's suggestion
** this is the right answer
*** this may also be the right answer, for all I know
**** yes, the same one with the car tires and the broken stove and the abandoned dog
Saturday, September 24, 2005
My Cheatin' Heart
There is a pile of dishes seventeen feet high in my kitchen.
This is minutes away from my front door:
There are 800 loads of laundry to be done.
The woods are minutes away from my front door:
There is gas in the van, the sun is shining and the cutest kid in the world wants to go exploring.
A prize to the first person who guesses how many loads of laundry and how many dishes got done ...
Friday, September 23, 2005
Go Look
At something beautiful.
~swoon~
Thursday, September 22, 2005
Breaking News
VANCOUVER, BC (BSN)
This just in. Our intrepid reporter, Eleanor Beatrice, seen here in her humanitarian efforts to save the Battery-Powered Panda Bear
has this day reported to her parents that the dreaded bath puppet, pictured below in his natural habitat of lounging on the flyer of mommy's spinning wheel
is a bastard.
It had long been suspected that this puppet was of poor moral fibre, and also of fairly skanky cotton fibre as he has all of these weird loops hanging off him.
We had not until this day known the extent of his perfidy, however "bastard" would seem to be the least of his worries.
A rabbit, who preferred not to be identified by name
said "I always wondered when the rubber duck said she got the clap from the toilet seat. I mean, it just didn't make sense. Not when she had been spending hours with the bastard bath puppet down her pants."
These speculations were brought to a head tonight when, during a game of "Make Eleanor Laugh Like a Loon," the aforementioned reporter, upon being tickled by the bath puppet, said in bell-clear tones, "Bath puppet, you are a bastard."
Her parents hastily defined the difference between "adult words" and "kid words" and in fact defined "bastard" as "quite a bad word and one that we would prefer you didn't say in school." These explanations were made while mommy tried not to pee her pants laughing while simultaneously being shocked, and while daddy tried valiantly to blame this transgression upon mommy rather than upon The Evil TeeVee.
Further reports as this story develops. Or when I stop cringeing and laughing at the same time.
It's all the Bastard Bath Puppet's fault.
Wednesday, September 21, 2005
Very Simple
1. Switch on camera.
2. Open front door.
3. Take six steps forwards.
4. Point camera upwards.
5. Take photograph.
6. Post it on your blog:
7. Enter contest.
Any questions?
Hardly Surprising
Today's gigglesnort, courtesy of my husband:
*****
An Honest Request for Assistance from Your Most Humble Servant in the
Name of God
Dearest Sir or Madame,
Good thing to write you. I am sure this comes as a surprise but I have
prayed over my selection of your name due to its esteeming nature, and
its similarity with the names of many who have, unfortunately, perished
by the hand of God, and I hold with the hope that you can be assist me.
I am BROWN MICHAEL, from Oklahoma, USA. While serving as FEMA's Director
of Relief Efforts for Hurricane Katrina I came upon the records of an
appropriation from the U.S. Congress for US$51.8 billion
($51,800,000,000) in hurricane relief funds that have so far gone unclaimed.
Because of the slow government response, I have been orphaned from my
job with FEMA, in which President Bush took me so special. I am now in
the process of cleaning out my office, which is messier than an Arabian
horse stable. Believe me, I know.
I am looking for an honest God-fearing individual who can assist me with
these unclaimed fund. Please to provide me with your bank account
information so that we can immediately execute this transfer. In return
for your help I will provide you with 20% of the funds as your fee.
I will also need your phone number and any other personal, confidential
information you can send me.
Time is of the essence. Please respond my email address immediately,
which is MBrown@InflatedResume.com
Praise God, the Most High, that we shall bring righteously these funds
to where they may us benefit.
BROWN MICHAEL PhD.
So, dudes, think I should be writing back to him?
*g*
Kill Me Now
You are 'French'. In the nineteenth century, it
was the international language of diplomacy.
It is a 'beautiful' language, meaning that it
is really just a low-fidelity copy of Latin.
You know the importance of communicating
'diplomatically', which for you means both
being polite and friendly when necessary and
using sophisticated, vicious sarcasm when
appropriate. Your life is guided by either
existentialism or nihilism, depending on the
weather. You have a certain appreciation for
the finer things in life, which is a diplomatic
way of saying that you are a disgusting
hedonist. Your problem is that French has been
obsolete for a long time.
What obsolete skill are you?
brought to you by Quizilla
I like Latin. I hate French. A lot.
The only redeeming grace is that it says French has been obsolete for a long time.
THANKS A LOT Sandy!
Bicth.
I'm going to go cry now.
Tuesday, September 20, 2005
Mutterings
I'm just in from a guild meeting and boy are my arms tired! No, wait. I drove. Wrong line.
It was a great evening. I thoroughly enjoyed spending time in the presence of so many other women who understood perfectly this ridiculous lust for fibre. There was a speaker from the West Coast Knitters' Guild. Interesting enough, but not enough to make me feel like joining, alas.
This is probably a good thing as I think one meeting a month is about all I can manage to find time for. Wasn't I going to have a ton of extra time once Eleanor started kindergarten?
I took Lily along with me but she was the only wheel there and she didn't want to be stared at, so I took the opportunity to finish the pinque shawl I'm making to send to Melanie. It's all done but the blocking. That is, if she's about the same height as me. Melanie, would you drop me a line and let me know if you happen to be about 4'11" or 6'2" and I'll make appropriate adjustments? If you're in around 5'6" somewhere then we're in business as it stands.
I'm uninspired at the moment with regard to blogging ("And this would be different from the usual how?" I hear you say) so I shall wimp out by answering the meme sent me by Imbrium.
The rules are:
1. Go into your archive.
2. Find your 23rd post (or closest to).
3. Find the fifth sentence (or closest to).
4. Post the text of the sentence in your blog along with these instructions.
5. Tag five people to do the same.
Mine is from August of last year ...
"These cards inspired me (once I went and changed my pants, thankyouverymuch) to look out some of my own old recipe books."
Oh well, at least I didn't say "ass".
As for tagging, I think I've annoyed just about everyone I know with memes over the last couple of months. Trixie
I think that's about the only person I can count on not to hit me with things for asking her ...
Monday, September 19, 2005
Annoyed
If one has had one's phone installed for their convenience and not for that of others, and if one pays extra every month to maintain an unlisted number so not to be called by assmonkeys trying to sell you services you don't want ... should one not expect to be left alone by said assmonkeys?
These guys don't think so. Automated advertising machines tying up my phone ... can't even hang up on the damned thing! (which is so convenient when one has a small child and would like to be able to access emergency services if need be). I'm sort of hoping their trucks all spontaneously combust this evening (with nobody inside, of course. We've had enough of the deading for a while.)
Answers
Got a whole bunch of comments I haven't answered, so I'll get to them here. This is a blatant attempt to get away without a real post today:
September 5: Ordinary Knitter, I think I found your blog through Statcounter. It's a fantastic tool for your blog, if you want to know who's coming to visit and from where (and what weird searchwords are being entered into Google to find your blog ...)
September 7: Marlene, I don't believe the nuns will allow her to marry. No, we're not Catholic. Shut up.
To all who were concerned about my apparent state of pantslessness on September 10, I was actually wearing a pair of flannel boxers. I like boys' unnerwares when I'm lounging around the house. (Yes, soon I will start wearing a wifebeater tank top thingie and belching a lot while drinking beer and scratching myself inappropriately. Oh, wait, I already ... nevermind.)
Tuesday, September 13: Yes, Anonymous, I freely admit I have viewed porn. The only problem with porn is that no matter how good the plot line (the what?) I always seem to lose interest about half-way through the movie. And then fall asleep.
Tuesday, September 13, again: I used almost every container I could find in the house for a vase. The alstroemeria is in a juice jug, the red daisies are in an oversized beer mug, two bunches of carnations are in an actual vase I used to use to keep pennies in, the glads are in a vase that used to be my knitting needle holder (and will be again shortly), and there was a huge display of all sorts of stuff (mum, coxcomb, etc) in a cut-down one-gallon milk jug. I have no shame, and I'm inventive, it would seem.
September 14: Lee Ann, the "little fuzzy ball things" will be gone before she has a chance to ask questions. They have about another thirteen weeks left, methinks.
September 16: I'm much better now, thanks. I kept going to work, Marlene. I don't usually actually take a day off unless I'm gouting arterial blood or something. (I try not to do that too often). I do, however, get a paid vacation day this week, as I had booked time off to go to the Fair. Yay!
September 18: Marie: No, they've changed the admission rules to the fair so you can actually get in without a husband now, however seeing my husband loves the fair as much as I do, and one of the reasons we go down there is to visit his family, it didn't seem fair to go without him. That being said, he's suggested that any time I have a Seattle/Tacoma area event to go to I could always take Her Surreal Highness and drop her off with Gramma Pat if she's not working -- they'd both be delighted! I may investigate this.
Stephanie: No, please keep the little purple skein. It consistently got up to no good in this house; I seem to be unable to provide consistent moral guidance to wool. I shall spin something else this afternoon (and likely it will be running amok before dawn).
Elaine: There is no fiber at the fair. You were correct. No need to go looking, honest. No, I'm not trying to keep it all for myself, and I resent the suggestion!
*flounce*
Off to wash some wool. The people upstairs have (finally) moved out (they were supposed to go in February) so for the rest of the month I can use the washing machine with impunity. The last of "The Fleece That Never Ends" will be washed within the next half hour or so.
We shall blithely ignore the other nine, ok?
Sunday, September 18, 2005
No Fair!
At least not for us. Not this year.
Hubby finished his OFA2 (Occupational First Aid Level 2) training and got a new job (same company). More money (very welcome!) but he can hardly take time off two weeks into the new routine.
I'm afraid that The Puyallup Fair will have to do without us this year. Seeing I haven't actually finished carding the stuff I bought last year that's likely a good thing, however I am not on a fibre diet and would have enjoyed getting something diferent to spin. Some silk maybe? Some ... hmm, anything but bamboo.
(Don't feel bad for me -- I have a bag of amazing purple kid mohair sitting next to me as we speak.)
To anyone and everyone I was hoping to see on our trip down there, um, maybe we can touch base before Steph's inevitable next book tour and do something around that time? Or maybe we can make it for the Little Puyallup.
I'm disappointed but not devastated, because on Tuesday we have this season's first Weavers and Spinners Guild meeting. I feel like an utter fraud going to this meeting. I mean, I haven't yet managed to find room or time for my loom, and as for spinning -- can I really call myself a spinner? With a couple of skeins of natural stuff, the morally-bankrupt little purple skein (now resting atop the Yarn Harlot's piano, I believe) and a few metres of clown barf to my credit, I think not. But go I shall, seeing I seem to have some urgent need to belong to this group. From what I can see so far, they are an enthusiastic and welcoming group of ladies. It's a teaching guild, which is a good thing, as I'm a learning kinda rabbit. Maybe if I take along some of the stuff I've dyed I can fake them into believing I can do stuff.
Or maybe if I lock my daughter in the closet tomorrow (PD day at school), spin like mad all day and make a hat and ...
Nah. Let's just hope they're forgiving.
Friday, September 16, 2005
I Love You, Even If You're a Titbucket
I'm still sic and have nothing much to offer today ("nothing much" = nothing at all), but the wicked and brilliant Rachael has a fantastic idea. Go look at her post from today and let me crawl back under my rock for another day, mmkay?
Wednesday, September 14, 2005
He's What?
Eleanor: Mommy, do you think Diamond is Chinese?
Me: Um, I don't think so honey, why do you ask?
Eleanor: Well, he's got that little white thing on his nose.
Me: Mm-hmm.
Eleanor: And he's black.
small chinese cat, lurking
Um. I can see we're going to have to review the Kindergarten Social Studies Curriculum with Mrs. E. at some point fairly soon.
Tuesday, September 13, 2005
Flowers
OK, three posts in one day is excessive, but this is my blog, so shut up.
Also too as well, I couldn't stand not showing you this. I got a lot of flowers tonight*:
I mean a lot:
This could in fact possibly be the amount that is usually defined as "a shitpile":
There was an abundance of stuff I love like chrysanthemums, gladioli, lupins (thoughts of Dennis Moore here), gerbera daisies and alstroemeria and of course irises; always the stinking irises (they're beautiful but they're also going out front of the house later tonight, I cannot STAND the overpowering smell). There was also some stuff I've never seen before in my life, such as:
and:
If anyone has any clue what they are, would you be kind enough to let me know?
Write back soon before Tigger eats the big one, ok?
*Hubby is a security guard/first aid officer for a convention centre. They had a Horticulturists convention and although he couldn't get them to use Dorothy Parker's famous line as their motto, he got given as many flowers as he wanted to take home at the end of the night. This is 14 bunches. He offered to go back and get more, but I declined.
Sing Along
Sung to the tune of "The Song That Never Ends"
This is the fleece that never ends
It just goes on and on my friend
Some asshat started carding it, not knowing what it was
And now she'll keep on carding it forever, just because
This is the fleece that never ends ...
Repeat, ad nauseum.
This is my first fleece. The first.
I made the clownbarf with it.
I used some in the neutral and also in the purple stuff I spun.
I used it in the stuff I dyed for Juno, and Oliver's Wool (which is on the drum carder outside as we speak) and the wool for Rachael are 100% Cheviot.
I carded up a bunch of plain batts, ready to be spun.
You'd think I should be getting close to the end of this first one, right? You'd think that at least the stuff in the green bin would be all of it, and there wouldn't be any left in the bin outside, still waiting to be washed.
Right?
Wrong.
This reminds me of Stephanie's wool for Joe's gansey. I think she said she'd packed all of the fibre into a big Rubbermaid tub and kept taking some out and spinning and spinning. So far she's spun about a thousand metres, and the tub is still full.
Clearly, wool is evil, and enchanted in some manner.
I would like at this point to note that I have eight or nine more entire fleeces, plus the baby Cheviot that I have still got to card (at least the baby one is washed).
My husband better start liking the smell of sheepshit right quick.
Send beer.
Bankrupt This Man
Holy snappers, Batman!
This man has pledged to donate $1 to the American Red Cross for every comment he receives to this post.
Talk about putting your money where your mouth is. Talk about someone who's going to be eating a lot of Kraft Dinner. Talk about admirable.
Talk about someone whose book I'm going to be buying.
I commented, but I also said that if he's going to end up all bankrupt (which is hardly likely, as we all know how rich unpublished authors are) that I'll send "my" dollar in on his behalf.
His book has an interesting premise: Coming Out Straight is an urban fantasy that juxtaposes sexual identities to answer the question: What would it be like to be straight in a world where everyone is gay? The protagonist, Adam, is a straight man living life in the closet as a sexual minority. He falls in love with a straight activist, and is faced with a choice: come out and find love, or live in the security of his closet, alone.
I'd read that. You?
Go comment, drive the poor lad into bankruptcy, do what you can for the victims of Katrina and pledge to buy his book when it comes out, mmkay?
Monday, September 12, 2005
Fake Blogging
You can tell someone is grasping at straws when they post the results of a second quiz within a one-week period.
I'm tired. Tired, dammit, and getting sort of sick. My kid has a cold and whine whine whine waa waa waa.
And such.
 | WATER OF WATER. Pretty lady! Fair and gentle, your empathy attracts others to you. Possibly psychic, you are pure emotion and are more likely to act on feeling rather than practical thought or logic. You think that's just fine because imagination is important. You are the Whore of Babylon with her cup of abominable things, the Medium of Endor and in the mundane world you usually make a good wife and mother. You shine when you are able to give emotional support to others. |
Well, I certainly like that one, but I'm thinking "fair and gentle" may be reaching just a little.
A little, I said.
Shut up.
In knitting news: there is (pretty much) none. I finished a couple of washcloths for the family as it struck me as being highly foolish to go and buy washcloths of inferior quality in the store when I have 10 billion balls of cotton here.
My shawl is about 5 rows away from getting itself all blocked, and then being shipped off to Melanie in thanks for her contribution to America's Second Harvest and there will be something interesting for Ann shortly also.
The wool for N'Awlins is finally dry, I think. I'll take a picture tomorrow. For tonight I think I'm just going to stagger off and crawl in with my sniffly little kid.
Saturday, September 10, 2005
Free Foo Foo Yarn
Seems that Bernat's giving away their Foo Foo.
(Not for the yarn Nazis amongst us).
And yes, I filled out the form. It's FREE, dammet!
The sun is shining, the birds are singing, and I'm not wearing any pants.
Heading out to the front yard to play with wool for a while. I have about 800 hours of carding to catch up on!
Friday, September 09, 2005
Scholarly Pursuits
Not trivial at all, although I'm a sucker for that game.
Morning is supposed to start gently. Perhaps around noon, accompanied by coffee in bed. Maybe strawberry shortcake with real whipped cream, too.
OK, it usually starts with coffee (made by me) in the kitchen and sometimes a slice of toast if I can find some bread that hasn't gone green yet, but it certainly starts considerably closer to noon than it has been doing in recent days.
Thursday, the alarm went off far too early (or I went to bed far too late). I expected complaints from the decidedly-not-early-rising Missy Moo, however the mere whisper of "first day of school" catapulted her out of bed and into her brand-new orange dress with flowers and her light-up Barbie sneakers.
The effect was considerably more salutory than one might at first imagine. Then again, that kid could make a dishcloth look good. Which, considering my knitting history, may well be a good thing.
(Speaking of dishcloths, here is a quick and easy way to help out the hurricane victims while using up your massive stash of cotton ... or do I have all of the cotton now?)
I managed to convince her that a good breakfast was a necessary part of an effective education or something and got about half a bowl of porridge and a cup of milk into her, and then off we toddled to her first day of class.
We live three blocks away from the school, which is one of the reasons we chose it over several others in our catchment area. The other reasons being its small size, its stellar reputation and, in particular, the reputation of the Kindergarten teacher.
This reputation seems to be well-founded, however despite the warm welcome and the many children ready and willing to play, Eleanor chose to sit alone (with me) and draw a picture for Tracey. I left after about half an hour, went home for coffee and came back.
Friday morning was just about as early (they're going to start later next week, right?) and after yogurt and an apple and something or other (one cooked breakfast a week, dude, that's all I'm promising) we set out again. Today she also started the day by drawing a picture, this time for Diamond, and only consented to my departure after half an hour or so.
When I went back to pick her up after class, she was fine and was playing with the other kids. They went outside to the playground and she joined in just fine, making friends with a couple of little girls and running around like a goonybird.
I sat down on a bench and hauled out my knitting and sat there in happy solitude for a while, while the other mothers (and a father) hung out chatting, closer to the playground equipment. They obviously knew each other, and I waited for a while until I felt comfortable and then went over to talk to them. I was welcomed into the group and discovered that there were at least two or three other knitters there.
I had been a little concerned about my daughter's lack of willingness to leap right in with the other kids right off the bat, and then I realized ... I had done exactly the same thing. Sat by myself, doing something that I found familiar and comforting, until I was ready to join the others.
I smiled to myself. It seems that in many ways, the apple and the tree are, indeed, even closer than I had known.
I'll start saving for the therapy next week.
Wednesday, September 07, 2005
It's Always Darkest Before the Dawn
No, this isn't another post about New Orleans, although my heart still hurts every time I read about the situation there (and Madeleine, thank you for the kind note. You're more welcome than we can say.)
(And I'm pleased to note that the wool I've dyed for auction is drying outside as we speak. My, there's an awful lot of it!)
This is a post about my daughter. My tiny baby.
My silly muppet.
My great big happy moosebaby.
My crazy nugget.
My great big girl.
Tomorrow morning at 9am, I have to turn this small person over to the authorities.
No, stop the panicking, there isn't any sort of child protection order going on here. I may well be the third-worst housekeeper in the world, but there's nothing of that sort happening.
No, I'm speaking of the day that all mothers look forward to with eager anticipation until it's here.
I'm speaking, of course, of The First Day of Kindergarten.
The day I have to turn her over to the public school system. The system that failed me so badly and that failed my husband almost disastrously. The system that will mold her and shape her and take her away from me.
Oh god, I need another year. She isn't tough enough. She isn't big enough. Dammet I haven't bought her a gun yet and there will be boys there!
*koff*
I'll be ok, and she'll be more than ok. She's ready to go. She needs the structure and the routine and I'm betting she'll love it. I need the time and space and really, I can't do math past a second grade level, but dude.
Dude, she's so little.
I'll let her go, freely and with joy, but man ...
Aw fuck, does anyone have a tissue?
Monday, September 05, 2005
OK, this works for me.
You are Joan of Arc! You don't really want to hurt
anyone, but if they attack your friends or your
country and no-one else will stand up to fight
them, you head into the battle. Beware though,
conviction tends to get you killed.
Which Saint Are You?
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Hanging With My Kid
We went to the PNE. We hung out:
We hung out some more.
We hung out with the kittens:
And we dyed some wool to be auctioned off shortly:
A good time was had by all.
Thursday, September 01, 2005
So Long, and Thanks For All the Sodomy
I have had an utterly wicked week. Worked 27 hours in a 46-hour period (hrm, that doesn't sound as bad as it felt), and have had one mishap after another.
Yesterday, I discovered that my brand new tire -- did I mention the brand new tire on the van? The one we got two weeks ago? The one that had to replace the tire that got a big nail through it while my friend was moving stuff out of her house? The one that replaced the one that couldn't be patched because it was so old and cost us $88 that we didn't have and because of which we had to do some damned fancy footwork involving a lot of no-name products and pasta for dinner (and doing without beer, dammet)? Yeah, that one -- had a giant bolt through it. Yes, a great big shiny new bolt (apparently complete with washer but I didn't look all that closely).
Seemingly this happened when my friend borrowed the van to finish moving stuff out of her house. Same friend. Same house. Same van. Same tire. Different piece of metal, though, just to break up the monotony!
Yes, there is construction in that part of the city. Why do you ask?
OK, so I drove the van home last night with the bolt in the tire (yes, stupid, but I didn't want to try to change the tire in the hospital parking lot at 10pm), clunking all the way home, to find that a) the person taking care of my child had decided she could leave at 4pm to go "do stuff" even though she was hired for a consecutive 36-hour period (hubby was home but he had to study so he can pass the course he's taking for the new job he's starting shortly) and b) the same person (who was, incidentally, the person involved in The Van Incident and who broke my stove the week before last) had thought that it would be ok to leave a large dinner plate full of green paint in the middle of my daughter's table. The table upon which The Knittens play. I'd send a prize to the person who guessed the correct number of green kittenfoot prints on my white ottoman and beige carpet but I can't count that high. Fortunately the aforementioned items of upholstery were ruined even before I got The Three Mouseketeers and the paint wasn't toxic, so I just stared in shock for a few moments and then broke out laughing, played Polly Pocket dolls with my daughter for 20 minutes and then headed back out to work again.
I didn't laugh quite so much when I saw how the bathroom had been redecorated, but that's just me. Like I've mentioned before, fat people aren't always jolly.
Today started out far better, with me getting an adequate amount of sleep (close to six hours) and taking the seabus (and the roadboat) over to work. I like this, generally. It involves sitting reading or knitting (depending on available elbow room), poking out the occasional eye (thank you Franklin!) and letting someone else deal with the assbeagles all over the streets of Vancouver. Apparently today was, yet again, Let The Muppets Drive Drunk day, so I was just as glad to have left the van at home.
Grocery shopping was urgently needed, as the kittens poop and poop and poop all the livelong day and we were out of litter. I know, I know, Laurie warned me -- she warned us all -- but did I listen? No! I just kept on collecting purring little poop machines until it was far too late.
i shall now eat her eyballs. and then poop.
Far, far too late.
OK, so I went and bought meat for my husband's sandwiches (Tigger -- the grey (and smallest) kitten -- isn't the only one who walks around the house screaming "I want MEAT, woman!" and it's a lot more effective when it's coming from a 280-lb man), bread for the aforementioned sandwiches and dainty bits of toast for Eleanor and me in the morning because dude I have a day off and we're going to PLAYLAND and I'm so excited, but I digress.
I also bought food for Sasha (the big cat who is not a raccoon) and kitty litter. You know, for the pooping situation.
After I lugged this all back to work I realized that I was going to have to take this all home on the bus. "Fine," thought I, innocently. "Just fine! I am strong like tractor!" And, apparently, smart like bull, because I was blithely ignoring the fact that my neck is completely out of whack both from being on the phone for 900 hours, knitting so much over the last couple of days and from passing out for six hours last night without moving once, with a horrible foam pillow wedged uncomfortably under my head.
I trekked home on the skytrain and the seabus (and the meadowchariot), stood about for a while waiting for my bus and then realized that All was Not Well. When yours is the last bus waiting at the Seabus terminal, when the doors are closed and all of the other drivers have been running around smirking before leaving in their buses, when you see someone scuttling towards the bus wearing rubber gloves, carrying a tub of something, a broom, a shovel and a spraybottle, you know that All is Really Not Well.
At this point I chose to complete the last leg of my journey on foot. About nine blocks, many of which are uphill. Carting 7Kg (15.432 lbs) of kitty litter, plus the aforementioned cat food, bread, and such.
It didn't take me long to make my decision, because, you see, at home there was beer. On the bus there was vomit.
Are you bored yet? Too bad. Go click the "back" button or something; I'm not quite done.
So I get home and realize that The Meat that I had purchased for the sandwiches of The Man was lying, properly and carefully refrigerated, in the kitchen at work. Way back over there. There was no way I was going to go get it, so I hopped in the van to go get some more at the grocery store, seeing they were open for another 20 minutes.
Ben had put the donut on the van so that I could take it down to Ukranian Tire to get the tire patched tomorrow, so I blithely toddled off, thinking all was well. After a block or so, the "thunk ..... thunk ..... thunk" noise was becoming "thunk ... thunk ... thunk" and as I was pretty sure the vehicle had never made that noise with the donut on it before, and as I had my daughter in the van with me, I made the decision to turn around and come back home.
A wise decision, it would seem, as my husband had had so many distractions while putting the temporary tire (donut) on the car, he had forgotten to fully tighten the lug nuts, and had I driven all the way to the grocery store, the wheel would have likely fallen off. While I was driving. With my five year old daughter in the car.
Disaster was averted, the lug nuts were tightened (by The Lug), the beer was poured and he can just have McDonald's or something for lunch tomorrow.
And as I sat down to rant about my day, it occurred to me ... that 99.9% of the folks in New Orleans would give their nuts, lug or not, to have had the opportunity to have such a day.
In New Orleans there is no electricity. Food and water is running out, lots of people are dead, and it would seem that some complete and utter assfucks are actually SHOOTING at emergency workers. (WTF? Who ARE these people and how did they lose all semblance of humanity so quickly?)
When I was driving home yesterday morning I was listening to the radio and I head the words "We have no choice but to abandon the city." I went cold, literally. I cried all the rest of the way home. I never thought I would hear such a sentence in my lifetime.
I have always had this fantasy about New Orleans. It fascinates, frightens and sometimes repels me. To me, it has always had the mystique of Sodom and Gomorrah (hence the title of this post -- you knew I'd get to it eventually, didn't you?).
I have always wanted to visit there, imagining that the streets were full of dancing, bare-breasted women, people performing all sorts of bizarre rituals involving blood and chicken bones, people actually speaking French (of a sort) in public. A big, noisy, bold and unrepentant city, full of history and culture and sin and music (and, of course the sodomy. Always with the sodomy.)
And now ...
And now it's gone.
And I keep crying.
I believe that the madness will be stopped somehow (likely through military intervention of some sort and a great deal of shootage but I have no problem with people who are actually shooting at buses and helicopters that are trying to provide emergency aid getting all deaded up and stuff). I believe that the city will rebuild. But it will never be the same.
New Orleans as we knew it, or as we imagined it, is gone, and I mourn, both for the city and for its people who are now experiencing loss far greater than anything I, sitting here in this apartment in the Great White North -- this apartment with electricity, food, running water, marginally sanitary conditions. This apartment which contains my loved ones, healthy and sleeping -- can possibly imagine.
I know that my fantasy of the city is in many (possibly most) ways incorrect. It wasn't all magic. It was a place where people got up and went to work every day, typed letters, flipped hamburgers, adjusted insurance, had children, died, burped and farted, wrote blogs, and possibly even knitted ugly green dishcloths.
It was a place where people loved and lived and hated and danced and just plain ol' went about their business; just like pretty much every city on earth.
But to me it was someplace special. Someplace mystical that I would go to when I was big enough. Someplace powerful and wonderful and enticing.
And now, it's someplace gone. And it hurts and I'm so terribly, terribly sad, for myself and for everyone there.
Like I said, I'm taking tomorrow off from pretty much everything. My girl and I have a date and there's nothing more important to me at this point than keeping my promise to her.
I have some Romney fleece that's been annoying me and, of course, the eternal supply of Cheviot and I'll get it on the stove tomorrow night to dye it up for an eBay auction, the proceeds of which will go to America's Second Harvest.
In the meantime, two people who are far more organized than I are spearheading a project, similar to what The Amazing Stephanie did recently to raise funds. Go visit them. Donate what you can. There will be prizes, perhaps even a few horrible green dishcloths.
If anyone chooses to donate to America's Second Harvest instead (or as well), please let me know. There can be prizes on more than one blog at once, and I don't REALLY need that shawl I've been making ... (no, not fancy, not lace, just all pink and girly) and I wouldn't mind getting rid of some of my stash as well.
Please send an email to bunniegirl@shaw.ca with "harvest" in the title of the email, and I'll put your name in the hat. Prizes will include the pink shawl (which I will photograph as soon as I knit the last 15 rows and block it. It's in vintage Italian yarn in viscose and cotton, just a simple triangular shawl done in K1, yo, k to end on big needles), a couple of the green dishcloths, and some other fun stuff once I've had time to get my shit together. No, none of the prizes will be shit. Honest.
Goodbye, New Orleans. So long. And thanks for all the ... well, you know.
