Tuesday, May 30, 2006
Phoning It In
I am totally faking it today. I am exhausted (2 hours sleep) and still moving all of my stuff which I can't get finished by Wednesday (oh dog, that's tomorrow) but which I have to get finished by Wednesday. So I'll distract you with this:
This is a site I'm enjoying at the moment. I found it through Rachael The Most Excellent Photographer's blog.
My horoscope today? Well, just take a look-see:
"Your power animal is the queen bee, which lays up to 2,000 eggs a day in the spring. Like her, you are stupendously fertile. In fact, you're capable of so much creative expression that it could take months for you to ripen all the new life that you're now spawning. Just because you have this potential, however, doesn't guarantee that you will use it well or completely. There's a first important step you can take to help ensure that you do: Treat yourself with the same care and reverence and optimism you would a woman who's nine months pregnant."
Gotta like that action.
Um, that means I should sleep more, doesn't it?
Sunday, May 28, 2006
The Only Time You Are Allowed To Say Poo In School
Is when you are reading the book about the chickens.
This was explained to me in detail yesterday by my small gap-toothed fuhrer.
Who knew?
I think this singular lack of knowledge on my part may explain many of the tribulations I experienced while battling the public school system. It may, in fact, explain how I got to be a middle-aged foul-mouthed drunken knitterspinnerfibreartist living in a house full of wool.
For I must admit, to my eternal shame, to having said poo upon several occasions not involving chickens at all.
And now you know. Govern yourself accordingly.
there is an incubator in Eleanor's school. there were eggs in it, and all of the chicks hatched last week. seemingly they have a book about chicks and their development, and the word "poo" appears in this book. apparently if you say "poo" at any other time it is a Very Bad Thing. even if you have to do it.
into the mud, scum queen! i distinctly heard you say poo!
I think, alas, it is too late to mend my ways.
Oh poo. I'm doomed.
Saturday, May 27, 2006
Under Wraps
I'm working on two "secret projects" so there won't be a lot of photographic evidence of any sort of knittage or spinnery in the next couple of days. I should be finished by Tuesday. I hope.
(Of course I've just found something I should have mailed out about six or eight months ago, over which I'm dying of embarrassment, so "Tuesday" may well be a sort of flexible concept. Bah! Consistency is for the weak! And, apparently, for the reliable. Shut up.)
Stealth-blogging from work here, as I've taken on a couple of extra shifts at my "other" job this weekend. Partially because I am a glutton for punishment, partially because it's almost the only place I can get any knitting done (after 9pm this is a very slack shift) and partially because my husband, who happens to have a 54" chest, would like me to make him a sweater of the merino/tussah I've been spinning. It would seem that I'm a process spinner as well as a process knitter, so I don't have the slightest qualms giving the fibre up for this, however with his size I'm going to need at least another three pounds of it, and it's ... um ... not cheap. I figure at the rate I spin, and at the rate I knit, the dude's going to get himself a $1200 sweater out of this.
I don't know if I can spin quite that much, but this stuff is heaven, and Stephanie has informed me that the first 1400 yards or so are fun. After that it sort of blows goats but by that time you can't really give up so you might as well just do it.
The spinning. Not the blowing of the goats. If you're doing that, please don't tell me.
She and I have also discussed that we should have chosen smaller mates. If Ben ends up running away with the base operator at work (the female one, not that guy who was answering the phone tonight), I'm going to abandon this sweater and look for a far, far smaller person to spend my time with. Possibly one with only one arm, or a penchant for sleeveless sweaters or little short tank tops.
Or headbands.
Hey, who wants to place bets on whether I finish Ben's sweater or she finishes Joe's famous gansey first? Please note that she has a couple of years on me in the spinning of the wool, but I'm not on a mad book tour here. I think I have a chance.
No, rilly.
Friday, May 26, 2006
We Have Enough Wool
After clearing out part of the first storage locker today (I have two) Her Surreal Highness informed me that we have enough wool to last "through Christmas, through Easter, through Hallowe'en, through Valentines Day and through the holiday." Seems like that's enough, to me.
See? A quick flash of the infamous Roving Cupboard. The stuff on the left is all carded and ready to spin (and it would seem there is some that hasn't made it into the cupboard yet). The stuff on the right is all washed and dyed, but needs to be carded still.
And this? Peeking around the corner? Um, the dark green bag on the bottom is the entire first fleece of a little Cheviot lamb that has been washed but still needs to be carded and spun. On top of that is a bag of washed Dorset, and then on top of that a bag of washed adult Cheviot. The bin on top of the roving cupboard? Um, more Cheviot, I think. Could be Dorset. Going to be spun and then woven into rugs anyhow, so I suppose it doesn't matter which it is, does it?
Yes. Yes, that's definitely enough wool. Especially when you consider that there are probably another six or seven entire fleeces waiting to be washed, and quite a lot more wool that's already spun hanging around somewhere.
Definitely enough.
Which is why today, after a two-month yarn fast, I bought nine skeins of sock yarn.
I'm not sure if it's a blessing or an illness.
Watch for hand-dyed sock yarn, coming soon to a sidebar near you.
Wednesday, May 24, 2006
And The Walls Come Tumblin' Down
Well, it's not exactly the battle of Jericho, bt the walls are comin' tumblin' down anyhow.
Seems that The Barn is structurally unsound and, while I regret not having a great big workshop, I must admit that the studio will (have to) be sufficient, and the prospect of dying under a heap of sodden stucco and rot-infested joists really doesn't appeal.
Also too I'll double the size of my back yard (ha! typed that as "back yarn". thank you dr. freud) and have a great excuse to go to Ukranian Tire or Revy or something and get some of those cute outdoor storage boxes and maybe even a couple of cute garden sheds (which will immediately be occupied by cute wolf spiders, as was the cute wooden box out front of the house. I keep reminding myself that spiders are beneficial. I keep forgetting.)
The work on the studio continues apace, although um, did I say the 24th? I meant the 10th. Of June. Yeah, that's what I meant all righty.
June 10th.
The second bobbin of the merino/tussah is almost spun and if I wasn't going out to get likkered up with The Family Stump tonight I'd finish it and ply it. You may remember I mentioned The Family Stump on November 7 or so of last year. They haven't become any more tasteful but seemingly enough time has passed that The Railway Club has forgotten such gems as "Have You Seen My Taint" and are going to let them play again.
I believe there's a Dating Game tonight, also with the handsome Ronnie Stump as the host. Come join me around 10pm if you can. I intend to be pretty seriously likkered up by 10:30 but I'll still be coherent at 10.
Maybe.
Monday, May 22, 2006
Adventures in Rabbitchland
So, as I mentioned before, we've been busy running about this fair city of ours, trying to get enough stamps on our Tourism Passport to get a free pass to most of the tourist attractions in the city for the next year. We're at either 10 or 11 out of 15 now and we've got to the end of the month, so we're pretty much set.
Here's one of the fun things we got to do:
do you really expect me to get into that thing? it's held up by a string!
ok, so i got in. i've actually done this many times before. it still makes me want to barf, especially when it sways over the towers.
look ma! there's snow!
It was actually a pretty good day but I would never pay full price to do something like that. It would have been about $50 for an eight-minute ride up to see a couple of film clips from The Discovery Channel. Good film, and I really do love being up there (and there's lots more to do than just that) but really. Dude. I can buy a lot of food (liquor, yarn ...) for fifty bucks!
I'd rather just stay home and engage in some whacking of the weeds. Which, from the looks of it, someone had better do right quick.
thank fsm i gave up guilt for lent
Sunday, May 21, 2006
Resistence is Futile
I taught the child how to draft fibre for spinning tonight. Not even six years old and she's got her paws around the merino/tussah and she loves it (and seems to understand it, too.)
You will be assimilated.
Saturday, May 20, 2006
To Distract You
From the complete lack of knitting content (I've been knitting, I've just also been tinking) and the complete lack of progress on the studio, I present for your viewing pleasure, more Nature Walk pictures.
here are trees. in the woods
oh look it's another tree. in the woods. who knew?
ooh! a dry stream bed. and, um, more trees. in the woods
We went to a whole buncha places today, and there are photos, but if I don't go and spin some more right now, I'm going to die, so stay tuned.
spinnage. merino/tussah. i assume you understand the need, now
Friday, May 19, 2006
Participants Never Quit
Yeah, that sounds like the title of all of that weird spam you've got filling up your mailbox, doesn't it?
You're welcome.
Lotta folks are going to disagree with me on this one. Comment all you want, but no hatemail, please (I'll publish it).
Today was Sports Day at my daughter's school. Apart from the fact that the main event seemed to be Sarcastic Disapproval of Parental Units (holy fuck do I loathe her teacher) it was a pretty good day.
But something I noted was that even if someone won a race or an event, they got a ribbon that said "participant", and so did everyone else in the race. There seemed to be no first or second place ribbons (unless some of the other kids got them and I missed noticing it). Now, while I'm all for warm and fuzzy and let's work together as a community and eat granola and such, I'm a little concerned by this apparent trend to spare the fragile prepubescent ego by identifying all as "participants" and none as "winners".
Few are more bloodthirsty than a flock of schoolchildren. They've tried fucking hard and they WANT to win that race! And the ones who don't win need to learn that they didn't win, and that although there are things during life that they WILL win, there are also things that they will not.
I don't feel that there's any shame in losing, if one has tried. I think that's the spirit behind the "everyone's a participant pass the organic yogurt" trend, but just because you participated and tried, does not mean that you won. And if you won, I don't feel that that "win" should be diluted. If you won, you should get the ribbon, the balloon, ride at the head of the parade, get to boff the cheerleaders (although there was notably little cheerleader-boffing today, which I was pleased to see), whatever.
Life, like it or not, is competitive. How do you think all of the Olympic athletes would feel at the end of the race if someone said "Well, dude, you may or may not have broken a world record, but we decided not to time stuff this year. It's bad for, like, bonding and shit. Here, no medals, but everyone gets a cookie on a string. Let's all go sing Kumbaya instead of your national anthem."
We aren't all marching to glory, shoulder to shoulder. There are leaders and there are followers. There are winners and there are losers. To artificially place everyone at the same level is, in my not so humble opinion, likely to create a society in which leaders are a rarity, if not an extinct species.
And dude, without leaders we're all just going to run in circles and end up with our heads stuck up our own asses.
Athletically speaking, I suck. The only time I ever even came third in a race was the one time that there were only three teams in the three-legged race at school. And we only got third 'cause they had to give it to someone and were forced to overlook the half-hour finishing time and the wandering off to pick flowers instead of run thingie that went on for a while there. I'm not so good with the "focus on the finish line" deal, it would seem.
The win meant nothing to me, seeing it was a win by default. But any time I've really really wanted something, and have really really tried and have by-gum won I've been proud of it.
The lead in the Grade 12 play? I got that role because I won it. Because I was the best out of all of the girls who auditioned. I worked damned hard to get it and I worked damned hard AFTER I got it, because it was something I valued, and I had won. (Amanda Wingfield, The Glass Menagerie, in case you're wondering.)
Lose? I've lost lots of things, and if it was something I had tried really hard for and didn't get, after I got over the wishing-the-winner-dead deal and the embarrassment, I have tried to learn from the person who DID win, so that I had a chance to be that person the next time.
I hate the thought that by making everyone "equal" we are depriving our children of a reason to try to excel. They are equal in value as human beings (apart from that nasty little boy who punched my husband in the nuts, who is a step or two lower on the ladder. No, really.) which I think might have been the point, but the results of their efforts are not all equal, no matter how some would like to sugar-coat the reality.
I believe that children want to excel, and want to be special and "the best" at something. If a child never has a chance to discover that there is something at which she does not excel, will she ever be motivated to find that at which she does?
As a parent, I find that frightening. I see my role in this instance as helping her to find that area of excellence and nurturing her to follow it. And to refuse to be "equal".
This whole rant, of course, could easily be explained at my bitterness at not even getting a "participant" ribbon in the adult hula hoop event, even though all of the other parents did, but believe me, I'm all over that now. No, really. I'm just fine.
I'll be sulking in the roving cupboard if anyone wants me.
Send ribbons.
Stitch Markers Updated
I've posted four more sets of stitch markers for sale. If you're interested you can find them by clicking on the "rabbits make stuff" link on the sidebar to the left.
I should note here, if anyone has a problem with their markers being damaged in transit or, FSM forbid, breaking during use, please let me know and I'll repair or replace them immediately.
Thursday, May 18, 2006
If You Ever ...
... want to go blind, make stitch markers to go on dpns.
I'm pleased with them, but I think I'm cross-eyed right about now. (They're already on the way to live with someone else. I'll see if I can get a couple more sets done instead of housecleaning this week *g*).
Wednesday, May 17, 2006
Nature Walk
Wanna come on a nature walk out back of the house with me and the flower girl?
i'll keep a watch out for bears
here's the entrance to the back 40. this is like 30 yards from my back door, perhaps a little more
Blogger or Hello or something is being a bitch and won't let me upload any more pictures so we'll have to finish the walk tomorrow.
I promise we didn't get eaten by a bear. But we did see bearpoop! No, we didn't photograph it.
Open House, Chéz Lapin
Come one, come all, to the partay of the century, or at least of the week.
Saturday, June 24, 2006, there will be a great big Bar Bee Cue and housewarming at my house. Come help us celebrate our beautiful new home in the woods.
Bring your kids, bring your wives (that is if you have more than one, but you can still get in if you don't even have one at all).
We have room to sleep about ten, if you don't mind communal living. If you're going to get all drunk and stupid and stay over, bring a sleeping bag and a pillow. The living room is huge, and snorers will be asked to sleep in the barn with the spiders.
There will be musicians, there may even be magicians. There will be a paddle pool for the kids (and for the adults after the sun goes down) and all sorts of fun.
There will be knitters, and likely also spitters.
Mid afternoon until late, late, late.
If you're within driving distance and you'd like to join us, drop me a line at bunniegirl at shaw dot ca and I'll give you the address.
I may even make my world famous potato salad. The secret ingredient? Potatoes. Who knew?
Hope to see you there.
Tuesday, May 16, 2006
Fibre Focus
I have been very, verry good since I joined the yarn focus dealie being run by Knit-Knack. Despite being allowed one "free" purchasing day a month, I have not purchased ONE hair of fibre or ONE inch of yarn since March.
No yarn, no roving, no fleece, no thread. Dude, I think I haven't even purchased dental floss. I've managed to get a couple of little things finished, and even gave away about a pound and a half of cotton to my mother today (it made no noticeable inroad into my stash).
I went to my guild's monthly meeting tonight and it was our swap and sale night. I didn't even know it was going on or I would have made a dozen sets of stitch markers to take with me, but that's neither here nor there: I fondled fibre. I patted fibre. I smelled fibre. I even spun a little fibre.
I did not purchase one hair of fibre.
I did, however, buy a new spinning wheel. shut up
Ashford Traddie, in need of minor repairs (very minor, like a new brake band would be nice and the piece of leather that connects the treadle to the wheel-driving-stick thingie needs to be replaced). It'll cost me $13 to repair.
Nice dark wood finish. Lovingly used for many years by another guild member who is moving from 4,000 square feet to a townhouse and has to downsize. She sold it reluctantly and was very happy to see how delighted I was to get it.
$75 cdn for those of you vulgar enough to wonder
And now all I want to know is why there aren't any spinning stores open at this time of night so that I could have purchased the repair kit on the way home from the guild meeting.
I do believe I've got me some fibre that needs attention.
oh, and the comment about wanting to repeat the experience of yesterday's post? i would like to have the flashbacks again. not the sweaty drug-filled days. just to clarify and all so the ministry doesn't come and apprehend my kid
Not There Yet
Thank you, all, for the response to my sweaty flashbacks yesterday.
Not menopausal yet. No sweats (apart from when my car is over 80 degrees), no strange(er than usual) quirks or happenings.
Just, apparently, my ageing body has realized that if I'm going to use the few eggs I have left, I'd better start licking the sweat offa strangers again, or something.
Yes, it was very odd. I enjoyed it and hope it happens again.
*g*
Monday, May 15, 2006
Old Ladies Shouldn't Sweat
This isn't the post I meant to write tonight. I was going to write a nice post about how salmon in the wild lay 2500 eggs, only 375 of which make it even to the point of hatching, and how we went to a hatchery yesterday. In the hatchery, 2250 of those eggs make it to the hatching point, and we got to go and get our very own salmon, maybe six inches long, and name them and then release them into the stream.
Eleanor's was named Rainbow Tail and mine was named Gertrude. Rainbow tail seemed a little lethargic and confused but swam off gamely enough when released. Gertrude was a fireball, trying to get out of the ice cream pail of water long before we hit the stream, and literally FLYING out into the water to start her (or possibly his) new life the minute he hit the water.
We said our goodbyes, let them go with love and hoped that they would be around in a couple of years so that we could kill and eat them which doesn't seem very fair but hell, that's what you get for being a fish. Choose something less tasty in your next incarnation, all right?
Oh Gertrude, we hardly knew ye. But we'd certainly like ye to come over for dinner.
Anyhow, the cute fish post aside, something in my head went *boomf* today.
It was unseasonably hot, the first hot day of the year, and I was driving along, minding my own business, being a respectable middle-aged housewife in a minivan and I started to sweat.
I have no objection to sweating. In general, if one has a fairly decent personal hygiene regimen, sweating is a desirable thingie in fact, but it's certainly nothing I spend a lot of time thinking about.
But as I was driving, feeling the moisture form on the back of my neck and between my breasts (which are pretty much healed, although I only have about 2/3 of one on the left side and thank you for asking) all of a sudden I was nineteen again.
Nineteen, newly out of college, beautiful (I may not have been as hot as I remember, but the reviews certainly support my recollections) and totally on fire.
Nineteen, rolling languidly in the damp heat of a Toronto summer, licking the oily sweat off a stranger's burnished abs, so fucking wired on chemicals I was damned near incandescent. Even the lightest touch a welcome scream along hypersensitive nerve endings.
For a brief, bittersweet moment, I could actually taste the beautiful chemical bite on my tongue (if you've never done a lot of speed or cocaine you have no idea what I'm talking about here) and just for an instant I was waiting for the start of that delicious subdermal hum, that quake that nobody else can see, starting somewhere around the base of my spine and spreading through my belly. The tingles on top of my head, running my hands through my own hair for the sheer joy of it.
A mouth, bruising mine. My own bruises being delivered in return. Days without sleep. Writing chapters I would prefer not to relate to my mother (or my daughter, oh god, don't let her find this blog if I'm still doing it in ten years).
All of that time, or at least as much as I remember of those years, suddenly back in the here and now.
Just from a little sweat.
I turned up the music and drove too fast for a while and I'm much better now. I wouldn't have those days back for love or money ... but for a few minutes there I would have sold my soul.
I should likely get air conditioning in my car. Ya think?
Sunday, May 14, 2006
Did I Say The 14th?
I meant the 24th. That is when I shall have the studio done by.
24th. Twenty. Fourth. Not the fourteenth. Nope.
Nothing to see here. Carry on.
So, did everyone have a good mother's day (she asks, hastily changing the subject)?
I got a handmade card and a flower in a decorated pot, and then we went to the Senior's Centre for a pancake breakfast with my parents.
My husband has some sort of Passport to Tourism thingie or whatever it's called and we get to go to all of the fun places for pretty much nothing for the rest of the month. Basically we pay for Eleanor and that's it (and she's free at some places 'cause she's only five).
If we hit fifteen attractions before the end of the month (I was disappointed to note that no noodie bars were included, I could have taken Dolores) then we get a free pass for two good for the next eleven months. Deal, or what? We're starting late in the month but we think we can still make it.
Today we went to the Vancouver Aquarium and then took a Horse-Drawn Carriage Ride around the park while I knit on a square for this in green Scheepjeswol. I like that stuff a lot! Gonna have to comb the stash and see how much I have.
Anyhow, the day was way cool and cost us $85 less than it would have had we paid full price and then we came home and I hung new curtains (well new to me) that a friend had given me while Ben made a big pasta dinner.
The curtains are crumpled and about a foot too long, but it's a big improvement. Now instead of looking like trailer trash with bedsheets at the windows, we look like trailer trash with drapes.
Movin' on up, baby.
studio updates tomorrow, I promise!
Saturday, May 13, 2006
Send Help
My house is full of children. I don't like children, remember? And yet ... my house is full of children.
One is being a complete drama queen (she has very borderline asthma, has decided she can't breathe) one is being about 4 years old (crying for her mom) even though she's almost ten and one is being a defiant little twatmonkey (this latter child is mine) and is insisting on having about ten bowls of sugar-laden cereal rather than going to bed.
I have absolutely no control over these children. I think they can sense my fear.
I do, however, have a modicum of control over my scanner again. Here is a quick scan of what A Very Talented Young Man sent me.
does this picture make my ass look fat?
Back to battling with ... um ... something.
Is it time to start with the drinking yet?
Friday, May 12, 2006
In Which Technology Defeats Me
It's been one of those days. You know, the sort of day where you do something stupid (like tighten your lug nuts and then try to take off your wheel) and then run around for hours trying to fix it and blaming everyone else.
So, um, I disabled my computer connection and then sort of lost my shit quite a bit, for maybe a couple of hours.
Just before phoning the ISP and reaming them out I thought I'd maybe reverse the thingie I'd done earlier and it's all good now.
However, this in no way makes my scanner work (WTF? Plug and play or plug and flay? Really, the truth in advertising people have to get on this) and we just won't talk about my webcam or the state of my studio, mmkay? So the lack of scanner means that a) I can't show you what The Cutest Boy in All the Land sent me and b) I can't list the new stitch markers I made. Stay tuned for updates some time over the weekend.
Oh yeah, and despite being anti-war-and-violence toys I bought my daughter a gun that shoots foam darts.
I'm deeply ashamed, but dudes, there's only so many My Little Ponies that you can buy before you have to start shooting stuff.
Hold still, willya?
Wednesday, May 10, 2006
And Now For A Commercial Message
I meant to do this days ago, clearly I suck.
A friend is trying to sell a 36" LeClerc Nilus Floor Loom. She has two
reeds, boat shuttles, bobbins and a bobbin winder. No bench.
She's asking $650.00 which seems pretty reasonable to me, but it's a little rich for my blood.
If anyone is interested, please email me at bunniegirl at shaw dot ca and I'll pass the info on to her.
Ten days. It isn't getting a lot better. I pray to FSM that someone's taken these babies in. I hate the thought of them being alone in little tiny cages.
Tuesday, May 09, 2006
Not OK
It's been nine days. I can still hardly breathe.
mommies aren't allowed to have favourites. sometimes your heart doesn't read the rule book
I wrote a post about how horrible I feel and bla bla bla but decided to take it down because really, I can wallow in this shit all alone, can't I?
There have been many things to comfort me (although none are helping, noticeably, except for sleep, liquor and pharmaceuticals)
There has been wool:
this was washed and dried by me. it's either Dorset or Cheviot and it will eventually be part of a rug.
There has been barn:
this is the view of the east half of my garage (which I keep calling "the barn" for some reason)
There has been more barn:
this is the west half. this entire thingie is mine. as well as the studio. yes.
For the curious, the barn is about 19x23 feet.
There has, for some reason, been a picture taken of the ceiling:
ooh, spiders
There has been more wool:
this was sent to me by Farm Witch. it's even more beautiful than it looks; she's a jeenyus.
There have been noticeably no photographs taken of the studio.
Um, I'm holding off so that I can wow you with pictures of the complete transformation on Sunday. Yes, really. Sunday.
Shut up.
where are those damned elves?!
Saturday, May 06, 2006
If this is Saturday
Then it must be Day Three of the Grand and Glorious Studio Transformation (tm). And yet I don't seem to be 30% finished.
Dammit, I ordered Studio Elves to get in here and get all of the work done! Clearly there's something wrong here.
It's actually coming along but there's a long way to go. I can't find batteries for my camera, so pictures will hopefully be up tomorrow (when I've had a chance to hide more crap in the guestroom).
The good news is, I've found the thingie I was missing for the leg of the dining room table! And only 18 months after I lost it ...
Is it time for the heavy drinking to start yet? I'm pretty sure it is. Going back to watching Stupid War Stories on TV and knitting on my bathmat.
Thursday, May 04, 2006
Grand and Glorious Studio Transformation
Here we are on day one.
You think it looks bad from there? Try standing in the middle of it! (Or don't. There really isn't room for two people to stand about screaming in the middle of this.)
Seems that everything that didn't immediately "fit" anywhere else got to come live in here.
Ten days. This is going to be done by the 14th if it kills me.
heh. studio studio studio. not that i'm happy or anything. carry on.
Wednesday, May 03, 2006
Getting Connected
After many false starts and lost appointments (not his fault at all) The Cable Guy came over this morning. He was friendly, efficient, and got his work done in half an hour, including installing another, more convenient cable outlet in the bedroom so that I can be a bad, bad mother and let Missy Moo be entertained by the electronic babysitter now and again. (And don't you just want to punch The Backyardigans? Creepy as all-get-out.)
After a few brief hours of sleep (truncated due to a misunderstanding as to when TCG was actually coming over) I dug through the mounds of stuff in The Studio and found all of the bells and whistles (and computers and cable modems and tables) needed to get online.
The house is so perfectly silent that the clicking of the keys is almost too loud. What a change from the last place, with the alcoholics with the blasting music to the left, the pot-smokers with the odd hours to the right, and the elephants with the wide-screen TV upstairs. I think I could get used to sitting in the (very cold) room, looking over the mossy roof of my garage and watching the light slip through the trees out back of the house. This kind of peace has been missing from my life for far too long.
I should, of course, have a fat black farting cat on my lap, a small concerned grey one at my feet and a tabby on my desk (and a little black cat desperately trying to open the fridge to help himself to the ham while everyone else is otherwise occupied) but the pain is less than it was yesterday. I don't believe it will disappear any time soon and I'm lonely as hell, but it's more bearable today.
I took photos of the wreckage of the room and will post them tomorrow. Transformation has begun, and I am determined to finish by the 14th. I have the 15th and 16th off and believe I will have enough cash to ransom my loom and the rest of my fibre (yes, I've only flashed a very small portion of my stash) out of storage by then, so I'm planning on spending a couple of days immersed in fibre up to my ears and making more stitch markers. (All of the ones that are listed are gone except for the bottom-most set. More will be up next week, FSM willing.)
Life is pretty good.
Tuesday, May 02, 2006
Only the Lonely
Today was hard.
I had a bath and there was nobody sitting worriedly on the side of the tub, making sure by sheer kittenly will that I didn't drown. Nobody drank any of the bathwater, either.
I knit on my bathmat (yes, I'm making bathmats. Stop laughing or you won't get one) and nobody fought me for possession of the yarn. This may be the first item I've ever made that doesn't have catspit in it.
Shut up. I like catspit.
I took a nap and my ear was unoccupied by a small wet nose. I had nobody to hold. Nobody tried to suffocate me by actually sleeping on my face. (Yes I, the world's lightest sleeper, the person who can be woken by a moth farting next door, can sleep with an entire cat actually ON my face.)
I don't know if I'll ever be able to make or eat a ham sandwich again. Ham just tastes like slices of dead pig if you don't have anyone to share it with. Tasty dead pig, but ... you know ... dead pig, nonetheless.
It's very lonely. Like being widowed but without the benefit of less laundry.
I'll get over it. I'm still crying but I'll get over it.
Anyone suggests I get a fish instead, you're going to find yourself needing a goldfishectomy, btw. Be forewarned. Except for you, Lee Ann. I wouldn't do that to you or Elmo.
But enough about me.
My heart may be broken, but the rest of me is doing just fine. Someone who needs some positive thoughts, however, for actual broken bones is Mr. Etherknitter. He seems to have had a mishap requiring him to pretty much grow a new leg which, if you're not a starfish, isn't the easiest thing to do.
The Big Knitting Mojo has been called upon. In the interest of inspiring his leg to "knit" a new bone, Maryse has designed a button (which I'm not putting here 'cause I'm not on my own computer and I can't figure out the saving it to my own server thingie from here), Kellee has flashed her finished Rogue (go look, it's gorgeous!), and Beth has bravely displayed her Drawer of Shame. Me? Well, I'm going to ... hrm. Knit a second sock to go with the first one I ever made? Finish Kiri? Knit me some lace curtains with the thousands of yards of crochet thread I found while moving?
OK, not the last one. A couple of folks have said they'll have me locked up if I even consider it (but just the kitchen window? Please? It's only little!)
Got it! I will post a "before" shot tomorrow (or the next day, whenever I find my freakin' camera) of the disaster that is the room that shall become my studio. And then I'll give myself um, a week? No, ten days to kick its ass completely and make it into a space in which I can actually work. All in honour of Mr. E. and his recalcitrant limb.
I have no idea what happens if his leg won't cooperate. I'm pretty sure the studio won't blow up or anything. Just in case, though, I'm going to send him all possible good thoughts, as well.
So, whatchoo gonna do?
Monday, May 01, 2006
And If My Voice Starts Suddenly Shaking
Don't be confused any more
It's just the sound of my heart breaking
Ship to shore.
The move is over. It was utterly horrible, but it's over.
The cats are all at the SPCA. I'm devastated.
It was necessary. It's for the best. But if it's so damned good then why can't I stop crying? (If I go on much longer I'm going to need an IV for dehydration. I'm so graceful. The red nose and swollen mouth is an especially nice touch.)
More when I'm human again.
