Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Missing, Presumed Red
I'm still here, I just haven't had a whole lot to say of late and unlike the lunatics who signed up to write a post a day for the entire month of November, I decided just to shut up and not say the things I don't have to say. There is nothing more that I can safely say about work (apart from the fact that it just got a whole lot worse, and I just started caring a whole lot less) and I think we've all heard enough whining about cars and weather and Mr. Assmuppet and the state of my laundry for a while, have we not?
My apologies to those who sent concerned notes (and to those who were concerned but didn't send notes, too).
I've been dyeing up a storm and have managed to get a few (very few) skeins of yarn into the store today -- I think one of dk and five of sock, in pinks, purples and red. I'm hoping to get a few more listed tomorrow (seeing I'd like to pay rent and all) however the camera and I have been having a difference of opinion. You see, when I think of "point and click" I assume that first I point, and then I click. Makes sense, no?
Ha! Apparently there is a "focus" thing involved in the middle there, and although I've been doing my part when it comes to the focusing, apparently the camera has not.
Either that or I'm a total twat who can't work a very simple camera. That, too, is possible but I would prefer not to entertain the idea until after I've finished berating the completely-innocent piece of equipment.
Anyhow, the pictures in the store still aren't perfect but they're like my fourth try and I need to eat and engage in some sort of grime-removal ritual before heading out to work, so they'll have to do until tomorrow.
Seeing I'm making this post all about the filthy lucre, if anyone's doing some holiday shopping, I believe that miss mousie has updated her store with some pretty things, and Libby has also made her initial foray into the world of
And my child has apparently just accidentally dropped an entire plate of spaghetti and sauce into her toybox. I do believe I know what I'm doing for the next hour ...
Gah.
Thursday, November 22, 2007
Performance Art Is Not Dead
Yesterday the reader board said "Dollar Giant Hiring, Apply Within".
Today it says "Anal with Dog".
This brings me joy. And also reminds me that if I ever work for some place that's hiring that we shouldn't put an easily-accessible sign near a bus stop where high school kids hang out.
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Just Sleeping
Or not.
Whenever my husband sees an animal spread over a rather larger amount of road than that animal had originally been constructed to cover, he informs me that whatever it is is "just sleeping".
I'm sort of feeling a little like that at the moment, despite any actual experience of this "sleeping" thing that I have heard people speak of.
Work is getting ... interesting. The kind of interesting that people wish you (you know, "may you live in interesting times") when what they really mean is that they hope you wake up to find that you have a rabid weasel growing out of the back of your neck.
I'm pretty sure I have one -- or perhaps it's just a monkey on my back -- however it's not something that the wise discuss at length in public before they have an alternate income-generating source.
Hopefully there will be news on that front shortly.
Until I have the time and energy to write something more entertaining, why don't you pop over to my friend's blog and participate in his wee contest. It's going on for another week and it looks like the judges (of which yours truly is one) are beginning to lose their minds.
Stay tuned for
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Y'all Are Sick
So I go on over to Statcounter and check the latest keyword searches. The results?
69.77% rabbitch
4.65% rabbitch blog
4.65% wet boxers blog
2.33% get carsick unless i'm driving
2.33% downjacket bondage
2.33% fucked diligently
2.33% lunette the clown naked
2.33% stumble you might fall
2.33% ratcatching with ferret
2.33% dead deer being eaten by coyotes
2.33% stars from wisconsin
2.33% short haired harlot
Tsk.
You should be ashamed of yourselves.
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Answers -- And Spinning
There seem to have been many questions of late that I have let go unanswered. I shall now attempt to rectify this situation.
1. "Have You Heard From Your Ex in San Diego?"
Nope, and his email keeps bouncing. I figure if something had happened, someone would let me know -- there's not much else I can do.
2. "When's The Deadline for the Warschloths and Can I Send Other Stuff?"
End of November. The shelters aren't able to accept any opened toiletry items but if anyone's included anything that's still sealed I'll make sure they get passed on.
There will be prizes and I'll start pulling names December 1.
3. "Did You Have A Good Time And Do You Have Photos From Seeing Crazy Aunt Purl in Seattle?"
Yes, I had an excellent time, despite the Amtrak-that-is-not-a-train (still bitter!). I really needed the time away and am going to try to take time for myself more often in the future. (The fact that my next day off from work is Christmas Day in no way lessens my determination to do this.) Laurie is cute as a bug (that is, if you think bugs are cute. If you do not, then replace "bug" with cute thing of your choice) and I really enjoyed having the opportunity to meet with her, however briefly.
As for photos ... uh, no. There's one photo of us together on CAP's Flickr photostream here. Apparently I was too busy eating, drinking, hanging out with lunatics, buying fibre and rubbing my ass on total strangers to get the camera out. (She had also asked people not to take photos but I think when she started yelling "y'all, I know this woman! Someone take a photo!" that that should have been my first clue that it was OK.)
4. "What Do We Have To Do To See Your Handspun?"
Just ask.
Here is the goat (mohair) as it now looks on the bobbin. I apologize for the picture being a little fuzzy but a) I was drunk and b) it's mohair -- it's going to be fuzzy no matter what I do.
I'm almost finished spinning this bag of goat and will have it plied and washed for your viewing pleasure this weekend.
Here's what it looks like against my leathery, wizened hand.
I hope I've answered everything that everyone's asked but I'm well into the "crazy rabbit" mode right now, so if I've missed something just holler.
And now back to work ...
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Tell It To The Merinos!
Apparently I'm a dyeing machine tonight. There are something like seven skeins in the dyepot as we type.
Five skeins of merino sock, one of rideau arcott/jacob/alpaca sock and a skein of DK that just wouldn't let me say no. I think the DK is merino/alpaca.
Blues and greens. I had been asked for some pinks, recently, but apparently the grilled cheese sandwich had other ideas.
I have one strangely-dyed hand (fortunately they're used to this at work) and I'm hoping to have those skeins plus the other pile of stuff I've dyed recently in the store soon.
There will also be four skeins of burly wool, exactly right for those of you who (like me) are living in denial and haven't started the Christmas Knitting yet. One skein will make a scarf -- something like 3.5 st/in. Each skein is being sold as 140 yards but they're well over 150 I do believe. There's nothing stupider than running out of wool three stitches before the end of a project, especially if it's hand-dyed that you can't get any more of, so I like to underestimate yardage.
However, in the category of Wool I Have Dyed That Is Actually For Sale Right now, if any of y'all have a hankering for some Rabbitworks Studios "Toe Jam" sock yarn, hustle your bustles over to Michelle's Store toot de sweet, and get your very own limited edition 70% merino/30% nylon sock yarn in colours that won't be showing up anywhere else any time soon.
I worked really hard on those and for the first time ever I had a little trouble shipping a few of them out. I don't usually lust after my own yarn -- I'm a process knitter and also seemingly a process dyer. It's done, it's lovely, it can go live with someone else. There were, however, two or three skeins that I had a lot of difficulty packing and sending. "Anthem", in particular, made me tear up when I sealed the box.
I'll miss it; I hope whoever gets it loves it as much as I do.
And now for a quick "cute kid" update.
This past weekend was Novemberance Day (Veteran's Day in the US) and as my daughter is a Brownie she had to go march in a parade. My husband is a military veteran, so he was proud to march along with her.
Apparently during the march there was one young man, somewhere between the ages of six and eight, who did not understand the solemnity of the occasion and was lurching along in the parade muttering "brainssss".
My husband said that it was worth putting up with Mistress PissyPants all day (apparently she was unhappy about a fairly long list of things) just for that moment.
I almost wish I'd been there, but being a selfish cow I was out knitting with the boys instead. It was my last day "off" from work until xmas day, so I thought I'd be a little self-indulgent.
I hope all of the dead people will forgive me. If not, oh well, I just won't knit them any scarves.
Friday, November 09, 2007
I Take It All Back
Remember Lily? The wheel I love because she's so pretty but I hate because she won't spin worth a damn?
I take it back.
Today I had the honour of busting Mrs. Q's spinning cherry. She showed up around 10am, right after the coffee had finished brewing.
We broke out buckets of fibre and two wheels and went mental. We went over the basics of what the parts of the wheel are called and noted that almost everything about spinning sounds vulgar, if you say it right.
She spun some BFL and some Romney and something else -- Coopworth, I think. There was much hilarity with wheels deciding to spin backwards and roving breaking into bits of useless mess and the usual thing one gets when one is learning how to use a wheel.
By the end of the day, she was spinning fibre that, while a little lumpy and thick, was recognizable as yarn. Heck of a lot better than I did my first time out of the gate, I can tell you.
She left, two hours later, happy and spun out, with my Ashford and three bags of fibre in the back of her van.
No, I didn't give away the Ashford, she gets it for a week or two while I beat up Lily. I'm generous, not crazy.
Anyhow, I had set Lily up in the living room also, so that Mrs. Q. could see how not to spin. She heard me call the wheel a motherfucker and I have to say that I told my husband that she was the c-word. Not chenille this time. Also not Mrs. Q; the wheel.
I had decided to spin up some goat fleece (I think it's mohair -- you have two kinds of goat, right? Mohair and angora? Anyway it's some sort of goat) that I had purchased from Shades of Narnia at the PNE this year.
Lily has always been a trial to me, as many of you know. She's clunky, she's badly balanced, but she's so pretty I haven't wanted to give up on her.
There's a hole on the hub of the wheel. When I first got her and took her out to my Guild for them to have a look-see, a couple folks said they thought it was an oil hole, but then it was generally decided that that was in the wrong place and it was just a flaw in the wood and bla bla bla.
I took the advice of spinners more experienced than am I, and oiled the shaft of the wheel and all other moving parts, but I never put oil in that hole.
Guess what? It's an oil hole.
Today for some reason, after spinning on her for a bit while Mrs. Q was here, I decided to put oil in that hole.
She sang (Lily, not Mrs. Q, although I believe that Mrs. Q can also sing).
She sang, indeed and she feels a heck of a lot faster than the Ashford. Who knew I'd like a fast wheel?
She's still a little clunky and unbalanced, oil alone will not make up for poor woodworking, but dudes ... apparently not only did nobody tell me that it was an oil hole, nobody told me how much fun it is to spin goat.
I suspect that I may be spinning laceweight. I hope it'll hold up in the plying, it's awfully darned thin, but it seems to be even and it's not breaking yet.
I believe that it may be time to rejoice.
Wednesday, November 07, 2007
Career Planning
My husband isn't working these days, so he's spending a lot of time taking kids all over the place and so on.
Tuesdays is dollar day at the wave pool and so this week he took Her Surreal Highness and a friend to swim for a couple of hours.
E came up with the idea of riding on daddy's shoulders and pretending to be a celebrity while signing autographs for her friend. I don't know what movie E was the star of, but when it was her friend's turn to be the celebrity, my daughter decided that she was star of "Zombie Horror".
Which is all fine and good, however with her pronunciation it came out as "Zombie Whore".
I'm pretty sure that wasn't one of the options the guidance counsellor offered us in high school ...
Monday, November 05, 2007
Humour Chez Lapin
There was mention of opera.
I started singing, operatically.
Him: That was vile.
Me: I wish you wouldn't be so curt about it.
And then we fell about laughing like loons.
Anyone who doesn't get it? I'm sorry, but I cannot marry you. Not now or at any future date.
The Whole Story of The Wheel
I've been jonesing for another wheel for a while. Don't know why, my traddie is fine ... but you will note that I named Lily and didn't name the Ashford.
It's a nice wheel, a good wheel. It does what it's supposed to do, and I got it from a fellow guild member for $75. These puppies are about $530 new so I totally made out like a bandit. She was moving from a big house to an apartment and had three wheels. She hadn't used this one in ages (there was a lot of dust on it) and was delighted to give it to a new spinner and a fellow guild member so that the spinnage could move forward.
I loved it. I still do. There were a few small repairs to be made and I bought a repair kit for about $19 and fixed it all up fancy-like.
But I never named it. It's just "the traddie" or "the Ashford".
It's ten times the wheel that Lily will ever be. Lily is a total bitch and badly balanced. I actually pulled a groin muscle spinning on her until 3am one day and could hardly walk or drive for a week. She's going to visit my woodworker shortly and either get one side shaved down or the other side drilled out and have weight inserted. I refuse to have a wheel that badly balanced in my house any more, but she's so pretty it's a sin to just let her sit, not spinning.
But Lily has a personality and a name. The traddie, not so much. It's a tool. I guess I needed another wheel worthy of a name.
So I looked on Craigslist and they had this wheel listed, "Saxony wheel, flyer, bobbin and drive band missing, $25". I didn't bite. And then last night I saw the same ad but they wanted $12. I couldn't quite believe it. I wrote and said "OK, the title says $12 and the text says $25. Do you still have it, and if so how much do you want?"
They still had it. They wanted $12. I thought "ok if the Mother is missing there's no point but if it's just the flyer ..."
And so I went and saw her and it was just the flyer. And I gave them the $12. And she came home with me.
Her name is Virginia.
Captain! We Canna Take Much More!
Captain! There's something in the garrrden! It luiks like another one of those bluddy wheels!
Relax, Scotty. It's just a little Saxony wheel. Not even a whole one. Look! The flyer, bobbin and drive band are missing!
But Captain! We have two wheels in the hoose already! We cannae keep giving room tae every wheel that follows you home.
It's just a tiny wheel. Not even a whole one. It won't take up much room at all and if I'm to be giving spinning lessons to all and sundry (random do-gooding moment, go check out her sister's blog if you have a need to find something warm and fuzzy to do) then I'm going to need more than my Ashford Traditional and Lily (aptly named by my husband after the Lilies of the Field -- they do not toil and neither do they spin)
But Captain! Ye cannae afford another wheel! We're living on bread and tatties as it is!
Um, we are living on bread and potatoes because we're Celts and we happen to be all about the carbs. There are pork chops in the freezer and some meat and cheese in the fridge, too. Eggs, even. Since we started working every weekend and not driving the car, our financial situation has improved markedly. We could even have steak if we felt like it (and did recently, to celebrate Mr. Assmuppet's birthday)
And besides, the wheel came from Craigslist and only cost me $12. Less than the price of a decent six-pack of beer.
Captain! It's at the door!
Then let the wee fucker in and let's post about it. Maybe someone will know where I can get a Saxony bobbin and flyer array for cheap like borscht.
Aye Captain, but it's on your head if they start referring to this place as The Wheel House.
Shut up and pass me another beer, Scotty. You're starting to piss me off.
Friday, November 02, 2007
Idiot Savant
Or maybe not so savant.
My order of wool has been received by The Sweet Sheep and will be listed either this weekend or early next week. She says the skeins are beautiful.
I worked hard on this and it reassures me to know that I'm not just a hack.
Oh yes, I know folks have told me that before, but when I see people like Ruth, and the huge amount of stuff she gets done and all the talk of colour wheels and this, that and the other, I feel like a total amateur.
I really do.
I know nothing of colour wheels and intensities and matching this and that and balancing the other. When I dye wool, I mess with colours until my belly feels like I've just eaten a grilled cheese sandwich. When I feel that feeling of "right", then I know it's right, and so that's what I do. It's all totally by instinct. I just listen to my belly. It's an actual physical feeling.
Sometimes it's not even a colour I'd wear or that I like, but my belly tells me when it's right and so I do it. It's sort of the way I write; I have no training in this sort of thing. I just wait for the grilled cheese sandwich feeling.
My husband knows how I do things, I've explained it to him. I asked him today what a colour wheel was and he said that he could explain it to me but he didn't think he should, because it might fuck up what I do.
The boy is smarter than I am now and again. Not often, but now and again.
And so I'm going to go on the way I am, just waiting for the grilled cheese sandwich to tell me I'm doing it right.
I've decided that things at work are so excessively fucked that I have to find something else to do. I'm going to be dyeing up a storm and starting in the new year I'm going to be showing up at some fibre fests as a vendor.
And maybe in the spring I can quit my job.
The grilled cheese sandwich told me I had to.
