Monday, April 28, 2008
If Someone Would Please Explain ...
... how I got dye on my ceiling, I would really appreciate it.
I dye stuff in the dining room. The dye is on the living room ceiling. It is black (the dye. My ceiling was white).
Oh, and if you could also explain how I managed to forget to go to work today, that would be nice too.
Thanks In Advance.
OK, Time to Stop
My post a couple of days ago about the person who talked about something I was keeping confidential was out of line, in a number of ways.
When I told the person who "spilled" my news we were in a public place, we were surrounded by knitters, I didn't haul her into the bathroom and whisper it to her. In no way did I indicate that the information that I was imparting was confidential. And it really wasn't, I've told about a dozen folks.
We had met once before, we had never emailed. We don't have a close personal connection. I like her and I simply felt like sharing some good news. She was excited for me as she likes me also (although perhaps less after this tempest in a teapot, which I regret) and so she told a few folks. She had no reason to think that I was giving her advance knowledge of an event.
Well, ok, so "telling a few folks" involved posting on Ravelry, but it still wasn't like taking out an ad in the New York Times, and her information was correct. There were no rumours involved at all. Nothing she said was made up.
SO, let's stop dissing her in the comments, k? I don't want to have to start deleting stuff, but I won't tolerate it any more, even though I know it's done in support of me and to bolster me through a hurt. As I've said before, this isn't a democracy, this is my blog which is mine and belongs to me (SNL fans may recognize this reference) so if I have to get high-handed I shall.
I've learned a few lessons over the last few weeks. Reading about myself on Ravelry has been a bit of a trip. Surreal, actually. I'm here in my penguin jammies at 4am dyeing yarn and doing my best to do what's right and feed my family. It's weird to read about this "me" that doesn't seem like me to me.
Reading about herself in my comments has to be equally surreal and also hurtful. She emailed me with an apology. I emailed back with an apology for public sniping. I'm socially inept and just didn't know what to do and so I reacted. The mature thing would have been to email her and say "dude, I wish you hadn't said that, can you delete the post?". The more mature thing would have been to have told her in the first place that I wasn't going public with this information yet, but what's done is done and we can't turn back time, no matter how much Cher sings about it.
She seems to be a kind and decent human being and doesn't deserve slamming, so let's stop with the slappage right quick, all right?
KJ, I apologize publicly to you. Seeing I smacked you about publicly in my prior post, it seems only fair. I was wrong and I'm sorry.
And now, seeing one can't put the toothpaste back in the tube, I'll share the news with everyone.
I hadn't posted about it before, except in a vague and oblique manner because I have self-confidence issues, as many of you know. I thought "what if it doesn't happen?" "What if the article never shows up and I look like a tit?" "What if I'm completely and utterly publicly humiliated and look like a poser?"
Well, I suppose all of those things could happen but it's unlikely.
Lee Ann, as many of you know, writes a column called Made in Canada for Vogue Knitting.
I'm going to be in that column for the Fall issue. It was submitted a couple of weeks ago so I guess it's really going to happen.
I believe there are going to be pictures of Revenge (which is why I was asking for pix last week).
I expect never to sleep again and I couldn't be happier. Sleep is for the weak. Dyeing yarn is for me.
So let's all play nice and try to assume that everyone intends well. Knitters and fibre people in general are amazing, loving and forgiving (apart from a few bitches who I intend to stab with Addis fairly soon.)
A little philosphizing here: Even before I started knitting, I believed that there are two sorts of people in the world. There are those who build up and those who tear down.
Knitters are builders. We take hair from the backs of animals (or sometimes plant fibres or extruded plastic, this is in no way meant to exclude those who don't use animal fibres) and we wash it and comb it and twist it into string, and then we dye it pretty colours and we build with it. We build socks and sweaters and blankets and hats. We build for our friends, ourselves, our communities and often even for strangers.
We build up. We don't tear down (we shall not discuss the tinking here).
And so, if you don't mind, there will be no more tearing down in the comments. She made a mistake. So did I. Mine was the greater error and if blame needs to be assigned it rests firmly on my shoulders.
As for the rest of what's happening, I'm working on getting a new supplier before the magazine comes out so that I can fill orders. I'm going to be a reseller for Ashland Bay shortly (another piece of news I've been waiting to share) as soon as I get the loot together. Probably June, the way things are going, but seeing it's almost May that's not long to wait. Very, very soon there will be yarn enough for everyone.
And now, if it's all the same to you, go and build a sock or something.
Make the Rabbitch proud of you.
Sunday, April 27, 2008
My Secret Alfredo Sauce Recipe
Today I slept late, woke in time to rescue the last slice and a half of bacon from the "bacon shark" who kept circling the kitchen and then headed out to the river.
Rocks were thrown, branches were floated, wood ducks were observed. Dogs were patted, many hours were walked, and everyone was tired and famished by the time we got back here.
And so I cooked.
As requested, here is the recipe for my Super Secret Alfredo Sauce.
I was in fact going to be lazy enough to buy trays of frozen fettucine alfredo and just add scallops and peas, but the store we like was closed so I settled for a jar.
Now you know the truth.
The mug behind it has nothing to do with anything, apart from being my favourite mug, sent to me by Emma last year.
After the sauce was put in a pot, I found I had a giant bucket of bland.
Here's the first step to saving the situation; a little olive oil and some coarsely-chopped fresh garlic.
Garlic is my friend. Fortunately the neighbours live far enough away that we didn't actually blow up their houses with our breath after dinner.
The next step in the improvements; a few baby bay scallops.
My version of "a few" is about the same as my version of "a little" garlic. I'm generous with measurements, apparently. This is about a pound of the little darlings, none even as large as my thumbnail.
Rest assured they did not die in vain.
The Bucket of Bland was vastly improved by the addition of a couple of large tablespoons of grated Parmesan.
The scallops, oil and garlic didn't hurt any, nor did a sprinkling of nutmeg and a few shakes of ground black pepper.
Generally I hate pepper, but you've got to have a little in an Alfredo. Just gotta.
Um, if you remember, that is.
Green peas make everything better.
Well, except for ice cream. I'm pretty sure they wouldn't help ice cream one little bit and could, in fact, make it worse.
Looks like wallpaper paste with green and white lumps in it.
Tastes like heaven.
It probably would have been better made from scratch but I just don't have the
I forgot to put in little bits of onion, too.
There's a good chance I'm going to hell for forgetting the onion.
In case dinner tasted like shit on a stick, I had bought some ammunition.
This is a cheap white wine (less than $9) from South Africa. Yes, my dinner of delight was rounded out by the sweat of an abused farmworker's labours.
Man, those farmworkers taste good.
(This is in no way meant to imply that I have first-hand knowledge -- or have even heard vague rumours -- of any sort of abuse involved in the making of this fine beverage. It just amuses me to say politically-incorrect shit on a regular basis. You may have noticed.)
(Also too the wine doesn't taste like sweat, at all. It tastes like fruit and wine and stuff.)
There were further fortifications purchased, in the form of a half-dozen "Blackheart Oatmeal Stout" organic beers, brewed by the fine folks in Nelson, BC.
I don't like stout, it's way too chewy for me; I prefer pale ale.
Ben, however, is partial to a good stout and oatmeal stout (which is, I believe, the thickest of this particular sort of beer) tends to be hard to come by.
He was well pleased with it and had a bottle before dinner.
The addition of some fresh crusty French bread and some butter was also deemed to be a plus.
You'll notice that one of the pieces (about one o'clock on the plate, I believe) looks sort of chewed.
The bread had been greeted with great cries of "Nom!" and bits had been ripped off and dipped in olive oil and organic balsamic vinegar almost before I got it into the house.
We're all about the bread around here.
And the dipping.
I then added a Caesar salad.
This was from a bag; I admit it freely. If I can't make an Alfredo sauce right now, there's no way in hell I can make a Caesar salad.
Served in little glass bowls and topped with squeezes of fresh lemon, it was deemed acceptable.
Acceptable enough that I hardly had to wash the bowl afterwards, it was so cleaned out.
Um, come to think of it, I haven't washed the bowl yet. Oops.
Well, that's certainly far from the ugliest dinner I've ever produced.
It feels good to be in the kitchen again, even if I'm taking shortcuts.
Oh hell, let's face it, I've always taken lots of shortcuts. We liked this so well I'll quite probably take the exact same shortcuts next time.
This was my first time cooking scallops (apart from the bacon-wrapped thingies that you grill) so I was nervous, but they were tiny and tender and delicious.
There will be a post of more substance shortly; I just wanted to let you know I'm not withering away in a garret gnawing on dry crusts as I languish and all.
Saturday, April 26, 2008
Ten Weeks Later
The title of this post is a play on the title of a training film I watched recently, "28 Days Later". This film was one recommended by Annie, so that I would be adequately prepared for the Zombie Apocalypse that is sure to come any day now.
(Note: If anyone has an objection to gratuitous gore, you should likely skip clicking on any of the videos linked here)
I now know how to avoid being raped by insane soldiers and eaten by zombies. It was very informative, and I thank her. The next film I'm going to watch is this one:
(Bloglines or other feed readers, there's a YouTube video embedded there, if you can't see it.)
It can't hurt to be completely prepared. I'm thinking of watching Night of the Lepus next:
Anyhow, it's ten weeks since Stephanie blew up my quiet little business, and it's been quite the ride. I quit my job, dealt with being sicker than a sack of diseased hamsters for three weeks, my kid was out of school for two weeks on "Easter Break" (um, hello? Two weeks for Easter break? I'm pretty sure the rabbit rolled the rock away from the cave and Jesus came out and gave everyone brightly-wrapped chocolate eggs all in one afternoon), a supplier who wouldn't answer my emails or ship my order, another supplier who both answered emails and shipped orders but who ran out of fibre, a couple of people who let me down quite horribly, and a lot of very interesting (and sometimes painful) lessons learned.
The people who let me down did to me things that I have done myself to others in the past. It's a fair turn of the wheel that I should now be on the receiving end, although the scale of the down-letting in this situation was far greater than what I did. I smiled, shrugged it off (after a few well-chosen epithets) and I wish them well on their journeys. I have resolved in future that I personally shall suck less; and that their journeys shall continue without the benefit of my company. I just don't have time for bullshit any more.
I also had a couple of weeks of fairly serious mental illness. The Depression got its claws into me bigtime for the first time in years and I coped with it poorly. I refuse to be medicated and usually just ride it out, knowing it'll be over soon, but this was vicious. I'd rather not do that again if you don't mind.
Like I said, quite the ride.
Over the last couple of weeks I've had a number of concerned emails and even some phone calls asking if I'm OK. I haven't been blogging, I haven't been emailing and my phone rings mostly unanswered.
I've heard a couple of rumours that I'm maybe not all right -- and my answer to those rumours and the emails and calls is "No. No, I'm not all right, but I will be. I'm way better than I was."
But at least I didn't go shave my hair off, show my coochie in public or drive down the street with my daughter in my lap, so I'm still a notch or two saner than Britney.
As I said, I've had to learn a few things. I have had to learn not to read about myself (I love Ravelry but I just can't go there right now, so if you've sent me a message there's a good chance you won't get an answer any time soon.) I've had to learn not to tell people I thought were ok anything at all in case I find it spread across the universe (something that's coming up in my business and that was mine and mine alone to tell was mentioned in a public forum in a very uncool manner after I whispered it to someone who should have known better.)
I've had to learn to give myself some credit for doing my best. If my best isn't good enough, that in no way negates the fact that it is my best.
I've also started scheduling in some family time because really -- without them, what's the point? So tonight I cooked a massive dinner (ok a lot of it was frozen like the soops and the potatoes but shut up, I made that box in the kitchen get hot and produce things) and then we all watched a movie. Everyone's asleep now -- it's 4am. I'm going to bed shortly and tomorrow I'm going to the river with my kid. I'm not going to dye anything, ship anything, update anything at all. We're going to throw rocks and look for bugs and then for dinner I'm making a huge vat of Fettucine Alfredo with peas and some baby bay scallops sauteed in olive oil and garlic. I'll serve it with a salad and a baguette or two.
And maybe some wine for the grownups.
I'll be back in the world again on Sunday or Monday, but we need this interlude.
Report on the Harlot in Seattle visit will happen maybe Monday.
While you're waiting for me to get off my ass and actually write something, go hug your kids and maybe look for some bugs. I guarantee it'll do you some good.
Saturday, April 19, 2008
Be very scared
see more crazy cat pics
Well, it made me gigglesnort, especially seeing I'm heading over the border on Monday.
Be afraid.
A Cry For Help
Does anyone have any pictures of my Revenge colourway, not shrunk? My camera seems to only take pictures in 72dpi, which is fine for blogs and such but not so good for what I need it for (yes, I'm being mysterious, but I'm not sure if I have permission to talk about it).
What I need is needs a print size of no smaller than 4 x 4 inches, 300 dpi.
Oh and seeing I'm asking for miracles, I need it by tomorrow at the latest.
If anyone can help, please drop me a line at teh.bunnei at gmail dot com. I shall think of some sort of outrageous brible to offer in return.
okthanksbai.
edited to note that i am offering a bribe, not a brible. WTF is a brible? I suppose if you want one of those instead I could find one. I have almost everything else in this house ...
Friday, April 18, 2008
Ann Needs Mittnz!
I don't know if I've blogged about this before (or at least about this year's drive). Likely not, which makes me terribly remiss.
Someone should spank me, but really I don't have time for that sort of thing right now.
I'm running off to have a quick shower and see if I can do anything about this haircut (I'm not thrilled -- she was so concerned about not "making me look like a boy" that she has made me look like a dorky boy with a bad haircut), get the kid from school, clean up the mess that animals made with my garbage in the side yard, take said garbage to the dump and then come back and get all of my little packages of joy in the car to take to the post office.
However, before I go, I would like to urge you to go take a peek at Ann's blog and see if you can't talk yourself into making a Mittn or two. Or sixteen.
I'd like to, but I'm all through making promises I can't keep. It's starting to suck and I don't think I could handle one more giant truckload of fail being delivered to my door.
And now I shall go and indulge in a little
Happy knitting!
I Wonder What That Pays
As you know, I seldom discuss here matters of a biological female nature, as it were. I believe that's best saved for whining on LiveJournal.
However, the other day I had to go and purchase what my local drugstore euphemistically calls "feminine paper". There's nothing feminine about this. In fact I don't know if it's paper, either.
Anyhow, that's beside the point. What startled me (apart from the cost -- my holy FSM, shouldn't these be free? It's really adding insult to injury) was the description on the package. (Heh, I almost said "box". I giggled for a while before I deleted it. As I've mentioned before I'm clearly only 12.)
Writ large on the side of this product was the designation "Pro Comfort".
Uh. Yes.
"Pro" can be used in several different ways. It can be used to indicate that one is in favour of a particular subject (the anti-choice loons, for instance, call themselves "pro life") and I would certainly put myself in the group of those who are in favour of comfort being something taken well into consideration when manufacturing things to shove things up one's jahoobie.
"Pro" has also been used at times to refer to ladies who make their living by "waiting for the bus" on the street corner but I'm pretty sure that had nothing to do with this.
The main use, however, at least in my realm of experience, has been to designate that something is "professional". Now, I don't know anyone who does this professionally but I can just imagine the conversation. I have found that usually when I meet someone in a social situation and they say "what do you do?" they mean to ask what you do for a living. Most folks don't want to hear that what you do mostly is make pancakes for your daughter while wearing penguin jammies and write odd poems to cats having surgical procedures (I'll post my Ode to Max tomorrow, to prove that this is something I do.) They want to know what you do for a living.
Them: So, what do you do?
Me: I'm a menstruator.
Them: An administrator?
Me: No, I'm a professional menstruator.
Them (looking frantically about for someone to rescue them from the conversation): Oh. Um. Well, is there a lot of call for that sort of work?
Me: No, I can only really get four or five days a month, but I'm thinking of subcontracting for a service in town. Totally drains you, though. I just couldn't do this full-time. Bloody hard work, it is.
Srsly, dudes, if they pay for this I'm owed 34 years of back pay. If anyone knows where I should send the claim, would they let me know?
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Better Than Coffee
With apologies to Woolgatherer for stealing his title.
This is the view on my dining room table right now. If you are still waiting for your order (there are a shameful number of people who are) ... there's a good chance that two of these are yours.
Some are light, some are dark, some have much black, some more green ... and I would marry them all, if they asked.
Instead, they are going to the Post Office in the morning (accompanied by a dozen or so of their friends).
I wish them well on their journeys.
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Picture. Worth Thousand Words.
Therefore I apologize in advance for the length of this post.
Too busy to write much -- back soon, I promise.
Oh, and I can has car. 1994 Nissan Altima. More kms on it than you can imagine (366,671 I do believe - 227,839 miles for those of us who are of the non-metrical persuasion). Drives well. Smells like wet dog.
I am in lurve. And on wheels.
w00t.
Wednesday, April 09, 2008
I'm Half-Warped
Guess what I've been doing with my copious free time?
No, really. Guess.
This is an old LeClerc Medico 22" table loom I got from Craigslist for a song a few weeks ago. It was dusty but otherwise in great shape -- no rust, nothing weird going on.
LeClerc doesn't make this model any more, but I'm pretty happy with it. It's way less intimidating than the floor loom and far more useful than the little lap loom I seem to have been making bunny saddles on.
The Dreaded Warping Board.
The loom came with accessories (a book and a couple of shuttles) but this came with my other table loom. Apparently it's completely reasonable in my world to not weave and yet to have four looms.
I found my path ...
After a few rough starts I figured out at least part of what I was doing. Sort of.
All done. 60 ends.
The first warp got thrown out -- it was far too weak and would have snapped in moments. This will hold. I hope.
And now to do it all over again.
I never knew it took two weeks to warp a table loom ...
Monday, April 07, 2008
If Not Flying Hamsters, Then ...
... how about some Human Tetris?
Dude, I haven't laughed that hard in a long time. I'm pretty sure it's not just the cough syrup, either.
Saturday, April 05, 2008
A Further Ode to Cough Syrup
As I sit here,
This, for instance.
Hold your cursor over the picture. A word-bubble-thingie pops up. I made a sort of hooting noise out loud at work. I think it was laughter, but one can't be sure these days.
There's a reason it's best I work alone.
Friday, April 04, 2008
Oozing
Isn't that a useful word?
Oozing.
That's what my head has been doing this week as I recover from the cold that started making itself known during the kick-ass concert on Monday night.
I'm now at the point where I sound like a coal miner (with all the hacking) and my nose is sort of bright red and peeling.
It's very sexy. Very, let me tell you.
The thing that startles me the most is that my head can hold that much snot. I mean, when you run through the fourth box of tissues, you'd think that you would have emptied out pretty much anything there was to empty, no? Not so! I'm here to tell you that the head, or at least mine, apparently has an infinite capacity for snot-manufacture.
I may have found the secret to ... um ... perpetual something or other. I'm sure if I could think clearly that I'd come up with some amazing scientific theory, however the dextromethorphen in the cough syrup, while allowing me to have lovely restful sleep filled with interesting dreams, is also keeping me in a bit of an alternate universe here, one filled with talking llamas and mounds of sock yarn.
Oh. The sock yarn isn't a fantasy. Crap.
I've been at work a few days (I thought I should share the illness) and have also been toddling off to the post office most days to ship out at least a few packages. I seem to have lost my wedding ring, so if anyone gets an unexpexted "extra" in their package if they would please send it back, I would greatly appreciate it.
(WTF? Who loses their wedding ring and then wonders if they've mailed it to Utah or something?)
It's far too dangerous for someone as hot as I am, what with the red, peeling nose, to be wandering the streets without a wedding ring. You'd be performing a public service.
And now I'm going to get back to
You gotta love the graveyard shift.
Tuesday, April 01, 2008
Bruce Springsteen
Again, my heartfelt thanks to She Who Must Not Be Named for giving us the tickets to last night's show. I've warned her not to read the review to spare herself the need to get all stabbity with her dpns but you know she will. It's like telling someone "don't pick at that, it'll scar!" Y'all just know there's going to be a scar there, don't you?
I believe it was Armistead Maupin who wrote that (and I'm paraphrasing from memory here, so I may be a little off) "every generation produces one male star over whom it is OK for the straight boys to get a little queer. This generation's is Bruce Springsteen."
Last night's concert proved this, for me, without a doubt.
The concert started fairly late and GM Place has apparently paid their power bill as there was no shortage of air conditioning. One of my very few complaints about the evening was that I was ice cold almost the entire time. I had to put my coat back on and by the time we got home (way, way late, our bus didn't show up) I couldn't even feel my feet. I now have a cold but I think that's more thanks to the little cesspit of disease that is public transit rather than being chilly for the evening.
My other complaint was the gaggle of well-groomed but obnoxious women in the front row of our section. Two of them had seats in row 1. Apparently two others had seats in row 7 (or perhaps 9) and didn't much like this arrangement, so they toddled down to sit behind their friends, taking two seats in row 2. The ushers ushed them back to their own seats (as, this being a pretty-much packed event there were no spare seats in row 2). After the ushers had ushed off to do something else, the row 7 ladies came back to sit with their friends. Fairy nuff, however for the rest of the night these four women shared two seats. Bruce, being clearly committed to giving everyone in the room the best show they could possibly have, no matter where they were seated, made a point of playing to the seats on either side of the stage and also behind it (where we were). Every time he came over to our side of the stage, one of these elegant assbeagles -- the same one every time -- would stand up and dance and wave her arms about, neatly obscuring the view of the people in the six rows behind her, of which I was one.
Ben noted that it would be politically-incorrect of me to casually tip her over the edge of the balcony so I restrained myself, but I must say it was mostly beause I was too cold to leave my seat (and also because I didn't want to spill my bottle of expensive water by tripping over it and perhaps dousing the equally-cold people in the seats in front of us).
When the band arrived, Mr. S (or "bootsie-woogums", I prefer to think of him*) was perhaps a little stiff. He looked startlingly older than I had expected. I keep forgetting that as I age, the cultural icons of my generation do also.
The band was just fantastic (that is really what I think**), especially the blonde woman who can, apparently, play about 900 different instruments. She started out with maracas or something and I thought "oh nice, a chick with maracas, that's sweet". And then she hoisted a guitar ... and then a fiddle. She also has a completely kick-ass voice and I really should know her name but I found the website too difficult to navigate (tons of stuff there but I couldn't find what I wanted and I haven't had enough coffee, so I apologize even though the chances of any of the band reading this are slim to none). There is seemingly no end to her talent and I wouldn't have been at all surprised if at some point she was playing the theremin, however no such surreal event came to pass.
The songs came fast and furious, with little more than a heartbeat in between each one. The man hardly stopped to take a breath and within minutes he was coated in sweat.
(as an aside, do you have any idea how sexy a camera close-up of a very muscular forearm dripping in sweat can be? I had no idea either but I think that's an image that will take many years to fade and I shall deeply mourn its passing. If I could have just one rock star poster on my wall, it would be that shot.)
A couple of songs into the first set, you could feel the room change. All of a sudden the wall came down. Mr. S wasn't standing there in front of 12,000 strangers, singing his heart out; the man was there to party and by the grace of the FSM, he was going to do so and we, his 12,285 closest friends, were invited along for the ride.
I think that at some time or another during the night, each and every one of us felt that he was playing just for us. The fact that he was clearly having the time of his life made it all the better.
He made love to our hearts and our minds. Once I almost cried, which is sort of silly at a rock concert really, but any "big" event that overloads me with sensory input will do that to me -- this is one reason I chose to work nights and alone for so long.
At some point I looked at my husband and said "I'm sorry, but I would leave you for him. I would leave my wool for him. I would leave my spinning wheels and looms for him. I think he's turned me straight."
Ben just took my hand and smiled. He understood, as he also would leave me for The Boss.
Bravo, Mr. Maupin. You hit that nail right on the head.
And bravo, Bruce. I liked you just fine before but I believe you have just acquired another middle-aged housewife as a hopeless groupie.
*with thanks to Opus the Penguin and Berke Breathed
**yes, I know, this is in reference to another cultural icon completely unrelated to Mr. S or The E-Street Band but please excuse me, I'm sick and undercaffeinated and have a massive amount of work to do as soon as I am finished dutifully reporting in, and besides, shit like this makes me smile.
