Sunday, July 30, 2006

A Day Off

It’s almost 2:30 and I just realized that I have done almost nothing today but sit in front of the computer reading blogs and listening to pod casts.
I did manage to get the last 2 loads of laundry done for the week but beyond that nothing. I blame Husband for that. He had left Friday night for a weekend camping with the guy’s and I was giddy with thoughts of what I could get done over 2 days.
I go the call Friday night that Youngers practice was canceled for the morning and with Husband gone Younger and I settled in and relaxed for the evening. I fell asleep on the couch so I have no idea what time she went to bed. All I know is that I woke up around 1 am with lights and fans on. If anyone looked in the window I must have looked like I was shot or drugged on the couch!
Saturday we took off to relieve Susan at Lucy’s and had a good afternoon. I made progress on the Clapotis to the point where I have dropped my first stitch in Section 3. I figured that I could get a few more stitches dropped but NOOOO! I didn't even finish the first repeat when I found my stitch count off! So, I set it aside and went to bed.
I awoke later than my usually time this morning (6:15) and settled in with my coffee and knitting to listen to a few pod casts figuring that Younger wouldn’t be awake for a couple of hours when I heard Husband’s truck backing down the street at 6:45 am! What the!??
The story was he was kept up all night both Friday and Saturday and came home to sleep. With the Nextel Cup having a weekend off I had nothing to watch this afternoon so I just sat here.
I have tried to start a new pair of socks for Younger in Fixation but had to frog it because I cast on too many stitches! So I decided to try using the 2 circ method and that went bust as well! I guess I’m going to make a burned offering of cashmere to the Knitting Deities in order to get out of this funk with being able to knit socks!
Maybe I should try and spin a little??

Wednesday, July 26, 2006

I Must Be Wearing A Sign

You ever have one of those days where the public assumes you are in charge and make all the decisions? Well, today was my day.
I was sent to the RMV to put another new company vehicle on the road and take one off. Before I left the office I went over the RMV-1 and filled in the missing stuff. I also made sure I had the correct registration for the vehicle coming off the road. I have this routine down pat. I know what to expect when I get to the registry. I’ve learned from past experience what the people behind the counter will hone in on and NOT give you plates.
What threw me today is when I was informed that I Had To Call a certain state agency because that agency would not perform the requested function. I am only the messenger! I’ve been given the warning the past 6 times (in less than 3 weeks, mind you!) about the PROBLEM and I have passed the message on to the appropriate person who should have dealt with this PROBLEM already!
Of course, it’s not an emergency for them because they didn’t heed the warning. By the way, the person behind the desk said I could come straight back to them today as soon as the PROBLEM was taken care of. HA! It’s going to be a few days before I get back there.
Later on, my boss was out of the office and I had to call him to find out what vehicle was to be looked at by an insurance adjuster. He had been told this person would arrive at 10 am. It was not 10 am but several hours past that. He was standing in the office and overheard my boss say that the vehicle in question might not be available because of the 10 am thing. To which, this man rather rudely said we don’t make time appointments because we don’t know how long it will take to make our assessment of a vehicle and if the vehicle was not here he would call in a few days to reschedule. Then I had to fast walk after him to inform him that the vehicle was here and point it out to him. Yuck! When my boss returned I passed the message on about the not scheduling times and he has decided that someone else will deal with the insurance stuff from now on.
On a better note, I have been knitting. Because of the issues with the sock knitting deities, I decided to tackle a Clapotis using a silk and rayon lace weight yarn from my stash. So far, so good. I’ve got to work 1 more repeat in Section 2 then comes the fun part with the dropping of stitches. I’m hoping to give this a SIL for Christmas. And husband commented that SIL would love the colors.

Saturday, July 08, 2006

Writing Letters

It’s amazing what good stationary does! A few weeks ago, I was gifted with a couple of boxes of great quality, small note size stationary with matching envelopes. In the past week, I’ve discovered writing letters and mailing them.

I grew up in the age of paper. My grandfather came to this country after WWI from Germany and I can remember the look and feel of the airmail envelope. I can remember looking down the hall way and seeing them propped up on the bed and hearing Grampy reading (in German) all the news from the old country.
I remember being sent to the desk for paper and pen to write thank you notes and letter’s to family members that had moved away. It was exciting to receive mail in my name and know that someone had thought enough of me to do the physical task of putting pen to paper, writing my name on the envelope and spending money to insure that it arrived where I was living.
To this day, I still get excited butterflies in my stomach when I receive mail from family members and I still have letter’s and card’s I’ve received from when I was a child.

Don’t get me wrong. I now live in the electronic age. I spend a huge amount of time in front of computers both at work and at home. I love getting and sending email. I actually find it easier to write an email than a letter because I can erase any mistakes I make in spelling or grammar. Writing a letter in pen slows me down because I have think about what I want to say and then write it down. I’ve always thought faster than I can write and it became very frustrating forgetting what I wanted to say. Not to mention the fact, I can’t spell worth a damn.

Getting back to the stationary - During the week, I wrote a longish letter to a member of my knitting guild. She did not attend that last 2 meetings and I missed her. She has been my inspiration for a long time. She’s taught me so much about knitting and life in general and is always the first person I want to show off a Finished Object to. She is also a night owl, literally! She sleeps all day and is up all night so getting her on the phone is difficult. Not to mention that I don’t like to wake up her husband by calling too early in the morning.
And then tonight I was thinking about the wife of Youngers softball coach. She was diagnosed with cancer earlier in the year and has not been able to come to any of the practices. We’ve been getting update on her progress from Coach but today it came to me that I wanted to let her know I was thinking of her and sending good energy her way. So I grabbed the box, pulled out a sheet and wrote her a short note. Then I folded it, put it in the envelope and addressed it. I’ll drop it in the mail at work on Monday.

Stationary is good!

Tuesday, July 04, 2006

I Can Not Knit.......

Socks! I have been trying to make some new sock for myself since November? December? of last year. Oh, I’ve finished a few that were on the needles and I’ve completed a few simple pairs for younger. What I’ve been craving to make is a few more pairs of OOOH! AHHH! socks for my collection.
I’ve got all the popular books – Knitting on the Road, Vogue Socks One, Socks 3X. I’ve even bought a new one recently – Sensational Knitting Socks. I’ve got a gazillion patterns printed out from the web. I have a multiple sets of double point’s, 16 inch circ’s and 24 inch circ’s.
I have the desire and the need to make a pair that are chocolate for my feet. I can see these socks on my feet and feel the sensation of my body relaxing because my feet are happy.
So why is it that the desire is there, the knowledge is vast, the materials needed to complete this task are so available and I can not knit a pair of stinking socks!!!!
Since Saturday, I have cast on and frogged the same yarn 3 times. With the first pattern I chose I was able to complete the cuff and the simple 3 stitch ‘clock’ pattern down the sides defeated me. I couldn’t get the math to work. Of course, today it all made sense.
So I kept the cuff (I really, really like it) and found a different pattern for the leg. I got half way through the gusset decrease and frogged that! The cast on was a little tight, the leg was short and the gusset was going to be too large for my foot.
Today I attempted the original pattern again and I dropped a stitch somewhere in the working of the Cannel Isle cast on and didn’t find this out until I started the cuff pattern!
ARRRRGGGGGG!!!
It’s got to be some kind of karmic voodoo thing from some knitting deity who has decided that I should not knit fancy socks every again.
I give up. I’m going to knit lace.