Everything All At Once...

So I'm home.

Only really I'm at work because as soon as I go home I am too tired to deal with much more than dinner.

And about dinner, thank the gods for Hulu.com, without whose old 70s TV shows there would not be enough of a distraction for me to both cook and eat my dinner as I'd probably fall asleep on the couch and wake up grumpy and sore at about 3:30 AM otherwise.

Settling back into my old routine has been difficult.  I think this is because I hated my old routine.  I think some changes are in order.  More on that later.

Right, so too much is in my head at the current moment.  Mostly having to do with deadlines at work, but I did want to say I'm here, I'm alive.  And pictures soon :).  Cuz we all love the vacation slide shows, I know!

15 Whole Inches, Baybee

So, who knew step one to cutting off all of my hair would involve a trip to the hardware store?

Really and truly?  I figured as much, seeing as my greatest super power at my parents' house is a combination of "it's never ever easy" and discovering something that makes people me shout, "eeeuuuw, what's that!"

This time around I've had such Nancy Drewish adventures as:

• "The Great Mold Adventure"
  
• "BUG!"
  
• "Rust Be Gone"
  

It's the last (for now, the visit is still young-ish) that I had to fight with for my haircut.

Apparently, everyone (but my mom, whose professional shears they were) is happy to use whatever scissors they can lay their hands on to trim their locks.  Well, what can I say, they are all boys and my mom has kept her hair super short for forever and um, can't reach where her scissors were relegated to, possibly since the last time she gave me a haircut (2001 I believe).

So when I pulled them out, I was not all that surprised to find them all rusted solid.  Instead of fighting to see if I could salvage any of them via soap and scrubber, I borrowed the car and visited our local hardware store.  

Unlike the craft store, they were super well stocked and even helpful!  Though, being my father's daughter, I decided to roam the aisles on  my own to find the Naval Jelly and Barkeeper's Friend.  See people, years of being the fencing team's armoury chick, and having to wash stainless steel pots and pans that have seen better days on a sailboat have armed me with lots of rust knowledge.  Besides, the scissors were so gone that I knew if I broke them there'd be no great loss.

Hours later...okay, maybe one at most, I was able to salvage my mom's "Arbolito" scissors.  To give you an idea of how um, aged they are?  The manufacturer stopped making/shipping/selling shears to the US about 20 years ago.  Vintage!

And still sharp enough to cut off 15 inches worth of hair (four semi-easy snips as I had to divide up the hair into pony tails) for Locks of Love.

My baby brother thinks I look super young with short tresses.  At my age...isn't that the goal?  :)

I Must Be Losing My Touch...

You know I don't care much about this, really I don't, it's just kinda weird how 5 people unsubscribed from my bloglines feed in a 24 hour period.  Seeing as they were all private folks?  I never knew who they were to begin with, and usually I don't connect to my blog via bloglines but being in LA it was just something I noticed...and no one who's left really cares, I know.  And it's probably because of online ponderings like this that people are choosing to read other things.

Okay, I'll stop now :).

In other news:

Earthquakes, we've had a few.  

Yep, LA in the Spring is the perfect time for them.  We've had half a dozen small quakes since I arrived.  I've only felt one of them though, the one in the almost 5 range...4.5 or something?  Anything smaller and I am still so much of a SoCal native that I don't really feel those anymore.  But if they are small and sustained?  I think I get flashbacks of the '87 Northridge quake...just because that one seemed to go on for FOREVER.

Knitting, oh has there been knitting.

Not only have a plucked (plugged?) away at Andy's never-ending socks (you'd think I'd have learned from my first experience with size 11 feet?) but I'm down to the toe on a mangled "Fawkes"(I will find a link later...sorry googlers) sock (I did not use the heel nor am I taking the pattern all the way down the foot), as well as one leg and half of another on a super secret present knit that wasn't so super secret before but I unraveled that one completely and have started again using some ohmygod soft and silky stuff.  I'll have more details and maybe a picture or seven later.

See, as usual, I have the camera, I've even taken some pictures...but even if I had a compatible cord with me?  There is no way I'd connect it to my brother's PC.  I am a bit afeared of it, I guess.  (Why yes, I did just have to delete a whole slew of nasties on here, so you know where I stand.)

This wouldn't be so bad, the no pictures thing, except that my niece (6) really really really wanted to learn how to knit!!!  (And because of this, so did her brother (4).  I love the "me too" years.)

So I traipsed off to the local big-name craft store that was in such disrepair I couldn't believe it (dear god my mom lives in ghetto-ville), and found ONE pink and ONE blue (the last of each, I think) Vanna's special yarn, and after digging through the mess at the bottom of the needle display, I found 2 pairs of those uber-cute matching children's knitting needles.

And there are pictures!  But I will add them later.  Just imagine pictures of pudgy hands trying to hold knitting needles interlaced with my mom's hands helping my nieces fingers find the yarn...and about five minutes later what my nephew decided he really wanted the yarn for :).

My mom thought I'd be crushed.  Maybe 20 years ago when dealing with small fries was frustrating.  Something magical must happen at 30 though; or maybe it's just the culmination of all my kid experience.  I just like the fact that they are playing with the yarn and think their needles are cool.

My niece wants a hat and when she is "tired" of knitting or needs "to take a break" I take the knitting and fix the oopses and knit a few rows more.  We're going to make a "square" fold-n-sew hat which I'm sure many of you will know it when you see it but I have neither the words nor the time to search for what I mean just now...the nephew wants to play fire-trucks again.  I'm game.

On the Ground...

84 degrees is quite a shock after Seattle's high of um, what was it? 59?

I spent about 10 minutes at a wee little park with my niece and nephew after dropping off my little brother AT HIS PROM (!!!  I is old), and I think I'm a little sunburnt and a really lot tired.

But hai!  I'm here!

Some Good News, for a Change...

For those of you following the whining saga of my former life as a Sailing Adventurer ^(TM), I will stop tormenting my land-lubbing friends (love ya' lots, honest) and just post it here to have it done with.

I received a surprise call while at work on Monday...just after I hit "PUBLISH POST" or I might have edited/amended/changed the ending.

So the Irish Rose is soon to be called something new. She deserves a new name, she is so no longer the same sailboat we found abandoned in Alameda. Instead she was, until recently, an abandoned and damaged hull + pieces on the Big Island of Hawai'i. I do hope this doesn't become a recurring issue in her life. But, yeah, so many parts and pieces gone and missing that really now, if the tales say a boat has to be torn down to her bare bones before she can be renamed without bad juju about? This would be the closest I'd ever want her to get.

Why the new name? New owner. A (to me) wonderful Peruvian man and his wife (?) have taken ownership of my girl and want to make her into their Sailing Adventuring home.

He LOVES my boat. You can hear it in his voice, the sadness at what he found, the joy of telling me about finding the owner of the mast and bartering his carpentry skills to buy the mast back, the ecstatic giddiness of my extensive knowledge of the boat's history...

I think my little girl has found the right man. A mother's heart is at peace here.

Seriously though, he kept calling her mine throughout our conversation, and it kinda hurt every time...especially when I would correct him and say "no, your boat." My Irish Rose, but his...um, he hasn't quite decided on the name, but he wants it to be the equivalent of "Ocean Flower" so as to keep the floral theme going. Yes, tears. But yeah, it definitely will be his, you can just tell.
~~~

And on a different more EEP note...I leave for LA on Friday and have not even started figuring out what all I need/need to pack/etc. and everything. The best part is that I'll be at my mom's house, so I can pack some undies and dirty laundry and will still be good :). I am silly, I know.

It Is Not A Tumor

Okay, hai, long time.  I may win space-cadet of the year soon.

So did you all know that yesterday was mom's day?  Yeah!  Happens every year shortly after 5 de mayo and yet, can you believe I almost missed it?  Again?

But I did indeed finally pack up and send my mom her ripple socks, whose picture and post I can't now remember and am being too lazy and hazy to link to just now.

Good thing I even remembered to call pretty early in the morning because just about 2:30 PM after my friends J & L left for home I collapsed and proceeded to have a migraine-style headache that I've deduced was not a hang-over but maybe an epoxy-cat-over.

Okay let me 'splain a little:

There was a "welcome spring" party on Saturday at Tim's house.  Yeah, I know it's May, apparently spring really needs coercing in the PNW, and we were to wear plaid and paisley to please the gods and bust a pig-shaped pinata while we were at it to scare away some bad juju or other and as with most of these parties, burn things.  Yes, that party, did you get the flier as well?

Last year there was a similar party (without the plaid, paisley, or pig...but definitely with the fire) where in a new "portable" fire pit was christened and what is that smell?  Is it the pit?  It smells of plastic and epoxy and is the pit on fire?  Bah, we're just drinking too much and are having a group hallucination or something.

Right.  So when shortly thereafter everyone caught some lung-bug, no connections were ever made...maybe cuz we drank too much?  I'm not sayin' nothin'.

This year we are older and wiser and used such terms as "pace" and "moderation" and also maybe only sat a few minutes at a time around the same fire pit because, ugh, what is that smell?  Is it plastic?  Epoxy?  Is the fire pit ON FIRE?!? And besides, there was "Rock Band" to be played and um maybe I got 100% belting my lungs out in a very angry rendition of the Beasty Boyz' Sabotage, thankyouverymuch, but yes, my throat does sting a little because you get really light headed when you have to scream for five minutes straight to get those "awesomes" to flash across the screen and your palms are sweating and your nervous and really?  100%?  Well I need to get some air and instead of air inhale way more epoxy smoke of death that is healthy for anyone...

So the next morning, my head is a little groggy and my nose stuffy but yeah, a shower would be awesome...like my score...until after scrubbing and scrubbing my hair I'm wondering why no one told me I reeked of so much smoke!  How horrid!  I shampooed my hair three times and still no good and then I realized it was because the smell, the buring and slightly epoxy smell?  Was IN MY NOSE.  

I'd inhaled so much of it, that it was still here...probably looking a whole lot like toxic black tar (I have an overactive imagination, what can I say) coating the inside of my lungs and sinuses and yeah, so not good.  And no dosing of Advil or Sudafed or Netti Potting made it feel all that good...and then came the headache.  I haven't gotten one so bad since the burning tires incident back when I lived in Mexico.  Apparently pyromania knows no racial lines, just sayin'.

I threw the cat-thing in because I am preeeeeetty badly alergic to one of Tim's cats, so I thought it best to not inhale too much of her (you know what I mean) at the party.  She was technically someplace else, but unless you are deep cleaning your place?  There is cat dander and hair where you'd least expect it....like where I stashed my purse and sweater, for example.

We'll Make Great Pets*

I've been trying to figure out the best way to lay out all these things and, well, there isn't one. So hello, and welcome to my disjointed and stunned Monday night.

So I really hate it when Mike Judge is right.

To whit, the H1N1 panic being blasted like so, is not that far off the reality.

The reality, that I could only wish I were making up, was in my "day 1" perusing of Flu-demic filled news. I wish I had saved at least a screen shot so you could feel my discomfort and spread the crazy out of this corner of the world to dilute it a little. A comment left on what I want to say was the Seattle Times website had a person freaking out because s/he has Mexican neighbors and OMG s/he is going to get teh Swine Flu! From her neighbors! Who are Messican!!! And therefore infected! Cuz they are Messican! (Okay, s/he stopped after the first exclamation point and the rest is me, but you get the idea.)

That was about the time I posted my previous 2012 commentary. Cuz really, sometimes, if you don't laugh, you cry.

I explained to someone else closer to my sphere of influence that um, no, actually, most of the folks catching the bad flu in the US were actually not Messican but 'Mericans who had vacationed in the land of my ancestors as most of "my people" in the US, in Washington State in particular, were not likely to be heading to Mexico any time soon. And probably hadn't been for years, because, well, we either lack the funds...or (please don't shoot me) the papers.

And, no, I do not know why so many more Mexicans are dying from the flu than others in the world, but my guess is that if you live in the D.F. you may as well be smoking 5 packs a day, so if you catch a virus that kicks you in the respiratory balls? Yeah, not gonna be a good outcome if your lungs have been thrashed your whole life, you know. Or, okay, yeah, you got me, we are dying because we are not as cool as you. Is that what you wanted to hear? Or can you drop this line of questioning already if you don't like my initial answers?

Your theory sounds just as plausible as mine or my dad's (which revolves around narco-trafficantes and their need to fight back and kick some ass and whoops, where did that vial go). Hmm, maybe my dad's been watching too many of those mexican drug trafficker movies.

And, because I'm tired of it all already and need a little more laughter in my life, did you know that Mexican Ranchera music, the kind with the big horns and the guys all dressed alike and almost marching to the beat as they sing about their horse or their truck or their woman, have entered the 21st century with such modern classics as, Maldito Texto. A-yup, a song about a woman breaking up with a guy via text message. At least she won't give him swine flu that way.
~~~

10 days until LA. If they don't shut down the airports my plan is still go!

* Cuz you were good and read to the end: Porno for Pyros, Pets (Personally? I vote for the Martians.)

The End of Days...Coming to a Mexican Theatre Near You...

So, there's all this hoopla about the latest pandemic/book of revelations/end of daze stuff (isn't it amazing how fast things go from "oh there's a flu-thing" to "OMG WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIEEEE!!!")  And even more hollerings and ponderings as to why it's started in my ancestral homeland.

So pardon me as I don my aluminum foil baseball cap but um...did we all forget the Mayan calendar/2012/end-of-the-world thing already?

Hello crackpot theory from Seattle:  This, of course, is based on the idea that back when the Mayans disappeared it was because they were a super-intelligent race which developed space flight/cool star-trekky teleportation/something similar and POOF!  Gone, in a pre-historic instant!  

So the theory goes that come the "end of the world"/calendar, they are returning to bring their forgotten brothers home (ET-style).  When my people come back in the spaceships, come December 22nd when they start taking a headcount...do you really think there'll be room for 6 billion?  I don't.

I mean, just counting the peeps who live in the D.F. (Day-Effay for full effect), that's over 20 million!  Now I'm no UFO expert, but thems a lot of peeps to stuff in the ships.  So a pandemic here, a war there, it's just what the Mayan witch doctor ordered to keep the numbers in check, or something.

Right, you all think I'm super nuts now, but need I remind you all that TWO states found me sane enough to teach children?  Buahahaha!

Is Writer's Block a Little Like White Coat Syndrome?

I have White Coat Syndrome.

You know, that thing about high blood pressure at the doctor's office but nowhere else?  Yep, that's me.

But the last time, when my doctor asked me if I did?  Explaining what it was and then taking my pressure?  Dropped ten points, just like that.  No really!  As she said, just admitting it to the nurse and/or especially yourself does wonders for your nerves and pressure and BAM!  Well more like, Aaaahhhh, normal numbers.

So after telling you all and my various emailers how bad I am at writing right now because I just can't?  All of my Jack-Handiesque thoughts and nonsense has made their way to the world via blog comments and random one-liner emails and chats and scribbles at stoplights.  (Yes, red-light-writer, bad, very bad...but does it help that I only do it when I know it's a super-long light?  It doesn't, I know...for shame...)

But where was I?  

Right, the nagging thought for the day:

So Seattle is one of those hip-cities that are all about the recycling and stuff, right?  Making it super-easy every year to recycle more and more and mix it all up and feel good about the environment and all that noise.

Well, earlier this month they added more stuff to the list of what can go into recycling.  I'm all down with that.  We can even mix glass with everything else!  Aren't we cool?  

Why is it then that they replaced a big ole' trash-sized recycling dumpster for non-glass items with two "house" sized recycling bins for ALL recyclables?  Sigh... 

Mindblocks are Trippy...

I thought I had writer's block.

But that's not really it.  I can write fine, I can tell you all about how I can't write about anything other than not being able to write.

See my problem?

Every time I sit down to relate the latest wacky thought crossing my mind?  It dribbles away to nothing before I can start typing.  Vanishes like the last wispy veil of the dream you had last night that you just can't remember anymore but it's all on the tip of your brain waiting for you to fall asleep again...because as soon as I get up and walk away from keyboards, pens, pencils, scraps of paper?  Like maybe in the shower or while cubing up chicken breasts or running around delivering my inter-office love notes?  Yep, the words and stories and pictures keep flowing.

If I try to write it down?  All I can think about is how hard it is to remember my great idea.  And I can tell you all about that.

My brain is stuck, blocked, broken.  Or maybe just too jam packed (jammed pack?) with all the weights and worries of the world that I, me, my vioce, we're all trapped beneath it and can't seem to break free right now.

Which is trippy cuz how did I get my previous post out so easily?

TGIF

My Life Looks So Exciting, When Written Down...

Reconnecting with high school friends involves a lot of synthesizing of the last 17 or so years of my life into a few lines of coherent prose. To whit, and because a lot of my history is scattered hither and yon throughout these posts, I shall summarize it all here! And maybe you too will think I am so freakin' cool that I should be in the history books! Or committed! (I've linked to older posts and/or websites for those who want to delve deeper.)

17 Years in 10 Points + Epilogue

1. Just before graduating high school, my best friend and I decided, damn it, we were going to work the 1992 Renaissance Faire (in San Bernardino) if it killed us. I think it almost did. But we were young and adventurous, and immortal and I don't think I ever had that much energy sans caffeine ever again. Adrenaline is a powerful drug, people. So is fear and the abject need not to get into hard drugs or pregnant just before leaving home for college, just sayin'.

2. Technically I did not pack up my room to move away from Los Angeles for reals until after grad school, but as I only really "lived" there during summer breaks, let's agree that mentally? I moved away the summer of 1992 to go to UC Santa Cruz.

3. After many years of schooling and fencing and working horrible hours at the library and being a writing tutor, I graduated in '96 and immediately moved up to "East" Menlo Park (as my students liked to call it) to go to Stanford's Teacher Ed Program and get a Master's degree and my first teaching credential.

4. The spring of '97, just before graduating, in the midst of intense student teaching, final projects, and as a mom-day gift to the women who filled that role in my life, I got married to a fellow I'd met at that 1992 Renaissance Faire.

5. Four years (!) later after learning how to sell books, some accounts receivable, AND actually using my degree teaching 7/8th grade ESL? My world changed. A lot happened in 2001, of course. The one that changed my life forever was that my then husband cashed out the last of his options just before the stock market crashed. Debt free (I know, hate me all you like), we took off to Mexico on a 32 foot sailboat thinking we'd be gone a year.

6. We spent two sailing seasons cruising down the coast of Western Mexico all the way to Zihuatanego, Grro. I was very disappointed that it looked NOTHING like the stretch of beach they used for the movie. But dude! We'd gone 3,000 miles in a sailboat!

7. March of 2003 we set sail to Hawai'i. Yes, same boat. Just the two of us. Yes, 32 feet on deck. We did not kill one another. Didn't even get into one single fight. 29 days. 3,000 more miles. I was the strongest and buffest I will ever be during that trip. We landed in Hilo in April and I was about 40# lighter than I am today. SICK AS A DOG, but damn, I looked good.

8. February of 2005 I was packing the last of my bags and boxes to get the hell out of dodge. In two years I'd earned my second state teaching license, found the sweetest and sassiest, and scariest kids as I taught middle school, met some of the nicest people in the world in our neighbors and friends, and a nightmare of a marriage that ended very badly.

9. I ran away to North Lake Tahoe. As far away from the ocean and tropical weather as possible. I fell back to library work, because my world works in circular patterns...and I took to crocheting them as well (circular patterns) and knitting many many hats and met another set of very nice people that made me think the world is not that bad of a place and everyone has a world of stories in their past and hai! They made it, so could I.

10. In February of 2006 I realized I needed to make real money again but the thought of moving to southern california was too depressing, the bay area was never my thing, Santa Cruz was no longer feasible...in a turn of events that I don't think anyone could have orchestrated, I was but one of a group of friends decided to move to Washington State/the Seattle area at about the same time. It just kinda happened. And remember the circular thing? After temping for a year/year+, I got a job doing accounts payable.

Epilogue: I don't know if I'm going to teach again. The fact that I still wonder about it makes me think I might not mind earning yet another state's credential. I just don't know. In that same vein, I don't know if I'm sticking with accounting. I know...no, I KNOW I'm not living up to my "potential." This is especially true when I run into old school friends who are doing amazing things. And knowing is half the battle, I suppose, but right now this is where I am. And no, I do not have children. I live in a pet-free building, so currently, no animals to call my own either. My relationship status is technically single.

Yes, I was vague in a lot of points because um, if I tell you everything then what do we have to talk about over copious amounts of coffee/cocktails/milk'n'cookies?

Defeat Never Felt So Sweet

Someone else filled the last spot in my division, cue huge sigh of relief.

Now I can go enjoy the sun and daylight after work instead of sitting in my corner trying desperately to knit one more row before dinner, and another after, and another just before bed...

Why do I try then? Two years running and all?

Because I think it makes me knit faster.

Or at least it reminds me that other people out there knit at my pace and I am not such a sl-o-o-o-w knitter, only a slow one :).

I know, I am not a well person.

But it does feel good to sit back and be a cheerleader instead of a competitor, sometimes.

Have I mentioned my OCD Tendencies?

I did not drive back to work last night to look for errant knitting bags.

You have NO IDEA how difficult this was.  It took so much self-control I think I may have blown a fuse.  I know I gave myself a tummy ache.

See:
- LOST would be on before I returned.  Yes, I am addicted, la la la, not listening.

- Did I mention I had no idea where I might have left it?  Yes, I know I've walked almost all the way back to Tim's condo when a mere feet from my own front door in search of a lost item, but this time?  This time involved stops along the way to places long closed (library) and if I didn't immediately find it on my chair at work?  That would only add to my trauma.

- I think subconsciously my arm needed a break.  I have this badly damaged tendon issue that was never resolved and knitting every spare moment of the day after you've been typing and data-entering and pretty much just over-using damaged parts is just plain not smart.

- We're working on smarter, not harder this year.

- I am not OCD!  Shut. Up.

So this morning:

- I collected my knitting bag from the "found" box behind the front desk.  The note said it was found in the back stairwell (I'da never seen it) and signed by the security guard.

What's really silly here?  The knitting contest?  Not much of a big thing to me at this point.  I know I am too slow to win in the more advanced rounds.  The knitting?  I have the pattern at home, there is always more yarn to be purchased, and what a great excuse for new needles!

No, the thing that made my tummy turn inside out was the little bag I've been using to cart my sock knitting projects about.  It was a going-away gift from the last class I may ever teach.  And losing it?  I don't wanna say I'm a big baby or anything...but um, yeah, I think I might have cried a wee bit at seeing it all in one piece...and the word "inconsolable" might have drifted into my thoughts last night if I would never see it again.  I am so not good at losing things.

Which is probably why Andy's advice to me today after I mentioned I'd found my bag was that maybe I should to try to stop being such a space cadet.  Isn't he a sweetie?  Don't you want one of your very own?  This is the kind of thing best friends are for though.

I promise I will be better of keeping track of all my junk.  Less rushing and more planning ahead.

Oh, and planning ahead?  

I'm trekking down to LA la land May 15th - the 24th, leaving at waaaay too early on the 25th, just FYI and all that :).  

Convincing Myself to Wait Until Morning...and Failing

I can't find my knitting bag.

You know, the one that contains my Tokena-in-progress? Which, according to the Ravelry forums I may be the last one they are waiting for to finish. Yeah, that one.

See, I took it to work today because I had a whole real 15 minute afternoon break where I literally put on a timer and just sat and knit while listening to some Nine Inch Nails on super high. I should hang a sign on the back of my chair that says "ON BREAK" or maybe set my screen saver to say "NOT LISTENING" or something similar because I know people walked up behind me and started to ask questions which my supervisor-guy deflected for me.

In a very literal sense (due to seating configuration) he watches my back during these times of "DO NOT BOTHER ME."

I have my ipod. I do not have my little bag.

Crap.

I would so drive to work tonight right this second to get it, but what if it's not there? What if I left it somewhere in between?

See, I rushed out the door. I had errands and stuffed things willy-nilly and no, I did not shut my bag, why would I go and do something like that?

Urgh. My head is starting to hurt.

Everyone's Private Rainbow

I wish you could see my violets. They are so purple! Deep, rich, mysteriously purple. But all I can give you, even after fiddling with Photoshop, is this:



I am far too lazy to look, but I'm almost sure I've mentioned Dr. T., my high school Chem and Physics teacher who taught me more than he may have realized.

He was "shoelace smart," as my friend Pam would say, when it came to Math and complicated thinking. So smart, so very very very smart that the little things like tying your shoelace are so irrelevant a thought that they never stick?

Yeah, he'd start an equation on the board and two lines later it was solved, because he did all the "inconsequential" and "fiddly" bits IN HIS HEAD. We would have been doomed had it not been for Ms. B., Math teacher extraordinaire who would walk us through the page-long explanations to get the magical outcome that Dr. T. insisted was EASY.

I am tangent queen this morning...where was I?

Rainbows. Or at least color spectrum. Dr. T. said everyone always only ever saw their own private rainbow due to combination of water droplets, light, angles and the way our human eyes captured it all and processed it in our brains. He mentioned in passing that possibly purple and red, at either end of the spectrum, were probably the most individualized.

Ah, purples. I've been told that red is the hardest to photograph, is that why? Because we're all seeing our own version of red? And purple aside from being mostly red+blue? And as mentioned, at the end of the spectrum? It has not been the easiest for me to duplicate.

I've tried for days now to get a good picture of my Tokena socks-in-progress as well, and obviously each day the progress is a little more...but the picture? Still not doing them justice. So I fiddled with the Photoshop again:



I'm told I'm still in the running...but unless I get WAY PAST the heel and/or a good deal into the foot area before I go to bed tonight...I may not make it.

On this quiet and reflective Easter Sunday though? Who knows.

Two Steps Forward...

Like getting serenaded* with Whitney (love the hair!**) yesterday at the park wasn't enough to pitch me head first into the 80's...I now have Paula Abdul in all her dancing glory + cartoon cat jumping around in my head...you know the one that goes, sadly, "Two steps forward, two steps back..." But not in the happy-rappy-dancy way?

This is what my socks looked like on Sunday, basking in the sun, having a fabulous time at Gasworks Park as I waited the arrival of L&L&T&B.

This is also what my socks look like again tonight, after "tinking" back the measly 7 rows I painstakingly added to the sock on the right as I realized that somehow? Maybe too much sun? Maybe too many small children and dogs and people with kites? The sun? I completely and totally IGNORED what the chart said to do and put in a couple rows that had absolutely nothing to do with the pattern.

It's not going well, people. Cuz, baybee opposites are not attracting. (Here, get it out of your system, and yes, it really is as bad as you remember it.)

Yeah, good times.

*By serenaded I mean that one lonely guy in that tiny red fishing boat with the very loud speakers and the very dated soundtrack...but it did cause both L&L to burst into song...

**Actually I do love that bow. If that isn't the precursor to the Aretha hat (which I still think I could pull off, shut up) I don't know what is. (ZOMG! Did you know Aretha appears on the video? It's a sign people! Okay, must go away now.)

The Thing About Fish Oil...

So I officially have the lowest blood pressure I've had in years for the last few months.

And maybe I'll find out via the web or maybe you all know? Am I just a shade darker than glow-in-the-dark pasty white because of the fish oil pills or the 1000 mgs of vitamin D? Regardless? I don't mind it at all. Anything to make the day-glow veins look less, well, day-glow, you know?

But the one daily fish oil gel-cappy thing I take? Which, when I read the suggested dosage is only 1/6th the norm? Screws with my head like there was no tomorrow.

Every day, once a day I get this taste in my mouth that tells my brain, "Oh, you had Salmon today already, so no fish for dinner."

And then I do a double take and sometimes actually have to stop whatever I am doing and tell my brain no, no, no, you did not have sashimi for breakfast, that's just the cheapie fish oil pill letting you know it's all swooshy in your tummy, yum! And the next thought promptly becomes, "Am I going to be like when I'm a ditsy little old lady? Stopping myself and pretty much talking (sometimes out loud) to myself to explain things to me?"

At least I'm not doing it in the third person, yet.

O-okay, back to the knitting...cuz I made it through round one (yey me!) and round two started today and I'm still working on the cuffs while everyone else seems to be nearing the heels.

These Are Not the Socks You're Looking For

I think I am worse than a grandmother.

Do grandmother's make people hold their child in such a manner to get "just the right shot" of be-stocking'd feet?

I made these socks for L&L's little girl about 4 times. See, she keeps growing. I finally gave up all hope of making a heel and created tube-socks for the ever growing legs. Yep, they are knee-highs right now, but give or take a week, she'll be using them as anklets.

For all your knitters:
US 2 needles, CO 32 stitches and 2 x 2 ribbing until I thought I'd go blind. Then I made an eye of partridge "back of the heel" but never turned the corner, just kept the ribbing going on the "front" of the sock so that it would maybe stay on the child's foot longer than 5 seconds...until again, I thought I might never finish, and then made a toe.

The yarn? The left overs of my Vesper Sock Yarn in Cantaloupe. Yey bright colors in far-too-grey Seattle!

I do love having a bit of color in my pocket during the dingiest time of the year here.

I use to joke about this and now I am so very much eating many bitters about it...it has been "All Summer In A Day" around these parts for far too long. And when the sun is out and shiny and bright and tempting from the window??? It is still not anywhere near 50 degrees outside.

Andy and I (more Andy than I...my mouth runneth off lately) were pondering how we would walk around in shirtsleeves in Tahoe when it was just touching 50 while here we are still dragging around scarves and pea coats while the hard core PNWers are busting out their shorts...

I think I've acclimated...It has not been 15-28 degrees all winter and now the temps are melting snow like it would a mile up by the lake. So now I am grumpy-mc-cold-pants and NEED to go to to Mexico or Hawai'i or anywhere where I can break a sweat AND catch a sunburn while wearing shorts and a t-shirt...and not my pea coat cuz someone's left the heater on too high as I'm running errands.

And now my break is over...I have to finish some toes tonight so I can maybe get my nerve up to trying a new-to-me heel.

You're Not Missing Anything, Honest

My life has not become too sexy for this blog or anything.

More like the utter and complete opposite.

For those of you wondering about my non-knitting life, sorry, I got nothin'.  Everything is pretty much as it was last week...except maybe my butt hurts a little less and the sinus thing is now just an exploded eyeball thing (okay, maybe I should catch you all up...I can hear, I can breathe, but my god, my eyeball looks like that time my elementary school classmate got slammed into the coffee table by his older brother when they were "playing" wrestlemania and his eyeball was all bloodshot and awful and the skin so swollen it looked like he was growing a new head?  

So all I have is the bloodshot eyeball.  No swelling, no new head.  It doesn't hurt, itch or anything, but feels like my eyeball is dry...which to me says, "HELLO SPRING!"  Yep.  even in artic-ly cold Seattle, flowers are starting to bloom and spread their pollen-love to all...especially my eyeball.)

On the all-I-do-is-knit-front?  I am tirelessly working away at my Sock Madness Sock #1...but I am a slo-o-o-ow knitter at the best of times and so, to make sure I don't get distracted by some other shiny thing, I've kept my life super-simple in the get home, knit, make dinner, knit, eat, knit, clean up, knit until my eyes grow so heavy I must go to bed-style that leaves NO TIME for bloggie things.

I mean, I have cute baby feet pictures to share (good blogger), but yeah, still on the camera along with the pie pictures and everything else that seems so time-sensitive that I'd have to find a way to wander back in time to have it all make sense.

Odd how life keeps moving forward and you're stuck 3 or for days/weeks behind.  How do scrap-bookers do it?  (Sorry that kind of stuff just pops into my head at random...usually when I don't have enough sleep.)

And yeah, I have no chance of finishing my socks before the Sock Madness round is up or all the spaces filled, but as I've decided they'd be a perfect gift item, I have incentive to finish, at least.

In Pain, but Here...

Pain #1:

Wednesday's headache?  At this point I wish it was a hang over.  It's sinus related...my theory is that the music and bar and live instruments combination was so loud that it dislodged everything and put extra pressure where it need not be.  I am insistent on this because I am still stuffy and head-achey in that "trying not to be another bloody sinus infection" way.

And yet, yes, still kinda sorta planning on getting down to the High Dive to listen to In the Drink in non-rehearsal setting.

You caught that kinda sorta bit eh?

Pain #2

So um, can someone just come on by with an ice pack/heat pad/vicodine/a saw?  Because the cure?  Oh dear me oh my it is so much worse than the disease just this second.

Yeah, I went to my "butt" doctor yesterday AM and what was supposed to be my last visit ever became my last visit related to my bike accident and my very first one related to strained back muscles due to possibly my 3, 4, too many to count and remember past bike accidents (remember when we were young and immortal?), that one really bad sailing accident, and possibly that other time when I was slammed into the wall not-so-much-accident that I don't talk about...

i.e. my body has finally been inflicted upon by that dreaded "last straw" and the onion metaphor was used on me and I used every bit of control in me not to say I liked parfaits better.

Yes, even when I'm twisted and contorted in pain (the main muscle worked on yesterday is the one just to the right and up of what most would know as the "pulled groin owie;" the one that wraps around and does major work for my spine...hence the right thigh/hip/groin area not so happy with me this morning...and if I cut it off would it hurt less?)

Pain #3

I bonked my head on my car super hard this morning while I was trying to figure out how to get into the driver's seat without hurting myself, too much.

Yes I wanted to cry.  But being a big girl now, I simply swore loud enough to convince the new folks just moving into the building that maybe I was the one tenant best avoided...I make such awesome first impressions, let me tell ya'.

However, the distraction given to me by my pounding head was just enough to get me into the car without thinking too much about how much my pelvic area is inflamed and HURTS when I lift my leg up enough to clear the door frame of my car.

~~~

I won't say he promised, but my doc did hint that maybe today would be the worst of the pain seeing as he had to work on the biggest of the muscles yesterday.  I hope he was not lying to me so I'd come back.  

I am counting the hours until I can take more advil...is that bad?

Happy Friday!