Wool socks seem a bit much this evening

Well, we went from 50 degrees and rainy last week, to hot and humid (and now, raining) this week. Seemed like the perfect time to finish up the "Magic Stripes" socks. Check 'em out!This picture is fun because not only does it show my lovely socks, but the wall that I painted as well.

Wearing the socks was a bit steamy but I just had to try them on. Here's a picture (a CRAPPY picture, I have no idea why it came out so blurry) of my mom, wearing her turquoise raglan sweater:

So I don't know if she's dancing and I'm also swaying to the music, or if I had the camera on some crazy setting, or what was going on... but there she is. It FITS! Perfecto!

And here's the interesting Yoga Mat Bag, in a bilious shade of green. As you may notice, the strap is completed though not yet attached.


On to my newest fiasco... and it will be a fiasco. I don't know what I was thinking. That's not entirely true; I was thinking that I'd like to try some intarsia and I'd like to make something for a friend of mine for Christmas next year, and I thought I'd try to combine the two tasks into one.

So the deal is... I have a friend who has a solo music project. You can see his website and hear his music here

Obodoh

As you can see, he has a lovely little birdie as a "logo," and his musical name is Obodoh. So I thought to myself that it would be a great idea to knit this little birdie on a scarf to start off my intarsia fun. Upon thinking about this plan a bit further, it came to my attention that intarsia on a scarf was a great idea, as long as there was some sort of backing to it (particularly on a beginner's intarsia experience!). So, I gathered ideas from a great bunch of guys and gals on the MySpace.com group Stitch 'n Bitches. They were very helpful (have been and continue to be!). Some ideas included knitting the scarf on straight needles, then sewing on some sort of backing. Another idea was to knit it in the round, which would be helpful in avoiding having to sew. Knitting in the round sounded like a great idea at the time, so that's how I proceeded.

HOWEVER... what one (read: I) didn't consider in this was that as I knit intarsia in the round, when knitting more than about 5 stitches in any single color, it creates a situation in which the yarn has to be cut on EACH side of the piece every friggin row. As opposed to knitting on straight needles, in which you can usually just pick up the color of yarn where you left it to continue in the pattern back and forth. So yeah. Can you say HUGE SPAGHETTI MESS??? Weaving in all of those ends has not been fun in the least. You live and you learn.

I had gotten quite far into the project before I realized why this was such a pain in the neck, so I decided that I'd just tough this one out. My plan is this:

On each end there will be the bird on one side, and the letters "obodoh" on the opposite. As you can see in the picture, I got the "doh" part done. Yay! The middle of the scarf will just be straight black stockinette, easy schmeasy.

To get the pattern for the bird, I went to this great website at which I uploaded my .gif of the picture, and it shot out a lovely graphed out chart of the picture. The charts for the letters were taken from this website. In order to make it easier to see, I transferred the chart onto graph paper with larger squares, which I created at another fabulous website. Is there anything one CAN'T find on the internet? How did people ever get ideas for projects and fixes to problems without it???

Now I'm trying to decide what project to start next (while the Obodoh scarf is on hiatus). It'll probably be something small (gloves??) so that I don't have to have fabric sitting in my lap during this heat wave!

Happy Memorial Day

I'm tired and weary yet feel it necessary to post something, as it's been a week. I realize that there are millions out there waiting with bated breath...

This weekend was Memorial Day weekend, the official kick-off of the summer season. Surprisingly, gas prices in the Capital Region stayed where they were. In fact, I even saw the price in some stations go DOWN a cent from Sunday to Monday. Interesting, if not very helpful or comforting.

It was a gorgeous weekend here, which was great after the crap week we had full of cold, rainy days. The campers up in the Adirondacks really got their money's worth, for sure. Instead of camping, we went up north to Moffitt Beach with my parents and our dogs. My brother had a site up there with a friend of his, so we just sat and "shot the shit," if you will. Typical campground activities: going for a walk, sitting by/poking the fire, eating, and doing nothing. Oh, and of course I had been smart enough to remember my second "Magic Stripes" sock and got a few rows of the foot down.

Today, we went to the biggest event of the YEAR: The Town of Galway Memorial Day Parade!! Never has such fun and excitement been had by literally hundreds of people. We've fallen into a pattern for Memorial Day, one which I do not mind in the least. We get up early (well, I mind that part), go to breakfast at Chuck's (local diner and 'hot spot' for the high schoolers), then stand outside in front of Chuck's for the big parade. My dad and brother act like fools for the candy that is thrown, comments are made about what's missing or new in the parade that year, then we head down to the park in the "center" of town to buy some used books to support the Galway Public Library. All in all, a down-home country kind of day, which is just fine with me.

Next time, pictures. Now? Bedtime!

Yay for weekends

I finally got a chance to finish up the turquoise raglan sweater for my mother this week. I had her try on the almost finished product last weekend, when everything was complete except the second sleeve. I am proud to say that it seems to fit beautifully and she seemed pleased with the results. I will take a picture when I give her the finished product, whenever that may be.

Since that project is finished (SUCCESS!!) I have moved on to another project that I've had in my project queue: the "Om Yoga Mat Bag" from Stitch 'n Bitch Nation.
The green is just about as crazy green as it is in that picture... I'll just say that it was on sale. It's Lily "Sugar 'n Cream" in Hot Green. And it actually looks pretty cool in contrast with my blue yoga mat. Interestingly enough, I don't even use the yoga mat. Maybe once every six months. However, I felt the urge to try my hand at a lace knitting project and this seemed like a relatively easy and very inexpensive project. Plus, it'll provide me with a place to keep the unused yoga mat! Fantastic.

In employment news, I have my first REAL interview on June 1 for a full-time elementary school psychologist position in Amsterdam, NY. I wouldn't go so far as to say I'm optimistic about the outcome... considering the fact that many other candidates have graduated or will graduate at this time of year. So the small pool that I graduated with, many of whom I'm sure would like to stay within "the 518" will be applying. Oh well, life sucks and then you die, right?

If this rainy weather doesn't break soon, I just might hurt someone.

My sense of humor is warped

If you have a sick sense of humor at all, you have to check this link out. Totally hilarious:

www.yumlum.com

Beats the hell out of a scarf (no pun intended).

Update, schmupdate

I ask myself again, WHY exactly am I writing things and posting things? I'm fairly certain that the "clicks" I do receive are simply people surving through the blog ring and accidentally end up on me. Only to leave ASAP. Again I ask, why do I bother? I'm not entirely sure, but I know that I continue to do it, so I might as well shut up and get on with it.

So the job is going well. It's been about two weeks now, so only 5 more to go which is sort of sad. It goes so damned fast. It's been pretty relaxed all in all, I've got some things that I'm working on that keep me busy enough, but not so busy that I'm a crazy woman. Like today, for example, I didn't get much done. But yesterday I got a load done so I think I'm even.

Last night I shopped as if I was actually making a school psychologist's salary, which I am not. However, I do have to look the part, and since all of my summery clothes were casual (partly due to the fact the job I had last summer required casual clothes)... I spent some money. And, truth be told, I don't feel bad about it. So THERE!

Got a new coffee maker thing today. Chris picked it up and gave it a whirl. It's one of those that you can make basically single servings at a time.... but it came with two 16 ounce travel mugs. It deposits the coffee right into the mugs, and you can do them one at a time or both at once. Very handy for me in the morning, when I don't want to make a whole huge amount in the percolater we have. Yay!

The turquoise raglan is coming along. It's been tough being back working full time along with tutoring. And you should see the laundry piles!! Scary!

The Big Apple

I played hooky yesterday and joined my husband on his business trip to NYC yesterday. I had always intended to join him on a day when he only had a short meeting in the morning, and yesterday was that day.

We left Albany (well, Rennsselaer) at about 8 a.m. and arrived in New York (Penn Station) at 10:30 a.m. While Chris and his boss went to their meeting, I walked down a few blocks to Union Square, where I spent a few hours just mostly sitting, enjoying the gorgeous day, and watching the dogs in the dog park. Though there were quite a few people around (doesn't anybody WORK???) it was very peaceful and I actually just enjoyed sitting there, watching the people and the dogs. I'm not usually such a "sit and do ABSOLUTELY nothing" kind of person... but it was good.

After that, I met up with Chris and we took in a few hot dogs, as well as some mango and papaya juice, at Grey's Papaya (the #1 special with sweet onion sauce... yummy!). From there, we decided to hoof it down to the World Trade Center site, as neither of us had been since 9/11. On our way downtown, we walked along the Hudson River Park

Looking downtown at the skyline, sans Twin Towers

Some pictures of the activity going on at the World Trade Center:

By this time, we were both overheated and our feet were killing us. There's only so much draw a beautiful day can have, so we headed underground to take the subway back uptown to Times Square.

Hard Rock Cafe in Times Square

Once there in Times Square, we decided it was time to sit in someplace cool and have someone provide us with beverages. So, since Chris had never been, we went to the Hard Rock Cafe for an early dinner/late lunch/afternoon snack of salads and diet Pepsi. I enjoy the Hard Rock Cafe experience with all of the fun memorabilia on the walls and loud rock music playing, and it was wonderful to sit down out of the sun and heat and drink like a fish. (We made sure to use the bathroom before we left).

After our respite, we headed for the TKTS booth in order to find some tickets to a show. Which we did. But before heading to the show, Chris wanted to spend some time in Central Park. So again we headed for the subway. There were quite a few people out, and we stretched out on the big rock and basically just hung out for probably an hour or so, shooting the shit and taking random pictures of women singing with full face veils on and a bum who seemed infatuated with or fascinated by the pieces of wire holding the lengths of fence to the posts surrounding the lanscaping work in the park. In a nutshell, boring in a good way.

Then it was time to head BACK downtown to Greenwich Village, where we found our theater destination, then set out to find another snack (really, we just didn't have it in us to walk anymore so we had to SIT somewhere). So we had a dinner/snack at the Peculier Pub on Bleecker St. We just had sandwiches, and we did not have beer though the bottled list looked pretty extensive (alphabetical by country!).

A crappy yet still visible picture of a clown mosaic made of beer bottle caps at the Peculier Pub(yes, that's PeculiEr, not PeculiAr)

After that pit stop, it was time to head just down the street for our show at the Village Theatre to see "I Love You Because..."

I won't go into all sorts of details and what have you about the show, other than to say that it was an acting cast of 6 people that must have an incredible amount of energy. It was entertaining, funny, and I really enjoyed it. I don't have a lot of experience with musicals (on Broadway, off-Broadway, or otherwise) but it kept me entertained and the 2 hours flew by and that's all that matters to me.

UNFORTUNATLY, fly is what we had to do after the show ended. We had really cut it close by taking in a show with an 8pm start time "all the way down" in the Village. The show ended at about 10:15 and our Amtrak train left at 10:45. We made it, fortunately, because that was the last train of the night. We would have been stuck in the city for the night, which would have been expensive (compounded by the fact that I would have probably missed work today too...)!!

I wanted to sleep on the train, since we wouldn't get home until 1:30 a.m. However, people are morons. And morons have technology. And morons with technology tend to have the LOUDEST technology, because he/she is too much of a moron to realize that other people don't need evidence of every single flippin' time one presses a flippin' button on one's F@*$&N' phone. Not to mention Moron Supreme, who sets a flippin' alarm on the flippin' phone, then proceeds to fall soundly asleep so that the rest of us are subjected to hearing that alarm for an entire HOUR before my darling husband decided to go (literally!) shake the guy out of his slumber and tell him to turn it off!

And that was our day. We got home and crashed, and I had to get up at 6:30 for work. YAY! Now I'm tired, and I think I need a nap. And my calves hurt. I won't even MENTION my completely ripped up (formerly BLEEDING) feet b/c of my F@#$IN' shoes. Damnit.

My brain hurts

I'm not sure if it's possible, but I think going back to work has given me a brain ache. I came home yesterday from my first day back at the middle school with a flippin' migraine. Mind you, I had a relatively stress-free day, had the office to myself and basically spend the day sorting through emails and piles of paper just to get things organized. I was wrecked when I got home! I had a probably more stressful day today, in that I got more of an idea of what I was to be doing and actually had tasks to complete, etc... yet today I don't have a headache. I'm tired, but no headache. So I really attribute yesterday's ill-feelings to the thinking equivalent of "brain freeze." After four months of chilling, knitting, tutoring, and doing household projects, going back into the role of School Psychology threw my poor brain for a loop.

I got my books in the mail yesterday, though, so I had that to come home to. After I took some pills and a nap, I flipped through those suckers. I really liked looking at the animal knits book, and I have some projects I'd like to try out... but I think the Ann Budd books are going to be extremely handy. They're pattern books that provide the patterns for VERY BASIC projects, with the information on how to add/change details to your personal taste. But more importantly, the patterns are given in chart form in which you choose your yarn gauge that you are working with and the size of the object (i.e. gloves for a child's size, or a hat with a certain circumference), and you simply follow along with the pattern, inserting the numbers from a chart as you go. This allows you to not only knit with whatever yarn and needles you want, but it gives you a great blank canvas on which you can add your own designs (like intarsia, or stitch patterns). The one is all different project (hats, mittens, gloves, scarves, and a basic sweater) and the other book is all sweaters. I can't wait to try out a pattern...

However, I am still working on the turquoise raglan. Getting there! I have about 2 inches left of the torso before I end with 2 inches of 2x2 ribbing. Then all I have left are the sleeves. I tried it on yesterday and it seems to be the correct shape and all of that. So that's a good sign! Though, as my knitting time has been drastically reduced, it probably will not get done by Mother's Day as I'd thought it might. Thankfully I wasn't counting on it as a Mother's Day gift!!