January flew by with only one other small knit getting done, and that was just a new nalgene water bottle cozy. Nothing special there. I still don’t like the handle on it, so no photos yet. It’s the same yarn as the tea cozy so it’s pink/salmon handspun and I did it in a broken rib. Use your imagination. It’ll look better than what I actually did I am sure.

The end of January was Shmoocon of course. And despite taking extra time off of work to be sure I got plenty of sleep and wasn’t stressed, and Zinc and Vitamin C for two weeks ahead of time and during the con, and naps, and no boozing it up or partying. I even did a different job so I wouldn’t be exposed to as many people. By Monday night, I was sick. And in fact, I am still sick, though finally off of the antibiotics (for now, unless I have to go back again). This time I actually went to the doctor and his verdict was tonsillitis. The antibiotics given did nothing to make me feel better and two days before they were up I called him because I suddenly had a fever again. So I got new, stronger, expensive even when generic, antibiotics designed for bronchitis and pneumonia. They were supposed to clear me up by the end of the weekend, but they did not. So, Monday morning of what was now week three (this past Monday) I was back in the office so he could listen to my lungs and take an xray if needed. He decided they were clear and I sounded good except for my lack of voice and the coughing. It’s now Sunday and I still have no voice, still having coughing spasms, and still very very tired. I spent most of this weekend sleeping, again, much to shmoo’s dismay. He is also tired of me being sick.

So now I’ve burnt an entire week of time off from work on this crud, as well as the extra days I actually took for the con, and am still sick and quite frustrated because I’ve done everything I can to not get sick. The doctor said “you should have had a flu shot” to which I replied “Oh I had one back in October thank you very much”. Basically, if you get a flu shot and then wash your hands at least 5 times a day, you cut your risk of getting sick by 50%. I washed my hands way more than that. So now I am angry at myself for getting sick and it taking so long to get better. And I am frustrated because I really don’t know what else I could have done to prevent this. I guess I need to decide if it’s worth and if I am going to the con again next year because other than not going, I don’t know what to do about getting sick every year.

But enough bitching!

The naughty reindeer olympic hat was a huge success! Todd loved it, and wore it ALL weekend, despite being indoors and it being a very hot hat. Better yet, the registration desk had a few inquiries about where they could buy “the hat with the fucking” on it. So that made me feel good. Mostly I am glad that Todd got a hat that I like and that he loves because he waited two years for the damned thing, so he should have a hat he quite likes. I’ll probably never do another one like it, because the one was enough, but it’s always nice for a knitter’s gifts to be loved and well received.

That’s all I got for now. Been to sick to knit or do anything else but nap between coughing fits and trying to keep it together for work.
Maybe there will be progress to report next month.

toddhatfront

toddhatback

toddhatreverse

I love the armwarmer and can’t wait to wear them one day, but I still need to finish spinning the yarn for the second one…

armwarmer1

I’d show you photos of the one finished arm warmer and the finished Naughty Reindeer hat, but both need to be washed and the hat blocked for sure. And I am worried it’s going to be to small, because Todd has a big head. Or maybe it’s my imagination he’s got a big head. Maybe it’s normal sized and it will be fine. But now I am worried, none-the-less. And shmoo won’t even try it on. He says he’s not going to contribute to my crazy. And that if I am going to be crazy about the hat, I can do it on my own.

It’s like he knows me or something!

The new job has been been very busy brain-wise. There has just been so much new to learn that my brain is just pooped out by the time I get home at night. Not that this is a bad thing, it’s just not how it has been for several years. It’s been an adjustment, but I am starting to feel like I’ve found my feet. It doesn’t hurt that I LIKE my job. I feel challenged every day and I respect the company I work for so much. I am not used to being proud of the company for which I work. It’s a novel experience.

I only recently started creeping along at some knitting again. I’m half way done with a pair of handspun rainbow armwarmers now. But the 2nd bump of roving is still needing to be spun up the rest of the way, and I didn’t use a pattern, just kinda winged it as I went along, so we’ll see if I end up with anything close to a “pair.”

I also knocked out a dog sweater in September, but it only took a day or so and I didn’t actually finish it very well. The dog took it and started wearing it before I got the ends tied in, much less finished up the arm holes and tweaked the neckline to be more what I wanted. I don’t think it matters, she loves it, it keeps her warm, and if it ends up getting trashed, I’ll probably be ok with it. It’s made from Lamb’s Pride worsted so it’s hairing and fuzzing all over the place, but since I am not the one wearing it, I can live with that.

Speaking of Daisy, she had surgery at the end of last month to have some tumors removed and get her teeth done. She came out of it just fine, despite all my nervousness and worry, but the tumor was a Mast Cell Tumor, Grade 2. Which means, yes, it was malignant, but that the vet thinks she got all of it, since she was pretty aggressive when removing it, and now we are just observing to see what happens and she has a check up again in March.

Shmoo found out that my vet is a knitter and spinner. And then he promptly forbid her to talk about the fiber arts to me. I don’t think it will last, as I’ll just talk to her about it instead.

That’s about it for news here. Hopefully I’ll have some finished arm warmers to show off before the end of the year.

TRIP.
We went to Niagara Falls and camped at Four Mile Creek State Park this year. It was pretty darned awesome. The weather was nice, the park was lovely and right on Lake Ontario. We ate at a biker bar that had some of the best food ever, twice. We ate at several nice mom and pop type joints that did wings and beef on a weck (A local roastbeef sammich on kemmelwick rolls. SO GOOD!). We met up with internet friends, and relaxed and saw the beauty that was the rural western New York area and the stunning natural force of the falls. Absolutely stunning. So beautiful and just overwhelming. I highly recommend going if you haven’t been and you are able. Take the boat ride and the platform walk on the US side and the tunnel walk and eat at the fancy restaurant overlooking the horse-shoe falls on the CA side. Seriously. You won’t be disappointed! The few pics we took can be found here.

TAKE.
While on the Canadian side, in the Falls parking lot there, my Jeep was broken into. They damaged my glove box, but didn’t get anything out. They took what they thought was a purse however. It contained my iPod, my entire fountain pen collection, and my knitting. I was torn between being thankful that they didn’t get anything “important” and pissed off that they ended up taking something they wouldn’t really find useful and was important only to me. I imagine the thief was fairly disappointed because my bag was turned in to Niagara Park Police Lost & Found. No idea when, but I submitted my L&F request to them this past Sunday morning, and they called a few hours later saying everything was there except the iPod (including the various cords and chargers!). Now, don’t get me wrong. I loved my iPod. I miss it greatly. But I am pretty damn happy to be getting back my knitting and pens. Very very happy! As for the bag itself, meh. I had already replaced that $12.00 Target bag with a nice new shiny purse from the Coach outlet and then got some fancy Canadian yarn as a consolation as well. (Fleece Artists Merino in a fingering weight Crimson.) But I had decided I wouldn’t be starting my knitting project over because I just didn’t have a suitable replacement yarn and didn’t think finding one would be possible without a lot of effort. Not that I had been knitting much. It’s too hot. But I’ll be happy to keep plugging away at my tiny project when it comes back home to me, and eventually finish it. (There will likely not be an actual knitting post this month, and probably would not have been even if the knitting had not been stolen.)

START.
I’ve started my new job. (I would not have quit the other one without a new one!) And I love it. Everyone is friendly, and the company actually likes its employees. It makes such a difference. I cannot express how much happier I am with this job. The commute is about four times longer (almost 16 miles, up from 3.7), I can’t work from home anymore any old time I want, and I have to be on time, and I. LOVE. IT. The learning curve is steep because I am basically changing fields, but I am plugging away at it with a joy for my job that I thought I had lost. I am sure that there will be bad days. There always are. It is work after all, and there’s a reason they call it work and not super-happy-fun-playtime. But I feel that these days will be fewer and further between and I will be happier in the spaces between them, and that’s really what it’s about.

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The first was on July 4th. We went to see the Nats play and had really great seats that we got for about 25 bucks off each. They were still 60 dollar seats though, and while my cheap little heart squeezed in distress at that, we wanted to go out and do something, and have it be a little special, and nice seats were a way of doing that. Nats stadium is very pretty as stadiums go and there’s really not a bad seat in the house. I did over all find it to be a bit too loud for me, and ended up with a massive headache and had forgotten to bring any Advil for just such an emergency. Nats stadium also has the advantage of being right there off of Metro. So we had metro’d in, walked the half block to the stadium, and bam we were there. No muss, no fuss, no paying to park (free metro parking due to holiday) and no having to deal with DC traffic. Metro does have the downside of making me motion sick on the best of days however, so while I find the convenience of it rather handy, I hate the actual riding on it. We watched the whole game, which had gone into an extra inning. The Nats actually won, and over all, we were not disappointed with our day out. It was just special/costly enough to be something we had done for the holiday and we enjoyed ourselves, despite the heat, headache, the really drunk dude heckling the Cubs’ pitchers constantly, and the insane costs of shitty beer and food (rough food estimates were around 50+ bucks total spent for 2 beers, and 2 bratworst (no condiments!). 1st beer was a 12oz an of Coors Light, 2nd was a Sam Adams draft also around 12 oz. I drank water, which they allow you to bring in one bottle each, unopened.)

The second game we went to was last night. We went to see the Bowie Baysox. They are the AA affiliate of the Baltimore Orioles, and they were playing the Nats AA team, the Harrisburg Senators.* We had 3rd row seats on the end of the row behind home plate. Our tickets were 14 bucks each and came with “free” food. (The would have been 11 bucks each without the “free” food option.) So we had two really good seats, dinner (a foot-long hotdog (with better/many more condiments stands than the Nats), a popcorn, and a bag of peanuts each), and a nice evening watching the game. Parking was free, and we got to drive there instead of having to use Metro, so I was already in a better mood once we arrived. Parking was also pretty darned close to the entrance as well, and it’s not like we got there that early. Beer choices were a lot better and a lot cheaper than at the Nat’s stadium, and the food choices seemed more diverse as well. And when shmoo came back from grabbing another beer, and me a lemonade, stating that he didn’t want to talk about the pretzel, because it had just fallen from the sky and into his mouth, I made him share it with me. And the pretzel was a damn sight better that the one I had at Nats stadium on Stitch-N-Pitch night back at the end of May. We spent around 35 dollars. (2 24oz beers, one was Molsen, the other was a Corona Extra, 1 pretzel, 1 Bicardo Mohito, 1 lemonade. I had the Mohito and Lemonade, and we were also able to bring in water. As for the “free” food, we ate a both of the hotdogs, about 3/4 of the popcorn and took the peanuts home.) The crowd was a lot better too. No one was being a drunk beligerant asshole, and the game was just as good as the Nat’s game we saw.** The Baysox won and traffic getting out wasn’t insane. We were back home, parked in the driveway less than 30 minutes later.***

So, after discussing it on the way home, shmoo and I both feel that the Baysox was better all the way around. (And not just because I remembered to bring Advil with me just in case. Which I needed, and was thankful I had it.) We don’t regret seeing the Nats like we did, but for future baseball urges, we are going Baysox. In fact, he even mentioned getting season tickets as a possibilty for next year. I am thinking we should just get an 8 game package myself, as 8 games over a 5 month period is probably enough for us. If we get really crazy, maybe we’ll do 11.

*- Some guy named Bryce Harper was playing for the Senators and people went nuts with the cameras every time he got on deck. Based on my google search last night after getting home, he was the Nat’s first round draft pick last year, and is up and coming or something.

**- I *might* be of the opinion that baseball is baseball so ymmv. It’s got a lot of downtime to it, and I remember when I’d go watch in college, we’d almost always take some homework to get done while we watched. It’s not that I don’t like baseball, I do, but if the teams are equally matched, and it’s not T-Ball level, then it’s pretty much the same to me. For me it’s more about geting out of the house, and away from the computer and enjoying being outside and watching a little ball while you are at it.

***- Also, Tuesday night was Tailgate Tuesday, which we didn’t participate in, but had we gotten there early enough to do so, it was 2 buck draft beers and live music from 5-7, with the game starting at 7.

teacosy

I did not put the button on it yet, but just used some bits of yarn to tie the button hole to the fabric instead. Not perfect, but it works and it’s impressive what a difference it makes for keeping my tea hot.

As to the Swedish Fish sock, I hate it. It’s a cute sock, the colors contrast great, and I should love it.
But I don’t. I think it looks awful on and now it’s in time out. I’ll have to think about it and revisit it some other time after it’s been washed, blocked, and left to behave itself for a bit.

For those of you in Canada, Happy Canada Day. And if you’re in the States, Happy 4th of July.
And I guess the rest of you can just piss right off.

(No, there’s nothing wrong with your feed reader, I cheated and back-dated my post to be in June instead of posting on July 2.)

So if you need the sidebar, it’s likely at the bottom of the screen until I get around to fixing it. Which won’t be today.

Dear Family Next To Us,

I know this may come as a shock to you, but some people actually read AND follow the rules of the campground they have chosen to stay in. You however, would not be included in either subset of the population. The basic tenants of camping involve not being loud ass-hats, keeping your pets on a leash, not making a lot of loud noises after quiet hours start, not collecting wood in the park’s forest when expressly forbidden, checking out on time, and knowing where your kids are. Most of these would fall under being respectful to your neighbors, but that last one…. it’s just a basic parenting rule, which alas you seem to be poor at also.

Breaking the camping rules, well, those are just dick moves, which shmoo and I will bitch about and mock you for, but this last one, it’s really inexcusable.

When your sister, Aunt Margie, came over with Creepy Kyle* because he wanted to introduce himself and meet the dog, that was fine. And when he went and got your dog, and your dog peed on our chair in our Canopy AND THEN peed on our dog, well, these things happen, especially when you fail to keep your dog on a leash, as per the campground rules. I shall not berate you for the dog being a dog, it happens. Your failure to control his behavior in other ways is all on you, but this is not. But I digress…..

When exchanging casual “where are you from?” information with Margie, I mentioned that Daisy was an older dog, and that she was unused to kids because we did not have any, and we were just there camping to relax. I thought this made it rather clear in a polite way, that we really didn’t want to get involved with your children. We didn’t want to watch them. We didn’t want them at our camp, asking us questions and touching our things with absolutely NO supervision from you. And newsflash, just because YOU said it was OK to come to our campsite, that doesn’t mean it’s OK. You need to teach your children to ask, or better yet, you should have come with them to ask. God forbid you teach your children courtesy and respect for others space, property, and time. And that’s not even taking into account that you had 2 children and 5 adults at your campsite, and yet, you couldn’t seem to keep track of where the children were, no matter how many times you lost them. I am now very familiar with little Donna*’s entire name.

Yes, that’s right, I know your children’s first, last, and middle name.
Me, the stranger you let your children wander off to harass numerous times because you couldn’t be bothered to be a parent.
Me, the stranger who could have taken your children and done unspeakable things to them were I a bad person, and you wouldn’t have even noticed until well after it was too late.
Me, the stranger who has the power of the internets and could use their names to find you, all of you.
Feeling a little skeezed out yet? You should.

Because, get this, it’s not just nice people who go camping. And while yes, most people are friendly, and I don’t believe in raising your kids to be afraid of people, perhaps instilling in them a bit of caution would not be a bad thing. The childless couple beside you might not be a nice one next time.

With respect, though you showed us none,
Laura

*Names of the kids have been changed because it’s not the kid’s fault the parent’s a douche.

Now then, things we’ve learned about camping:
1. Don’t go on Friday, leave on Monday instead.- Sunday night was the nicest night there. It was peaceful and quiet. The grounds were mostly empty. Everyone was spaced out enough that you weren’t all up each other’s butt, and traffic coming on Monday day was light because most everyone else was at work. If you are taking day off to make it a long weekend, make it a Monday (non-holiday monday’s please!) instead of a Friday. You’ll not regret it.
2. Get some damn tiki torches.- not for the light, but for the bug repelling oil they burn. Set up a perimeter around your camp and keep those fuckers burning. Because as it turns out, if you don’t and someone else does, it just runs all the bugs over to you and no amount of citronella candles and deet spray are going to keep you from getting eat up in mosquito bites. Ask me how I know this. *scratch scratch*
3. Having a tent with a little “porch” area really helps keep the bugs out of your tent.- This is, of course, more important when it’s the only bug free zone you have. We downsized to a smaller tent with a little screened in porch, and it’s made a huge difference for keeping the bugs out and making sleeping more peaceful. It’s also a good place to stick the dog’s water bowl at night. I miss being able to stand upright in our tent, and the extra floor space for storing crap, but really, we didn’t need that extra space and being bug free is far nicer.
4. Taking the dog’s crate keeps her happier and us less stressed in dealing with her. – It gives her a place to stay where she feels safe and can still look out at the world and watch everything, and provides a way to confine her that a leash or line just doesn’t match. Don’t leave home without it.
5. A roof rack is freaking awesome. – Not only does it give us more cargo room, it also allows us to go ahead and put things up when packing up, and still have the tent and bug canopy standing so that they can be the last things to come down without affecting how we load the Jeep.
6. Put a tarp under your tent.- That way, when you take it down and need to roll it up, and you still have crap on the table, so you end up rolling it up on the ground, you can still do a neat job and not roll a bunch of dirt in with the tent.
7. Store the trash where the squirrels can’t get it.- Because otherwise, you wake up to bag rattling at night, and then in the morning you find a corncob and a halfbag of giant marshmallows by the tree behind your camp.
8. A cheap shower curtain is a most excellent table cloth.- No seriously. I got a cute printed one for 9 bucks. It’s ok if it gets wet, and it’s sponges off easily. It’s also a bit thicker than the “camping set” table cloth you can buy so it’s sturdier. And while I had wanted to sew an oilcloth one, I couldn’t even get the fabric to do so for 9 bucks.
9. If you are over the age of 20, just go ahead and get an air mattress.- Really. Do it. Your back, and various other body parts, will thank you for it. Sleeping on the ground is uncomfortable and painful, and leaves you sore once you get past a certain age. And having a good night’s sleep makes you appreciate the days activities better.

That’s about it. If you are of a mind to go camping, hopefully some of these tips can help you out. We go a few times a year now, and we’ve gotten fairly decent at it. Or at least, we have a system that works for us, but we learn/think of new things all the time that would make the next trip better. The trick is to find a balance somewhere between “hey that would be really useful so we should take it” and “we have packed everything we could possibly want or use so it’s just like home except it’s not” because in my mind, camping is something that should take you away from home and ALL the comforts there of, but it shouldn’t be a miserable experience, otherwise, why would you want to go?