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Originally uploaded by kyoti
This is my desk today at work - well lunchtime-ish.
As you can see, I have my priorities straight.
The project is the second of the toe socks. I cranked the first one out in about a week, this one is taking longer. That is mostly becuase I've been knitting less and reading more.
But the knitting is good for lunch since it fits quite nicely in my purse. Better than the book I'm reading.
I keep trying to find the exact blog post but Yarn Harlot, a long, long time ago, wrote a bit on how knitting makes her feel better about life. Badly summarized to make a pair of socks, a sweater or even a simple scarf you have to do the same thing over and over correctly.
Each finished project and even stitch just proves you can do something right - time and time again, she wrote.
When everything else is a mess I try and keep that in mind at least in knitting I accomplish something. It's my little bit of perfection.
http://icanhascheezburger.com/2009/11/1
I would note, cats' interactions with yarn is another reason, in my book, they should generally be avoided.
So to me, socks with toes - each little piggy encased in its own little fabric tube - is cause for much squeamishness. I don't get it, I just don't
The last time I mentioned these socks several friends pointed me to these shoes I'm still trying to understand the appeal. To me it would be like a very horrible form of torture. Every cringe-inducing step.
So you can see why this flickr group might not appeal to me.
In fairness, I got an invite to the group after posting pictures of these socks:
I'm knitting them for a friend who specifically requested socks with toes... and I'm always up for a knitting challenge. I might not want to wear the things, but making them entertains me.
Still even modeling them (they have to be washed anyway before hand them over and my feet are clean) made me squirm for the two minutes the pictures took.
Nothing else to that - just bored and thought I would share.
Two weeks ago I started a pair of socks with toes for a friend. Now I have one sock finished, I need to just stick in the tail ends, but haven't started the second one.
Instead I diverted my attentions to a scarf for a hockey mascot. Which really, I won't have much longer so I think that kind of makes sense. Still, I think maybe I should do one thing at a time. I just can't seem to focus.
There is also the sweater I've been working on forever for my brother, a sweater I started in March for me that needs sleeves and a baby sweater I keep meaning to make.
The list doesn't include all the projects I have lined up to do in the future.
So much yarn, so little time.
Just saying that makes me giggle a little.
Pictures will come soon, but I just had to share. I'm on the first sock and have two toes down, three to go. Productive lunch break today really. =).
I'm using this pattern from Garnstudio and bamboo and wool yarn I found at Jo-Ann Fabrics. The yarn looks like a Southwest sunset over the mountains.
Shocking, I know.
Growing up my father would frequently comment to me that I should act "to the manner born."
Or at least that is what I thought he was saying.
My father is a surgeon, but his mother was an English teacher and throughout my life he would frequently quote snippets of poetry or literature to me.
I was well through High School before I realized this wasn't how most people grew up. Then again, I also thought it was perfectly normal that someone would tell you the history of a building, event or things when they were brought up in conversation.
It was only in the last year or so that I realized I'd might have been hearing what he was saying to me incorrectly all this time.
I always understood the phrase to mean I should be comfortable in all situations. As much at home in a cocktail dress as I was jeans and a tee-shirt.
It wasn't totally out of line. He is the one that first read me my favorite poem, Rudyard Kipling's "If." I'd gone through a bit of disappointment and that was his response, not much else, he just read the poem to me.
I still read it when I'm struggling or unhappy. Which means it's tacked to a wall by my desk.
But I took the phrase in the sense of this bit from the poem:
"If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
' Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch,
if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;"
In hindsight, it's likely he really meant "to the manor born." Or act like you were born into nobility, young lady.
That meaning makes just as much sense.
His other frequent admonishment to me was "her voice was ever soft and gentle, and excellent trait in a lady."
The first person to ever tell me THAT was his mother. Someone had made the comment about her when she was young, in her case it was said as a complement. In my case, it was likely said, along with the full story, when I was being too loud or boisterous.
Have I mentioned I was not a quite or demure girl?
I was always more likely to be found stuck climbing trees or practicing a wrist shot that playing with dolls and in a dress.
In fairness to my parents, they gave me ample rein to get muddy and stuck in trees.
Even more recently, I've realized maybe I was correct in both meanings.
The original phrase likely came from The Bard's Hamlet:
HORATIO: Is it a custom?
HAMLET: Ay, marry, is't:
But to my mind, though I am native here
And to the manner born, it is a custom
More honour'd in the breach than the observance.
Over time, the saying (quip?) has morphed a bit in to "manor" and the meaning changed.
Either way, I think the phrase serves me well.
I have several rough edges that could be smoothed out and, as I've gotten older, I have become more "girly" wearing dresses, makeup, jewelry and all that muck.
There is much to be said for being comfortable, or at least polite, in any situation. It's a lesson that's been good for me in my job. I at least treat all people with the same politeness regardless of their background or wealth - stupidity is another matter all together.
There is also a lot to be said to being able to walk into a black-tie event with a degree of comfort and comport.
So that's me dive bars to ballrooms, sometimes in the same night.
Mostly, I think I do it well.
Besides, how many debutantes do you know that play hockey?
This week has been an exception. I started a purple and silver camera cover on the flight from Minneapolis to International Falls last Saturday. The nice thing is I finished it that night, now I just need to felt it and sew a snap on. I made a similar trial one for my iPod and finally sewed the snap on while I was up in the fish camp.
OH yeah... spent the last week in Canada about 2 hours north of the border on a lake fishing - every day. Muskie (didn't get any), Walleye - caught several, Lake Trout, Northern Pike and Whitefish. It's a family trip so it's been a fun bonding experience with sharp hooks and lots of fish.
Anyway I took some projects for the evening and generally carried one project with me during the day to work on during lunch.
This was the view for lunch today:
The project is a set of wool fingerless gauntlets I'm working on for me this winter. I'm on to the second one which makes me happy. It's almost done and I had just cast it on shortly before leaving. Hoping I can finish it and get a project finished.
Lunch today was what they call shore lunch. Essentially the guides cook over a fire and you eat fish you caught that morning. Today we were eating Lake Trout. AMAZING!
There is little better than very fresh fish cooked outside. A few days before we had Walleye with the same kind of set up.
Oddly the boat ride today took us through a very shallow windy creek so I could pull out my knitting to get some work done. I feel guilty pulling it out when there is fishing to be done and the rest of the time the boat is moving too quickly over open water.
The guide was watching me knit away - and making pretty good progress really - and commented "You know I'm starting to see why hand knit sweaters cost so much."
He also mentioned there was a place near here that sold locally grown yarn from sheep and buffalo. My family shot down my GENIUS idea to stop there tomorrow. Bummer.
Tomorrow we are on our way home. I'm tired from all the fishing but not so happy to be going home - at least to the work part on Monday.
Oh yeah, photos from the trip are here.
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Originally uploaded by kyoti
This is my little brother, Collin, catching a loon.
We're up in Canada on a fishing trip. What better way to do things that relax, catch some fish and hook the national bird right?
Next he is going for a bald eagle.
They got the bird off the line shortly after I stopped recording this. It was a baby and going after the minnows we were using for walleye bait.
He also caught some fish.
I forget sometimes how very relaxing it is to just chill out in a boat and do little but stare at a line waiting for a fish to do something. I also forget how little skill fishing can take.
In this case the skill seems to be knowing where to find the fish - and in a 75 mile long lake, that isn't anything to sneeze at. But once you are there the fishing is put the minnow in the water, drop the weighted line in the water till it hits bottom. Bring the line up about 6 inches an wait. Don't jiggle it, just wait. A fish may, or may not bite. Every once in a while, check your minnow.
It has been fun to hang out on a boat with my brothers for the past two days though.
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Originally uploaded by kyoti
These are maybe the most important women in my life. My mom, my Aunt Missie (to the left) and my Aunt Barb (to the right)
They have taught and shown me how to be strong, compassionate and loyal - pretty much most of my good qualities. They've kicked my rear when I've been lagging or slacking and helped me up when I stumbled.
I can't express everything they've been for me.
With them are their respective daughters Kassie and Megan. You can see they are inheriting their mothers' traits - even if I'm the one that got the blond hair.
While I was in California for the wedding I made a side trip to Folsom to visit a friend of mine from high school. The drive on Interstate 80 takes you right through Sacramento which is home to - you guessed it the California Statehouse.
My friend was nice enough to arrange a tour of the capitol for me and took the day off to come along.
I'm still working on the pictures but they will eventually all be here on my Flickr account.
We also toured Sutter's Fort - this guy inadvertently set off the California gold rush while trying to build a sawmill up in the hills. The last stop of the day was the Standford Mansion which is used for official functions by the governor.
The visit reminded me of this blog at the National Council of State Legislatures about the country's various statehouses - specifically their domes.
According to my genius plan, I would land about 2:15 p.m., pick up my bags, proceed to the rental place, pick up my car and be off to Folsom to visit a good friend who I haven't seen in a very long time. Under this plan, I would have missed San Fran rush hour by a bit and made good time. HA!
Like most of my plans, things didn't work out quite right.
The plane got in early, my bag came right away and I figured I was going to be on the road lickty split.
Those hopes were dashed when I got off the AirTrain at the rental area and walked into a pandemonium of people, long lines and just general confusion.
I should have been braced for this. When I was making the rental reservations every company was sold out, except Hertz. Go fig apparently last weekend EVERYONE was going to San Francisco.
Given that info - guess who had the longest line. Yup, Hertz. The line snaked so far past their roped little section that I thought the people were waiting for the company one over at first. But after walking along the line three times I realized, yup that's what I have to stand it.
Years ago this would have cause me to melt down. I don't like things that delay my plans. Maybe I've grown up or maybe I've just had enough travel mishaps that I roll with the punches better.
So with a little sigh I got in line, pulled out a book and started reading "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" which I had started on the airplane.
By the time I reached the front of the line I was totally engrossed in Lizzy and Darcy fighting "poor unfortunates" in the English countryside and was almost done with the book. That's what you get for queuing up for more than two hours.
Not everyone was as calm as I was.
The only bad thing happened when this guy decided that all those people behind me really weren't standing in line. Nor was I for that matter and just jumped in front of me. I did not react well to that since I'd been in line already for about 30 minutes. So I dressed him down in front of everyone and eventually he moved to the back of the line. I felt some vindication.
Eventually, I got the car and left - just in time to hit stand still traffic on the 101 as everyone left work. The joy.
On top of having to take a week of unpaid leave, I had some personal stuff happened that sent me into a bit of a tail spin. It was bad enough that I scared myself and some of my very close friends. I came a little unhinged to put it mildly.
Anyway I'm better now - not perfect but better. I feel kind of like my feet are back where they are supposed to be. Even if I'm taking the wrong steps I'm OK with it and I think I'm coming out a little stronger.
The whole episode sent me into a bout of self reflection. Well in between the freaking out and obsessively reading Sookie Stackhouse books and various chick-lit.
I came to a few realizations. As much as I've been improving over the last year or so, I still have some really bad self esteem issues. I know that sounds like psycho babble but it's true and a little confusing. Logically, I can see that I'm better than average attractive. I'm funny, smart, accomplished in my career. I can go into a group of strangers and hold my own. On top of that I'm well traveled, I knit and I play hockey.... really I'm a damn good package on paper.
The thing is, in my heart of hearts I don't believe I'm any of that. Well I know I'm a hockey player and I know I knit -I know I'm smart. But really I spend a lot of time waiting for everyone to realize that I've had them fooled.
One of these days my bosses will cotton to the fact that I'm not such a great reporter and really kind of a slacker. My friends (who love me and give me faith in myself) will realize I'm not worth their attention. That someone will tell me people aren't really laughing with me, they are laughing at me.
I've had several people point out just how crazy this thinking is. They wonder how I can think this. Truth is I don't know - but I know what the chattering monkeys in my brain tell me.
I think that is pretty unacceptable and I think a lot of the issues I'm dealing with will go away if I can resolve this.
So I'm on my own odd little version of self improvement. Mostly it's called meeting people. Over and over and over till I realize I can do this and I'm OK.
To that end I went out to a wine tasting tonight. Wonderful group of women from meetup.com. If you've never visited the site I highly recommend it.
But I could do it, they laughed with me, talked it was fun and very low key. So I'm not all better but I think each time I do stuff like this it is a step in the right direction. And hopefully every time I do it, it will get easier to walk into a room of strangers and say "Hi, I'm Jeannie."
And eventually maybe the pieces will fall into place a little easier.
In the meantime - here's to me an a minor victory.
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Originally uploaded by kyoti
I finally uploaded photos of the North Shore camping trip from my small camera. They are kind of unusual in that I didn't take them so you see the result - a picture of me, taking a picture.
I'd loaned it to my friend Dwain for a hike we went on to the highest falls in Minnesota. Gorgeous if you can ever get up there.
The rest of the photos on the camera illustrate my big problem even with digital technology. It used to be I would wait until I had 15 or so rolls of film to get developed before I would haul the whole lot it.
That always made picking up photos kind of like unwrapping presents. I was never quite sure what I was going to find.
My little camera - a Fuji Finepix Z - I got when I purchased my bigger Nikon. I typically carry the little thing with me everywhere. Which means I sometimes have two cameras on me.
But I don't use it nearly as much as the Nikon so I don't always think to download the photos.
This came very clear when I was looking at what was on there.... the oldest photos are from the Rocketts show my family and I went to in the winter like November or so. Obviously I'm not up dealing with these.
That also made for some pleasant surprises like a photo of me grinning with a fish I'd caught down at the farm. And photos from an art fund raiser I'd gone to with Frank and Alica in January.
For all the photos go here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/27717375@N
Second problem is the order to post the photo from your first folder, 10th pic. Few problems there:
1. I just switched computers, so there are a lot of photos missing.
2. I just switched photo programs.
3. My current photo program doesn't organize by folder like a PC does automatically, you assign everything to a project. Makes it much easier to find stuff when you are dealing with 500 photos, ore more, at a time. And projects are organized by name not date.
I'm giving you three photos off this computer. The 10th out of the first "folder" iPhoto had, the same from the first folder I created and the first "project" from Aperture 10th photo.
It helps I like all three photos.
10th Photo from iPhoto:
Hot Cross Buns somewhere in West Seattle... I dunno exactly where.
First folder created, 10th photo:
Tonya taking pix with a Seattle back drop. Can you tell I got my new laptop when I traveled West in April?
First project (alphabetically) 10th photo:
And finally, some random purple flower growing in a field on my parents' farm around Memorial Day. No clue what it is, just liked the contrasting colors.
I guess I'm supposed to take five people so here we go:
* Lora, cause she hasn't posted a photo from the other tags, so she is fair game. HA!
* Daniel because I always want to know what he is up to and he has interesting photos.
* Panda do pandas have the attention span to upload photos?
* Raven because we all need to see more photos of Africa. Seriously - I wanna see some hippos here.
* Tonya, who likes to keep her site private so I'm not linking. But I like her photos so I want to see what pops up.
DONE!
I've written about R's recent move to Niger, where is just happens they speak French. Which is handy since that is what she and her husband speak.
It's kind of nice for me too, since it's given me a reason to start relearning the language. See right now I'm planning to visit R, C and K in Niger next November, for a month or so.
French would be handy, my goal is to not be worse than K, who will be three by then. I've already had Spanish-speaking kids in multiple countries look at me like I'm a drooling moron, I don't need to repeat the experience in French.
Keep in mind R and I met in part because we studied French together at Colorado College. At one point, I was fairly conversant in French. Not fluent but getting there.
Before that I studied French in high school, and spend my summers canoeing around Minnesota's North woods speaking French and German... yes, I am that much of a geek.
Then I left CC and French went by the wayside. I didn't really know many people who spoke it so I had no cause to practice, and aside from a few trips to French Canada I had no chance to use it.
Despite that, I thought "It shouldn't be too hard." I figured all I really needed to do was brush of the cobwebs in that part of my brain.
It's been more like verbal yoga where my tongue falls over itself.
My dad got excited about my French studies and bought me some language disc sets to practice with. You know the one where a snobby Parisian says something and you are supposed to parrot it back?
I can't knock them too much, they've helped improve my minimal Spanish skills in the past.
But I do find myself driving around, and wandering about the apartment speaking to myself.
I'm a little shocked at how much my brain remembers - not always perfectly but I could get a point across. My brain might be on bored, but my tongue isn't.
It's all the v's and a's.
"Voulez-vous aller à un restaurant avec moi demain ?"
I'm also sort of wondering just how awful and grating my accent is anymore.
But that may be the least of my worries. Like I said, I just don't want to be shown up by a 3-year-old.
So here's wishing me good luck, or "bonne chance" to stick with the theme of this post.
It's boggling my mind. Granted the stolen nano was 4 GB and that kind of boggled my mind at first. Maybe my mind boggles easily.
My parents, nice folks they are, are loaning me one of their iPods till I replace my nano - cause I still want a green one and I like the size. Crazy yes, but I REALLY love that green. And you can shake the new nanos to change the songs.
I'm in the process of loading music on to my new laptop to transfer to the iPod before I get on a D.C. bound plane tomorrow.
Some people spend their time packing, not me.
I'm going to run out of time before I run out of music. This is great!
As bad as this may be, the music lineup on my nano hadn't been changed since I left Oregon. My old laptop didn't have the capacity to run ITuens so no luck there, plus I really liked what I had on it. There were a few things I would have added but nothing I couldn't live with out.
So now I'm trying to reload that music, plus the new stuff I've added since my surgery in June 2007 (when I got the nano).
The problem is my music really is not organized. Unless you call everything is at least in a case organized. So there a few CDs i'm struggling to find. On the bright side, I found a few CDs I thought were lost forever. So there is a give and take.
I think maybe - just maybe - the 1,000 some odd songs I have on here now might be enough to get me through the week.
I hope so.
The only thing harder than picking out my music for a trip is picking out the knitting project. I've settled on my pink gauntlet which I should be able to finally finish, the sleeve of my poor brother's long promised sweater and a baby blanket for a kidlette that should make its appearance at the end of July.
That should keep my fingers and ears occupied I think.
Call it a present from the economy. I should be pleased to have a job in a time many people don't, but this on top of a pay cut last quarter is a hard pill to swallow.
I'm angling to take my time off at the end of July. I'm already supposed to take care of the beasts that week and this way I can just have a mini-vacation at my parent's house. Fixing stuff about their house seems like a good way to keep me distracted.
No matter what I do that week, or when it comes, I need to cut expenses.
I've never been overly extravagant, my splurges tend to be $30 in music here $50 in yarn there or the like but essentially I lack discipline. Cutting those expenses is easy, I won't go in the stores.
The bigger thing is eating. I've never been good at eating broke, I'll admit I'm a food and a drink snob. But I think this is the area I can pare back my budget the easiest, aside from the obvious no new music, clothes, books, yarn or other things I don't need - which is pretty much everything. There's also eliminating eating out, which doesn't bother me so much.
So suggestions - how do you cut spending from your budget and who has good, inexpensive, recipes that will give me leftovers for a few days.
Give me feedback here kids.
My aunt noted that I don't so much move into a place as nest in it... not in the normal girly sense of making a home but in the squirrel like sense of building a safe nest.
A friend who helped me move commented he never pegged me for a pack rat, then I started pulling stuff out of the attic of my old house. He was convinced and a little horrified I think.
Becoming a reporter has only exacerbated my pack rat habits. In journalism the person with the most and best information wins. It makes sense to keep pretty much every slip of paper you get - you never know when the military will reclassify the numbers of weapons stored somewhere, or when you'll need to know what the state's budget was five years ago. So I've learned to save and file EVERYTHING I receive, the second I toss something is the second I'll need it.
It's just as bad in my personal life, I'm just less organized about it. I have all kinds of receipts floating about from various excursions, box for shipping stuff, tons of yarn (obviously) and all kinds of random dust catchers I've collected - most with an attached story.
Sometimes my habits pay off.
Last week, my car was broken into. Fortunately, all they grabbed were my three year old iPod Nano - green and 4gb from the console and the FM transmitter from the dash. The Nano was out of date almost as soon as I bought it and since they make a green one again I'm not too upset. The transmitter is replaceable at pretty much any store with an electronics section.
I wasn't upset about the stuff the only problem was insurance told me they would replace the transmitter with "an average priced one from Wal-Mart." Mine was a mid-range one, not a super spiffy $90 one but also not the $30 one that doesn't charge the unit.
The catch was, if I could find the receipt from 2007 they would give me that amount. But who has such a thing easily available?
When goalie boy and I were vacuuming the copious amount of glass from my car I opened a second console and notice I still had an envelope marked "moving expenses" in it. It was all the stuff I'd horded for tax write offs when I moved... in 2007. The transmitter purchase was prompted by the cross country move.
I didn't think much of it at the time just made a mental note that I should stick that in with the my tax stuff, just in case. Then I moved on to the rest of the cleaning and feebly trying to explain that, yes I did SOMETIMES clean my car, and no I don't know how this much crap fits into it.
Some people just don't get the need to be prepared to every possible disaster or event. All that paper would be very useful to start a fire if I were, say stranded on the Interstate some cold winter or something like that.
Side note here - I think I'll start calling the car my Tardis, it is blue after all.
Anyway back to the receipt. I was grousing about maybe not getting a lot to repurchase a transmitter for the new (green!!!) Nano when I remembered the the envelope.
So I pulled it out, and true to nature I had saved every slip of paper related to the move. Including one for an FM Transmitter purchased from Staples.
Because of my careful hording I'll get the full price of the unit.
Vindication is MINE! Ha!
This is the third time we've been separated by oceans and continents. Fortunately, this time there are blogs, and Facebook and email so staying in touch should be easier.
A daily part of my day has become checking her blog Sahara Mama for updates and pictures. The hardest part so far has been the days I reach for the phone just to chat, then remember why I can't call her.
R and I met our freshman year of college. We were neighbors in the dorm, and about as different as two people could be. Yet somehow - and odd fluke of fate and desperation - we ended up living together our sophomore year.
By all rights it should have been a disaster. She's a morning person, I'm a night person. She listened to Johnny Clegg and I was obsessed with ska and punk music. The list really goes on. But somehow out of that grew one of the strongest friendships I have.
There have been months and years we lost touch but when we reconnect that time melts away. I have brothers, but no sisters. For me that bond has come outside the family and she really is my sister, overtime I've come to view her husband C as the big brother I never had. Which is good, because he treats me like a sister, it is one of the biggest complements I've received in my life.
I was reading about some of R's adventures in Niger today - nothing huge just house hunting and taking K, her son, to play. Learning about how he's starting to pick up some French and other every day stuff. As excited as I am for her I miss her and am already plotting when I'll come and visit - next year after the elections I think.
While I'm excited for them, and the job opportunity that took them there, I'm intensely and selfishly grateful this didn't happen while I was still in Oregon. It would have made the leaving much harder.
I survived my first two years in the desert because I had them to run to in Portland. Every other week almost I would hop in my Pathfinder and crash at their little studio apartment to just get away - get food I couldn't in a small town and be in a city.
They were newly married at the time and working to set up their own lives but they never failed to welcome me with open arms.
They've seen me through sickness, boyfriends, breakups, job changes and moves. I've watched them start a family with K, go through job changes, both good and bad, move from a cramped studio to successively larger places and now back to Africa.
There isn't so much a point to this post as I was missing my friend intensely this morning. I have books and events I want to tell her about. Like I said, the hardest thing is no being able to pick up the phone to just chat.
But it got me thinking about our friendship and how much it means to me. I knew it before but some how the distance is bringing it into sharper relief.
So R - miss you and I'm looking forward to another post. A letter - on paper and everything - is on its way.
Over the weekend I made a dress form using duct tape.... and here I thought the stuff was only good for fixing everything under the sun. Nope, inexpensive custom fitted dress form - or in my case a sweater form =). Perfect for fitting that WIP, so long as you're the one wearing it.
Below are the finished products, mine is the ummmmmmm curvy one, second in.
Making them is an easy two person process. Take a tee-shirt you can stand to lose, hand a friend a roll of duct tape and go to town. Essentially you make a corset of duct tape.
Below is me, in all my floppy hat glory getting wrapped by Lisa. It was only fair I had already bound her in a silver cast.
The whole thing event was the brainchild of DeeAnna, pictured below getting her cast made.
Her mother gracious allowed us the use of her lovely garden make the forms in, and provided pointers along the way. That is her wrapping DeeAnna.
So in addition to the fun of playing with duct tape - really who doesn't like playing with duct tape - it was in a lovely setting.
Once the victim is totally wrapped in three to four layers of duct tape, that's quite a bit of tape really, you simply cut them out.
Then reseal the seam, and stuff the form with batting, newspaper or old tee-shirts - anything to fill it out. Mount it on a dowel rod and you have an inexpensive form.
More photos are up on my Flickr page.
