Long Time, No See

Seems like only yesterday, but it’s been literally months (months!) since my last post.  I’ve been busy, but not that busy.  Seems like I just don’t have much of anything to say after all.  I started the blog in a burst of enthusiasm, but now about a year later, it’s tapered off to nothing.  What’s that all about?

It’s not that nothing’s happening, at work , at home or with my knitting.  Some of the highlights…

… my brother Casey is finally off on his winter time motorcycle ride to the Grand Canyon and back. What possesses a grown man to ride 3,000 miles in the wintertime on a motorcycle? Who knows.  I myself am strictly a fair weather rider and no mistake.

… work got a whole lot worse and overloaded when the firm laid people off, and then to top it off the junior paralegal also up and quit.  Now I’m the only paralegal in a group of 22 lawyers and truthfully it’s as much as I can do to show up there every day.  Attitude is not what it could be. In this terrible economy (which has truthfully not affected me since I’m still employed) I try to think of it as job security.

… one of the partners I work for has just had a baby girl and I’m knitting a Clara dress for a baby gift. That’s the sweet little yellow dress in the Soak ads.  So delicate! So precious!

… all three cats are healthy, but Handsome is on a diet (vet says 16 pounds is too heavy) and Precious had to have his belly clipped because he got matted up.  I try to comb them regularly but they protest and bite me for my care and trouble. The cats don’t seem to enjoy the ministrations. On the plus side, I have actually started collecting the fur I comb out and will have it spun up when I get enough. It’s as soft as rabbit angora and of a beautiful whiteness.

… tax time brought a pleasant surprise, a nice refund I didn’t expect.  Seems I adjusted my withholdings last year and more was taken than needed.  I’ll have to readjust again, but the good thing is that it looks like I can afford a vacation this year after all.

… speaking of vacation, C&C and I are going to Paris for two weeks in July.  No frantic tour, no rushing from place to place; just park ourselves in Paris and soak up the ambience. I have not been there, but C&C have so they can show me some sights and I’ll have a grand time in the Louvre.  One day trip is planned to Versailles but the rest of the time will be just doing whatever sounds good at the moment.  Oooh la la!  and I’m learing French courtesy of Michel Thomas’ audio classes.  I have already learned to say useful things, such as “I’m sorry but I can’t do that for you now because I have to go to the university to pick up a book on the political and economical situation in France.”  Now isn’t that a wonder?

… I made the switch to an iPhone and although I was prepared to sneer at it, I do not.  I love it.  My son Ben calls it an “icon maker”  and that’s pretty funny when you think of it.  He’s a Google Android man and he does sneer at my iPhone, but no matter.

… second son Adam has become a Knitter.  I knew he would enjoy the technicality and creativity of it. He has learned very quickly (about 3 weeks after being taught the knit stitch) and has, on his own, learned the long tail cast on, made a hat, made a neckwarmer, and is mostly done with a Noro silk garden scarf as seen on Brooklyn Tweed’s blog.  He’s even on Ravelry!  On Wednesdays, he hangs out with me, and often we are joined by my friend Champer and we dine out sit and knit and watch a movie and read knitting magazines.  It’s such a joy to be able to share my knitting passion with at least one person in my family.

… I’m trying hard not to buy a lot of new stuff.  I have enough stuff; but somehow that doesn’t apply to yarn (especially sock yarn) and I confess to having a weakness.  I’m seriously considering removing my credit card from my wallet and going cold turkey.

… speaking of yarn, I attended Stitches West in February for the whole four days and a full slate of classes.  Not all were spectacular, but I learned some wonderful new skills: (1) Japanese short rows (perfect shoulder shaping!) (2) Estonion Patent Stitch (easy peasy once it’s demonstrated) (3) designed reversible cables.  I also took an intarsia class from Nicky Epstein and a sock class from Cat Bordhi, just to sit in the same room with them. Lily Chin taught the reversible cables class, and she’s quite a hoot.  The market was not as big as last year, but I still managed to spend more than I should have. Hence the afore-mentioned turkey coldness.

… the weather out is spring like, it has been quite warm but this weekend it’s clear and cool with a good breeze. The air is fairly sparkling and it’s good to fill my lungs with air I know is not smoggy and full of particulates.

Do you ever sometimes just look around you and wonder “where has my mind been for the last ‘x’ months?” I dont’ think I’ve done much of anything, but still time passes and here I am, suddenly aware that I must have been hibernating.  Diabetes makes my head fuzzy sometimes, and I don’t pay enough attention to it. All morning long I’ve been in a mental fog, even while doing my chores I just wasn’t there in the moment. I’m going to go out for a walk and see if I can shake the cobwebs out.

cheers,