Scarf? What scarf?

Nope, still haven't gathered the courage to finish grafting the seaman's scarf. I'm pretty sure that will have to wait until Thursday night stitch and bitch. If I attempt to do it while I'm at home I'll just end up yelling at Purl, or drinking, and neither one accomplishes anything. I have, however made a bit of progress on Something Red. This yarn is determined to not be photographed accurately. Out of 10 photos, this is the best one. I am loving it, though. Sooooo soft.

I finally made it to the doctor. I figured I might as well use the insurance while I have it, right? Turns out I have an ear infection, which explains the never-ending headache.

These have nothing what so ever to do with yarn, but they are cute. My cat looks a little concerned, doesn't she?

Murcury

One would think that since I was so close to finishing the red scarf the last time I posted, 3 days ago, that surely it would be finished by now. One would be wrong. I can now add grafting to the list of techniques that I not only don't do well, but also drive me completely nuts. I am ripping out the progress that I have made on the 2 rows of 32 stitches (I included that so you would know how silly it is that I have not finished yet).

Instead of finishing the scarf I did the only practical thing I could think of. I cast on for the Something Red . So far I really like the pattern, but has you can see, I really don't have that much done.

Yes, I do think purple on purple makes for great contrast. Don't you?

I really haven't been walking much. First there was all the snow, and you may remember how well Purl does in the snow, and then I caught the plague, so we havn't gotten out much.

Aren't I pathetic? Please take me out!

She's not taking it well.

Mama's girl

I was going to wait until I was done with the scarf before I posted today. I started the grafting, and it is going well. But I have the plague a cold, and grafting just took way too much concentration. I had better never get really sick, but I turn into the biggest baby at the mere sign of a sniffle. I am 24, and have been living on my own for 4 years now. I am working on an MFA. But the second I get stuffy all I want to do is go home to my mom and have her take care of me.

I had a test tonight. I'm not so sure how it went. I almost rewrote everything on a separate piece of paper so the professor could read what I wrote. It was an essay test, and I tend to write down the first thing that I think of, then go back and change words and add sentences. Probably a result of using computers for most of my life. I can add sentences here, but on a piece of unlined paper while using an ink pen, it doesn't work so well. Luckily, I tend to write with lots of space in between the lines, so I can fit the words in, it just doesn't look pretty.

I'm going to go drink some night time cold medicine now. Hopefully the scarf gets finished tomorrow.

Almost Done!

I have finished the knitting portion of my Seaman's Scarf. I meant to get the two ends grafted together and have it off the needles today, but, well, life got in the way. I went grocery shopping first, then went to the Crooked Tree with Deb.

I should probably lay off the caffeine for a while. At least until I get a job to pay for the coffee. By the time I got home I was too wound up (I had 3 cups altogether today) to even try and figure out how to graft ribbing. I think I have it figured out, but thinking it and doing it are two completely different things. And yes, the corner of the coffee table is chewed. No, Purl did not do it. I got the table from some friends when they moved out of the building. It is pretty solid (I can stand on it), so I chose to just ignore the chewed on corners. I figured it would only be a matter of time before Purl got to it anyway, so for now I might as well not have a really nice one. This way I can't get too mad at her when she mistakes the table for her bone.

Now that I am mostly done with the scarf I started swatching for my first sweater! Not only did I swatch, I soaked the yarn and remeasured! The sweater is Something Red by Knit and Tonic, and I am using Debbie Bliss silk alpaca in burgundy. I was a little unsure of the yarn, but after a nice soak

it lost a lot of the fuzziness that had developed from sitting in my knitting bag for a long time. This picture shows the color best, kind of a nice eggplanty color. I love it! Now I just have to go buy some circulars so I can cast on.

What am I doing?

So, the full implications of what is about to happen is slowly setting in, and I am starting to get a little bit panicky. I am about to quit the full time job that I have had for the last 3 years in order to wok someplace for free. That means no pay. That means I will have no way to pay bills, or for food. Crap.
Yes, I realize I should be able to find something that pays somewhere. And I will just have to live on a budget, something I really should have been doing anyway, since that full time job really wasn't all that great in the first place. But still, change is very scary, and I may be having trouble breathing right now, which should explain the rambling on.
OK, I'm going to go hide from reality for a bit and take a nap.

Yeah

I have an internship! And a job prospect! The prospect is not definite, doesn't pay all that much, and does not have clear hours, but it will be something that I can put on my resume, and it does pay. Again, not a lot, but still. I'm excited. If it pans out I'll talk more about it, but for now I don't want to jinx it.
Yeah ME!

Change

I am stuck at a Bread Company while waiting or my car to get fixed at the Dobbs next door. I will be here for approximately 5 hours before they finish my car. Thank God for wireless Internet! And being well prepared with books to read, homework to ignore, and knitting. I have to be out of here by 5 tonight, because I get to babysit for the aforementioned cutest little girl ever.
While I am here I need to work on my resume. I need to find a job that has to do with my degree - art management. And also, I just need a new job. I need to get out of the place I currently work. I have been there for three and 1/2 years, and to say I am over it would be putting it mildly. It was never supposed to be a permanent thing. I started there while I was working on my undergrad, and it was a great place to work part time as a student. But I'm still there, and it has become less great. A LOT less great. I've sent resumes out in the past, but always for positions that I kind of know I have no chance at. So today I made myself promise to send it out to a couple of places I may have a shot at. Just one or two places a week until I hear back from some place. Maybe even to places with internship possibilities. Because I need a change. And I need it soon.

Single Awareness Day

Happy VD, otherwise known as single awareness day. I had planned on spending tonight drinking a bottle of wine by myself, but ended up going to a Trivia Night with m friend L and her fiancee K. Since she is the MC, and just went back to work last week after giving birth to the most beautiful little girl, I felt it was safe to go, what with this being my first single VD in 4 years. It was good, but I might be a little bit intoxicated (yeah, drunken blogging!).
That is all. You may get back to your romantic evening now.

Passive Aggressiva

Don't be fooled by this face. She may look sweet and innocent, like she would never dream of hurting yarn, but the second you let the dog drink her water all bets are off. She used to just wait until I left then seek her revenge on the toilet paper, but between her shredding and Purl's love of used Kleenex from the trash can, I wised up. Now the door stays to the bathroom stays shut at all times. So she found another way to let me know she is unhappy.

This poor yarn doesn't stand a chance.

Day 3

The weather man keeps calling for snow. They've been calling for it for about a week now, and I keep hoping that there will be enough snow for classes to be called off, but so far - no snow.
That's really all I have to say for now, I just wanted to keep the shock going for another day or two.

Surly Not!

What this? Two posts in two days? And there's knitting content? Am I seeing things? I spent yesterday and this morning working on the Seaman's scarf (I'm too lazy to find the link, it's there on the sidebar if you are really interested), and have almost finished the first skein of the second half (the first half took little more then 1 3/4 of a skein) so I am close! A few more cable repeats and lots of ribbing left, but at least it's close.

Ok, so in this picture, it looks like I have A LOT more to go, but I swear, I'm close! It also looks like the ball of yarn is trying to escape, doesn't it? It almost went over the edge of the porch, that would have been great - I'm sure the wonderful neighbors below would have loved that (yes, I am being VERY sarcastic here).

I also started a new pair of socks today. I know, I know, I still need to finish start the second Anastasia sock, but I decided to go to church this morning (yes, the surprises do keep on coming) and I didn't want to do a provisional cast on in church, because it tends to produce lots of swearing and taking the Lord's name in vain whenever I try to unzip the stitches. So I dug out some Trekking from the stash and cast on for a top down, plain vanilla sock.

I totally got busted by the preacher. Luckily, his wife is a knitter and friends with someone I used to knit with, so he just laughed and assured me his wife would start knitting the second the sermon started.

I'm glad I went today. I've been feeling lonely and a bit depressed this week, so church was good for me. And it was a great service - they have puppets for the children service! This week the puppets sang a religious version of "Achy Breaky Heart," which was just hilarious. The only awkward parts for me were when the preacher asked if there was anything I needed him to pray about for me and communion, because the church states as long you are baptised , which I am, you can participate. I felt that I should wait until at least my second time going to participate, but this nice little old man kept trying to get me to go up! I finally was able to explain that I wanted to come a few more times before I did that. I also got to see my old knitting friend. She was one of the co-founders of the stitch and bitch I helped start, but hasn't been able to go in a while because mom stuff got in the way. I hope I go back. For some reason I only start to think about attending service when I am feeling out of sorts with my life. I'm sure this won't be fixed by next week, so we'll see.

Now I have to go pretend to do more homework. Bleh!

Bad Blogger

Wow. So it has been a whole week since my last post, and I have absolutely nothing to show for it. No knitting progress what-so-ever. To be quite honest, I really haven't done much of anything this week. I was a bad student, because not only did I not attend class, I haven't done my reading yet. I get to try and catch up on that this weekend. I did go to an art opening at the Laumeier Sculpture Park last night with Deb. The show is by Karyn Oliver, and was great. I almost didn't go, because of the whole unproductive recluse thing, but I'm glad I did. I have also done better this week with walking. Purl and I are now over the 50 mile mark on out 100 miles by April 1st goal, which is great.
I'll try to do better this week, but for now I am off to do homework.

The tale of the Lorna's Lace

Shortly after photographing the mess that my green sock yarn had become, Purl struck again. My own fault, really. I should know better then to leave yarn, especially yarn she has already shown interest in, sitting out on the sofa where she can get. Honestly, though, this interest in yarn of hers is a new thing. Normally she ignores it because she knows she will get yelled at if she so much as sniffs my yarn. But once she decides she wants something there is no hope. She is a very determined dog, and will stop and nothing to get "her" toy. So she attacked my yarn again. This time she ate the needles, so there was no saving the sock I had started. Luckily I had only knit the toe. Unfortunately, the yarn was one giant knot.

So this,

Became this...

Which became this (this part used to be the toe).

Which has become this (Cat included for scale - also, she refused to move).

The yarn is currently soaking in citrus Soak in order to remove all traces of doggy drool. Once they are done soaking I will hang the yarn up to dry, then turn them into 3 minny center pull balls!

Oh the excitement here at Chez PG13!