Idyllic Chick

Yesterday I tried out a new (to me) flavor of Chex Mix. It's called Sweet and Salty Honey Nut. Like kettle corn, but on Chex Mix. So Cathy tries some and says, 'This tastes like some kind of cereal. Hrm. Some kind of cereal that I've had...'

Maybe, um... CHEX? Hrm?
=)

Tonight as I walked out of the grocery store (Yes, I shop now. Shutup.) the Christmas carols that had been playing inside were still dancing through my head. Preparations to stock up on fir trees were being made. The way the rain was spitting on my face made it feel like snow. So it was a lot like Christmas in WV. Except it was 70 degrees outside!
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I just printed out a bunch of golden snitch photos in preparation for my appointment with Wayne at BodyTech (Alachua branch) tomorrow. C&I had talked to Rob at Body Tech a few weeks ago, and I was very excited about working with him. But last week I got a call from the studio saying that Rob was no longer with the company, but that the owner would be happy to take over my project. I was sad about not being able to get tattooed by Rob. I think he had been with Body Tech for many years, and he seemed to be kind of psyched about drawing up my design for me. But I'm happy to take the opportunity to get an easy in as a client of Wayne's, since he's often booked to the gills.



And I apologize in advance to the (I'm sure) very sweet young lady who belongs to this tattoo, but my snitch will be big and sleek and techno. It will not look like a flying potato.

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Beer is good. Especially with Jeno's pizza rolls. I wonder if Jeno is married? I'd so stalk him.
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I have so much to do this weekend! I have to plan and shop and make dinner on Friday, make a JoAnns and a yarn store run, spend as much time as possible working on a super secret surprise project, and get the x-mas tree and decorate it and hang all the stockings with care. For some reason I'm much more stoked about Christmas this year than I usually am. Could it be that I'm enjoying this family life? This domesticated, settled-down, habitual life of fantastic husband and adorable puppies and wonderful friends where I'm happier than I ever thought I could be?! Yeah, that might have something to do with it. =) Go figure.

My dream tree.

Since I took the dreadies out, I decided to dye the ends of my bitch handles to match the outfit that I bought to wear to Chirs' company holiday party this weekend. Turned out fabulous in a deep red that fades up to black. Love it!

I made this icon as an ode to my beautiful black and blue dreadlocks that will be sorely missed.

I took out my felted roving dreadlocks tonight. They had been in for over two months, and my hair was starting to dread at the roots. I love the hairstyle I've been left with! I wish I could recreate it at will. My hair feels very waxy. I wonder if there was enough lanolin in the roving to get soaked into my hair. If that's the case, my hair is probably more healthy now than it was when I put the dreads in.

(Not necessarily in this order)
Puppies
Chrises
Family-in-law
My wonderful, fantastic friends!
Having A Plan.
My stress-free job
Baileys
Indulging in beautiful yarn
Silk long underwear
My plot of land
Two running vehicles
And more...

I just received a message from an employment agency that got my resume through the G'ville Sun, from when I was looking for a job EIGHT MONTHS AGO. At first I thought it was just weird, but now I'm feeling like a loser if my resume has been circulating for that long and NO ONE else has called me. ;-)

...and don't know what to get me, pretty much anything from here would be appreciated.

Damn!

Those left-over mac & cheese (I always want to capitalize it, because it's such an important food to me.) fried bites thingies? Oh. My. Gawd. Betharoopie was right on. That shit rawks. Word.

Missed another day of blogging. I wonder if I'll get kicked off the NaBloPoMo list for missing two days this month. But I gotta say, I'm kind of digging this frequent posting. You might not give a rat's ass what I have to say, but I'm enjoying writing it. And since it's all about me, that's a good thing.

But I don't know why I didn't blog yesterday. I had a great day! I know you don't care what I had for lunch, but I had lunch with Becca at Satchel's and that is definitely blog-worthy. Then we did a bit of secret shopping, I dropped her off at home, and I went to the grocery. And boy, what a trip it was. Kelly summed it up pretty well here, and you can even read my comments on the occasion.

You might find it odd for me to speak of grocery shopping for anything other than beer because I am not the cook of the household. Chris very graciously does 99% of the cooking at home. Until now, that is. Since I have Fridays off, I'll be meal-making once a week.

This Friday's menu consisted of Paula Dean's crab cakes and Alton Brown's mac & chee. On the crab cakes I left out the parsley but added a tablespoon or so of Old Bay seasoning. Of course I couldn't find fresh cleaned crab meat in Florida, so I used 8oz of pretty expensive tubbed white meat and 8oz of mid-range tubbed claw meat. I gotta tell ya, for as many tears as I shed trying to make these things, they turned out absolutely delicious. The lemon-dill sauce was a welcome change from the remoulade the usually accompanies crab cakes. AB's M&C was pretty good. I'm so used to the boxed stuff that the consistency got a little weird for me as the cheese congealed. But I can't wait until tomorrow when we'll try AB's fried M&C! I shudder in anticipation!

In other around-the-house news, Chris tore down what I've always affectionately called 'Mr. MacGregor's Garden' today in order to make way for the first line of fencing that we plan to put up sometime over the holiday season. Hrm, I should have taken a picture of it, but the garden was a small area that the previous owners enclosed in chicken wire so that they could grow some veggies and such without the local bunnies and gopher tortoises eating the crops before the humans got to them. It was a cute little area, but we'll never use it for a garden. It'll be nice to have instead a goodly amount of fenced in area so that the dogs can romp to their hearts content without running off.

As a sign off note, I'd like to say that I find it odd that Blogger's spell check dictionary does not contain the word 'blog'.

Thank gawd for the Treo*, else my NoMoBloMo streak of only missing one night of blogging would be broken because of our erratic-as-of-late Internet access.

At least I've got newly downloaded iTunes to play with. The software never ran correctly on my previous computer, back when I had the IdyllicShuffle. But I wanted to download it again just in case I happen to get a black or red or pink iPod for x-mas. I want to be prepared, you understand. So I've been organizing my music tonight and tomorrow I'll figure out how to subscribe to podcasts and stuff.

No space left on TM and my fingers hurt!

*You know, I've never named him/her, which is pretty odd for me. I guess that might be because I've never figured out if it is a boy or a girl.

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I kept forgetting to post this awesome picture of The Mistress of Snark in front of The Wall of Seduction at Chez Casuelle.

Break out the popcorn!
Word on the street is that there will be a book as well, but I don't see anything listed on Amazon quite yet.

I've just added this to my Amazon wishlist. The entirety of which is here, just in case you would like to peruse it in preparation for the holidays. ;-)

An interesting day at work. I wonder where this house is going?

It's not even 8:30, and I'm going to bed. I was barely able to even laugh at the Daily Show we had taped. I can't even stay up long enough to have another beer. Just as well, I suppose. I slept really crappy last night, despite the bottle of champagne I drank, and I guess these 10-hour workdays will take some adjustment. My gawd it'll be worth it when I get to sleep in on Friday again. Good night, sleep tight!

Champagne is good *any* night of the week! It's just maybe not so conducive to sock knitting. =)

I was frightened, but I ripped back Rogue to the bottom of the v-neck with just a couple of hitches. Whew! I've knit just three rows, and it looks better already. I feel so silly for not doing my M1s correctly the first time. All I had to do was go to my little computer and look up the proper way to make the stitches, but I was too lazy. I've learned my lesson now! Perhaps Lorena and I will be able to debut our sweaters together!

Yesterday was my first Friday off on the four day work week plan. Honestly, it didn’t feel like a day off. C&I had a couple of folks over to enjoy the Ring of Fire, and I had errands to run and preparation to do. We did have a most wonderful time, and left many, many empty bottles in our wake. We’ll use those for target practice later. ;) I had a very fun night, but I was a little headachey most of the day, and it just didn’t seem like a free Friday to me. Until I woke up this morning. That’s when it hit me. Today’s not Sunday! I don’t have to go to work tomorrow!

And so it came to pass that she deemed this, the true Saturday, the day of knitting. C’s people are coming into town for the football game. They are bringing Sonny’s (W00t!) and C might grill some corn to go with it. Susan may or may not go to the game. I hope she doesn’t, because I’d love to spend the day with my mum-in-law, watching movies and talking about knitting and sewing and stuff. I want to get back on track with Rogue. The Mistress of Snark has cast on for hers, and I would be truly embarrassed if she finished hers long before I finish mine which I cast on months ago. I just have to get over that irritating little frogging bit and get on with it. I’d like to do another ‘square’ on the freeform piece, and maybe even start working on the design for a sewing project.

I can be a natural blonde!

John got home last evening. I don't know if someone was able to reach him on the road, or if he came home to the ashes, expecting things to be normal. Chris and I talked to him and he was in a lot better shape than I expected. 'These things happen,' he said very matter of factly.

He knows that the Salvation Army would give him a voucher to stay in a hotel for a few days, but he said he has everything he needs in his rig and would prefer to sleep there. He did not have insurance, but he didn't have a mortgage either. Apparently he was kind of renting to own, and the 'owner' of the house had insurance on it. So the house will be covered, but John's contents will not. He said that the only thing he'll really miss are the photos of his kids.

He already has a plan: His boss is going to lend him a travel trailer to put on his property. He'll stay in that while he cleans up the debris and decides what his next step will be.

The dogs came back, but we haven't seen the cat. I think the nature of cats will keep him away longer than the dogs.

So I got up this morning, 5:30, same as always. Peed. Put on my jammies. Put Monty on the leash and took him outside. Walking out the side door, I heard what sounded like someone walking through the woods, coming towards our house. A really, really big someone. When I woke up a bit and realized that a swamp monster wasn’t attacking from East, I thought the noise might be that of the folks on the property beyond the swamp continuing to clear their property. At 5:30am? Then out of the left corner of my eye I saw a glow. ‘Ohhh, it’s a fire. The neighbor is burning his trash,’ I considered. Don’t laugh. Trash burning before breakfast is not unheard of in my part of the woods. ‘Wow. That’s a lot of trash. Monty, are you going to pee or not? Holy cow THAT’S HIS HOUSE!’

I’d never seen a house on fire before. The weirdest part was that there were no firemen, no cops, no paramedics. How can a house be on fire and no one know about it? I should call someone.

I told the 911 operator that my neighbor’s house is on fire. After getting the location and other important information he asked ‘How do you know it’s on fire? Do you see smoke?’ Yes. Yes there is smoke because the house is ENGULFED IN FLAMES. ‘Is there anyone in the house? Can someone get inside to see if anyone is in there?’ What part of ENGULFED IN FLAMES do you not understand?

Chris and I put the dogs in our house and wandered out towards the road to help direct the emergency personnel to the road to take to get to the neighbor’s. It seemed to take forever for them to arrive. When we finally saw the lights approaching from the county road, it looked like they paused, but kept going up the county road. So I called 911 again to corral them back our direction. At one point this operator asked me, ‘Do you have a key to their house or anything?’ Key? Lady, you don’t need no key to get in there now.

I’ve never spoken to any of our neighbors. Chris has talked to this one, John, a couple of times when Chris had to go retrieve Monty from his yard. We were fairly certain that John wasn’t home because when he’s there the big flatbed that he drives is parked in our yard. Chris said that it was there last night all loaded up. I found out later that he left about 11:00pm last night, and that as of this morning no one knew how to reach him on the road. The fire marshal will come later today to see if the cause of the fire can be determined.

We know that his animals (At least three dogs and a cat) are all outside pets, so they were all probably hiding in the swamp this morning. I’ll keep my eye out for them this evening and make sure they are fed. And I’ll be reading over my fire insurance policy tonight, and hugging my husband and pets.

This photos at this link are not for the faint of heart knitter. You have been warned. But I can see why she's knitting a garter stitch scarf instead of, say, a fair isle sock.

I've recently become interested in trying some freeform (Also called scrumbling) knitting. This project is what produced most of my inspiration, but my mum-in-law mentioned the technique to me way back (A whole year and a half ago!) when she taught me to knit. You basically start with a hunk of knitting or crocheting, and just add stuff to the hunk at will. Whatever stitches, whatever yarn, whatever technique, whatever whatever! It's like a yarn collage. Or I guess that would be a montage since I'll only be using yarn. Anyhoo, I want to stay with a strong green color scheme, and I plan to make a pretty something for a special someone. =) I'm anxious to see if I can pull it off without doing any crochet on it, but I doubt if I'll be that lucky. We'll see! Wish me luck!

People are more opposed to fur than to leather because it is easier to throw red paint on Rich Old Women than on Bikers.

Had a lovely trip to Leesburg and Orlando yesterday shopping for Yarn. Yes, that's with a capital Y. Chez Casuelle in Leesburg is one of the most wonderful yarn stores I've been in. Our little troop of knitters will be frequenting that shop even though it is a hundred miles away. Carla opened the shop early for us, and it paid off for her, especially after Lorena saw the sock yarn room with the wall of Lorna's Laces.

After Chez Casuelle, we went to Sip and Knit (Not nearly as cool or having the selection that CC does.), then to a fellow knitter's home to stock up on Susan's Spinning Bunny fibers.



Here's what I picked up. Ooooo... Ahhhhh.... The fluffy purplely greeny stuff is hand dyed Corriedale from Susan's Spinning Bunny. I'll use that and the ocean colored Patagonia (Hand dyed 100% cotton) for a special project that I can't talk about here.

The skein sitting on top of all of that is one of my dream yarns. It's Schaefer's Andrea in the Toni Morrison colorway. I was eyeing this at the Fiber In, but couldn't justify spending the cash, even on such a primo yarn, without having a project in mind. But now I have plans to join our S&B's Shawl/Poncho knitalong, so I'll use this gorgeous silk yarn for my lacy poncho, and I will name her Andrea, and she will be beautiful!

Hoorah for yarn shopping! Pictures tomorrow. Yes this counts as a daily blog entry. Shut up.

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So. Lorena? Breakfast next Friday!?!

My employer has approved a four 10-hour work week! I now have every Friday off, and can't even begin to say how excited I am about it. It will definitely be a change of lifestyle in our home. I'll have to get up at 5:00am in order to get to work by 7:00 (It's a beautiful 50 minute commute, usually with Harry Potter.) which means that I might be waking Chris up as I'm leaving for work. I really enjoy our quality time in the morning, so that will stink, but I'll be able to sleep in with him on Fridays, then get up and knit all morning long, then go have lunch with him! Then knit all afternoon as well! Damn, I'm going to need more yarn. =)

I completed my first felted project last night. I wanted a small tote bag in which to carry my diet pop and can of ravioli to work each day. I loved the Mini Skull Tote, but as written it was just a bit too small for me. But I liked the proportions, so I calculated a new pattern using the same ratio throughout. Worked out fine and dandy! This was also my first intarsia project. I thought that was a good idea since all of the nasty carry overs in the back would felt in.

When I realized that I would run out of blue yarn (Manos del Uruguay. The off-white is as well.) I planned on finding some black Manos to finish up, but being impatient as I am, I picked up some similar yarn in pink at Yarnwerks. Once I started knitting it in, I thought it looked like crap. Black would have weighed the bottom of the bag down, and this pink ain't weighing nothing. But I was in 'fuck it' mode, as I had frogged much of the bag a couple of times already. I figured if this one turned out like crap, I could always make another one in different colors. Finished seaming it up last night and threw it in the washer. Voila! Felting is way cool!

Those four letters might have a whole new meaning to me in a couple of weeks. My employer is considering moving to a four day work week! Right now it looks like they are leaning towards allowing the office staff to have the choice of working five eight-hour days or four ten-hour days. We might even be given the choice as to whether we take Monday or Friday as our day off if we choose a four day week. I would *so* be willing to get up an hour earlier Monday through Thursday in order to not have to get up at all on Friday! I'm crossing my fingers that this will be finalized soon.

Happy NaBloPoMo! I think I can I think I can I think I can. Check out my cool new button. =) And good luck to those who are participating in NaNoWriMo. You are far more wordy than I could ever hope to be. And I bet your grammar skills are much more refined than mine.