I may have to marry this woman...

I know what you're thinking.... "Holy crap not ANOTHER one...what IS it what that family". Well, Shaddup. I don't mean 'marry' as in Lily and Robin..and Lynne and Linda 'marry'. I mean, well..... Ok, it was a bad headline but it caught your attention.

Feast your eyes on the most amazing thing you're likely to see in awhile. Oh I can hear you from here..."Look Sue...we've all seen your freakin' dishcloths ... get OVER yourself already, it a bit of yarn wrapped around itself and you're not impressing anybody anymore."

First of all, you people need to stop being so rude.

Second of all, this mini-dish cloth is different....this one is.... wait for it....NEEDLE-KNIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That's right, regular, grown up, like adults do it, needle knit. No "recommended for childen" looms here!
I cast on, knit for (well, either 12 or 24 rows I don't know how to count them in this style and I wasn't paying attention) and CAST OFF, all by myself. Casting off was, embarassingly easy. How did it take me THIS many years to get it?

Who is this future not-quite fiance of mine you may ask? Well, her name is Amy Finlay, and she has the most wicked website on the Internet. And yes, I'm including in the comparison both http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page and www.nakedgeorgeclooney.com

Her site is www.knittinghelp.com and I'm here to tell you that it's URL more than lives up to it's name.
She has a schwack of videos that show you everything you've ever wanted to know about knitting...and bunch of stuff you never knew you needed to know but you're sure glad you do now. And the best part....if you have to ask her to repeat herself about 10 times (as perhaps, somebody might of whilst learning the continental cast-on maneuver) ....she NEVER loses her patience, and her vocal tone NEVER gets sharp with you. She sounds as delighted and helpful the first time as she does the 10th. I love my Mom...LOTS, but she tended to lose it at about the 3rd time.. the 10th... game over. :)

The sampler...well it has some minor defects (the end of the first row...not so pretty... I blame the incredibly s*#&tty first few singers on American Idol WOW did they stink up the place tonight). But who cares, it's a perfectly respectful sampler, and I love it! The tension is just a little bit different from start to finish, and there are a few spots that look a little 'wonky', but they're minor. I just can't believe I did this without:
SWEARING (no really, I'm sure it's hard to believe, but I didn't once, I sw... er promise).
And my hand didn't cramp up....
and I could always get the yarn in the 2nd loop without the assistance of a jackhammer....
it was AWESOME.

Night night!

Oops, I'm slipping

I guess I don't have much to write about. I finished two more bunnies (tonight) ...I watched a bunch o' DVD's on the weekend (didn't get enuf sleep) ...nuttin' too exciting.

I boycotted a fundraiser dinner Fri night... on a stubborn point. I pick little, silly, mountains to die on, but there you are. They raised a bunch of money, and that's great. I bought coffee for them today, so I did my part.

I've found a great new website. www.knittinghelp.com it's got AWESOME videos to teach you how to knit, and FINALLY 'casting off' makes sense. I don't know why I didn't understand it before. So now I'm jonesin' for needles. Going to raid Mom's stash this week I think...make a dishcloth (oooh, what else is new) I can't wait until I can make myself a sweater. Melanie Z teaches a "how to knit a sweater" course...so maybe I'll end up taking a class from her...stranger things have been known to happen.

Anyhoo, it's late and I gotta catch some zzz's. Later dudes

MY CONSOLATION PRIZE IS HERE

And I ain't sharin' with nobody, no HOW, no way.

teehee

Correction.. TEA hee

It's Election Day

I'm connected to polling stations via walkie talkies...it's taking every bit of professionalism I own to keep from asking the polling stations to refer to me as "Super Shark 7". (I know...that was Linda's handle, but a: I ALWAYS wanted to be Super Shark 7, and now it's my chance, as well, I don't know how politically correct "Black Cat 13" would be)

Happy Poetry Day!

I wish you all, upon this day,

a time most fraught with rhyme.

This poem would entertain you more,

if, perhaps, I had more time.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Poetry_Day

She thinks she's funny....

...but she's snot.

My sister sent me this pic in response to my photo of my car in the snow. She claims to have taken it in her front yard in Kamloops this week. I think she cut it out of the latest National Geographic magazine, from their "grasslands of the sick-hot deserts of British Columbia" special. You can just make out the imprint of the staple on the far left of the photo.



This weekend was a quiet one, couldn't get the car out of the street. It was dicey getting moving this morning, and that's after I spent an hour yesterday shovelling out a literal 'driveway' for pretty girl. Had to do the ol' back up, gun it forward, back up, gun it forward about 12 times. Freaked me out a bit, cuz that's how I lost my muffler in the Tercel, during a bad snow fall. That drive home was so surreal, it took about 1 1/2 hours, and party way through I just about lost it because I thought some big bully truck was tailgating me in the terrible my weather, then I realized the huge rumblingsound was coming from 'Piggy' (that was my tercel's nickname). She sounded like about 25 mopeds tied together.

Started reading a great book, Enigma, by Richard Harris, but then I left it AND my kntting at home, so now I have nuttin' to do over lunch (boo). Made a new bunny with chenille yarn, very cute. Think it'll be Mom's bunny!

UPDATE:
She sent me two new pictures that refuse to upload. They're of today's paper superimposed over 'grass' from the front yard. It's just amazing what they can photoshop these days

What a crappy day for snow

...I had a free reiki session, and am supposed to volunteer tonight.

I can't get out of the street, there's so much snow, and it's still coming down, even harder than before!


Damn near killed me shovelling the walk (and a crappy job I did of it too). I shovelled off the car, so you can' really tell how bad it is from this shot. But the show on the car...that's after 1/2 an hour of more snow post-shovel. If you know what I mean.

Last Saturday, I had a nice cheery stack of BBC sitcoms to watch. This week, only some Will and Grace..which are ok, but NOT as much fun as last week :(

Happy shovelling peeps!

Sue

Happy St Paddy's Day

Robin invited me to do some St Paddy's day baking last night. We arrived at Karen's at about 6:20, we pulled out of the driveway at about 9:15...and in the meantime the three of us had baked, iced and decorated 72 cupcakes, and made 20 cups of rice krispies into rice krispie squares (KayKay did the rice krispies, R and I did the cupcakes, mostly) We were masters of efficiency. Oh yes, and about 20 minutes was devoted solely to listening to Lester's new stereo system via a Fleetwood Mac DVD. It was tres awesome. They turned out really tasty too. I copped out and bought a can of Duncan Hines cream cheese icing (it was on sale) and it was yummy!

Karen -- so clever that one -- dyed some of the Rice Krispies green (just sprinkled some green food die on them , and stirred through) they looked so pretty. Much more efficient than the hand-sorting of Mom and Dad's past. She died the marshmallow green for one batch, as a trial....not so attractive, those.

I had forgotten that one of my new summer blouses had some green in it, and I'd purchased the matching tank top..so I was even dressed for the season!

Just got an email from Leanne (formerly of SVEN BLVD) who'll be in town tonight, so hopefully we can hook up for a St. Paddy's beer (somewhere where they'll be no lineup!)

C'mon people...I mean really

So, I received two emails, from the same person, both within minutes of each other.

Email # 1 subject line was "I've been asked to pass this on....blah blah blah" and is about some special M&M promotion where if you buy the M&M's they make a donation ...etc etc etc. wanting you to forward it to all your family and friends. Save the world, etc etc.

Email #2 is this one http://www.softlab.ece.ntua.gr/~sivann/pub/swf/may02-smilepop-soapbox4.swf

which is a cartoon character that comes on and totally mocks people who send stoopid emails about donations/forwards/people dying of various diseases, etc.

So basically she DID the annoying thing and then sent a cartoon about how annoying what she just did was, and there's no hint of self-depreciation in the email so you kow she wasn't being ironic. The kicker? If you actually go to the M&M website ...(which took me roughly 1 second to google) you can read how they stopped making the F#*$@(#* pink M&Ms in Oct 2005. So WHY IS ANYBODY STILL SENDING THESE ON! They stopped making them so STOP THE EMAILS.

Makes me wonder, if somebody else on her email list finally had enough, sent the 2nd link as a subtle message to her. Maybe that's where the irony comes into play...

Feeling small minded anyone...

... I know it didn't go perfectly but it was content not format that was the issue. SOMEbody could have said "hey, good crowd, we've never had that many people there for a forum..whose idea was it to have it there....your's Sue?...good job".

blech.

I'm just so tired of having to nag for the same things over and over again, every time...why when I ask for something it is NEVER a priority...especially when the stuff I ask for is usually huge things (hellOOO executive elections.... how can people not consider that important) and just the feeling that there's only 'me' in team. Not that that's entirely fair, there are people that try. But somedays I just get the feeling that I only get listened to if I bitch, so why bother asking three times nicely first, why not start out bossy and crabby?

Sue

soooEEEEEEEEEEEEE piggy piggy piggy piggy

I'm so proud of me. I altered the bunny pattern to make a little piggy for my sister in law. (Linda, if you read this DO NOT TELL LYNNE).
All you need to do is only sew the bottom 1/3 of the curly tail down, make the ears 1/2 the length it calls for the bunny, and run a line of yard around the front 1/3rd of the head, slightly tighten and tie off a TA DA. Of course, the front right leg is about twice the size of the rest of the pig...but whaddya going to do. I was stuffing/ playing with this during CSI Miami, so my focus was a little off!

Everybody's slackin' for the weekend....

Gotta love the weekend. Friday night I had dinner with Sheena and Melanie and we got a right good gossip in. Melanie is off for a month in Europe (mostly Amsterdam)...Made me long for a foreign trip of my own. So I started e-filing for a passport on Saturday. Can't travel if you don't have the paperwork! I'll probably only use it to travel to the US...but Sheena mentioned having someone we could stay with if we went to Italy...and it's REALLY been on my mind....

Saturday wasn't feeling well, didn't go to dinner with Anita and friends. Spent the day in the basement drinking tea and watching British BBC DVDs...ended up dreaming in British accents.
Watched some Jeeves and Wooster (good stuff, what). Hugh Laurie looked SOOOOOOOOOO young compared to "House" show nowadays. I took a photo of the screen with my camera, neat huh? I lurve him, and Stephen Frye. These books/series are so deliciously silly. The actor who played "Bingo" is familiar from some other show.. I don't know what, but it's bothering me. Must research it.

I finished a 2nd bunny, and have knit the 'body' of a third. This one is in better proportion to the first, and her tail is sewn better. But I think the front legs are too big, so the back legs have nowhere to go, and she's a little "hunchbacky" if you get my drift. It takes about 2 hours to 'finish' one of these suckers, but that's not a good estimate because I had to pick out a seam that I made a right balls up on.

I gave rodent (Laura) the prototype for her birthday. Which brings me to Sunday..Sunday I read some Douglas Adams (so now I was reading in a British accent) and then went to dinner for Laura's b-day. Fish n' chips and then back to the parental unit's abode for cake. mmmmmmmmm chocolate wafer and whipped cream cake. mmmmmmmmmmm.
Came home and finished the afore-mentioned/photo-d bunny watching desperate housewives and The Family Guy. No "American Dad", and I had no way to tape "Grey's Anatomy", which makes me very sad indeed.

Oh well, gotta toodle off now, what ho.

Sue

Ed-u-ma-ca-ted

I work at a post-secondary institution. There are things that get posted around here that make my head shake. This is one of those examples.

Do they mean legal pleas? Or pleas for sympathy? What if I have nothing to plea for? Can I use this door then?

The college food service company recently launched a survey website. Their advertisements requested you go to www.collegedinning.com . Not dining, mind you, dinning. To add insult to injury...the tent cards that had this information were generic for multiple locations, and the portion of it that contained each institution's website address was a LABEL that was STUCK ON afterwards...therefore EASILY CHANGEABLE. They have since produced flyers made on a PC that look like ass that contain the proper website.

I haven't visited the site to take the survey yet, but apparently it's so user un-friendly that it totally discourages individuals to finish the process. Kind of a "beware the leopard" thing!

boo!

Somedays I love my job...

...we had to buy some new manequins for work the other day. Went to this creepy display place, with two rooms filled with rows and shelves of store manequins, most of them naked. Half of the women's ones with perky nipples (apparently that's the 'old style manequins')

I took a couple pics with my phone. The first is a creepy custom face paint job, I think they used white out for the eyes, and a jiffy marker for the irises. He was naked except for the januty little scarf. Like some demon drag queen from hell.

The second one was of a female, whose head didn't fit under the overhead shelf....so they had to make due. I had a really pithy-funny one-liner for this...but I've forgotten it now. Damn it was good tho. Something along the line of "I've heard of having a good head on your shoulders".... but it was dirtier and funnier than that.

I don't know which part of the trip I found the creepiest though. I didn't take a photo...damnit ...but there was a line of about 5 male "groins" obviously used to display underwear or bathing suits. Far more bulge than you would have thought necessary. Tres wierd. Would have been a great place to host a halloween party though!

Finished the Slippers!

They're sooooooooooooooo comfty and warm, I didn't count rows when I made the first one, and tried to judge for the second one from the first one, but I was off, so the left slipper looks like it's one-size bigger. But anyone checking out my slippers that closely can kiss my butt while they're down there.

I'm gonna have to look into some kind of row-counter. Maybe I'll steal something from my golf toys!

I learnt a new way of casting on last night too, off a website. Going to email the kniftyknitter message board about it. It'll make for much nicer dishcloth. Wish I'd found it before all the other cloths.

I'm embarassed to admit I've become 'interested' in America Idol (hold my head in shame) but there are some really interesting singers this year. I blame my nieces Robin and Lily for getting me hooked. CURSE THEM.

Two Days in a Row...

Well, it's a record. Two updates in a row.

I did some über knitting over the past two days. Finished a stuffed bunny rabbit (prototype only, need some serious work) the ears are way too long, but I followed the pattern. Silly me. I'm looking forward to doing a better one. Well, actually several better ones...as the ball of yarn I bought is bigger than a freakin' basketball and this took about...well 1/1000th of it. But it's cute. I 'added' the whiskers, they're my own inspiration...yup, I'm awesome.

Here's the slipper (I haven't done the 2nd one yet)
I knit the body parts of the bunny, and 1/2 the slipper during the Oscars, and then assembled the bunny and finished the slipper watching 24 and CSI on Monday night. I only watched 24 to wait for a commercial to call my boss, but then I ended up watching til the end of the show...and now I think I'm hooked. DAMN, like I need another TV show to obsess on.

Anyhoo, I just thought I'd brag about my knitting and stuff, I just figgered out an über easy way to upload photos from my phone, so they'll be lots more updates like this to come.

Buy bye for now!

Wow, can you spell sporadic

I am tres whore-re-blay at keeping up to date with this thing.

Going into SC meeting..could get dicey. Doesn't bear thought now. (bare thought? that doesn't look right)

I watched DVD of the Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy original TV series. FUN FUN FUN. Douglas Adams...truly a god. I love his writing, and now I have to track down my copy of Last Chance to See and reread it. Very funny, yet touches on so many important issues.

Started, and well finished, the knit parts of a bunny with the knifty knitter. Just have to 'sew' it together. I think I understand the sewing directions...I just have to track down a 'tapestry needle'. Did the knitting during the Oscar coverage, then I started and did about 2/3 s of a slipper. They're going to be LOVELY!

Oscar coverage. WOW, can you say both SUCKED and BLEW? The 4:30-5:00 Canadian produced CTV show, with Ben Mulrooney was so bad it was funny. He was shouting, from behind a pack of more important reporters, trying to get the attention of Jada Pinkett. At one point he actually turned to the camera, embarassed, and said "It's kinda a pecking order here, and when you're not at the top of it...". Basically admitted to the, well 5 of us watching, what a big fat nothing he is. HAHAHAHA

But then, from 5-6 the 'official' red carpet crew came on....and made Ben look like a 60 minutes anchor. Holy crap, they were awful. They would interview theses stars, and start off with these HUGE background questions, which basically answered themselves before they were done, and then shove the mic at the star who was usually left with a "well, yes" or "actually no" type answer. When they were talking to George Clooney they actually referenced his work on The Facts of Life! To which he responded with this absolutely gorgeous, but total WHAT THE F#*$( smirk when he answered. Love him LOVE HIM!

They asked Heath "What question haven't you been asked, and what have you been asked to death". So on one hand, they were wanting Heath to do their work for them, on the other they were asking him to bitch about past interviews. I mean c'mon.

Jennifer Aniston was asked about who she used to amire when she watched the show as a child. WHO CARES! The red carpet is NOT the time to do daring, probing, cutting edge journalism. We want to know: who are they wearing, how many ga-zillion dollars worth of jewelry have they borrowed, and where are they partying later. SHEESH. Then they kept showing clips from movies that have won in the past, almost like "yes, we know the public didn't care/watch/download this year's winners, but you've liked our stuff in the past, please dont' turn your sets off!!!" It was so bad it was good. I wish I'd had someone with me trading insults with the telly...I wuz on fire.

Anyhoo: Jon Stewart, funny. Lauren Bacall either drunk or past-it. George Clooney....sigh... ok I'm back. Dolly Parton, you go girl, Reese Witherspoon, I wish I could hate you you pretty-talented-humble-nice person you.

Oh yes, and a personal thank you to Brangelina and Tom and Katy for being knocked up and out of the picture, I'm SO sick of the sight of you all.