Does headset=tool?

I cannot stand Bluetooth headsets or the people that wear them. I am not fond of the people that wear them even when they aren't talking on the phone.

With that said, I'm getting a Bluetooth headset. I'm joining the precise group of morons I can't stand. Well, only when I'm driving.

I have this thing about driving with a phone in my hand -- I can't do it properly. Ever since I got in my first accident in downtown Houston while talking on the phone and driving I've been quite terrified of driving while on my cellphone. I almost never do it.

There is, though, the occasional call I absolutely must make while driving. So, instead of being scared out of my wits I'm going to do the next best thing, become a complete tool with a blue light stuck in my ear. Fucking cyborgs!

I think I'm going to write Motorola and ask the bastards to at least make the headsets a little more discreet. I mean, a blue light? And making the thing black and all sorts of colors? I don't want to advertise the fact that I'm becoming a frickin' tool!

Before the house lights go up

For weeks I've been wanting to take a weekend to slow down, camp my ass in one of our adirondack chairs and sip iced tea while knitting madly on socks or washcloths (washcloths if I feel guilty, socks if I feel self-indulgent). I got my chance for approximately two or three hours on Saturday before we were due at a neighbor's house for drinks.

Also, I was supposed to meet with a close college friend of mine, Jack, who was due in town sometime on Saturday.

So, I'm knitting and basking in the sun, big floppy beach hat on my head and cold drink to my side. It was a near picturesque day. We had somehow managed to get up that day at a reasonable hour (9 a.m.) and have breakfast and set out to the Dallas Farmers Market. It was an awesome diversion from my normal weekend of backbreaking manual labor (gardening and house cleaning). We picked up locally grown squash, tomatoes, tiny little new potatoes. Three huge heads of crispy green romaine for $2.50! Sweet little early season peaches from just a few miles away, blueberries from a nearby farm, onions from the Rio Grande Valley, limes from a grove close by! And my favorite: freshly shucked black eyed peas and multicolor sweetcorn!

Hornsby came with us, and he was such a good boy! When we take him out with us, people always remark on what a beautiful dog he is, and they ask us what breed he is (he's a Great Pyrenees mix), and they are shocked when we tell him he's a mutt. I guess he's just one well maintained mutt!

So, we stop and pick up some cheap red wine to make sangria, since we picked up some oranges, lemons and limes at the market. This sounded like a great idea at the time.

Flash back to the floppy hat and the adirondack chair, only I'm sipping on sangria after a lunch of lima bean and lentil curry with saffron rice and it's near 2 p.m. We're due at our neighbor's house at around 3 p.m. and still no word from Jack. At this point I'm beginning to get a little anxious on how this all will work out.

Dave took pity on humanity and decided to rinse the stink from his flesh before we went over to our neighbors house (We'll call them Art and Lauren). We met Art whil he was walking his dogs down our street and I was rehabbing an old side table. He's a pretty cool guy, and he works in remodeling. We're dead-set on having him do some work on the House of England.

So, we fix up more sangria and head over to Art and Lauren's. I leave the house sans cellphone because I sent a text to Jack earlier that I would meet him later. We get to their house and Art's very friendly pups take a shine to my skirt and decide to climb all over it and slobber, too. (I figure that's what the huge bruise on my leg is from -- one of the dogs trying to scale my skirt.) Art fires up the blender and all the sudden Dave and I have margaritas in our hands. We quickly dispatch those and are refilled. Repeat this process, oh, about six or eight times and you end up with a very sloppy drunk Miss Dallas.

Oh, how to deal with living down the street from someone now that you've imbibed in way too many? It's a Saturday evening, so I decided to use the good ol' work excuse (luckily I work in an industry where I can say "Gotta go! I'm on deadline!). I shuffled home very quickly and collapsed on my bed to be swallowed by the dangerous trifecta of tequila, sangria and a spinning room.

I checked my messages and lo and behold, Jack had to make a turnaround trip back home.

Sunday morning came, and it was me and a hangover on a desert island. I was beyond repair. Not even my trusty combo of three extra strength tylenols, cranberry juice and club soda could settle my stomach and dispatch the asshole using my brain to play the bongos. I spent the majority of the morning on the couch or over the toilet. What a waste!

I managed to salvage enough of my Sunday to bake muffins, a loaf of bread, a pot of turkey chili and a pitcher of kiwi-strawberry iced tea. I also learned my lesson: When drinking with neighbors, never overestimate your threshold. You will have to see those people again, and you don't want it to be awkward.

Life, cubed

Spending 9 hours a day in a small room made of half-walls and particle board is a lot like living in a house with three nosy sisters. My childhood definitely prepared me to the complete lack of consideration and privacy I would encounter as a cube dweller in a corporate environment.

Shit, I might as well pull a George and build a little bunk under my desk in my cube to sleep in so I don't have to commute during the week. That's how tied down I feel to this cubicle. I've even started to resent the walls and doors off office dwellers.

Ask Miss Dallas: "What's with all the corruption?"

Lucky readers, this is our first installation of an new feature that will focus on the ins and outs of this puzzling yet fabulous Southern metropolis.

Dear Miss Dallas,

I've heard that the FBI has indicted quite a of your public officials in a widespreade bribery probe. One of your former council members was convicted of stealing from one of the most famous historic black colleges. Not only that, but he still maintains his innocence despite overwhelming evidence. What's up with all of the graft in Dallas? Do you guys see it as a tourist attraction?

Hugs and smooches,

Sally Straight-edge


Dear Sally,

Thanks for sending me a fabulous note! What a heady question to start off with; hopefully I can cure your small-town ignorance.

Dallas is a big city, like, the 9th biggest in the U.S. As a big city, there are a lot of ways to hide under-the-table deals and corruption. It's not like, say, the Floydada City Council, where you can't take a shit without your neighbors asking you to use air freshener.

Our former city officials' preferred method of graft was bribery between developers looking to cash in on federal development assistance through minority contracts. Complicated much? Basically, rich and powerful developers used the black city council members and their longtime distrust of the predominantly white, rich area north of the Trinity River (whitey) to get govmint cash.

Still confused? I know you are, sweet Sally Simpleton. Allow me to provide some historical context. South Dallas = Institutionalized ghetto.

Dallas is historically segregated, divided by the Trinity River, and has remained that way mostly from widespread neglect. South Dallas is historically black and poor (though there are a lot of good people trying to change that). City leaders from this area south of the Trinity are wary of people in North Dallas (whitey) keeping them down, so sometimes to cut corners on their way to gain power an influence they make bad backroom deals with shady developers, stuffing their pockets with greedy developer money along the way.

So, there's a lot of corruption that feeds off of racial division and widespread, historic distrust between white power brokers in North Dallas and black officials. While it's not exactly something we're proud of, at least we're not advertising it like Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick (also another area with tense racial relations).

Keep it real,

Miss Dallas

All the Rage

Coffee wasn't what had me energized this morning -- all I needed was a healthy dose of Rage Against the Machine. To some of my colleagues the choice seems all to apropos considering we often work for the Machine. Sometimes we get to fucking piss of the Machine, which is all too fun for words. The fallout of pissing off the Machine, however, is not.

I do have a strange affinity for grunge rock and anti-government anthems. Most of the time Dave and I have very similar taste in music, but this is where we diverge. Dave doesn't like any form of punk, metal, grunge or thrash. Me: I likey.

So, driving up the guard shack at my office today I had "Bulls on Parade" blasting when I rolled down the window of my car. I have never seen whiter whites of strangers' eyeballs in my life.

Safe and sound (cluck!)

I don't know what y'all did, but Scout pulled through. She wasn't looking so hot, and she was really lethargic and not eating there for a while, but she's curious and vigorous now! She's starting to figure out how to make her place in the pecking order, and she's babbling like crazy!





She is the littlest of the three, but I think she'll probably be the best bird of all of 'em! Jane, the little Araucana, is starting to grow little tufts out from her cheeks! So cute!



In other news, I finished my Thai Fisherman's pants:


I know I look gross here. I don't care. I just put in an hour in front of a sewing machine and an hour of yoga.

I also finished Sara's baby sling!



Awesome.

The shower is in a month and I still need to finish her washcloths. I've got 1.5 done, and I need to make 6. I figure if I make them interesting enough I'll want to knit them up fast. Here's hoping!

Cluck, cluck!

Good news folks: I'm a chicken lady!



From left to right: Elaine Benes, Scout Finch and Jane Gallagher.



So frickin' cute.

In other news, Harrison Ford is still smokin' hot.



UPDATE

Dave called to say that Scout isn't looking so hot. EVERYONE, PLEASE PRAY OR THINK OR CLAP YOUR HANDS OR MEDITATE OR WHATEVER. Scout needs your thoughts!

Thanks,

Chicken Lady

Bone tired

I was starting to lose it at work earlier today. My nerves started fraying and my brain started hurting and I started to take a serious turn towards crazy. Fridays are usually like this, but today was different. Today was un-fucking-bearable.

I sucked it up though, and only left an hour early. Given, I did work an extra hour yesterday, so it balances out. But I was dying to get out of that oak-paneled, fluorescent-lighted purgatory.

We got our Economic stimulus payment today! Woo Hoo! Free guvmint money! We went out for pasta and beer at Scallini's to celebrate, and now we're back at the house. Two Heineken's later and I'm trying to work the heel flap on Dave's socks.

Exciting, no? Beats the hell out of smacking my forehead against my desk.

I'm really just dying for an adventure

A lot of my life story can be told through missed opportunities, and most of these opportunities have been missed because of boys. Stupid boys.

I didn't take the full scholarship to a small, East Coast women's college because I wanted to be closer to a boyfriend I would later dump. I didn't take the Washington, D.C., internship because my then-long-term boyfriend said that he loved me and didn't want to be that far away from me. I didn't get the job in Peru because I missed the decision period, meaning that I waited to long to accept. I was too scared to follow-up on a job teaching English in Japan because, well, the only country I've ever been to beside Texas is Mexico, and no offense, but Mexico is no Japan. (I realize this last missed opportunity has nothing to do with boys, but hey, I'll blame it on boys anyway if I want!)

Right now, though, I crave adventure. Crazy food, backpacking, travel, music and being out of my element. Morroco, anyone?

As if you couldn't tell from my blog rate ...

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Take me camping (again)!

I think I've been bitten by the camping bug. Besides knitting, sewing and dreaming of a hen house I've been dying to go camping again! It doesn't help that Texas has so many great state parks within spitting distance!

I think our next outing is going to be Dinosaur Valley State Park. There's plenty of primitive camping (yay!) and there's a river running right through it! I love me some river swimming!

After that I think we'll head over to Lake Tawakoni State Park. Last year there was this crazy communal spider web there! I'll have to bring my fishing rod for this one, because there is some awesome fishing here!

Maybe after those I'll think about going to Lake Whitney State Park or maybe over to Graham, TX for some rock climbing and mountain biking! Possum Kingdom Lake sounds good, too.

A coworker of mine has this thing about visiting state parks. I think I'll rediscover my thing for state parks, too. Now, I've got to go recruit the spouse!

When the cat is away

Dave is out of town, so I've pretty much completely given up on my normal routine. I would, on any give day of the week, come home from the gym, cook dinner and collapse in front of the TiVo. Maybe I'd knit a little, then I'd shower and climb into bed.

So far tonight I have:

Tended my garden
Started on my sister's Thai silk baby sling
Started on my Thai fisherman's pants
Mended one shirt, one suit jacket and one pair of slacks
Had one Heineken and a mish-mash sandwich of leftovers
... and right now I'm haveing a cup of vanilla ice cream with ...
another Heineken.

I'm going to go finish those Thai fisherman's pants.

I have my limits

Sometimes I'm a Type-A person: I want things done and I want them done quickly and correctly. This often makes me a pretty decent leader on projects. This quality, however, is a liability when it comes to marriage.

I asked Dave to help me do some gardening earlier. I needed to put some compost on our beds and plant some tomatos and peppers today. Dave isn't the kind of guy that takes direction well. Actually, he might take it well from other people, but not me. So when I started giving him instructions on what I needed help with, he just walked away.

This doesn't make me angry anymore, but when we first moved in together it annoyed the fuck out of me. He would ask me if I needed any help, and I would tell him, "Yes! Could you grab a spatula?" (I was making an angel food cake) He would act like I was asking him to move Africa over a couple inches, rolling his eyes and letting loose a dramatic sigh.

I don't ask him for help much anymore, but when he offers it, I know to say "Thanks, I got it." I've learned that offering help is just a way to make him feel better about planting his ass on the couch and calling up Baseball Tonight on the TiVo.

Anyway... The peppers and tomatoes and basil and lettuce and arugula are all planted. I'm planning on having some bitchin' salads this summer once everything grows in. I have Super Father-in-Law Bobby to thank for it all. The man is a true gem. One in a million. So is Vicki, my Super Duper Mother-in-Law. I really hit the jackpot in the In-Law Lottery.

Actually, funny thing about Bobby is that we're a lot alike. Dave is very much like Vicki, chatty and personable when he wants to be, reserved when he's out of his element. Bobby and I both love working with our hands, cooking, building stuff and gardening. We also enjoy chatting about business and economics. Bobby works for a multi-national bank as a manager of corporate lending. He was astonished that I could keep up when he was explaining the sub-prime mortgage fallout. He's a smart guy, but unlike his son (le husband), he doesn't make a big deal about it.

Bobby has agreed to help me in my latest endeavor: raising hens. That's right. I'm going to be an urban chicken lady. I ran some ideas for a hen house by him last night and he actually seemed pretty excited about building it. I'm going to draft some plans for him and we;ll go from there. It's not exactly rocket science, building a hen house, but you have to control several variables (heat, light, venthilation, proximity) and still keep the hens safe from predators, the most notorious of which in our area would be the feral cat. Bitches.

There is a ton of information on the Internet about raising chickens, different breeds of chickens, how to build hen houses, etc. Which is awesome, because when it comes to raising poultry I am fucking clueless.

A friend of ours that lives close by has about seven hens. She's a little fast and loose with her wits, mostly because she has three kids, but I think it's awesome that she doesn't have to buy eggs. Chickens cost almost nothing to take care of, they give you fertilizer (also known as poo), they keep your lawn tidy, they take care of pests (boy do they love to eat grubs!) and they're fun to watch! If we get two chickens we'll pretty much have an ark here, though. Two chickens, two dogs, two cats.

Dave has taken a couple of days to get wild in Austin with his best friends for his 36th birthday. I'm OK with it because he is on the back side of his 30s and it does pretty much go down hill from there. I made sure his friends all knew that there would be no strippers/hookers and that Dave is not to do any shots. No tequila, either. I know I sound like a joykill, but if you've ever seen Dave drunk and then hung over you'd know it's for the best.

What's on my needles right now?

Waterfall scarf for Mom

Not your average dishcloth (washcloth) for Sara (1 of 6)

Basic sock recipe socks for Dave

Urchin hat for me!

Once bitten, twice shy

I haven't left the house much lately besides running errands and work. I haven't even been to yoga class in more than two weeks (I plan on breaking that dry spell today). I've been trying to plant our kitchen garden and work our poor soil (black clay) and make the yard a bit more practical for the summer. But that's not the real reason I haven't left the house...

I usually walk our dogs around our neighborhood twice to three times weekly. Dave used to do this before his back went out on him, but I've enjoyed hanging out with the pups when I can. However, I just can't shake the fear I swore I wouldn't have after I was attacked. It scares the shit out of me to think about walking Hornsby out in our neighborhood and a dangerous dog coming after us again. What scares me even more is the thought that this could happen even without the dogs, that a mean dog could jump the neighbor's fence and come after me unprovoked.

I hate what I'm about to say, but it is what it is: There should be no "one free bite" in Texas or in any other state. Dogs that attack unprovoked should be put down, just like Tigers in zoos that attack are euthanized. People should be able to walk through their neighborhoods without fear of attack from mean dogs kept by ignorant owners.

(Note: I'm not talking out of my ass. I have worked in 4 veterinary hospitals, one of which was a veterinary emergency clinic. I have seen the kind of damage that vicious dogs can inflict and I've been a dog bite victim before. I knew that some dogs I was treating as a technician could bite me out of fear. I was prepared for that. This is completely different.)

I am also becoming callous to arguments from people who own pit bulls that are the "sweetest, most loving" dogs they've ever owned. That they allow these dogs to sleep with their children because they are so docile. Good on them. They very well may be responsible owners. But pit bulls are like guns -- in responsible hands, people have no reason to fear the owner, but in the company of ignorance they are most likely lethal.

We don't trust everyone with guns, therefore we should not trust everyone with pit bulls either. In some states we ask gun owners to register themselves. I don't think this is too much to ask of pit bull owners.

Just last night I was watching a neighbor being pulled down our sidewalk by two pit bulls. The leashes were vere long for these dogs, which is dangerous. The hair on my arms stood tall and a shiver went down my spine. If these two very strong dogs are able to pull their owner like this on a normal walk, could this man control them if they wanted to chase after another animal, or even another human?

Quick, knit something!

So, I've been pretty much corralled in my house for the past five days and I'm becoming quick and full with cabin fever. The fact that I've knitted and ripped down a scarf for my mother about, oh, four friggin' times, doesn't help that much.

I made a really cool cabled hat for my mom for Christmas. Don't believe me? Here's some pictoral evidence!

So, I intended to knit her a really cool cabled scarf to match for her birthday, which is tomorrow (Happy Birthday Mom!). Needless to say she won't be getting it. You see, I had planned to finish it this week, but mean-ass, fence-jumping dog had other plans for me. So, since she won't be getting her scarf by her birthday, and I wasn't really happy with the scarf all that much to begin with (which is probably why I waited until the last minute to work on it) I'm going to start over and make this scarf perfection. Or so I thought.

I decided to try another cable pattern. Well, the problem isn't with the patterns, really, it's my mom. And it's the yarn, too, but mostly my mom. She doesn't like wool (gasp!). So, the hat is the same yarn as the would-be scarf, and it's Caron Simply Soft Tweed, which has no natural fiber content. That means that you can't block it, so whatever pattern you use you have to be OK with the fact that it won't lie flat no matter how good your intentions.

Cables need to be blocked, that is, unless you knit them in the round for a hat and they don't need to lie flat (I think that rhymes!). Scarves, are by nature, flat and long. So, with this yarn, no cables. Back to square one.

So I tried another pattern, which was kind of lacey. Lace, too, come to find out, needs to be blocked. So no matter how many swatches I knit, it wasn't going to work. Period.

So, I've given up lace and cables for this scarf and all the little shitty swatches I made in favor of a drop-stitch pattern from my own friggin' pattern book library. That's right. I wasted tons of time looking for a pattern that would work with this god-awful yarn when I had one right under my friggin' nose. That, my dear, is frustrating!

So, I'm going to get to work on this ridiculously easy scarf and hopefully I'll be done in time to give it as a belated gift.

In related news, I've grown a bit batty.

I like the way you think, Florida!

If you remember the sordid tale of our busted water heater, you'll recall that the moonlighting plumber guy was a total mullet-tastic gem. You'll also remember he had some, ahem, rather unusual trailer hitch adornments. Well, if things go as planned in Florida, the only nuts that you'll find on a truck will be in the cockpit. That's right, there is a Legislature in the U.S. that is more worthless than Texas'! Florida has moved to ban truck testicles!!!

Watching Scrubs finally paid off

I decided to take some time off from work last weekend and get back in touch with nature. This is most often a great idea. Dave has never been camping before, so I figured that going to a music festival would take some of the sting out of his first real camping experience. We roughed it (No electricity, no running water) but there were porta-potties all over the place, which is so very necessary at a music festival where beer drinking is encouraged.

I've never really been a huge fan of bluegrass, but this festival was a great primer in the genre. The fans of bluegrass music are pretty outstanding, too. Lots of nice hippies. Lots of organic cotton and tie dye. Lots of campers. We stayed at Camp Ben McCulloch, which is a really good spot. It's in the hill country and right next to a cold, clear creek and it's got some really beautiful grounds. It was a stonesthrow away from the Salt Lick Pavilion, which is where most of the festival music was.

We got to the camp late on Wednesday night and had to set up in the dark. It wasn't hard because when our tent arrived from REI.com on Tuesday (in the nick of time!) we set it up in the back yard. We went with the Sirius 3 by Sierra Designs mostly because it's light enough to be carried by one person on a backpacking trip but big enough for two people on a regular camping trip.

So we set up our tent and I helped our friend Cody set up the screened shelter and then we cooked some dinner. I missed cooking dinner outside. It's a real blast. For some reason, cooking while camping makes everything taste ten times better. On the menu that night: Beer brats, sauerkraut and potato salad. I pre-made a lot of the stuff for the trip that couldn't be thrown over a grill in a hurry, like the potato salad, and marinated all of the meat before hand. Needless to say it was some tasty stuff. We stayed up and drank for a while and then I passed out. We woke up pretty early the next day and sobered up over cowboy coffee, eggs and bacon.

The downside to roughing it in the country is the lack of opportunities to shower. Lucky for me, it didn't get too hot during the day, so we really didn't sweat much. It got maybe 85, max. At night, though, it was nice and chilly. It dipped down into the 40s and 50s -- perfect cuddling weather. Despite the lack of showers, Onion Creek passed right by our campsite, so I grabbed some castille soap and washed off in the creek. It was one of the most exhilarating experiences to dive into what would become my bath tub. I swam as much as I could this weekend because it's not exactly like Dallas is surrounded by spring-fed creeks to swim in.

I almost didn't dive in the creek, though, because on Thursday, not long after our other camping companions arrived, we saw a lot of folks gathering around the rope-swing. It turns out that the creek was too shallow to rope-swing into, and one guy must have hurt himself pretty badly because he was flown out on a buck board and neck brace by helicopter. Scary.

So, we drank, ate and that night we went to a show at the campsite. It was pretty awesome, and what made it even awesome-er was the fact that they had HULA HOOPS!!! Any concert is better with hula hoops. Dave's back was acting up, though, so we headed back to camp before everyone else, which was a good idea because we may have been 20 yards from the campsite before it started to drizzle. As soon as we started to gather things in the tent and under the shelter it was like the sky opened and we were soaked in a deluge. Sheets of rain propelled by heinous winds crashed against our little tent while lightening coursed the sky like cracks in an eggshell. We woke up the next morning and -- surprise!-- we were the only ones in our camp that stayed dry! We had the smallest tent, but we didn't take on any water!

We hung out at the campsite until just after lunch. Plenty of time for me to finish my FIRST PAIR OF SOCKS!!!



Awesome, no? I was pretty much bragging on them all weekend, saying stuff like, "That's a beautiful sunset! It's almost as beautiful as MY HANDKNIT SOCKS, EH???"

FYI, already started my second pair!

Anywho, we went to the Salt Lick Pavilion, where they had vendors and more bands. Lots of tie dye, and lots of cool hippie-type clothing. Lots of poeple in both tie-dye and hippie duds.



Later that night we went to Gruene Hall to see SonVolt. Dave was right up next to the stage all night like a huge dork. He snagged some autographs and a picture of him with his idol, Jay Farrar.





We came back and ate grilled meat and eggplant, which was pretty awesome.





The next day? More creek bathing/swimming, more bluegrass, more gorgeous weather, more hula hoops, more relaxation, a little impromptu yoga and a LOT of beer. Dave and I brought two boxes of wine, a four pack of Murphy's and a four pack of Boddingtons and two 12-packs of Modelo. We finished the modelo, finished one box of wine, finished the Murphy's and drank the exceptional draft beer they had at the Salt Lick. In four days. My liver needs a break.

We returned to Dallas to dogs that missed us and roses that bloomed vigorously in our absence.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Now, Dave and I watch quality shows, but one that we have watched almost religiously is Scrubs. It's funny, and unapologetically so. It's good that we watch it, because Dave knew exactly what he needed to do when he took me to the emergency room last night after I was attacked by a dog. The dog freakin' jumped the fence of a neighbor's yard and came barrelling toward us. It started attacking Hornsby, and I was trying to pull on Hornsby's leash to get him free so we could run away, but I must have made that dog pretty angry, because he bit the crap out of me. See for yourself *WARNING* Don't follow the link if you have a weak stomach!

So I've been laid up at home, my leg is swollen and I can't really walk. Dave is doint his best to wait on me, but I'm sure it's getting old. What a crappy thing to happen after a really great vacation, right?

Downward facing pupster

My yoga teacher, Gregg, is fantastic. I'm not one of those students that idolizes her yoga teacher, but I have great respect and admiration for Gregg because he is a really caring, giving and attentive teacher. I've been going to his classes regularly for two years now and never have I blossomed in my practice more.

I think a lot of my yoga-related growth also has to do with the fact that I read a lot about yoga. There are a lot of really fantastic yoga teachers out there, but studying with them is so expensive. Gregg told me about this yearlong intensive with a really great Anusara teacher, and I want to do it pretty badly, but I doubt that Dave and I can afford it. Broken down, $580 is a pretty good deal for 12 weekends of intense study with a well-known instructor, but our budget is already pretty tight as is. I'm pretty frugal when it comes to a lot of things, and I wish Dave was more frugal, but I'm resigned to the fact that although I'd love to do this, I won't be able to unless I devise some ingenious strategy straight from a Saved by the Bell episode to raise the money. Alas ...

Also, Dave and I are fascinated by the way our dogs seem to have caught on to the yoga craze. It's like every time they wake up from a nap they do a long Downward Facing Dog with a perfect flow to an Upward Facing Dog. Their technique is almost instinctive!

On the knitting front: I started the second sock last night, but after all of the cool increases and decreases and techniques from finishing the first one I fricking forgot how to cast on for the second! Please, will someone tell me that this kind of forgetfulness is common among easily distracted knitters? I hope so. Anyway, for the record, 2x2 rib is boring, especially when the entire shaft of the sock is 2x2 rib. Ugh. I think that this is why lace and patterned socks were first designed. Why should the heel and toe be the only fun and exciting part?

I've been looking for a good sweater pattern that's easy to construct without a lot of sewing and nonsense. I've found three, two cardigans and one kimono-type sweater. The only problem I I have now is actually going out and buying the yarn for it and constructing it. I have project entropy like that.

It's rainy and stormy here in Dallas. The weather is ridiculously unpredictable. Tornado warnings are going off here and in Fort Worth seemingly every other day. Here's hoping we make it through the rainy season alive!

A day off, not a moment wasted

I've been working on my first knitted sock since last weekend. I've been wanting to learn how to knit socks since November, but I hadn't been able to find an accessible class ... well, until I met Silver. This was THE BEST sock knitting tutorial I've been able to find after months of looking. This is my finished product:







Her instructions made grafting the toe so un-scary. I've heard that it's crazy hard, and I was really scared to try it, too. But with her step-by-step pictures and detailed instructions ... ta-da! I have a sock. I'm starting the next one immediately!

Is it cheating, though, that I knit it up in worsted yarn instead of fingering weight? I didn't have any sock yarn, and I didn't want to wait any longer to start making my first sock, so I just used some worsted tweed I had on hand. I think it really helped to learn on a chunkier yarn, though, because not only did it knit up faster, but the worsted weight was a lot easier to manage. I think it would have been much more frustrating to learn with fingering weight, especially since I've never knitted with a gauge that small.

Although it's a pretty big accomplishment for me to finish my first sock (and it fits!), that wasn't the only big thing today. I took today off for what my husband would call a religious holiday: Opening Day. Today was the first home game for the Rangers, and regrettably, we lost. But that doesn't mean we didn't have fun!



I did do a lot of sock knitting during the game to distract me from the Ranger's heinous performance against the Baltimore Orioles. I do have to say that Baltimore fans are some of the greatest. Nice, gracious folks. Rangers fans, in general, are spoil sports. Lots of booing from the cheap seats today, which is something I really can't stand. If you're going to heckle somebody, get creative. Dave is a wonderful heckler. He's been almost thrown out of ball games many times, but never thrown out. There is a line to genuinely great heckling.

Anyway, besides some spastic work e-mail when I got home, it was a great day. Time to get started on that second sock!

My life was made for weekends like this

It's phenomenal that it's April in Texas and we've turned on our most hallowed appliance, our air conditioner, only once! Right now I'm sitting in our living room, watching the boys of summer and sipping on an extra cold pineapple horchata. I feel so relaxed, like I've done nothing all day, but I've done so much this weekend it's hard to remember everything I've accomplished.

The weather, sunny and slightly cool, was the only incentive I needed to do some much-needed yard work. Before Dave's back went out, he had pulled up half of the hedges in our front yard and then left them by the side of the house to put out for heavy trash day. The following weekend, Father-in-Bob came over to show me how to use the electric hedge trimmer because I've never used one. Seriously. I've never used a push-mower either. Needless to say, many hedges were trimed and many branches were pruned and much trash was gathered by the side of the house to put out for heavy trash day.

Well, Dave usually does the majority of the hauling of heavy things around this house. He also does the majority of the jar-opening, trash-taking and dishwashing. Well, at least he did before his back went out.

Yesterday it was all up to me to haul all of the branches to the curb. It took me at least 3 hours and forty bajillion trips to the curb and back to et all of the god-forsaken limbs and leaves to the curb for heavy-frickin'-trash day. Eff that. I get much more joy from pruning and hedge trimming than I get from the disposal of the branches and crap. Dave, though, likes the haulin'. Weird kid he is.

So, lots of yard work was done, roses were staked, hedges were clipped, weeds were pulled and so on and so on. It was much more fun than it sounds because I had a nice, cold beer by my side and warm sun on my shoulders. In between rounds of hauling and clipping and pulling we both sat out on our deck and soaked up our yard, which is quickly turning into awesome.

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Today I woke up late, on purpose. I love doing that. Most of the times I wake up late the first thing I do is freak out and yell, "DAVEOHMYGODWE'REGOINGTOBELATE!!!!"

Dave knows that that exclamation is an outright lie. "We're" not going to be late. "I'm" going to be late. If we didn't carpool, Dave would never be late. It doesn't matter what time Dave wakes up, he's always ready to go on time. Why? Because it factors out for him. If he wakes up 5 minutes late, that's 5 minutes off of his morning regimen. That means, not brushing your hair, or, maybe, not putting on deoderant. Sometimes it means wearing the clothes you wore yesterday, all because Dave just doesn't do "late." These things, however, are things I can't skip. Period.

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Back to today. Dave and I started drinking pretty much right after our breakfast of peaches and cream oatmeal. We emptied a bottle of blanc de noirs with some fresh orange juice. Best mimosas ever. Then it was a bottle of Famega Vinho Verde. We wend through half a bottle of Pacific Rim Chenin Blanc before one of the klutzy dogs ran into the table and knocked my wine glass over, pretty much ending our boozing spree.

Because I can't stand baking late at night, I started making dough for pizza and ciabatta early this morning. I had planned on making eggplant parmigiana pizza. I know I mentioned that we had been boozing a little. One of the side affects of boozing is laziness. Sometimes, often unexpectedly, laziness is a good thing. Like today, I was too lazy to crust the eggplant and all that jazz that I used leftover grilled chicken, peppers and onions from our fajita dinner Friday night. It was probably one of the best pizzas I have ever made. So frickin tasty, and it was ridiculous easy, too, which is good because I was super lazy.

I am looking forward to having a sandwich on that ciabatta bread later this week. That should be good, too.

And that's about all the randomness I can muster.