On, second thought, ribbit

When I was knitting the mitten today, I reassessed it, and you know, even with the plan to wear it over gloves, this is too big. I hate to say it, but it's heading to the frog pond. See?


My thumb marks how deep the difference is between the size I'm making and the size I need.


Hmmm. I need to measure it and figure out how much smaller I want it to be.

Or I could just frog it and start over with smaller needles, and see what happens. :)

The new printer is an HP Photosmart C4250, and it was $85 at BJs. It looks like this:


The top is the scanner part. And then when you open the feeder on the side:


It's replacing the 10-year-old HP Deskjet 693C, which no one wants to see a picture of!

Mitten and printer

Sometimes I crack myself up. I took a few pictures of my mitten in progress last night, and looking at the shots today, all I can think is, "A thief broke in to try on my mitten! And photograph it!"


No? Just me? Oh, well, story of my life.

The reason I'm wearing a glove under my mitten is a simple one. The mitten is turning out to be too large for my hand, or at least larger than it would need to be, but I'm not bothered, because this way I can wear them over my gloves, for added warmth! (At least, it works in theory; we'll see what real life does to this idea.) The pattern is called Alex's mittens, and clearly Alex has larger hands than I do. Not that there's anything wrong with that. I'm sure he's a very nice person.

So the mitten is coming along nicely. I got a lot done last night, when the Bruins game was too painful to watch. Listening to it while simultaneously pattern-watching and trying (mostly successfully) to keep Harold from dive-bombing the yarn was ... bearable. (8-2! Oy vey.)

In other news, I have a new printer! Yes, it took me eight months in one sense, and less than 24 hours in another. I work in mysterious ways. In fact, I now have a printer, scanner, fax, and copier. Love the all-in-one! Though I must give props to the old printer, it's the one I bought with my first Internet-able computer, which was about ten years ago*. I'd call that a pretty respectable tenure. (Go, HP.) I am now ready for my W-2, which will no doubt arrive on the last possible day (the 31st) just because I want it. Isn't that like life?

*Isn't it amazing that in ten years, it's gone from an oddity to a necessity?

Not the strongest will-power in the grocery store

Going grocery shopping can test my will power, especially if I'm hungry, but I was doing pretty well tonight, until the self-scanner* offered me $1 off my weakness, Ben & Jerry's Coffee Heath Bar Crunch. Well, actually it didn't specify the flavor, but that's always my first choice, and to get a pint for $2? My resolve crumbled.

* Not to do a scan on yourself, but to do the scanning. It's a handheld scanner that Stop & Shop has, so you scan items as you shop, and then bag them right at the cart. I like it because it cuts down on the number of times I handle an item.

Yummm...

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I'm fed up with the Bruins right now. They're down 4-1 after one period in Montreal, and not playing much better than that. They're not burying their chances, and making too many give-aways, letting Montreal walk in and make plays ... ugh. Plus, the game tonight is on Versus, and Sunday's was on NBC, and I miss my NESN guys. (Well, not Katherine Tappen, and her very convincing impression of someone who knows almost nothing about hockey, but some of the others, like Andy Brickley.)

That said, of course I'm going to go watch the second period. But I may be looking at my mitten more than the TV.

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Oh, did you catch that? Yes, mitten! I started mittens for me, me, me! Well, technically, I started one mitten, of course, but if it works, the second will be quick to follow (baby, it's cold outside). They are, naturally, more complicated than the ones I made for the babies, for the simple reason that I want thumbs in mine, but it's still a pretty basic pattern. So far, I like it very well, and find it clearly written. Further updates, and photos, as progress is made.

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I think it's time to buy a new printer. I said I would when I bought the new computer (yes, last May, that new computer), and of course I never got around to it, just bought a cord to allow the old (old, old) printer to converse with the new computer and went along with it.

However.

It apparently has made the decision for me. It has stopped printing, and started making god-awful grindy noises instead (which is not a substitution I feel good about). If it was not printing, that would be one thing, or if it was printing while making bad noises ... but both together, well, I don't know if I can do anything about that. I was hoping to at least wait until after I do my taxes*, but it occurs to me that in order to do the taxes, I will probably appreciate being able to print. So hmmm. Printer shopping, eh?

* I am dying to do my taxes, and the wait for the W-2 is painful. This was the first full year of condo-ownership for me, and I want to see what a difference it makes. They Say owning is better than renting in this way, and I want to see it! I bought my copy of RobotTax, and if my W-2 doesn't come with this week's paycheck, I may cry.

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When I logged on just now, I saw the news that Heath Ledger was found dead today. I'm very sad about this. I loved him in 10 Things I Hate About You and in A Knight's Tale, and Casanova ... so sad. Twenty-eight years old ...

A few bugs yet

I'm sensing that even though it's 2007, Microsoft has not fully resolved their Y2K issues. You think?

Either that, or New Toy is capable of time travel, which would be pretty cool, but I think that would have cost extra, and I know I didn't pay for that.

I have to go get ready for bed now, so I can watch the season finale of CSI at 9. I usually watch the CSIs via On Demand some time during the week after they air (love the On Demand from Comcast, so I can watch at my convenience, with minimal commercials), but tonight Sarah's disappearing and we find out who's behind the miniature killings, and I think I have to watch in (gasp) real time. Oh, the humanity.

Pan will be thrilled, since he really wants my lap back. The cats have been very lappy tonight. We lost power sometime today, I had to reset clocks, so perhaps there were boomers (i.e., thunderstorms, which they hate), and they want reassurance. I was on the computer earlier dealing with installing Ad-Aware and Spybot, and Pan was on my lap, and Harold came along mewing for the lap, really insistently, as if to say, "How can there be another cat on your lap when I want it?" He hung around for about 5 minutes before he gave up. Such a hard life. I am in great demand sometimes. Yet when I want a cat on my lap, there are times when I can go begging.

The best-laid plans

I had planned to head home tonight, relax after a busy week at work, perhaps blog about the weather or knitting, then spend a good chunk of time this weekend getting the old computer and office ready for the anticipated arrival of the new computer, and clean out the back of the car, too (since the box was being delivered at work), etc.

Except? I checked the tracking info online this morning, to see where the box was, and it said it was on the truck for delivery.

What's that? The box that was supposed to be delivered sometime next Monday to Wednesday? Well, that's unexpected! Good, but unexpected. I mean, I ordered the thing Tuesday night, and they said it would take a couple of days to be 'built' and 3-5 days for delivery, and instead here we are on Friday. It must have been a slow week at Dell.

Not that I'm complaining! It's 7:20, and I'm hooked up and typing away, and I have all weekend to play with it. Everything isn't set up, of course, and not one thing is transferred, but here we go, the start of a new era.

Now, the reason why I'll leave it at that for now has to do with this guy, as seen here this morning, resting from a strenuous night of bothering me:


He liked my original evening's plans much better, and has been dancing around meowing, so I'm going to go pay him some attention before coming back here to play some more (the photo uploaded in no time, love it!).

Three days of Summer

Spring is supposed to be coming back, but for three days now, we've had summer, 80s and all. I'm currently barefoot, wearing shorts, and sweating a bit. It's nice, actually, for a change, it's been lovely to be warm, even hot, but I'll welcome Spring back, too. So lovely, the flowers blooming and leaves on the trees and green and colors everywhere. I was going to post photos but that'll have to be another day, I'm yawning fit to bust my jaw here, and the new (high-speed compatible) computer won't be here until next week, and I Can Not Face Doing the Photos On Dial-Up tonight. So sorry.

I'm very excited for the new arrival, too. I got the "it shipped" message today, with an estimated delivery of next Monday to Wednesday. So when I go silent for a day or three, you'll know why. Hopefully it won't be long, but knock some wood for me. It's just your basic Dell Dimension, nothing fancy, but This Thing is limping along toward its 7th birthday and needs to be put out to pasture in the worst way, so I'm sure in comparison I will be having some fun with the new toy. I even splurged and doubled the memory (2 GB!), so it should knock my socks off. Can't wait, can't wait. I need to spend some time looking around this machine, seeing what I can delete before the games begin, so to speak.

But not tonight. Need to get the laundry out of the machines, and get ready for bed, because at the speed I'm moving, it'll take me a while to get there, and boy, do I need to get there. Almost weekend, yahoo!