Getting (Some) Things Done

A few things I've gotten done this weekend:

Tablet replaced!

I went to AT&T, on my way to getting an oil change, where I had to wait for a while and then ended up talking to someone who was new and not that confident, and thus unable to guide me out of my thicket of indecisiveness (at least not before I had to leave for that appointment). After the appointment and my next stop (about which more in a moment), I was in the mall and saw another AT&T store, and decided to try again. This time, the guy was able to help me realize that yes, if I go to a smartphone, that will be another $20-30 per month, which I'm just not quite ready for. But they had this nice little tablet, an Asus Memo Pad 7 LTE, and it seems to be much the same as the Nexus. Better sound, perhaps, and camera; hard to be certain. If I change my mind in the next two weeks, I can take it back, but it seems unlikely. I think I'm good.

That interim stop was at the Container Store, to come up with something to lower the risk that the cats will get into the open yarn bins, but still allow me to see the pretty yarn. I got two of these, $6.99 each. (There was another type I liked, but at $17.99 per piece, and I would have needed four instead of two, well, I didn't like it that much more.)

And went from this:

To this:

No guarantees, but I think it improves the odds. Makes me feel better, anyway.

While I was leaving the mall, by the way, I was going through Macy's furniture, and saw this on a table.

Rolled up book pages ... tied with string ... and placed in a bowl ... as decor. Riddle me that?

Or tell me what this plate is supposed to mean?

Also seen around, a display of Bruins clothing at Costco.

See the lone piece of red? For some reason, one lone Philadelphia Flyers jacket. Weird!

I've been working on the spider for Grandma today, now that the blanket is done at last. So far I have the body, the head, and a couple of legs done. No problems anticipated in finishing in time, knock wood.

Also today, Belmont went to snooze on the bed (after throwing up on the couch; I think she wanted a change of scene). Carlos was not amused at the proximity.

As you can see.

Mind you, he chose to be there. But he wanted to be there without her.

Meanwhile, she was unimpressed by his State of Miff.

A final note: I put on random socks this morning, as I sometimes do when I'm just being home, and was amused to think that in black and white, they would probably match.

Or maybe to someone color-blind?

All About the Wedding Blanket

The pattern: Fabulous Felines Rajah's Blanket. Verdict: I like the pattern. Few flaws and I had to make few mods (and one of those was because seed stitch and I have agreed we should keep our distance from each other).

The yarn: Loops & Threads Charisma, 18.75 skeins of the 26 I bought on New Year's Day. Verdict: A very good choice when you need bulky and want soft and machine-wash. It looks like it might blur a little over time, but I'm okay with that. The cables really pop in it.

The start: January 31, 2015; first pictures seem to have shown up here in February, amidst the snow and shoveling woes.

The finish: knitting on Sept 19, finishing on Sept 23

Finished blanket weight: four and a half pounds!

And then the pictures. Right side:

The lighting makes it looks striped, doesn't it? Weird.
Wrong side:

Not so bad, eh? For a "wrong" side.
Close ups:

And the final package, ready to hand over:

Done, done, done...

P.S. Carlos was so glad when I finished messing with his bed. He isn't one of those cats who enjoys a game of change-the-sheets, so that's a regular annoyance to him, and then this time, even more so.

Say It With Me

Done, done, done! The blanket is done, done, done!

I went to the other knitting group tonight and was weaving in ends, and chatting, and weaving, and listening, and, hey, where's the next one ... I can't find any more.  I'm... done?

Done!

Right, Left, and Center

To my right, how many hundreds of dollars of technology, capable of bringing in how many hundreds of TV channels.

To my left, a transistor radio, for which I paid less than ten dollars, probably ten years ago.

Guess which is bringing me tonight's Bruins game?

(I don't really blame NESN for going with the Sox over preseason hockey, but this is kind of funny.)

In the center, mildly headachy me will be weaving in blanket ends and trying to make it to the end of the game. Last night, I was in bed at 9, but maybe I can make it a little later tonight.

Imagine a Roller Coaster. In the Grand Canyon

Such ups and downs this weekend. It's tiring just to think about. Or maybe that's the Monday talking. Being laid off sucked, no doubt, but all the extra sleep this summer was marvelous. I've been tired for a month now, and I still haven't adjusted. (And I don't mean I'll adjust and not feel tired, but that I'll adjust to feeling tired. At least I hope I will.)

Biggest up: I finished knitting the blanket! Yay! Happy dance!

I have to weave in the ends, wash it, take a lot of pictures ... but the knitting is done, and that is, literally, huge.

Biggest down: I broke my little tablet. Sigh.

Not mine, but something like that. Non-fixable, believe me. 

As you can imagine, I'm trying to focus more on the former than the latter, and as you can also imagine, it's difficult to do.

In more detail:
Last week I watched a bunch of movies in the evenings and knit, knit, knit. I had planned to knit something else on Saturday afternoon, once my errands were run, but when the time came, I couldn't bring myself to. I didn't exactly think I was going to finish, but it was just so close that I couldn't put it off. So I watched movies (the rest of Some Like It Hot, which I started Friday night, and then Sense and Sensibility, and then Kung Fu Panda*), and knit, and knit, and hey, time for the border, and bind off, and whee!
*Eclectic tastes, I guess?

So that was good, and so were my plans for Sunday, although the day didn't start all that well when first, I had to clean up where Belmont vomited (though at least I found it with my eyes, not my toes), and then a little later when I heard that wheezing noise that often precedes throwing up, and went in to see if she was on the desk, and she was standing IN A BIN FULL OF YARN. Where I have never seen her go before, but she had to be in there when she felt like being sick? (I pulled her out, and she was not sick, in the yarn or otherwise, but still. She's lucky to be alive.)

But anyway, Sunday's plans involved joining friends for the historic house tour in Little Compton, Rhode Island. And it was fun, it was, but a long day. The drive each way is over an hour and a half, and then there was the driving from house to house, and walking around the houses, and don't get me wrong, it was beautiful and a nice day (well, kind of muggy when the breeze stopped) and lovely houses, but I got home eight and a half hours later feeling beyond tired, absolutely exhausted. Like, when I say "I was so tired," I don't mean, "Oh, gosh, I'm rather sleepy." It's more like what "angry" meant to Bruce Banner and the Incredible Hulk. And not coincidentally, when I'm that tired, I get super-impatient with stupid little things like meowing cats and electronics behaving badly. And the iPad was being really slow (it's been showing its age that way lately), so I put it down and picked up the Nexus 7, and when it wouldn't work at all, well.

Boom.

(It's not a behavior change that could be the sign of a brain tumor, either; I remember a time as a teenager when, annoyed about something and tired on top of it, I pulled off my turtleneck while forgetting that I'd been wearing a necklace over it. Broke the chain, naturally, and I was so mad about it ... I fantasized about a room full of breakable things I didn't care about, that I could smash without regret. So. You know. This is me. Unfortunately.)

The frosting on the annoyance is that in having done this, I have added to my to-do list...

Which means that, while I did enjoy watching the Bruins preseason game, on NESN, with all the good old homer announcers and all, and the kids played decently and even won, I was just so tired and annoyed that it wasn't a great evening. Which is unfortunate, given how good most of the weekend was.

So, I may just go into the AT&T store and see what they have in tablets, but who has recommendations? Small enough to carry around, but not phone-small?

Or, maybe it is time to take the plunge, as I was thinking I might do next year: should I go for an on-the-large-side phone instead? I have been getting a little tired (literally) of carrying phone and tablet and camera.

Thoughts? Opinions? Pros and cons?

It's Been a While Since I Could Say This

But I can't really* write tonight, I have a hockey game to watch! It's only preseason, but it's on NESN and at last I get to see my team on the big TV. Go Bruins!

 *or, as autocorrect would have it, "canard ally." Really, autocorrect?

Hockey and Socks. Not Hockey Socks

I just finished watching the first episode of this season's Behind the B, the Bruins reality show*. Obviously a lot of ups and downs, since it covered the time period that started with them not making the playoffs in April, firing the GM, trading big-name players, and so on. It was nice to get a glimpse of Bergeron, and see some behind-the-scenes stuff, training and all that. The draft, the kids at dev camp, Max Talbot trying to catch chickens! The promise of hockey. Training camp started today! It's coming!
*And I know that I should be grateful for the pizza place that is one of their sponsors, but oh lord, they play the same commercial twice every break for an hour--do you know how many times that is? I don't want to see a GOOD commercial that often!

Knitting continues to progress. I really feel like this pattern repeat on the blanket will be the last one I need to do, it's just So Big, and the closer I get, the more eager I am to finish, just finish, be done already. I want to hand it over! I bought an enormous gift bag at Target the other day. I'm ready. It's not quite, but I am.

I mentioned that I'd finished the last purse socks, the Carlos-colored ones, and I did get some pictures. Traditional, feet-in:

And the comparison shots:

 "What are you doing?"

 "Peoples is weird."

And here's the start of the next one.

 Mish-mash of colors, but I like it. A change is as good as a rest.

I'm off to watch the rest of Despicable Me 2; I was listening to music this afternoon, and when I got to Happy and other songs from the movie, it made me want to see it again. Good night!

I Was Going to Write Tonight

But someone doesn't think that's a good plan. Not if it involves leaving the bed.

Here I Am Again

This morning, I put this on Facebook:

The bad news: Landscaping trucks pulling up across the street for Day Five of whatever they're doing.

The good news: First paycheck today! It's like I'm working for a reason.

So, yes, day five* and counting of the trucks and the workers and the power tools. I thought they were just building a fence, but maybe it's a bunker, or a tunnel to Canada, or something more involved. It's a good thing they're named Done Right Landscaping, and not Done Fast.
*Yes, they came on Saturday

But in the happier news, yay, I got paid! That will come in handy for paying bills. It's not that I didn't think I was going to get paid, but I kind of didn't believe the woman who told me that the first check would be direct-deposited, since in my (considerable) experience, the first and last are usually live checks. How glad I am to be wrong! So much simpler, the money is just there, and the savings account remains unmolested. Whew.

And don't say I don't know how to celebrate such news. Why, after I went to the library and Target, I picked up Chinese food on the way home. Party time!

In other news, yesterday and today have been excellent examples of another reason working from home suits me: when my head isn't 100%, I don't have to do the "should I go in, or will it get worse if I do?" dance of indecision in the morning. I just go to the computer and try it, do as much as I can, take breaks when I need to, and it's pretty productive, actually. My head hasn't been awful or anything, but I'm definitely not at 100%, and yet, I am still able to get work done.

In Between

Some weekends are fairly accomplishy, and some (fortunately not as often these days) are lost to headaches. This one has been somewhere in between. 

I did, in fact, go to bed super early last Thursday night (I mean, 7:30 is ridiculous even for me), as I said I was going to, and felt much better Friday. 

Unfortunately, I had at least two separate "you moron" moments with guess who during the day, extra unfortunate because we had an after-work gathering and I was going to actually have to see her. But it turned out fine, I didn't have to talk with her that much, and I got to talk to other people, both catching up with the ones I knew and introducing myself to others, and overall it was a plus.

But it was pretty loud in there, so I wasn't surprised that my head felt a little sensitive after. Unfortunately it wasn't better Saturday; in fact, the only reason I went out at all was when two competing sets of landscapers were making too much noise for me to stay home, so I fled. 

The head never got into Severe territory, and I was able to watch TV last night, and then today it was almost normal. But tonight it's degrading again, so I decided to briefly check in here--not dead!--and get ready for early bed again. Hopefully one of these days, I'll be back to the usual long-windedness, but not tonight.

...Huh? Sorry (yawn), I Missed That

I am going to bed early tonight.

I didn't get to bed particularly late last night, but this morning the last hour-plus of my planned sleep was severely disrupted by felinis-avec-death-wishis, to use the technical term for cats, and man, have I felt it today. It didn't help that said house tiger, who tried to get me to get out of bed from about 5 AM on, then spent the day periodically trying to get me to come back to bed and keep him company.

Is there a stronger word than irony? Maybe I could think of it, were I not so tired.

At least work is going well. I'm making good progress on my current report, and was successfully able to call in to the monthly meeting this morning. AND, I managed to mute my phone, which I haven't had to do before, so I wasn't sure how to, but it was easy. And tomorrow afternoon we have a work gathering, so I'll get to talk to people, which to be honest I don't miss all that much on a daily basis, but once in a while is a good thing.

In the unfortunately column, one of my neighbors is having a fence put in, and the workers were here All Day Long, mostly doing loud things. Mind you, it was pretty cute when they stopped a passing ice cream truck ... but the leaf blower must die.

No, I don't know why fence installation required a leaf blower. Do you?

Reading, and Knitting, and Knitting

Last night after work I went right out, to get to the post office before it closed, then the chiropractor, then the library. And when I got home, I felt more like reading* than turning the computer back on. I did a little knitting and knit-prep, though, as the second purse sock was at the toe, so I finished it, and wound the yarn for the next pair (because of course I did). And I have no pictures of any of it, because, well, I don't, yet. I will! Sometime.
*Patricia Briggs put out a book of short pieces in the Mercy-verse, including some not previously published. Fun!

The yarn I'm using is one I got at Rhinebeck in 2012, from Ellen's Half-Pint Farm, and is pretty, and soft, and squishy in the best way (the last pair used yarn that will probably wear better, but wasn't a joy to knit with--fine, but not ahhh). It was hard to choose whose turn was next, I have so much lovely stuff. I mean, I want to have it, this is why I have it, this is a good problem to have!

Anyway, alt-knitting-group tonight, so I'm going to go switch the sweatpants for something a little more public-friendly (I love sweatpants, but I don't often leave the house in them). And maybe I'll spend a few moments with el gato before I go out. Purrrrr...

Moments of Proximity

We've had our moments today.

They haven't lasted long, but it's better than not having any.

Sundays are nice, but in a long weekend, even better.

I Think I Did Say That It Was Big

Now that the blanket is getting so big, I wanted to spread it out fully and see just how big it is. Not that it's meant to be a bed blanket, necessarily (well, I won't be policing what they do with it), but a double bed is a way to guesstimate a blanket big enough for two people. Basically, I was wondering if I was right that it was at least half done.

So I cleared off the bed, put half the stitches on another needle, and voila.

Big. And yes, I think more than half done. I'm coming up on the end of the 5th cable pattern repeat, and I'm guessing either 7 or 8 will be enough. So back to it!

Well, maybe a few more pictures.

I do love how the cables pop. So textured.

*****
In other news, I walked down to Starbucks today, to get out into the pretty day, and sat outside with my drink, knitting. A couple of women, one roughly my mother's age and one roughly mine, asked what I was making, and when I said socks, the younger woman said, with a little laugh, "Socks! Ambitious!" Not in a nasty way, but I just keep puzzling over it. I mean, I guess I felt ambitious when I first tried to make them, and how does she know it's not my first pair, but I certainly wasn't casually taking my first pair out to knit: I was struggling with them at home, where I could concentrate.

Ambitious? Just not the word I would use. Or even one of the words.

*****
I went out to dinner with a friend last night, and we stopped in Barnes & Noble afterward, so she could pick up a gift she needed. I hadn't been in a bookstore in a while, and it was nice to browse around for a bit. I even pulled out my tablet to request a book from the library (sorry, B&N).

I really liked the cover of this sketchbook, but I refrained from buying it, as there's no way I need it, and I don't even know what I would use it for.

Still, pretty!

*****
I got an email newsletter the other day, and one of the articles was about clutter, so of course I had to click through, even though I was not expecting anything helpful. And it wasn't, it was pretty generic, but I was struck by the stock photo they chose to accompany the article.

What about her says she's taking control of clutter? I think she's celebrating pulling off a clever prank on someone. What do you think she's doing?

Reading Thoughts

So today seemed to pass more slowly than usual; I'm not sure why, as I had work to do and all. But the day ended eventually, and I popped over to the library to pick up a stack of holds.

As it's a long weekend (and happy Labor Day to you), I especially wanted to be sure I got them. I'm on quite a roll with reading this year, especially with my, ahem, unplanned free time this summer, and I think I'm achieving better life balance than I did last year, for whatever reason.

While we're talking books, I am actually remembering to report back on the book I mentioned last week, A Murder of Magpies, by Judith Flanders. I really enjoyed it: there were only a few spots that I felt were pushing plausibility, and overall I very much liked, not only that the heroine was not a 20-something, but that her age could be used to her advantage. The details were good, like when she went to meet someone at an appointed time and place, but he was too busy looking important to come over right away, so she sat down and pulled out a book and suddenly there he was; or when a VIP kept her waiting a long time, so she (again, but she is a book publisher) pulled out a book and, when he came in to the room, looked up while putting a finger in the book to keep her place--small details like that made it feel quite real and very entertaining. I do recommend it. (Re-reading this, I can't help thinking that you'd never believe there was a time when I had book reviews published in a local newspaper. Honestly, they did say more than, "It was good, I liked it"!)

And I'll let you know how I feel about the ones in the picture, as I get to them. 

Worth a Thousand Words

Briefly, as it's getting late, here is something that was brought to my mind tonight when my mother and I were talking tonight about the time that I fell down the stairwell. I don't think I've told you the story of the stairwell and the radiator before, have I? There are a few things you need to put this in context:

• I was six or thereabouts.
• I fell down from almost the third floor to the first.
• I hit my head on the radiator, the bottom pipe that curved into the floor.
• I broke it. Broke the radiator. With my head.
• And, incidentally, when we were little, my brother and I weren't allowed to have sweet cereals: nothing with sugar as one of the first three ingredients, except once a year on our birthdays.

So, after I was hauled off to the hospital and they were sure I'd live (only a concussion, from breaking a radiator with my head, it's a miracle), my mother made a list of all the sweet cereals I could name, and when I got home from the hospital (after a week, if memory serves, which it may not), they were all there waiting for me. A long line of boxes on top of the fridge.

It's obviously my mother's writing for the most part, though I amended the first one. I didn't know how to spell "berries," but after all my mother didn't know how to spell "Chocula," so there we are. (That paper I have about loving hockey and the Bruins, that would be about the same era, I suppose, the one where I spelled Buyck right but "Jhon" wrong.)

Funny the things that make the biggest memories, isn't it?

A Mixed Day

Today wasn't an all-bad day, but it has had its moments.

The headache I had yesterday got worse last night, not all the way to Severe but definitely Moderate, worse than I've had in a while. It didn't go away when I went to sleep (early); I kept waking and thinking, "Ow, nope," before drifting off again. At some point, though, the tide turned, and I would wake and think, "Hmm, better," instead.

At 5:24, however, when my smoke alarms* went off for approximately seven seconds, and my heart rate leaped stratospherically, I realized that it wasn't completely gone. Ahem. Nothing like a strong jolt of adrenaline to test that out. I actually did lie down again, once I could, and eventually got a little more sleep before the alarm went off, but I was jumpy all morning.
*The sound does not make me leap into productive action or consider rationally what might be wrong: it takes me all the way past that and firmly into frozen panic. It's not good.

I finished up what I was working on this morning, and (spoiler alert) didn't get my next report all afternoon. At first it seemed like I would, and being at home made the waiting easier to take, since I could wander away from the computer here and there, pick up knitting or a book ... though still not ideal. (Although I perked up when I heard, unrelated to work, that I won a sort of contest thing, that was nice!) Eventually my boss told me that I should get it in the morning, and to end my day early, which was fine. And she mentioned how glad she is that I'm back, which even from her is nice to hear.

I had to take Belmont back to the vet about her ears, and between the timing and my post-headache hangover/lethargy, I didn't get anything much done with the extra time. Eventually I woke her (still napping in her desk-top shoe box) and poked her into the carrier; you can imagine how happy she was about that. The vet said the infection was better but there's some inflammation that she'd like to see go down, so it's a few more weeks of the drops and back again. Sigh. She hates the drops, plus every time we go in, cha-ching. Oh well. That's what you get with old cats. Same thing with the frequent throwing up, like what I had to clean up this morning, I almost forgot to mention that. On the desk AND on my chair, which I had (of course) forgotten to cover last night with the towel I usually put over the seat for just that reason. Oh, yes, and I sat in it. That kind of morning.

So that's where we are. Not all bad, but feeling kind of limp, plus indigestion/acid reflux that has me contemplating crackers for dinner. I just took some Alka-Seltzer, so maybe that will help. And not to end on a downer, I will include something I ran across recently when I was cleaning stuff out.

I used to cut out quotes that amused me, with the idea of sticking them up somewhere, and this one was from a piece in the Charlotte Observer, about cats.

I just love that "watch for small bones they are like fish that way."

A Quick Note on a Quick Knit

(Strangely enough, while emotionally I've been fine today, physically I'm a bit of a mess: sore lower back since this morning, slight headache this afternoon. Oh, and did I mention that since last week my face is breaking out like a teenager's? What I'm saying is, let's talk about something else. Knitting!)

The last time I got my hair cut, I learned that my hairdresser is going to be getting cancer treatment, and was in fact going wig shopping that day. I (naturally) offered to knit her a hat. Although I did mean it, it was casually said, but she was very touched and clearly delighted by the idea. So, okay then. A hat.

Last week, I realized that I have my next appointment this Friday, so I picked up a ball of yarn (the yarn I'm using for the blanket, in fact, nice and squishy and machine-washable, and before you ask yes I have plenty), and found a simple pattern to work with it (the Expedition hat). And a few days later, I had this:

I'm pretty pleased with it. I hope she likes it.

Sunday Night, All Right

I think it's a good sign that I'm not feeling heavy Sunday-night dread, don't you? Not that I'm excited to work tomorrow, exactly, but not dreading it. It's been a good weekend, and I know morning will come too early, but oh well. I had some friends over today for what I hope will be the first of multiple new-TV-old-movie events; we watched the Philadelphia Story, which two of us have seen and two had not, and it was very enjoyable. Quite an experience on the big TV! Tonight, though, I'm wishing for hockey. A few weeks yet before that will happen.

Thank you all for weighing in on the question I asked yesterday. I'm still trying to decide. Meanwhile, Belmont has come in to yell at me, which I am taking as a sign that I should get moving. I have to balance my checkbook before I can get to bed. Being an adult is not what I was expecting...

An Odd Kind of Question

The moon is gorgeous tonight, full and golden and haloed. It was rising as I drove home from a dinner with family/friends, and I wanted to stop and just look at it.

Other than the dinner, I spent most of the day cleaning and tidying. You might think that in the past few months, as I was not working, I would have had plenty of time to keep up with such things, and you would be right in the sense that I had the time, but I wasn't doing it. Somehow working, and getting the workspace organized, helped me see more clearly how messy everything else had become. Ugh. My right shoulder, which has been sore recently for no real reason, is sore tonight for a purpose. But things are looking better.

I have an oddball question I am pondering. When I took down the shelves that were on top of the file cabinet, I took down what was on the shelves, which was largely but not solely photos. Part of the "not" was two small wooden boxes that hold Pan's and Harold's ashes. And I kind of don't know what to do with them.

I got them because it seemed like I should, like it was the thing to do, that it would provide that mythical closure people talk about. But now, five and six years later, having the ashes does not make me feel good in any particular way. They don't make me burst into tears to see them, or anything like that, but to be honest I have hundreds if not thousands of pictures of the boys that are, to me, much more their memorials. They were great cats, I loved them, I hated when they died, but ... the ashes don't add any value, so to speak, to the relationship or memories of it. And I don't see the point in keeping something that brings me only faint sadness.

But. What do I do with them? It seems wrong to just throw them away. Pretentious to scatter them. I have nowhere to bury them, not that I'm sure that would feel right either; anyway, I don't want to put them in a pet cemetery. So, what am I not thinking of?

Sorry if it's a bummer of a question, but I just haven't been able to come up with an answer to this one.