Distracted, but Productive

We are on day 2 of the "biggest winter storm of the season". At least that is what the local weather people are calling it. Well, duh. I guess they are having a hard time coming up with superlatives.

It's really rather pretty. We had a bunch of snow yesterday, over night everything received a protective coating of ice, and now, I can barely see my neighbor's house for the Buick-sized snow flakes that are coming down like a hard rain. I'm glad I have no where to go.

I took some pictures before the kidlets were awake, and before they had the yearning to do what kids do. That is go outside and turn the pretty into not so pretty. You know what they are going to do to those icicles. Please ignore the Christmas tree stand in the bottom right corner that is still attached to the tree. I'll get to it, soonish.

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Now, the productive part. I started this Monday evening, and finished yesterday. It's Calorimetry using Manos del Uruguay in the Wildflower colorway. I only cast on 98 stitches (the pattern calls for 110) and repeated row 5 twelve times instead of 15. I have a smallish head.

This is a fun and easy pattern. It's a good introduction of short rows if you've never worked them before. I have enough of my yarn left over that I could probably eke out another one. The Girl has expressed interest in it. I can't have nuthin'.

There you have it

It's been 3 days since the inauguration and I think we've had enough time that we can put it into perspective. I didn't see one unicorn dancing on my lawn the day after. Nor was there a rainbow over my house with a pot of gold. Gasoline is not free, and my mortgage did not magically get paid off.

Don't get me wrong. I hope for nothing but the best from our new president. If he succeeds at his job, we all succeed. But to hear some people rhapsodize about President Obama, you would have thought that this would be the end to all of our problems.

I just hope (there's that word) that some people won't be horribly disappointed when it's the same old song and dance out of Washington.

Slash



You meet knitters in the most unexpected places, like the ER doc at Cincinnati Children's Hospital.



Last evening while waiting for 4 hours in the ER (the staff kept telling everyone that they had never been this busy before, ever) I got some knitting done. Quite a bit actually. Thing 1 inexplicably decided to put a marble in his mouth. I guess you know where I'm going with this.



But since he wasn't choking or having trouble breathing, I made the executive decision to consult the Husband later and sent all the kidlets to bed. When the Husband arrived home from the night out with his buddy, he decided that maybe we should have Thing 1 x-rayed just to make sure. I got the short straw.



So while Thing 1 dozed in the exam room, I worked on the newest sock. It's the Beaded Rib pattern from Charlene Schurch in her most excellent book Sensational Knitted Socks worked in Austermann Step. The exam room was the best place to work on the short row heel.



This pattern is worked from the toe-up and the short row heel requires much concentration. For me, at least. This was only my second pair of toe-ups. Luckily I had the forsight to bring all of the paraphanalia with me. I pulled the little table over to my chair, you know, those little tables on wheels that are designed to slide over hospital beds.



So the doc came in (finally) while I had my pattern book and stitch markers all spread about, and immediately said "Hey, you're making a sock! How long does it take you to make a sock? I'm the world's slowest knitter. I made my daughter a blanket, and I knit on that thing forever. When I was done it was no bigger than a doily!"



I immediately liked and trusted her.



Thing 1 is fine. This, too, will pass. I've added a slash to my job description - Mom/laundress/cook/driver/scullery maid/poop checker.

I don't want to brag or anything...

but have any of you signed up for Twitter? It's pretty clever. It's blog-lite. If you don't have the time or inclination for a full fat blog post, you can tweet. It's a good way to jot down random thoughts and observations or keep in touch with distant (distant in a spatial way, not emotional) friends.

Anywhoodle, you can also follow other twitters and they can follow your tweets just like bloglines and such. There are some well known people tweeting. John Cleese and Amy R. Singer, for example. (Wouldn't you just love to be lumped into the "well known" category with the likes of John Cleese?)

In addition to the above luminaries, I am following Stephen Fry of Jeeves and Wooster, Peter's Friends, and Wilde fame. I've always thought that Mr. Fry (we aren't on a first name basis, yet) was terribly clever. In addition to being an actor/director, he writes (novels and plays), and it turns out that he is now following me! I won't mention what puckered when I received the email letting me know that I had a new follower.

I've not twitted in a few days, because I now have the added pressure to be witty. Talk about twitter's block!