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Category Archives: Randonymity
This and that
Wow, last week must’ve been my lucky week. I won a contest at Kristi’s and received one of her very cool sock patterns and I won a contest at the Crafty Modster’s and will be receiving a copy of her Project Spectrum May mix cd. Fun!
Hmm, looks like Kelly’s cat Sockies doesn’t approve of Chaos’ antics… Check out the gorgeous green yarn Kelly dyed!
Jeanne and I dyed yarn yesterday. It’s not quite photo ready, so I’ll just show you what my hand looked like after I forgot to put my gloves back on before rinsing the dyed yarn – please note that, due to the flash, you’re not getting the full effect. My hand was dark, dark grey.
“Mom? Why is your hand blocking my photo op?”
I drove past this very Project Spectrum building on the West Bank (the area around the part of the University of Minnesota Twin Cities campus that’s on the west bank of the Mississippi). I can’t remember for sure, but I might’ve worked doing telephone fundraising for nonprofits out of the upper story of that building back in 1990 – trust me, it wasn’t that color 16 years ago, or I would remember!
Chaos also had a busy weekend, following the sunspot around the living room.
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The Phantom Paw and Other Tails
For the curious, my tattoo is on the back of my upper left arm. I had a mole biopsy there maybe seven years ago and it left a scar that bothered me, so I camouflaged it with the tattoo. (And my dermatologist even thought that was a fine way to deal with the scar!) Until last November, the tattoo was just the top half, which means “Good luck.” And yes, it was a bit difficult to photograph! It’s actually backwards (which amusingly didn’t occur to me until just now, or I could’ve corrected it!), because I ended up taking the picture in one of the plentiful mirrors around here.
Now, on to the Phantom Paw:
For all the Minnesota knitters who just took a collective gasp, trying to figure out how they missed the Yarn Harlot coming to town, don’t worry. Ana picked this up for me when the Yarn Harlot was in Pittsburgh a few weeks ago – thanks, Ana!!
Check out my new tape measure:
front
back
Yeah, that paw is definitely persistent, isn’t it?!I found some gluten-free beer while I was in Wisconsin! Of course, upon trying it, I discovered that beer tastes sort of weird if you haven’t had one for over ten years. Chaos doesn’t think too much of beer. When I tossed a bottle cap on the floor for Chaos to play with, he tried to bury it.
“I definitely don’t approve of beer. But that stuff with those nifty corks, that’s ok.”
This is what Chaos’ water looked like last night when I got home from work.
No, I agree, I don’t think that mouse is colorfast. Wouldn’t this have been a great March Project Spectrum picture?!
Handwritten
My handwriting and signature are somewhat notorious for their inscrutability. But you can judge for yourself via this nifty handwriting meme… I first spotted this at Mim’s, although Julia’s post reminded me to actually do it.
Write a pangram on a piece of paper, sign your first name, take a photo of it, and load it onto your blog or upload into the flickr pool.
“And the yarn and tuna are where, exactly?”
Random rambles
Wednesday randomness again, since I have no particular ideas for today’s blog entry.
Knitting excitement of the week was teaching myself Norwegian purling. I’ve been knitting continental and either purling by throwing in my own special very slow throwing method or by “scoop” (aka “combined”) purling. Combined purling produces a twisted purl stitch, so it’s great for, say, seed stitch in the round where you can knit into the back of the stitch next time to untwist it, but pretty much sucks for ribbing. Norwegian purling rocks. I can’t believe it took me so long to try it!
A few weeks ago, I wandered into Tuesday Morning to get some notecards and see what oddities struck my fancy. Imagine my delight at finding this candle:
“Why did you get an icky cookie candle? Didn’t they have a tasty tuna candle?!”
Here’s a shot without the lid – those are little wax chocolate chips that are loose on top of the candle:
Tragically, the candle turns out to be too strongly scented for me, so it’s gone to live with my brother. Maybe the angelfood cake or lemon meringue pie wouldn’t be quite as strong…
Last week, I picked up some Vesper sock yarn in the Strange Little Mama colorway. Fun! I think that covers all the yarns I’ve been craving…
Not to worry about Chaos not being in that picture. It’s a sunny morning here, so he’s busy lying on the floor in a sun stupor. He had a rough night. I pulled out the stove yesterday evening and rescued six or seven sparkly mice. Chaos hopped behind the stove as soon as I pulled it out, snactched SRM, hopped back out, and got busy playing. Some of that busyness included dropping SRM on my face in the middle of the night, trying to get me to play fetch instead of sleeping… exactly as relayed to Chaos from Cricket in the comments yesterday. Thanks a lot, Maeve!
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Where I’ve knit and a shocking revelation about Chaos
Kat is having a contest – list five places other than your home or a knitting store where you’ve knitted. Here’s my list:
- With Christine Lavin before a concert (she signed not only a cd, but her chapter in Knit Lit, Too)
- During team meetings at work
- Out at happy hour with my coworkers
- The Ghost Ranch (where Georgia O’Keefe did a lot of her painting)
- Walking around Lake of the Isles in Minneapolis (this caused a runner to run backwards for a while to watch me)
And the place I always mean to go knit but never quite manage to make it to… The Smitten Kitten (a feminist s*x toy shop about 10 blocks away), which has a weekly knitting group on Sunday mornings.
I finished the cage liner and will send it off to Chris tomorrow! Although there might be a bit of resistance about that…
“What do you mean, this isn’t for me?! I demand tuna in restitution!”
What I particularly like about this picture is that, if you click on it and make it larger, you can see the tabby striping on the side of Chaos’ face. Chaos is not exactly a black cat – he’s a stealth tabby. He has ultra black tabby markings on a near black background. You can only see the stripes when he’s in bright sunlight, illuminated by a flash, or if you spend some time around a cat who’s really, really black, like Chaos’ mom Riley.
I’ll give you some time to cope with the shock. Do you think I need to bow out of the Black Cat Web Ring?
Scattered in the sun
A few oddiments… I’ve made some progress on my Sunny Sock.
Most of it while I was hanging out with some coworkers after work on Thursday. It was 82F. In April. In Minnesota. We drank and were merry.
I’m also making quite a bit of progress on the cage liner that I’ll send to Chris on Monday for her local Humane Society. Sadly, I’m almost out of orange Canadiana, so I’ll be switching to all black or to green and black.
“Helloooo? Is anybody in there? Just nod if you can hear me.”
“Smells… orange.”
Here are a few more songs for the playlist – some from the comments yesterday and some from cds I picked up at the library:
- Wimoweh (The Lion Sleeps Tonight) – Nanci Griffith
- Under My Thumb – The Rolling Stones
- Year of the Cat – Al Stewart
- Slappin’ on My Black Cat Bone – Tony Glover, Dave Ray, Big Joe Williams, & Spider John Koerner
- Devil’s Gonna Get You – Bessie Smith
- Black Cat Moan – Tiny Parham & His Musicians
- Black Cat, Hoot Owl Blues – Ma Rainey & Her Tub Jug Washboard Band
- Black Cat Bone – Lightnin’ Hopkins
- Black Ghost Blues – Lightnin’ Hopkins
It’s sunny and warm here, so I’m going to clean up my bike and hit the trails. Have a great weekend!
Black cat fever
Today we shall celebrate black cats. (What? You think I do that every day? Um, well, maybe so…)
Last week Trish posted a picture of some very cool cat stitchmarkers she’d purchased. I went and checked out the lovely stitch markers Karen makes and ordered a set of black cats for very small needles and another set for medium needles.
“Hmm, these seem a little small and not furry enough to be cats…”
Aren’t they great? These are the ones for small needles.
And here are the markers for medium needles – Karen included a bonus marker for me – recognize Chaos’ brother Diablo there on the right?!! Now I need to start a shawl or something that will use lots and lots of markers…
Last week I took care of my neighbor Anna’s cat Sweets while Anna was in Hawaii. One of the best things about living in my building is that we exchange catsitting duties – so I went down the hall and visited Sweets a few times a day and one of my neighbors will do the same for Chaos while I’m out of town. Anyway, Anna brought back some very fun black cat swag for me!
“Well, this is bigger, but it still doesn’t seem like a cat to me.”
From the left, swizzle sticks, a very cool black cat nodder, and one of my wine glasses decorated with a little black cat that hangs from the rim by its tail.
Um, do you think Anna’s trying to tell me I should have a party?!
“Where’s the wine, Mom?! A glass of a fine tuna or catnip wine would really hit the spot right now.”
Hmm, do you think I should tell him that he’s not old enough to drink?
Randonymity
Congratulations to Sydney (aka “Doctor Dirt“), who was lucky number 15 and the winner of the Chaotic Playlist Contest – a package will be heading her way very shortly. Sometime this week, I will post a list of all the songs that were submitted – they were great! Thanks to everyone who participated.
Anyone want to hazard a guess how I missed this bit o’ yellow in my life?! *smacks forehead*
Over the weekend, I finished another pair of socks…
“I’m warning you – it’s not going to be pretty if you try to put those on me again.”
Some recent sock yarn procurement… From left, Dicentra Designs in Kingsfoil and Pelennor, Sunshine Yarns in Denim and Gryffindor (I am so happy about that skein), Brooklyn Handspun in Ramblings, and the previously mentioned Treadsoft in Sunburst and Burples.
Another fun booklet from the thrift shop, for knitting accessories flat and then seaming (for hats, socks, mittens)…
Annotated with these words to live by:
A is for…
Abundance. (Hey, cut me a break – I joined the ABC-Along late! I’m caught up now. Well, after this entry, I am.)
Blogging has brought Abundance into my life: Abundance of laughter, of tears, of joys and sorrows shared… Abundance of friends I would never have met otherwise.
You’ve probably participated in or at least noticed the Abundance of Pal exchanges (be they Secret, Better, or other) and contests in the knitblogging community as we reach out and share with each other, getting to know each other better, getting to know each other beyond the blogosphere. That was something that I never expected when I started to blog – but I’m definitely not complaining.
I love to get postcards from my friends on their travels, but over the past 10 years or so, the cards and postcards have dwindled as the internets increase. We send more email and virtual cards and fewer physical cards. It happened so gradually, I don’t think I really noticed. Until recently. The cards below are all from other bloggers. How cool is that?!
“I’m sure Mom won’t notice if I get up on the TV right now…”
As part of getting to know some other bloggers and sharing the Abundance, I participated in a little spring exchange with Peeve, Mrs Pao, and Eileen. I thought I’d share some pictures of a few of the fun things that have arrived.
Yum… A package from Mrs Pao, with some alpaca, Regia Silk (which I’ve been dying to try), and Fyberspates (which I’ve never seen before):
Along with a very fun goldfish wand toy for Chaos – I love the cat picture on the package!
And the aforementioned chocolate bunny (really, when the hormones hit in a few days, I won’t have any qualms about devouring that bunny), some cute mini knitting needles, a ball of Scheepjes (another yarn I haven’t seen before), some tasty gluten-free biscuits…
And my very own toy mouse, made from some gorgeous fruitwood! We’re having a wee spot of trouble with this mouse right now, since Chaos insists on knocking the mouse down from wherever I put it. Apparently, all mice are his mice.
Along with more gluten-free biscuits and steamed pudding/cake thingies (not available for this photo *ahem*), Peeve sent me Kafka on the Shore, with the far superior non-US cover…
*sniff sniff*
And a “Cat Garden” kit. Although the box says it’s for things like catmint and catnip, I think I’ll be growing a crop of little tabbies and torties and tuxedos. 🙂
One out of one tails exposed to this kit agree!
I highly recommend participating in a Pal exchange, be it one of the larger ones or simply a small one that you organize. It’s a lot of fun, and spreads the Abundance of blogging.