Mellow

I’m so freakin’ mellow. We’ve done a lot in the past 3 days and I’m ready for bed now.

D came home Friday afternoon, so to keep him up, we went looking for a geocache. We didn’t find it (but no one has and the owner couldn’t even find it when he went looking for it). We ended up with soaking feet, but laughing our asses off at our attempts to stay kinda dry. We eventually gave in and walked through a stream a few times. Then we came home and D managed to stay awake until 7:50. That’s not bad considering he had been up for over 36 hours at that point.

Saturday we meant to go biking but it was blustery and rainy. So we went to the Eddie Bauer Outlet and got our summer wardrobes updated. A lot of the clothes there are really too big for D and I, but when we do find something it’s a deal. With the additional 25% off coupon from the entertainment book, we ended up paying about 1/3 of the retail price for what we got. The deal of the day? A pair of wool pants for D for work, originally $148, 70% off then 25% off for a total of $33.30. Sweet! I got some new shorts and some very different styled shirts for me.

Today was gorgeous so we worked in the garden this morning, then had lunch on the patio and realised we really need a patio set. So we set off to Canadian Tire and got a decent but cheap set with a umbrella and set it up. That was followed by lounging and reading while drinking juice and we were very happy. Then our friend N came by and we went biking. 21.5 kms later I’m up to 96.8 for the year. Still in London. I will get to France! I swear!

I have started an excel spreadsheet to keep track of the miles. We’ll have to wait on other tracking implements.

In knitting news I ripped out the monkey sock on 2.25 needles. I was about to start the heel when I put it on a string and realised it wouldn’t fit over my ankle. Bye Bye sock! I’m now done 4 of 6 leg repeats on sock #2, so I should be able to get it done this week (well, if it’s nice I’ll be biking and gardening instead, so maybe by next week).

OK, it’s bedtime. I guess this is one of those sad posts without pictures.

I’m wired.

Every have one of those wired days? The ones where no matter what you do, you can’t sit still and by the end of it you have no fingernails, the air is electric and you can’t sleep?

That’s what today was. I wish I could determine when these days come and plan for them because I seem to get a lot done, but I can never tell when it’s going to happen.

D’s out of town this week, in another timezone, so it’s really quiet around the house. Maybe that’s why I’m wired? I’m trying to make enough noise to cover the fact he’s not here?

Today was a big day at school. I had the first supervisory committee meeting for my new project. It’s going really well. The professors (including one from another university) all think I’m on track and I have some interesting ideas. That was a good thing to hear.

Really, not that much else happened. I marked some exams… if asked in a science class “describe 3 ways the <course subject> affects your daily life”, don’t answer “It gives me a class to take” or try to convince me that you collect butterflies. Seriously. I was killing myself laughing at some of the answers. You’ve also gotta wonder about a professor who makes that worth 6 marks on the exam.

On the knitting front, I’m having another go at the Monkey socks in Regia Bamboo that Bronwyn sent me. The first one looks really big around, so with the second ball of yarn I’m trying it on smaller needles. Originally I was using 2.75 mm, I’m now using 2.25mm. The fabric is much nicer, but the sock might be too small around. eep. I’ll show pictures when I’m done this second sock and take a vote on which one to pull out.

Before D left we did a ride outside in the warmth – another 15 K towards the goal. Gotta figure out how to track this better though.

OK, off to bed. Hopefully I won’t be staring at the clock for hours.

high hopes

The long term forecast for my neck of the woods shows warm temperatures for the weekend. It seems we’ll jump from 4 or 5 degrees C to 18 in the space of a day. That should bode well for the start of biking season in earnest.

I’ve got so much else to do as well. I have comments from both supervisors now and the second set is much more involved to fix than the first. I have a supervisory committee meeting for my new PhD next Tuesday and I’m really stressed about that due to differing expectations from my two supervisors (they’re in different departments, heck, different faculties, so they’re used to different things). I’m trying to find an introductory biology course that’s not first year undergraduate biology to audit as I need to learn how to talk to biologists, but I don’t want to sit through a course the length of 1st year biology. I also need an anatomy class, but the one at my university is 2 hours twice a week and I can’t get grad credit for it – between the two I’d be at 8 class hours for the full year without credit. That’s not fitting with my idea of graduating fast. AARGH!

The last 2 paragraphs were written at an ungodly hour of the night last night – I was too wired to sleep for very long and I paid for it (and am still paying in fact). Yesterday I ran a games night for the grad students at school that went late without having a proper dinner, then I got talking to a student who is just finishing his undergrad about if he should do grad school or not (he started the conversation with “I wanted to talk to you about grad school. I think it’s my only option”. eep! going to more school because you think it’s the only thing left is NOT a way to start on a successful track.

Anyways, I got in late, was wired from games, no food and the conversation and couldn’t sleep. Today’s bee a wash as a result. The one thing I did accomplish? Picking up my new glasses. I LOVE THEM. They do push on my nose in a place that gives me a headache though, so I hope that goes away.

Another FO!!

I’m on a roll of late. I have another FO. This is yet another baby gift and it’s for a friend’s baby. It’s the kimono from Mason -Dixon Knits and I used an idea I saw from Webbo on the knittyboard to use buttons instead of ribbons.

It was all going along well, then I sat back and looked at what I had created…

Yup, that mom is never going to figure out how to put that on her infant. I sewed the sleeves up in opposite directions. After putting the thing aside to think about what it had done for a few days, I seamed it correctly and I now have a completed project. YAY!

Modeling it is the only thing in the house that was smaller. Standly Sheep (pronounced like Stanley with a silent d, like a greatuncle of mine) has arms that point in the wrong direction. Ted the bear is too big, and, unlike Nimrodel, I’d never get my cats into a sweater (well maybe Fred, but the shower’s this weekend and I don’t want to risk ruining the sweater).

So that’s the latest knitting update.

Bikewise, I put it back on the trainer and slogged through another 10 kms. That’s up to 60.3 kms for the year. Still in Britain. My sister in Ireland was able to RUN 20 MILES on the weekend in 20 C weather. I’m more than a little jealous. She’s training for a Marathon in 3 weeks so hopefully the weather will hold.

Thesis wise, I got the comments back from the second supervisor on Friday. There’s some pretty big ones that will take significant effort to deal with. I think there’s a whole section I’m going to axe because I don’t want to deal with the comments. It seems like chickening out, but I just want this phase of my life over and to be able to focus 100% on my new project (which is going really well!).

Otherwise, D’s off to Japan on Friday for a week, then he’s home for 3 weeks and then we’re off to Spain. YAY! Vacation!

SP Fulfillment

I promised I’d get around to posting the full goodies of my SP package, so here it is. The pictures aren’t the greatest, but I spent the day grinding down microscopy samples to less than 30 microns (smaller than the diameter of a human hair) and I was really late home from school.

First up is the whole goodness. Well, I’m missing the Hershey’s Kisses that didn’t last very long.

The glorious socks can be seen in yesterday’s late night installment. Up front is an eraser that will come in handy when I do the crossword puzzle. If only I could use it to erase real faux pas… like asking my Jewish supervisor if it’s appropriate to wish a Jewish person “Happy Passover”. I was curious – and he never answered.

In the wonderful bundle is Fleece Artist Merino Sock knit in Mermaid. It’s really nice. I think it might become a new clapotis for next winter. Or a pair of socks…

Then there’s a skein of Mountain Colors Mountain Goat in the Mountain Sky colourway. I don’t know what to do with this….

It’s not that fuzzy in real life. I guess that’s why good photographers use natural light for their pictures. I wasn’t home when it was light today though (well, maybe before I left for school, but that’s not really awake time!).

There were also 3 balls of Laines du Nord Korall in black. There’s no photographing black yarn at night. I think this is what my SP suggested as the “Manly Yarn” in the box. I guess D’s getting something warm – maybe a hat? It’s a very lofty well twisted multiplied yarn. I think I’m going to like working with it.

Thank you again Bronwyn – the socks are really nice, and now I know they’re made with really nice yarn all the way from England. If there’s one thing this SP experience has taught me, it’s that I should buy more on the net and buy myself the good stuff – it’s better to knit with good and love the result instead of knitting with junk and hating it.

PS. I did another 10k in the basement on my bike on Sunday… what does that take the total to? I’ll have to go check and update tomorrow – I have a FO to report as well.

SP Sneak Peek!

I was sitting at the table this morning, eating my Cheerios, reading the paper and the door bell rang. As I went to the door I noticed a man walking away from the house. How weird, I thought, usually people give you more than 10 seconds to get to the door before walking away.

The man didn’t want to talk. He was dropping off my third and final package from my knittyboard SP. She’s a sweetie. Turns out it’s Nararabbit and she sent me an Easter package. Up here in Canadia (as my friend John says), we don’t get mail on Good Friday, any Saturday or Easter Monday so it just missed the date.

I hurriedly ripped it open and it’s really cool. I didn’t have time to take pictures properly, so the majority will wait for tomorrow, but I’ve got a sneak peek now…

What’s that lurking between my (very dirty) shoes and my cuff?

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Why it’s my very first pair of knit for me handknit socks. They’re awesome. I wore them today and they’re scrummy. I’m so honoured that someone took the time to make me socks. Thank you Bronwyn! I bought cheesestrings today!

Holiday Friday

Today’s a holiday. We really needed it. Things were just flying by. Instead, today we slept in, we’re catching up on laundry and a few other things around the house. One thing I’ve been meaning to do is make baby shower presents.

Seems there’s a baby boom among my friends and I’m going to lots of showers in the next few weeks. It started with my cousin. She grew up next door to me and is 9 months younger than me. She’s due at the end of May and I really want to welcome the baby in style. We’re both scientists and she excelled at math at a younger age, so I wanted to do something suitably geeky for her soon to be baby. That’s the QT PI one. Her fiance is native and and artist and they gave us one of his silkscreened paintings as a wedding present. I took a good picture of it and got it printed for the bottom middle one. The last is the for “baby” in the language of the fiance’s community. I don’t want to say the name as it’s the place they’re from, but it’s on the west coast of Canada. This is the best translation to “english” characters apparently, right down to the question mark without a period! My cousin and her fiance do not know the sex of the baby, so that’s the 3 white ones. The pink one is for a friend from university who is due the same day!

Re-reading that it sounds awfully clinical – my cousin and her fiance are great but private, so I don’t want to use names as his community is really small so even the tiniest shred could give him away (heck, the spelling of baby and the art will do it if you know enough, but I’m going to try my best to keep this private!).

The plan was to clean the study today but it hasn’t started yet so I doubt it’s going to happen. I did get out my baritone and start practicing though. I was in a marching band in high school and it’s having it’s 60th anniversary this summer. I’m planning on playing in the parade so I need to get my chops back in shape. It’s been 7 years since I played at university. I’m surprised at how fast my lips tired out today. I used to be able to play for hours!

For some reason Mother Nature decided that we haven’t had enough winter here so it’s snowing again. There was accumulation yesterday, but it melted this morning. It’s snowing again now. Temperatures are below zero. I hope this doesn’t affect the tulips and day lilies that were poking up in the front garden.

Here’s a picture of Fred. He and Ginger have decided that it’s their job to dry the bathtub after a shower as we humans leave it so wet. Fred has appointed himself guardian of the drain. no monsters will come up while Fredward J. Snugglesworth III is on duty. Nope. He will protect the humans and Princess GingerBear ofAshley.

Thesis, Schmesis.

I’m not sure how to spell that, but that’s what I’m feeling right now.

I just looked through the corrections from my former supervisor on the Master’s thesis I have to write up. I think it’s going to be doable. VERY doable. Like get it done this weekend (since it’s a 3 day one and it’s supposed to rain). Horray!

Soon I will be like Mike Slackernery from PhD comics. If you have grad student experience, you know someone in grad school or you’ve ever wondered what grad school is like, check out PhD comics. It describes the life to a T. D gave me the “Women of Grad School, Women of Valour” T-shirt for christmas and I love it. But I haven’t seen it in a few weeks. Guess I should go look in the fancy new closet organiser mabob.

On the knitting front, I’m down to the ribbing at the bottom of rusted root. I made it longer than the pattern suggests because I have too many belly shirts and I need some longer things. I should be able to have it done for Easter dinner on Sunday at D’s mom’s house. I’m making the NY Times no-knead bread (needs registration, but I’ve never gotten spam from them – there are other places to find it without registering). I’m a big fan and a convert to this method. I think the trick is in the pot. Having the a right diameter heavy based pot is key. I made a loaf for D’s family’s Boxing Day dinner and his uncle said it reminded him of the bread his dad used to make and his dad was a professional baker. YAY!

OK, that was the completely random paragraph. D’s in Detroit tonight. The joys of working in an industry where the largest customer is the auto industry. At the end of the month he might be going to Japan again. The joy. If I don’t sound excited it’s because I’m not. Japan for a week sucks. That’s all I’ll say. That and if we’d known before we bought the Spain tickets, I would have bought a Japan ticket for myself, extended his ticket and gone there instead. Grrr.

I know people like pictures in blogs, but I really don’t have all that many. I think I’ll look through the pictures on my hard drive and pull 2 out to show.

This is me at my wedding to the wonderful D. He likes this one as it’s me in my natural habitat – slouching. You can see my favourite part of my outfit – I wore red shoes. My maternal grandmother used to say every woman should have a pair of red shoes, so I go with that completely. I later found out that it’s become tradition for the female cousins on my dad’s side to wear red shoes to get married.

This second one is the favourite of our parents and the photographer. We cleaned out n old outbuilding on the farm in case of rain at the wedding and found a pitchfork. Dad threatened to use it to force D down the aisle if he looked like he was going to bolt. We decided to recreate the American Gothic picture in front of the house and came up with this.

I was in a military style marching band in high school, so I have years of training in making a deadpan face and holding it. I really was happy that day. While taking this picture D kept laughing out loud. As I’ve mentioned before, our photographer was Dawn Alexander at http://www.dawnalexander.com. I can’t recommend her enough. She just understood what we wanted and did it.

Well, it’s late and I should go to bed. Without D to give me the cues, I go to bed really late on my own. Good night!

It’s the weekend again

We’re in a bit of a rut here at the Casa M-P. It seems we rush through the week, then do very little on the weekends and end up rushing through yet another week. Good news is that Friday is a holiday, so we’ll be forced to sit around and do nothing. HORRAY!

Tomorrow we’re headed to D’s father’s house. It’s about a 2 hour drive (well 1 hour 45, but it depends on a lot of stuff!). I’m on the home stretch of Rusted Root, so maybe I’ll have it done by next weekend. I hope to as the baby boom has started and I have showers coming out the wazoo right now.

We were hoping to get out on the bikes today, but it didn’t warm up and the wind was pretty strong. That’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it. The goal is to go and do some in the basement after dinner – I think we’d be better going to the gym first thing tomorrow. Perhaps I’ll go suggest that.

<insert 1 day break here>

So something happened yesterday and it’s now Sunday. We’ve had a day of lots of rain, but it was beautiful out where D’s dad lives. It was nice to see D’s dad, step-mom and grandmother. I got another 12 rows of rusted root done as well. I’m about 1.5 inches from being done the front, then I do the ribbing, the neckband and the sleeve bands. Should be done soon! Squee!

I’ve realised that posts without pictures are pretty boring, so I’m looking back through my pictures on this computer. This is me biking in Colorado in 2003. D’s company sent him there on business and it was cheaper to send him over a weekend so they paid for the car and we paid for the hotel and my flight and had a weekend in the rockies. Pretty cool. This was at very high elevation and we were zonked afterwards, but we had to do it!

We also watched Casino Royale this weekend. Good Bond movie! Can’t say much, but it was neat to see how the bond of later movies developed.

No biking to report, but there is fun cat news on the horizon if I can figure out how to upload sounds and catch the new Fred noise on camera.