How could I forget about RYDER!!! The lone Canadian in the TdF this year.
He road today and came in 13th of 145 on a 53 km time trial wearing a maple leaf helmet as the TT champion of Canada. Only guy faster onhis team was the team leader. He’s now 47th overall. Not bad for the first time out!
Go RYDER!!
but the tour is on.
I can now sit and watch the tour and work on my laptop. Last night I started to figure out GIMP, the photoshop of Ubuntu. I was working with a picture of gingerbear and this is what I ended up with.
It’s not perfect – you can see where the dodging starts and stops on the jeans etc, but I did adjust the colours and make them more “ginger-esque”. More time and I’ll get better.
I’ve got a serious amount of school to work on – big conference in a few weeks and I need to get my data together. Monday is the deadline for a top secret application that could completely change everything. I need to work on it, but it is so much nicer to knit and watch TV or sleep.
We’re 2 stages away from the end of the tour and I still have no-one to cheer for. I started the tour hoping someone would make me want them to win but I’m still just watching for the purpose of watching. The time trial tomorrow morning may change things, but what person chooses a favourite on the last real stage (the final stage is traditionally a parade stage for the overall contenders, with a few years as exceptions).
Oh well, gotta go figure out what to feed D for dinner. I have no idea beyond that I’m hungry.
The week has just flown by. D and I have been up late almost every night either working or watching the end of a tour stage because the $@#$@#$ DVR didn’t record it. There’s been good moments and bad moments in the tour yet again. One of the teams has pulled out as their leader was busted for using a new form of EPO to increase the red blood cells in his blood so he could carry more oxygen than other cyclists.
We’re going to a wedding tomorrow, so I’m sitting here waiting for toenail polish to dry. I’m so impatient that I usually end up smudging it. I hope typing on my new laptop will solve that problem!
Learning this new operating system has had some hiccups. I’m going to try to load a new program on Monday so wish me luck.
Still no knitting pictures. I’m through two of the lace repeats on the back of the Apres Snowboarding Hoody and only 1 cm on the D socks. There’ll be a few hours of knitting on the socks this weekend, so by nxt week I’ll have made progress Wendi!
No pictures even on this computer and I can’t even find a picture on the net to show you all. I w ill show you these two links though. I can’t decide who to send these two – I’m thinking chicken to my sister and mobile to my brother…
We live in a bungalow built in 1958. It’s small, but both D and I are smaller people, so we don’t need that much space. The stairs have been getting a workout tonight though!
My dad gave me a laptop that he “never wants to see again!”. I think it was to do with it’s size and weight (he’s started doing consulting on remote jobsites) and not ease of use, but it’s given D lots of computer fun in the past 2 days.
Dad loaded Ubuntu on in. It’s Linux for Humans according to the tagline. Unfortunately Ubuntu didn’t come with the drivers needed to run the ethernet or wireless inside the box, so D’s been trying to sort that out as thsi human was way out of her element. First he started on the coffee table. Then when he realised the TdF wasn’t on tonight he headed down and sat on the basement floor next to our modem to plug the new one right in rather than trying the wireless.
I’m up here on the desktop trying to figure out Paintshop Pro. I have a poster to make fo a conference next month and I need to make some minor adjustsments to an image from the literature. This is a classic line drawing that has been cited over and over, but one of the lines is in the wrong place causeing the measurement to indicate the wrong dimension on the drawing. My supervisor and I believe this is causing a lot of confusion in our area, so we’ve decided to correct it – that being the “me” form of “we”.
Went to the nurse practioner yesterday and I’m now eligible for Bezzie’s KAYE sweepstakes – but while I was there she determined that the cold I had in June has settled in my lungs and I’m on antibiotics. I have been feeling a little off my game, but not that bad. Today I feel worse, I’m blaming that on the antibiotics.
Knittingwise, I need a photo session. I’ve got the Aleita Shell, the Ivy League Vest and the Bliss baby blanket to show off. Perhaps tomorrow evening at Dusk would be a good time? I’ve started the Apres Surf Hoodie in Cashmere as well. LOVE IT!
Here’s my new haircut from the post doctor visit yesterday – no way I was going back to school after that appointment! You can really see how one side curls under and the other side curls out in this picture.
I just heard a WOOHOO!! yell from the basement. Guess the wireless on the laptop is working. OK, now he is singing the “I am so smart, S-M-R-T” song from the Simpsons. Ahhh. Husbands. Good work D! Time to go sit on the couch.
We had our department picnic today at school with the annual bocce tournament. I think I found someone else to run the tournament next year. I get really frustrated because it works well with 8 teams, but every year it’s like pulling teeth to get 8 teams together, then when the day comes everyone else wants to play because it looks like fun. This year someone actually brought another set of bocce balls and had a third set of games going on and then wanted to integrate into the progression to lead to a winner. I gave up and let the other person run with it.
Batty, thanks for tellign me what you cardiologist said. I was definately faint yesterday- I can’t remember doing anything from 1 pm till 4:30 pm and I had a killer headache until I had some salt. I was talking with someone else who mentioned that potassium is also very important.
Tomorrow I go back for day 2 of a study looking at strength and training in the dominant arms of women. I will be buff on one arm at least! The person running the study did say that I will be sore soon!
I’m reading a book about how to write a thesis right now and it says the most important thing to do is to write EVERY DAY. I’m thinking I should start that here. Might mean fewer pictures, but it would let me get more out there.
D and I biked in to school/work today. It was tough. Really muggy this morning – I was sweating but it wasn’t cooling me off. I have a sinking feeling that I’ve been over hydrating. I know I’ve been sweating, so I’ve been drinking water by the bike bottle full (like 5 at school on Monday). Each bottle is about 750 mls. Yup, that’s a lot of water in 7 hours. I was into the ladies’ room several times.
I think I should be watching my salt intake and perhaps upping it if I’m drinking that much. Seriously. I come home and had some salty stuff and felt much better. That was a good one to solve.
I took part in an experiment today. I’m the subject in a kinesology experiment. My mom says it’s not fair for me to do psychology experiments anymore. I can figure out what they’re looking for and find flaws. For instance, the only one I did asked “on a scale of 1 to 100, how likely would you be to invest $1000 in an investment where you had a 50% chance of making $6000, a 30% chance of making $2000 or a 20% chance of loosing $3000?” Seriously? There is a chance I would loose more money than I put in? Nope. Not for me.I pointed this out to the student running the experiment as I was answering 1 to ALL of the questions and she said I was the second one to do that in the entire 100 people she’d tested. After asking my friends at lunch, it turns out the other 1 was a friend of mine!
OK. that’s the start of turning this more into a diary instead of a trip/knitting journal.
I’m really stressed about getting my schoolwork done before another conference in August and my application in for a very cool job. Hence why this is being written at 12:29 am.
When we bought our house it was listed as having a pool sized lot. We’re not really swimmers, but having a nice lot with a small house is often enjoyable. Not so much when mowing, but when it comes to spreading out, we really like it (and Batty, D mowed the little maple trees on Canada Day, so if someone’s having their passport taken, it’s not me!).
As cyclists, we’re often hot and sweaty when we arrive home and there is a theory that to sleep well, you need to get your core temperature down.
One way to do that is a shower, the other a bath – you get the picture.
A few years back, while I was working at the bike store, D made a surprise purchase for me while I was at work one day. I biked back to the house and found he had full filled our house’s destiny – we now have a pool.
Sure it’s a wading pool, but it fits our lifestyle perfectly. We drain it once a week to water the flower gardens, it is deep enough that I can get in up to the arm pits if I slouch, the sides are sturdy enough to lean on and both of us can sit in it. The black is 1/2 of a garbage bag as a solar blanket. Heats the pool AND keeps the water from evapourating.
After dark we’ve been known to go skinny dipping (just remember to bring out a towel!) . Sometimes we sit out with dessert or a drink after dinner and soak our feet.
On days like today where the humidex has the temperature into the high 30s (Celcius!) there is nothing like getting in the pool right after getting off the bike. I did change out of my ike clothes and into my bikini.
No pictures of me in the pool as D is off biking right now, but I can guarantee he’ll be in it tonight!
On the knitting front, I’m making good progress on the Bliss Baby Blanket. What a great knit. It’s in a Bernat acrylic so it’s uber washable for the mommy and daddy to be. With the TdF on right now, I should have it done by the end of the week. Then it’s onto the Apres Surf Hoodie in Cashmere. Seriously. I even ended up with FREE cashmere due to the niceness of Richard at Colourmart.
While getting the pictures off the camera, I found this one from a few weeks ago. It had hailed, the sky had cleared and a goldfinch had come to our feeder. It was amazing light. I wish I had the skills to take better photographs.
OK, gotta run. Someone’s saying “rub the belly, Rub the Belly, RUB THE BELLY”!
