redhedlvr2

I've spent the last week knitting my wee knitterly fingers to the bone it seems.  And although I'm going to chalk this past week up to progress, I do have to say I have nothing to show for my efforts.  It has become obvious to me that HALF of the sock yarn I bought last week will not produce the incredible stacking and pooling effects that this afghan requires.

To be more specific, I started with this yarn.  The colors in this pic aren't true at all.  I find the yarn itself to be very pretty and will save for another SOCK yarn afghan I've been seeing around.  But for this project, it's just not working out.  And on the subject, tell me, what kind of masochist knits an afghan out of sock yarn anyway?

Here's the lowdown.  With a #2 needle, I cast on 64 stitches and worked the pattern, which is extremely easy and the swatch worked up quickly.  It did become apparent after about an inch that the desired pattern wasn't working so, as per the directions, I first increased by two stitches, knit for another inch, increased two more, knit for an inch.  Nadda.  I frogged the whole thing and repeated with a #1 needle.  Still no joy.  At that point, I ripped the whole thing out again and cast on with only 54 stitches, wash, rinse repeat as above.

My conclusion is this.  Sock yarn that will produce a "wider" solid stripe with jacquard patterning will not work.  It is possible that I have not hit the sweet spot, but I believe the nature of that thicker/wider stripe won't allow for the zig-zagging pattern that was intended.

Did I mention that I don't own any straight knitting needles other than double points?  Have I also mentioned that 64 stitches is too long to hold safely on a double point without some stitches falling off the back side?  My solution?  I rooted around in the kitchen junk drawer searching for a rubber band I could cut in half and wrap around the needles as sort of a point protector.  No rubber bands were in the drawer but there was an unopened pair of squishy ear plugs that I jammed onto the ends and have worked quite well.

The things we do for our craft, right?

I sent this from my phone to my yahoo email because for some reason I couldn't get it to go to my gmail email.  See what I mean?

I just finished reading Tom Clancy's Dead or Alive.  Has anyone else read it?

( Cut for bookish spoilers )

My gaming life is, well, I'm not sure I can describe it.  I've gotten 3 toons up to level 85, one of which has finished her Cataclysm loremaster achievement, but now I feel like, what's next?  I don't raid and I've never done much as far as grouping due to much trauma early in my WoW career.  Their tradeskills are maxed out so I don't feel much urge to log on the game except when the guild is on.  It's my daughter's guild and we boast a whopping six members.  We only really are able to group on Saturday or Sunday afternoons and then I'm playing a warlock alt I made just so the guild would have one of each class.

Anyway, so Rift has a new patch, which I've not downloaded yet.  I'm thinking of taking advantage of the free server transfers and getting one of my three mains off Wolfsbane and on to a lower population server.  Except...I downloaded Everquest II, the free version, and have been playing that instead.  Even though I had to pay for the race/class I wanted.  Greedy bastards.  I really liked playing it last year until my WoW got hacked and Daughter-Type got the guild going.

Finally, my father, who is 80, is moving out of the house we lived in since 1966.  Talk about your traumatic experiences.  I have mixed feelings about the move.  There are just so many memories tied up in the place, both good and bad.  He's buried two wives living in that house, one just two years ago in July.  He has to be feeling conflicted as well.  My sister has been there every weekend to help.  But he is NOT listening to her.  She schlepps boxes, old half full paint cans and other toxic waste and minds the burn barrel in addition to general cleaning and the like, but whenever she ventures an opinion he shuts her out.  To me, this isn't new behavior, but he and I have a different relationship and always have had.

Anyway, he finally closed on a condo nearby and he is going to settlement on his house mid-July.  However, he doesn't want to part with the eight dining room chairs, both leaves for the dinning room table or any of the filing cabinets (six) to fit into his new, two bedroom place.  I have visions of the movers stacking up in the hallway outside the place with all that huge furniture going, "Where ya wannit buddy?" and not being able to get in the door.

Finally, our prima donna sales manager here at work has allegedly resigned.  The rumor mill has it that one of his prima donna sales team has caused him to have to do extra work, since he did not enforce proper returns policy with said sales dweeb, fondly dumbed King Baby.  So today, Sales Manager is absent, although the rumor mill does not believe it's a permanent thing, just a temper tantrum of some sort.  This place is just a laugh a minute, that's for sure.  One of these days, when I grow up, I'll have a real job at a real company, with a Ranger and Morellie dilemma like Stephanie's.  Oh well, dream on, right?

Or maybe just whine.  Actually, let's go with whine, since I feel rather tired and peeved and just generally whiny.


There's the usual HATE MY JOB whine I could indulge in, but here are a few specifics.  Staying in whine mode of course.  Our receptionist, who is new and fairly nice so I really shouldn't be too hard on her, is annoying when she announces calls.  The PA system makes two beeping sounds before you can actually talk and she never waits for the second beep.  So all of her announcements are cut in half and we have to call her and ask who that last call was for.  I mean, nobody had to tell ME to wait for the second beep!  Whine, whine.

New Boss is still an ass.  Actually, he's a well paid, baby-boomer male in a cushy job and he has a slave (ME!) to do all the un-glamorous tasks.  This year he is apparently the one seaching for new healthcare insurance and I have nothing to do with the process except face the unhappy employees when they have questions.  And of course he's wedging his buddy-buddy insurance broker in and my trusted and longtime guy is out.  Bastard!  I know, dangerously close to a rant here.

My A/R clerk (at least I thing she's still mine, New Boss might have sole her too) will be on vacation tomorrow.  This means all the whiny, pushy sales people will be lining up at my door tomorrow begging to let their deadbeat customers buy just one more thing.  They'll pay on Monday, I swear.  Yeah right.

My dog decided to not wait for the treat I give her when I come home for lunch just to see her friendly face and have a nice petting session and ate a blue pen.  Right in the middle of my living room rug.  Waa waa.

I don't want to go to class tonight, see first line, even though we'll be getting our second test scores back tonight.  I did ok, so I'm not really worried.  I just want to go home and wallow in my whiny-ness.

( Cut for WoW whine )

Ok, now I have to get ready to talk to the ADP guy about how much they screwed up our timeclock and payroll system.  For anyone thinking of going with ADP, don't!  They are the most disorganized group I've ever had the misfortune of working with.  I could do a whole rant/whine just on how they screwed up our local taxes.  But, I'll save that for another post.

I can't believe it.  My WoW account got hacked.  I hope whoever did it was greatly disappointed, so much effort for so little gain.  I don't raid, or even go into many instances.   I don't even have my epic flight for Northrend.  I just usually quest around and really only belong to one guild, which Daughter-Type started.  And yes, they took the measley 800 gold we had in the guild bank as well.

I do have access to my account back.  Whoever did the hacking got me banned as well.  But now all my toons are naked and only have a few silver to their names.  I just don't know how to recover from such a thing.  I'm almost tempted to just scrap the whole thing and start over.  I mean, how sad is a lvl 70, naked hunter?  The bastard even took her ammo!

We don't seem to have a Runes of Magic community out there right now. Yes, I know the game is shinny and new and all. Must have patience.

( Boring gamer stuff )

So there I was, struttin’ my stuff on the treadmill at o-dark-hundred at the gym. As I input the usual stuff that is required before you just start walking, you know, speed, incline…weight, I gave serious consideration as to what I would think about during my workout to avoid thinking about work.

Break from topic #1. Whoever said that working out reduced your stress level was heavily into BULL SHIT! I mean, ya stand there, walking your life away going nowhere fast, and all you can do is think. And usually the topic is whatever is bugging you most at the time. And in this case, for me, it’s work.

So, I get all those pesky numbers programmed in and away I go. As I clomp away and really put some effort into walking a relatively straight line to avoid staggering about ‘cause I’m not truly awake yet, I check out the bank of TV monitors the gym has thoughtfully provided for my viewing/work out pleasure. They have usual offerings. News which means rapes, fires and murders. Fishing gone wild. Slice and dice o-matic. And so on. All without sound, of course.

Then, on monitor number 4, who do I spy? Why, it’s Chuck Norris! Goddess preserve me! There to save me from the treadmill to nowhere of my own thoughts, star of such unforgettable film gems as Breaker, Breaker; Missing in Action, (1, 2 and 3); Texas Walker, and last but certainly not least…Barrens general chat. Yee ha, a whole new topic to mull over as I wear out my sneakers.

Who the hell started that Chuck Norris thing anyway? I mean, I’ve played on a lot of servers and gotten a lot of characters through those awkward teen levels and I have to say that it’s always the same. Some turkey just shouts out CHUCK NORRIS and we’re off. I usually play Horde characters so I can’t say for certain that the Alliance has this same little quirk but it never goes away. Perhaps it’s a preprogrammed response when nobody is shouting out about fucking n00bs or whatnot. And of course, turning off my general chat filter is just not an option. I may not be participating in the nonsense, but some of it can be very amusing.

Break from topic #2. For myself, I have never seen ol’ Chuck in anything. Woops, big lie there. I did see Breaker Breaker way back in 1978. It was the only movie playing at Camp Humphry the first weekend I got to Korea and I was bored to tears having just gotten there and had to have something to do, so it’s really not my fault. I do have to admit to seeing many Steven Seagal movies. I am also a closet Jean-Claude Vandamme fan. But my heart will always belong to Sylvester Stalone. And I mean Rambo 3 here. Ooo yeah, that scene where he’s doing that stick fighting thing at the very beginning of the movie, brrrrr! Gotta love gratuitous violence and half naked men. Way off topic here.

Anyway, back to Chuck. So he’s hawking some new and improved way to get that old bod into shape and I’m coming to the end of my 30 minute walk to nowhere with out even once thinking about work and the insanity there. So, thanks Chuck. Ya saved me from myself for sure.

Is that Erik Estrada on monitor #5?