Wahoo, winter is upon us!

Okay, so maybe I shouldn't be so ecstatic about the forecasted snow, especially since we could really use an additional day to wrap up the house painting. We're down to having to caulk a couple of spots and prime and paint our dormer that's scraped and ready, but I can't help being excited about the cold weather. You see, I'm one of those seemingly insane people who's crazy about wintertime. Knee-deep snow and sharp pains when breathing in on a particularly brisk day; plus, I can finally pull my Dales out of storage and wear them without feeling like I'm going to burst into flames. Allergies seem to die away and I have a good excuse for drinking hot chocolate on a perpetual basis at the office. Yep, winter is the time for me.

One cold-weather downer that happened today was that I couldn't find my Pop-up Paws mittens! I had a pair that was knit out of Lamb's pride bulky that I absolutely love. I've even blown out the thumbs a few times and reknit them b/c I didn't want another pair, <sigh> though if I don't find them soon, I'll have no choice but to make another pair.

And, while we're on the topic of winter, I was told that the Old Farmer's Almanac predicts this winter'll be a good one with tons of snow. Hooray! Maybe this'll finally be the winter that I'll be able to get into cross-country skiing. I've been eyeballing a pair of skis at Summit Sports, and remembered that they were deeply discounted for the after Thanksgiving sale last year and were priced at $45 per pair....now I just need to find a friend who's willing to be a personal shopper this Thanksgiving for me since we usually head off to Cleveland for the holiday (hint, hint, anybody?)...

Speaking of skiing -- if you're local and are into downhill skiing, the East Lansing Ski Team is having it's 2nd annual ski and snowboard swap meet on Saturday, Nov. 15th at the East Lansing High School. If you'd like to sell ski equipment, drop-off is from 9am-11am, with the Ski Team receiving a 20% commission from items sold as a fundraiser for the team. Equipment can be purchased from 12pm to 4pm, and the best deals tend to leave the room at noon; so if you're interested, get there early. This is a great opportunity if you have a child that's outgrown their skis and you're looking to unload a pair and pick up something the next size up.

Well, I have no new knitting projects to report. Still working on the Evening in Eden shawl and that's going even slower than the other two Christmas shawls. Maybe by my next entry, I'll be close to being finished with it and ready to start something else. Figuring out what that'll be will be the tough part: should I finish Chuck's Christmas stocking from last year (aka "the long and lanky condom stocking"; if you're on Ravelry, you may know this story already from this project's description)? or should I focus on seaming together the Great American Aran Afghan squares (especially since having a nice warm afghan will be great to have pretty soon)? or am I ready to start a new Dale or something from Bergere de France? There's only a couple of projects from the Knit Generation book that I don't care for....

So, it's 8:30, we just finished dinner (Chuck made an all-American meal of meatloaf and mashed potatoes) and I'm about done with cleaning for the day. Sylvain practiced with his trio to prepare for a chamber music concert this Thursday; and he put in some extra practice with the hopes of getting a chance to play at Lynn's 50th birthday get-together tomorrow afternoon. Once I'm done with this entry and get the kitchen whipped back into shape (since it usually looks like a catastrophe after Chuck cooks), we'll settle down to family movie night of "Journey to the Center of the Earth" and "Hot Rod". Hopefully, I'll have good things to report about these movies, though something tells me that I should just open up a bottle of wine now and keep my knitting close at hand...

Has it seriously been a month?!?

Okay, what is going on here?!? I can't believe that I haven't blogged in a month. Sorry folks, but I've had the craziest time since returning from Portland: back to back meetings, proposal writing, research, and report writing. And that's just the work part of it! Chuck's been laid up with an injured back, so a lot of the house scraping work has been up to me (yes, that project's still going strong) and Sylvain's activities have just been a barrage of stuff lately. And to top it off for him -- I've put him to work on scraping the house and getting the yard in order (leaf raking and cleaning out the flower beds). Thankfully, we've entered the lull of November (no trips, no presentations, and no football!), so I'll try to be a more faithful blogger.

As I look back at the photos taken for this blog, I realize just how pathetic things have been lately. Confession 1: I was too busy to carve my own pumpkin, so Sylvain did it for me! Sylvain started his own pumpkin carving from a pattern, but then decided to modify it to add "Happy Halloween" onto the sides. The only claim to fame for my pumpkin was that I picked the pattern (many happy pumpkin faces). He carved it for me after school on Halloween before heading off to trick or treat with friends. I think that he'll be pretty sad when he's too old to be trick or treating...But that's okay, we had plenty of left-over candy here at home since we only had three visitors that night. Chuck dressed up as a mad scientist and set out a flashing light next to one of our trees to give our yard a spooky look, but insisted that we keep the porch yard lights off. I hope that didn't make any kids shy away from stopping by, but we didn't get too many trick or treaters last year either. We know the three that stopped by this year, so maybe next year we'll do individualized treat bags.

I also now realize that I didn't take a photo of Chuck's pumpkin (a traditional scary pumpkin face) and should do that tonight before it turns to mush (if it hasn't already)...

Confession 2: I never finished that angora capelet that was talked about in my last blog. As I was packing for my trip to Portland, I realized that it didn't go well with the outfit that I had in mind, so I left the project unfinished and at home. This is important b/c while working on the project, I didn't feel quite well and was slightly itchy, but thought that it was poison ivy rearing its ugly head again. I recovered quite well while in Portland, and didn't think much about it. However, when I returned home, the itchiness returned. I'm quite allergic to cats, and think that I'm also allergic to angora too. Which is a real shame, since the capelet was looking very good. Thankfully, Erin is such a good friend, that I was able to dump the capelet and the remaining skein of angora in her lap and have her take it away. Hopefully, she'll make better use of the yarn than I did. So, after obsessively cleaning my house and all of my usual knitting spots to rid myself of the angora fly-aways, my allergies seemed to wane. But then, the weather turned nice and I focused on scraping the house and leading Sylvain in the yard work. With those chores, I was viciously attacked by leaf molds and who-knows-what-else. So, I've awaken each morning for the past week with red, puffy, itchy eyes and hives. I've also given in and am visiting the doctor's tomorrow in search of stronger drugs b/c my daily regimen of Clarinex, Nasonex, eye drops, Benedryl, and cortozone creme don't seem to be cutting the mustard.

And since I can never sit still during Sylvain's bass lessons, informal meetings, etc., I have gotten some knitting done. The Clapotis scarf/shawl for Debbie for Christmas is done and is waiting to go on the blocking board. I casted on my final Christmas shawl: Evening in Eden by Lynda Gemmell.
According to the number of pattern repeats, I'm about half-way thru the recommended length, but am thinking about adding in another repeat for good measure. The pattern is easy enough, and the project is going quickly enough that even with that change, I'll be able to finish this up before my self-set deadline of Thanksgiving. Need to finish early so that I can focus on other Christmas knitting...

And since it's Election Day, and I'm sure none of you are tired of election stuff, I'll share this last little story. I've never volunteered before for any sort campaign before and decided that this was the year to get involved. Like I said earlier, things have been hectic, and per usual, I found myself helping out on the absolute last opportunity to do so. A friend from my MSU Library days, Kriss, is very actively involved in various Democratic Party events and was looking for people to hang reminders to vote on house doors for the Obama Biden campaign. That sounded good to me, so I signed up for Monday (yesterday). When I showed up at the campaign headquarters, I was told that they finished ahead of schedule, but needed folks at a secondary location at a nearby UAW hall. After reporting there, I found that they needed folks to go specific houses and talk to the residents there, reminding them to vote today and give directions as to where their polling locations were. I didn't feel comfortable doing that alone, so was paired with another first-timer, Katie. We were assigned a Lansing neighborhood at the corner of MLK and Willow around Bassett Park. The canvassing went fine and everyone that we met seemed to be in favor of Obama. The only interesting person who came to the door was a guy who was very obviously stoned. We knocked on his door, and thought no one was home, so before leaving his porch, we were looking at our list to figure out where to go next. He answered the door with a large (but seemingly friendly) pit bull on a leash and was barely able to stand up. I felt quite nauseated from the smell wafting from his house, but trekked on in our spiel about voting. Katie seemed oblivious to the whole thing, so I'm not sure that she noticed at first. After walking away, I said, "I wonder what he was up to," and she just laughed along. But, hey, a vote's a vote, right?

Packing my bags and heading west!

Sorry to be AWOL this week, but I have absolutely no clue where the week has gone! Last weekend, Chuck and I worked on the house, Amy and Andy came up on Saturday to go out to dinner with us to celebrate my birthday, and then Amy, Tracy, and I competed into town for the Dino Dash on Sunday. I was very happy to see that I was able to top my 13-min/mile pace and bump it up to 12:49-min/mile. Woo-hoo! I shaved off 11 seconds! Also, if any of you know Tracy, please give her a pat on the back the next time you see her b/c her hard work has really paid off. I tried to keep pace with her, but just couldn't do it.

The rest of the week was really a blur of work, running errands, knitting, and preparing for being out of town this coming week. Thanks to Cheanne's help, I was able to finish the tear down and re-knit of a shrug that was made several years ago (2004, maybe?). Wearing this shrug felt like I was in a Chinese finger trap, so rather than have a nearly finished project (needed a ruffle) that wasn't ever going to be worn hanging around the house, it was re-purposed into a man's scarf. In case you're wondering, this project was made out of Encore (!). I have since lost the label, but actually like this colorway. If you look closely at the yarn, there's a second, thinner yarn spun with the thicker, overall color. The thinner yarn is a baby blue, which catches the eye every now and then...

After much consternation over having to run out to the store to purchase size 10.5 needles (a swatch using size 10s and one using size 11s just wasn't doing it for me), I started and nearly finished the "Medallion Caplet" from the Winter 07/08 issue of Vogue Knitting. I'm making it out of Noro's Kochoran. I'm hoping to wear it this week while on my trip, so need to finish the collar and do some light blocking tonight. Oh well....I really didn't want to hem that pair of slacks anyways. Hemming is such a pain!



The yarn and pattern for this project was bought at Knit Michigan back in February (yes, 2008, for those of you who've held onto projects for longer than that). I saw a version of this cape at the Skeins on Main (Rochester) booth and knew that I really needed to make it.



Since there's angora in the yarn, it did shed quite a bit on my clothes while wearing. I'm hoping to pair this with a brown shirt and gray slacks, so hopefully the shedding won't really stick out too badly....

Now, I just need to find the right button or clasp in my collection to hold it shut.



In case you've made it this far and haven't gotten completely agitated with me b/c I haven't mentioned where I'm going, congratulations on your perseverance! I'm headed to Portland, Or tomorrow for a dam removal and sediment monitoring workshop being held by the Subcommitte on Sediment. I'll be back on Friday, and am hoping to enter at least one blog entry over the the week to update on how things are going. I'll twitter for sure, especially since I'm hoping to hit some of the LYSs while there.


Before I quit for the night, there's one more project for me to mention: I took all of these little squares from Nancy's monthly Stitch Challenges at Woven Art and seamed them together to make a third scarf for the MSU vs UM Charity Knitting drive (Go State!). I'm not quite done as I have 2 more months worth of squares to go, so I'll worry about taking a better photo before turning this over to Nancy to add to her donation tree. This'll be my 4th scarf for this drive, so I really hope we kick some Wolverine ass!

I broke my "wear a white shirt" mantra and am regretting it...

Okay readers, I don't normally post this much (two days in a row -- woohoo!), but had the strangest experience at the Secretary of State's office this afternoon that I just needed to get it out....

So, my birthday is on Monday. And, like most blue-blooded Americans, I waited too long to renew my license and vehicle registration on-line or through the mail and need to head over to the Secretary of State's office. Monday is the worst possible day, since it's the last day for voter registration before the November election, so that day was out. Ever since moving to the Lansing area close to 15 years ago, the only Secretary of State's office I've ever visited is the one in East Lansing in the Habitrail.

I thought I was safer going there today than tomorrow, since it's MSU's Homecoming and things are likely to be crazy down there and all. So, I arrived at the office, picked a number (#21) and saw that they were on #99, ready to start all over. I plopped down in a seat and started gathering together all the stuff I needed: wrote out my check for $100, made sure I had both my forms for the registration and license renewal, and opened up my little binder that stays in my glovebox with my insurance info and expiring registration....only to find that my insurance paperwork wasn't in there....Call for numbers 0, 1, and 2....Crap!! Where could it be?!? Quick! Rechecked the binder thoroughly...checked my bag to make sure it didn't somehow slip out.....call for number 3.....Ran up to my car in the parking structure (level 2) and tore apart the glove box. (What's Leo and Nicole's wedding program doing in here?!?)

So, dejected, I headed over to the nearest AAA office on Saginaw, just west of US-127 and had a new proof of insurance printed. I really didn't want to have to do this on another day, so I headed right back to the Secretary of States with hopes that they hadn't reached my number yet b/c I literally was gone only about 15 minutes. This was a day that none of you would have wanted to have been in the car with me. [P.S. Anyone out there harboring doubts as to why the Honda Civic is one of the most tricked out cars out there?]

I was lucky enough to score a meter spot outside of BW3. Now that's good karma talking! Rushed across the street to the Secretary of States, and was immediately bummed out when I saw that they were on #38. Nuts! So, I picked a new number (#81) and took a seat. I double- and triple-checked my paperworked (check -- check!, renewal sheets -- check!, proof of insurance -- check!!). Then, I took out the Clapotis shawl and started to knit. Hey -- why not? I've got 30-minutes on the meter and a wait ahead of me. The gal sitting next to me leaned over and asked what I was making. I showed her the shawl and she seemed genuinely impressed. Then, she hands me a number (#66) and said that when she had sat down, someone else gave her their number b/c someone else had given them a number that was left behind (#45). [Bonus!]

Soon enough, her number was called and off she went. Her seat was taken up by another girl, who had #91. I asked her if she wanted to skip 10 other people and handed her the #81 slip. "Heck, yeah!" was her reply. Life is so good when you share the wealth.

At any rate, my number was called. Down went the needles and off I went to the counter. I handed the clerk all of my paperwork, only to have her hand me back my insurance papers, to which she said, "Oh, I don't need this..." What?!? What?!? WTF, man? When did the Secretary of State no longer need your proof of insurance to register your vehicle? No wonder there's so many dishonest folks out there driving around without it! And, to make matters worse, she asked for my driver's license, which I gladly handed over, expecting her to stick a sticker or something on it b/c my license renewal form explicitly said "eligible for renewal by mail," which I took to mean that I didn't need a brand-new card. Instead of a sticker, she promptly clipped the corner and stapled a piece of paper to it. "Wait a minute! You mean, I need to have a new photo taken today?!?" Crap!

"Uh, can I come back on Monday for that? I mean, I'm not wearing a white shirt." Yes, folks, I actually said that. Right about then, I'm sure she was hitting the security button that's hidden under the counter to let the folks in back know that she had a live one on her hands. Let me explain a little bit here b/c you're probably wondering just as she was...I have been very blessed to have had all (but one) of my license photos be fabulous. And when I say fabulous, I mean fabulous. My hair looks great. My smile is great. The photo is clear. And, I'm in a white shirt. The only photo that didn't turn out was one of me in a black shirt. In addition to wearing a shirt of the wrong color, my haircut was bad, my smile poor, and I had a very strange, oily, flash-bulb glare on my forehead. Yuck! So, today, my hair was in poor shape (did I mention running up stairs in the parking structure, and running from the meter to the office??). And, for the record, I was in a maroon twin-set and jean jacket.

Snapping back to reality, I realized that avoiding Saturday and Monday at all costs was really why I was there in the first place. "Oh well, I already wrote out the check," was my quick cover and was delivered with an uneasy smile. "Okay, please step over to the monitor and read me line 2," which I did rather poorly after pulling off the totally gross paper forehead keepers that were on the vision checker doodad. "Um, do you wear contacts?" "Well, no." Should I? [Note to self: schedule an appointment with the optometrist soon.]

So, I did it folks; took my photo in the wrong shirt. Sure, they gave me the opportunity to preview the photo. But I felt guilty b/c all the while, the office was getting more crowded and they were already calling numbers in the high-70s. Crooked smile. Shirt collar off kilter. And I knew that a re-take wouldn't help. I really needed to come back with a white shirt.

Now, I need to know: if I lose this license that will come in the mail in two weeks, can I just retake the photo or is it now on file and they'll insist on printing me a new one from there?

Busy as a GI fungus...

So, right about now, I think I have enough material to write a country song: the furnace isn't working (woke to find the house at a balmy 63^o), went to the doctor yesterday and found that I have a GI tract infection, and it's my birthday soon, but don't feel much like celebrating....

Okay, now to elaborate on all that:

Since Chuck doesn't read this blog, I guess it's okay to complain about him (see my first blog entry for more on that). Way back in May, we had the furnace/air conditioning folks out to clean out the air conditioner. At that time, [apparently] we had them take a look at the furnace and found that we have a cracked heat exchanger. Okay, no biggie; they'll go back to the home office and give us a call with an estimate. Well, according to Chuck, he's contacted them three times throughout the summer and they still weren't able to pull together an estimate. So they must not really need the work then, right? And a reasonable, thinking person would call another business, b/c there's a ton of furnace places out there, right? Right? Well, maybe not. A couple weeks ago, I mentioned to Chuck that it would be a good idea to change out the furnace filter before we start it up for the winter. "Oh, that," was his reply. I'm still sitting here wondering just how long he would've waited to have another company come out if I hadn't said something. Did he not realize that fall's coming on quickly? As it is, the company that came out couldn't schedule the repair until mid-October. Mid-October!! So, I'm hoping that Indian Summer continues until at least that long...

Okay, so as for the GI tract infection: as many of you may know, I am a researcher who works on various projects related to river networks and morphology. I've been working hard to finish up our last season of data collection, and the flooding that we had in mid-September really didn't help me much at all. I really couldn't wait for the rivers to recede down to the level that they usually are at for this time of year, so needed to work in water a little deeper than I usually would. I'm fine with that and know that there's times when I'm just going to end up filling my waders and getting wet b/c part of the job is to characterize the river bed, and that involves actually touching the bottom and measuring the size of the rocks there or describing the sand sizes (this is called a pebble count). So, last Tuesday (Sept. 23), I was out with a coworker at 2 locations on the St. Joseph River and 1 location on the Prairie River. Needless to say, waders were filled, I needed to dive to actually touch bottom in some parts, and a bathing suit was worn under all my clothes so at least I was comfortable. Skip to the end of last week, I started to feel a lot of discomfort in my abdomen and just thought that it was something I had eaten. By Monday, I started to actually have a dull pain in both sides. So, yesterday (Wednesday) I was able to get in and see the doctor. She thinks that I have a gastrointestinal fungal infection, so I'm now taking nystatin 3 times a day for the next 6 weeks! Could this be related to being exposed to potentially contaminated river water? You be the judge, but I don't know any other way that I would've contracted this....

So, between the furnace and the gut rot, I'm not feeling much like celebrating my birthday. I'm supposed to "run" in the MSU Dino Dash on Sunday, but have only put on my tennis shoes twice in the past month to go "jogging". I'm not a runner, and have simple goals during these races: make it further on the route than the previous year before the walkers and pregnant ladies catch up with me; and to make it further on the route than previously before I need to start walking. Someday, I'll finish the race in under 35 minutes, but I don't think that this year'll be the year for that. As for the birthday, I'd rather just go to dinner at AI Fusion, so if you're in the Lansing area and bored on your Saturday night, stop by for some great sushi...


One thing I should probably mention is that I have been knitting quite a bit. The Clapotis shawl is going quite well and I'm very happy with how it's turning out. I'd definitely work this pattern again; maybe even making something for myself.






I have two more hanks of the Interlacements: one meant for Chuck's mom and one to knit up for myself. I won't work on the one for me until the Christmas projects are done, so it'll be quite a while...





I also started my second scarf for the MSU vs Michigan knit challenge. This is the "Linked Rib" pattern from Knitting New Scarves by Lynn Barr. Though it looks tough, the pattern really is an easy one. Just need to keep count of rows so that each of the ribs end up even...




Lastly, though I knitted this shrug 3 to 4 years ago, I never really finished it b/c I soon realized after seaming the sleeves that I'd likely never wear this. I dug it out last night to take a second look at it and think that it *may* pass as a scarf if I un-seam the sleeves, and remove the ribbing. So, maybe this'll be my third scarf to donate for the challenge.





Sorry to leave all of the fun photos 'til the end, but I really didn't feel like showing the world all of the dust bunnies that have built up around my furnace (boy, I really should sweep that before the repair man visits!) and the fungus photos found on-line while reading up about GI fungi.