This evening, whilst catching up with "RuPaul's Drag Race", I taught myself to knit cables!
Note to Moth: No cat fur was intentionally incorporated into this swatch, but Edith was sitting on me; so I can't promise that a strand or two didn't creep in accidentally.
I asked Doc C to bring me back a badge from New York, and he choose this one for me.
As you can see it's from the Strand bookshop, and it's red with white lettering.
Essentially it's just showing off about how many books are housed there. 18 miles of books... Just think of that... sigh...
I found a glove outside my office this week, and I scooped it up and brought it inside for safe keeping. It's been sat on the hallway sideboard for a few days now.
I'm pretty sure it's hand-made, because of some of the details to it.
In particular that little bit of light blue in the top stripe speaks to me of someone finishing off a remnant from their stash.
Of course I shall be submitting it to Unloved Glove; which is geographically based in Winchester and was pointed to me by Mum (who is in Norfolk), after she read about it on @ctramsey's (who is here in NC) Twitter feed, because I had traded tweets with him about the magical properties of toast.
Wouldn't it be hilarious if that convoluted chain of communication somehow lead to the mitten being re-united with it's twin?
It's Thursday!
Doc C will be home from NYC tomorrow!
"Project Runway"!
There is a branch of H&M opening in Raleigh!
It's only 6:30 and I'm already in my pyjamas!
Girly Monkey with a Mohawk Jazz Hands!
Today was very active. One great thing about Spring Break is that with no students on campus there is a lot less foot traffic and phone calls to the office.
So we went to Staples and bought office supplies! Yay!
I got a new chair, a set of shelves, an index card box and some jazzy binder clips for myself; a clock with multiple time zones and a red Swingline stapler for the Director; a cordless phone for Angela and Zack chose some ethernet cables for himself. It was very fun.
I put together the chair and shelves by myself, and I took before-and-after photos of the chair. The before picture is time stamped 3.39pm and the after picture is time stamped 4.08pm. That's right I put that chair together in just under 30 minutes.
My office looks so efficient now. Of course now I have to actually get some work done in it.
It's Oscar night.
We have pizza. We have beer. We have a big TV.
Sorted.
Today I let Edith out for a minute or two, under my supervision of course, to investigate the snow. Quite honestly I assumed she would not like the feel of the cold under her paw and change her mind.
She actually didn't seem to mind the snow too much, not even when she misjudged the depth and disappeared up to her arm-pits (paw-pits?).
Edith is intrepid.
..The Tree-Car is starting to bud!
I am not even joking.
The storms this winter have wreaked havoc on the trees around here, and we have quite a lot on campus.
Over the past few days the landscaping crew have been assessing the trees and putting yellow caution tape on any tree that looked particularly badly damaged with dodgy branches still hanging on.
Which gives the appearance of an active crime scene after a tree-hating psychopath has done their worst.
Well, it does if you've been watching far too many cop shows recently.
The box that Edith has been using as a climbing frame slash play house is looking very shabby now after several months of being jumped on. Today Edith finally burst through the base, it was very birth of an alien.
Then she turned round and started gnawing the hole she'd just forced her way through.
Because she is a nutter.
Hmmm... Call me paranoid, but I think someone grey and floofy has been chewing my needle protectors.
This is a relatively new bad habit that Edith has acquired, and I have to be very careful to put my needles away or it will only a matter of time before she ends up doing some damage to something other than a lump of green rubber.
Replacing the Ugly Kitten umbrella was not easy, and this time I've gone with a graphic white on red pattern. Even better this is a Paperchase umbrella, which I found in Winston Salem on Friday.
The design of circles and dots goes well with my polka dot bag, but I have to admit I'm still not 100% certain about this brolly. It's just that it's, well, tasteful and almost grown-up. I am very happy that it's so brightly coloured though, you will not miss me in a rainy day. Especially when I track down a pair of yellow wellies and a yellow rain coat.
Oh yeah, you'll be able to see me from England!
Amigurumi Dorian Gray has been getting some love on the internet recently, which is nice!
I already had set up an amigurumi set on my flickr account, but this made me think I need to also have a creature feature photo album here. So if you look over in the left hand column, there is a link to my new "Alien Made" photo album.
I can get so much visual enjoyment out of a donut with sprinkles and a cup of coffee, I find the colours and the shapes very satisfying. When we stop at this particular Dunkin' we nearly always take the table by the window so I can set up an impromptu photo shoot.
This time I actually asked the barista (is that what they're called in a Dunkin' Donuts?) for a more photogenic donut.
And you have to admit, the camera does love this particular sweetie.
One good thing about having to drive for two hours to get to the specialist's office was that we could detour via Dunkin' Donuts.
It's Dunkin's 60th birthday, and I love the paper cups with all of the fabulous logos they've employed in that time.
I'm also quite keen on the chocolate frosted donut with heart shaped sprinkles, but obviously only because it makes a great photographic opportunity.
And here is the artistic process in gif form:
The snow is never ever going to end. Ever.
I am so desperate for something colourful to take photos of that I am now prepared to use my laundry hanging on the dryers as a subject.
As you can see this was a red, pink and purple load.
As tasty as bread can be, I think we do need a bit more of a traditionally romantic photo as well; so here is a pretty flower, with Picnik's bokeh heart-shaped filter over it.
I've let Doc off a card this year (which may prove to be a tactical error), but we did have some heart-shaped bread for breakfast. That's the chocolate and cherry sourdough twisted with the white chocolate baguette. I don't know which is more delicious!
At Christmas we bought a small crate of clementines, for one thing because clementines are delicious and for another because I thought the crate would be good to store our fruit and vegetables in.
Which isn't very exciting, but at least the photos are more colourful than picture of the continuing snow.
I'm combing through my jpeg files to delete anything I don't need, and I found a picture I took on our trip home from Boston.
We picked up some snacks when we stopped to refuel and I could not resist this artwork. Isn't that great? Mama Zuma looks like a fifties pin-up Zapatista, which may be anachronistic but is fabulous none the less.
The crisps were deceptively sweet at first, but there was definitely a kick to them.
I have finished the orange with pink stripes wig hat! Yay!
This is the second time I've started this project off from scratch, and I ended up cannabalising the bottom of the hat to finish the top. The problem being I only had one ball of the orange acrylic, and whilst I could easily buy more, I didn't want to because this is the only thing I really wanted to make from it. So when I ran out of yarn, I started unravelling the hat from the bottom and then knitting the re-claimed yarn into the top. Doc C was looking at me as though I were insane, but it was an interesting exercise in creative problem solving.
The pink stripe was tricky, because I wanted it to go along the ribbing instead of across. I started off knitting the pink stripe in, which was ok on the straight needles, but totally infuriating on the circular needles. So instead I finished from the bottom of the fringe (American Translation - Bangs) upwards in the orange, and then stitched the pink over the top where I wanted it. The annoying yet gratifying part is that the embroidered pink stitches look a lot neater than the knitted pink stitches.
This is definitely the last time I make this particular hat. I may well make another wig hat from this pattern, but the orange and pink monster is finished.
There are more snow storms predicted for the next couple of days, and we've still got a couple of feet from the weekend.
Fortunately Doc C planned ahead, and his window boxes are inside. These flowers are gorgeous little bursts of colour against the monochrome winter landscape.
Today I've been re-knitting a project that I originally worked on the wrong sized needles, which meant it went all wonky beyond the possibility of rescue. So I frogged it, which is always more satisfying than you'd think; one would imagine undoing work that took you hours would be frustrating, but actually the way the stitches just unravel is sort of like popping bubble wrap. Destructive, yet oddly soothing.
Then yesterday I started the whole thing again, but this time on the right size needles. These needles are made of bamboo and are part of the gorgeous set Mum sent me for Christmas. Knitting with these is just lovely.
The bottom inch and a half is going to be rolled up into a curl across the bottom, but I wanted it to match the ribbing of the top, so I inverted the ribbing for the first 15 rows.
Knitting tends to be a sedentary activity, which is perfect for a snowy weekend when you don't intend to leave the house. This suits Edith down to the ground, she's been curled up on me or next to me for the majority of the weekend. In this particular picture she is using my foot as a pillow, I think she slept like this for about an hour. It's a tough life for a floofy cat around here.
When I took down the Christmas decorations, I didn't throw away the
paperchain so it's displayed in a vase on the mantelpiece.
This is just until I have something else that I feel needs to be festively festooned.
My second entry in the Threadknits contest is based on this t-shirt, Adorable Disaster:
I love the playful kittens, but if they weren't playing with a hand grenade I don't think I'd have bought this tee; it would have been just too cutesy. Mainly I wanted to use this image, because Nancy looks almost exactly like the kitten on the right.
So I made a hand grenade cat toy, and the cats modeled for photos beautifully. They are so accommodating to the crazy human female. It's unfortunate that the one shot I got of Nancy in a good approximation of the t-shirt cat's pose is blurred, but she was just moving so fast!
Nancy was meant to be the star of this photo shoot, but Edith does love the camera and the camera loves her right back.
It's probably a good thing that I didn't stuff it with catnip, because imagine how insane she would have gone.
Nancy did get to make a little film though!
I've mentioned before that I love Threadless t-shirts, and the first one I ever bought was this angry pastry:
When I read about the Threadknits contest the Threatening Muffin seemed to be a great candidate for turning into an amigurumi, and so I did. Ta-Dah!
My entry needs to be approved before it appears in the entry gallery, but you can see it here now.
Just keep your fingers away from his mouth.
Yesterday I had a Snickers bar (British Person Over 30 Translation: A Marathon), and I noticed there was some writing inside the wrapper. I thought maybe I had won a prize or someone was trapped in the factory by an evil super-villain and was using the wrapper printer to send out an SOS. What? That could happen!
So I read it, and then took a photo so that you could appreciate it as well:
I may be taking this a little personally, but I feel like that chocolate bar just insinuated I'm not as motivated as I could be. I'm afraid to eat another one, in case it implies something rude about my taste in clothes.
My doctor suggested that I add Echinacea and Goldenseal to the many vitamins I'm already taking to boost my immune system.
You can get gel capsules but I'm taking 30 to 40 drops of a tincture in a glass of water three times a day for the next two weeks. This means I can control the dosage more efficiently and I'm avoiding gelatin.
This is a herbal remedy, so it doesn't come in a fruit flavoured syrup. It looks like brackish pond water, smells awful and it tastes horrible; so it must be doing me good. Plus Doc C only sniffed the bottle and is now more than ever convinced that I must feel impressively terrible, because why else would I be drinking this three times a day?
Let's get 2010 off to a good start on the cupcake front, shall we?
Boston, we bow to you. These beautiful yellow rose cupcakes were on sale at a local Whole Foods supermarket. I have no idea what they might taste like, but just seeing them was a treat.
We had a Boston Cream Pie instead. Yum!
Hey, have I mentioned that I've put on a couple of pounds over the Christmas break? I wonder how that can have happened?
I am back in the office after my Christmas break, and I must admit to having that Monday morning feeling when I woke up today.
So, here is a photo I took in Boston of a gorgeous bunch of balloons in a wintery tree.
It just seemed apt somehow.
I woke up really early on Christmas morning and it was cold, so I didn't feel like getting up and I just curled up and went back to sleep. When I woke up properly, I reached for my iPod and was annoyed to find there was no internet connection and it was really freaking cold.
Doc C and I realised that there had been a power-cut, fortunately we'd bought an apricot brioche so we could at least have breakfast. Because we couldn't cook anything, or have a shower, or turn the heat on, or do bloody anything. It turns out everything in our house is run on electricity. Everything. So we piled blankets and cats on the bed, and opened our presents from my Mum which included books which we could read whilst waiting for the power to come back on.
When we looked out of the window we realised that the predicted ice storm had hit, which makes things looks beautiful (see the above picture of hideous sculpture covered in ice) and knocked out our power. Of course it being Christmas Day, the power did not come back on, because I'm betting there weren't enough people working that day.
This is totally understandable, but it didn't help us to warm up much, and we had to get ready to go to the cinema. So we called Randy and Laura, and asked if we could use their shower, which they very kindly let us do. This may or may not have been because we were going to the cinema with them, so they were really saving their own noses. (The movie was "Sherlock Holmes" by the way and it was really fun - I'll post about that later!)
It was extremely lucky that we had made plans to leave the house, because the power was still not back on when we got back from the film. We had to go to bed by torch (American Translation: Flashlight), and it was really really cold.
Yes, so Christmas Day 2009. It was absolutely bloody freezing.
Still, a tree fell on one of our neighbour's car, so at least the ice storm made us laugh. Because they are ever so slightly annoying and because we are evil.
This morning I had a bowl of porridge for breakfast, whilst I finished off the detective novel I've been reading on this trip. Then I walked around the corner to The Mysterious Bookshop on Warren Street, and they had, not one, but two Mrs Bradley Mysteries by Gladys Mitchell; neither of which I had previously read. Score!
Then Doc met me for lunch, and we went to Le Pain Quotidien, for a simple rustic lunch. And a teeny tiny raspberry custard tart. So adorable, and so delicious.
This evening we are going to get a curry.
New York. I bloody love it!
This morning Doc C managed to push open the back door just wide enough for him to be able to get to the snow shovel, and dug a path from the front door to the car. Then he dug around the car, before finally getting the snow off the car itself.
He gave the car a snow mohawk, which I had to get a photo of because you can see exactly how much snow the car was covered with.
And, oh yes, once again we were delighted with our decision to get a car with heated seats. Toasty!
So, did you hear that it snowed?
It really did! A lot! In fact we got snowed into our house; well, ok some spoilsport did actually snowplough our road, so technically I think we could get out with a bit of effort. However, I studiously avoided noticing that; and did my best to distract Doc from noticing either, so we stayed inside all day today. Yay!
We slept late, Skyped my lovely Mum, ate very well, watched Hulu ("Dollhouse" is so rocking, I still cannot believe that Fox cancelled it. Damn you Fox! *shakes fist at sky*) and allowed the cats to spend the entire day alternating between our laps. I also did a lot of knitting, whilst Doc C did a lot of reading.
I did take photos, of course, and I particularly loved the shots I got of the birdfeeder in use. We're weren't 100% sure what this bird was, but our best guess is a woodpecker; what say you?
One of the best parts about working at a University is the dress code of "smart office wear" is very ambiguous. I'm not able to get away with Threadless T-shirts, but apart from that it's fairly easy to have some fun with my wardrobe.
For example, I felt the combination of a neckerchief with a cardigan was looking a bit twee, so I pinned my faux-silk scarf with a badge that said "I Love Brains" with a little cartoon brain in the middle (Nut and Bee, of course!). It was mainly because the colours worked well with the pattern on the scarf, but also because I like zombies.
My manager spotted the badge the moment I walked in the door, and said "You should give that to me!", because she's a neuro-scientist. Well, this brain is mine; but I may have to order more Nut and Bee goodies, so I'll probably get one for her then.
I woke up this morning and felt awful. I'm guessing I could have coped with one social event this weekend, but three was just too much and I got over-tired which Mono does not like. I thought I'd been really careful, but I suppose the weekend is when my body has been stocking up on sleep so I can get through the working week.
So I called work and went back to sleep, which helped a lot. I'm feeling better now, but but I'm just going to chill for the rest of today.
These three Nut and Bee badges (American Translation Which I Still can't Get Used To: Pins or Buttons) seemed appropriate. As you can see my status for today is: A little bit poorly, curled up on an armchair and knitting.
OK, FINE.
I'll decorate the Christmas tree.
This year I'm keeping things very simple - Lights, gold beads and a Union Jack paper-chain. The paper-chain was a birthday present from my Mum, and it makes me very happy!
I made mincepies for my office's Christmas party, ummm, Team Building on Friday and that used up the only jar of Crosse and Blackwell's mincemeat that I'd found here. I think it was worth it, everyone made appreciative noises at least!
So, yesterday, I made my own mincemeat! With like raisins, and currants, and apples, and zest, and stuff! And a hefty shot of rum!
Then, tonight, I made my first set of totally home-made mincepies.
I followed the recipes from Nigella Lawson's "How to be a Domestic Goddess", and by way of an experiment on my part I zested the orange before I juiced it for the pie crusts; so that's what the curly stuff under the stars is. It makes them smell amazing.
How much do you love it when you have colleagues at the office who unexpectedly bake gingerbread people and write everyone's names on in icing? Oh, and there were red and green gumdrops on the plate too.
I especially love that my name (Yes, I'm "Jennifer" in the office) was hyphenated on mine, and she's got cute bunches (American Translation: Pigtails).
As a special treat for having been so good for a whole week (!), Edith got to play in the big cardboard box.
We played jump-into-the-box, jump-out-of-the-box, attack-things-on-top-of-the-box, Jack-Nicholson-in-The-Shining-in-the-box, and, finally, lemonade stand.
Except, of course, Edith had her own ideas on what business she wanted to open. She's yet to make any money.
There really is a book for everything.
Edith already likes this one because it advocates weekly catnip parties, and she's sleeping off her nip buzz right now.
Living with cats is, as I may have mentioned, like living with aliens. There is human logic and there is cat logic, and they have almost no points of correlation. Nancy particularly loves sitting on a table and patting at objects until they fall over the edge, at which point she'll stare down at them from the table in surprise and then move on to the next object. It's really funny and sweet when it's something you don't particularly care about, like a pen or a handful of change, but it does mean you have got to be careful where you leave things you do care about. We are fairly certain Nancy knows what happened to Doc's wedding ring, but she's just not saying anything.
With Nancy's behavioural quirks in mind I decided to buy a small box to put on my bedside table, where it could hold all my important stuff. So it needed to be big enough to hold my watch, my phone, my glasses and whatever jewelery I forgot to take off before getting into bed; but I didn't want an actual jewelery box, because I'm just damned awkward.
Fortunately there's a small newsagents near us that also sells cigars, and they also sell the empty wooden cigar boxes, so I bought one of those (Naturally I chose a box that used to house Churchills). It's the perfect size, and it has the bonus of smelling nice. Over the original logo on the lid of the box I've added a skull sticker that my friends Laura and Jasmine gave me ages ago that I've been saving for the right project. I love that you can still see the gold medals from the logo in Miss Skully's eyes!
Now I need to work out something fun to do with the sides of the box, and I think I'll be turning to a tip from Martha for that. She mentions in her latest Christmas issue a brand of Japanese paper tape, which has lovely patterns printed on it. Martha recommends it for wrapping gifts, of course, but I think that could work very well around the edges of the box, don't you?
This is the red cotton cowl that I finished last week, I knitted most of it in a moss stitch and then the frill at the top is three rows of crocheted shell stitch.
It's mainly to wear instead of a scarf, but it's also cozy as a hood and it's stretchy enough that I can pull it down over my shoulders like a small poncho.
This is what I've been knitting today, I suspect it's a muffler which I'll wear with a kilt pin. The pattern I'm following, for this part at least, is a weird sort of knit one, skip one and then pick it up on the way back technique. I think this is what it's meant to look like, and even if it's not I quite like it anyway. So there.
Nancy has always enjoyed pushing small things off tables, and it's taken me a while to realise that that would probably mean she would enjoy pushing things down the stairs.
So now I leave one of the foil mice halfway up the staircase, and it will just sit there until Nancy feels like playing with it.
Of course, being Nancy, she will not do this when I've got my camera ready to capture the magic. So you'll have to believe me when I say it is adorable, instead here is a photo of her staring at the mouse, and another of her giving the thing a thorough nomming.
With Christmas trees and decorations everywhere by now, it's hard not to be effected by the Christmas spirit. Doc and I needed to buy a few cleaning supplies from the hardware store, and whilst we were there I thoroughly enjoyed looking at all of the decorations on offer.
I found a great set of shatterproof baubles, in great shades of silver, hot pink, petrol blue and lime green; I have no clue how I'm going to be using them yet, but they are too fun not to get.
Shiny!
As you may remember from back in September, I decided that it was about time I started wearing a watch. I put three different watches on my Amazon wish list, and my lovely Mother somehow knew exactly which one of the silver-watches-with-quartz-movement-and-a-black-leather-strap was my favourite. She is amazing like that.
I love it!
As you can see it's got that classic tank watch feel to it; but with a long face to accommodate two dials on it, which you can set to different time zones.
So I am now able to see the time in both the United States (Arabic Numerals) and Great Britain (Roman Numerals) at a single glance. I find that very reassuring.
I took this photo of Edith sitting on the stairs just before I left for work this morning. It makes me giggle.
Edith has such a serious look on her face whilst sitting in the most inelegant pose possible for a cat of her great beauty. Doc thinks I should photoshop in a beer bottle.
You should have seen her face when I showed her the picture.
This morning I was woken up by the pitiful mews of a hungry Nancy, so I got up to feed her and Edith. The sun was shining through the morning mist, and the leafless black trees so it all looked gorgeous and ethereal. I love Autumn!
So then I had breakfast and played with the cats for about an hour, before curling up in a patch of sunlight on the sofa and sleeping for 3 hours. Then Doc took me out for lunch, and a quick trip to the yarn shop. After that we came home, and I went back to sleep again on the sofa.
Yeah, Mono is apparently called the Kissing Disease, because that's one way the virus is spread, but that name gives the mistaken impression Mono is fun. Actually it should be called the Cat Nap Disease, because I definitely slept as much, if not more than, Edith and Nancy today.
Last night we went out for a really nice birthday dinner at the new tapas and martini bar in town, where I can highly recommend the cheese plate, the calamari and the Dry London Fog (which is a shaken vodka martini with two olives stuffed with blue cheese. Yum).
We then went for a drive to let dinner settle, before getting some ice cream from Marble Slab, whose trade marked slogan is "Find Happiness Within". I wish they had that printed on a t-shirt, with a suitably retro graphic.
In case you are wondering, Doc had his usual, which is a scoop of coffee ice cream with pecans mixed-in. I went for a scoop of birthday cake ice cream, with frozen raspberries mixed in. Fabulous; particularly on your birthday, curled up on the sofa in your PJs, whilst watching "Project Runway" with your husband and your cats.
Yeah, married couples in their mid-thirties know how to party.
Woooh!
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