Happy Thursday!!!

Happy Thursday everyone! I used to watch the Sonny and Cher show every evening in high school. Because of this bit I've always had a desire to sit on top of a piano and sing in a red dress. I even do a pretty good Cher impression when I'm a couple of drinks in. That is, I think it's pretty good and people are usually too busy snorting their drinks through their noses and laughing to tell me otherwise and that is the kind of feedback I like: too debilitated to critisize.

I hope you have a lot of delightful weekend plans. I will be watching the first season of Remington Steele and knitting Christmas presents.

One last little beloved

Just found this. And fell in love with everything about it.

Monday Beloveds

1) Pre-Christmas Excitement Lists

Passiveaggressivenotes.com never fails.

As you know, I like to keep seasonal things seasonal. I don't like to get ahead of myself; I want to enjoy November for its blustery in-between-ness, transforming from fall to winter and I love Thanksgiving and want to give it its due between Halloween and Christmas. So I do not watch any Christmas movies or listen to any Christmas music or read any Christmas books until after Thanksgiving. But I do tend to get a little excited to get excited for Christmas. Some Christmas things I can't help but think of before Thanksgiving. I make two lists every November: a list of things I'm going to give or make for people at Christmas and my Christmas list. My parents ask for my Christmas list every Thanksgiving and I'm a big dork about it. I play with fonts and colors and strategize about which category (yes, category: books, dvds, gift cards and miscellaneous) should go where.


Speaking of Christmas lists, one of the items at the very top of mine is non-stick frying pans because I only have two frying pans which are more of the everything-sticks variety and one is teeny weeny and the other is HUGE! Does anyone have a preferred brand? Something middle-of -the-road in expense and quality?

2) Downtown Abby

I'm a sucker for British TV. Especially anything with Maggie Smith in it.

She is so joyfully bitchy. Her scenes are absolutely the best. I've only seen the first two episodes, but the other discs should be coming in through Interlibrary Loan any day now and I can't wait to sit down with a cup of tea and knit and enjoy the (polite, British) drama.


3) The word "gormless"


I love that word. Gormless. Although now I've thought it to much and it's lost all meaning and sounds totally weird. I wonder if you can be gormful? Or what a gorm is? Apparently and a lot of different things, it seems.

Happy Thursday

Happy Thursday, everyone! Here's the best thing I've seen online all week:

This weekend is busy, busy, busy: I'm teaching two classes, helping my grandpa with a project, starting Christmas projects, going to a party, and hopefully vacuuming (my living room carpet looks like it's made out of cat hair. Ew).

Cranky thoughts from a crabby morning

You know those mornings that start out like any other morning and then rapidly go downhill? It starts with the alarm jolting you out of a weird dream where you are at the movie theater watching a Jason Bateman movie on a date with Jason Bateman and your friend is encouraging you to hold his hand except it's not really Jason Bateman, it's more like a Jason Bateman/somebody else hybrid. And then you actually have enough time for once in the morning and you get just to the point of doing your hair where there is no turning back,  the point of no return: the curling has begun and if it doesn't come out looking reasonably sane then you will actually have to call in sick because if you go in with crazy hair like that they will fire you anyway and then you realize that you hit some sort of wormhole because you are now five minutes late. Everything is the worst, it's everyone's fault, mostly Jason Bateman and you're so late and then you get to work to discover that it's just as awful as it is everyday and everyone's crabby and everything is terrible. Or is it just me? Here are some adventures from this kind of morning:

-I forgot what Ravelry was called and how to get there. Forgot. I go to this website everyday and I forgot it. I kept thinking: "Stitch...something? Stitchery? Stitch'n bitch'n? Yarn...? Yarny?...Do I have a brain tumor? I can see the website with the alpacas and the Boston Terrier...Knit...something?"


-Seriously. We are grown ups. If you are going to chew your gum, chew it. If you want to snap it constantly (20 times in 30 seconds I COUNTED), fine. But don't blame me if I "trip" and "accidentally" impale you with a letter opener.


-You know what I find extremely soothing on crabby days? Well, yes, whiskey, but not at work. What I find truly soothing is imagining I have a tiny little pocket-sized Al Swearengen. And he whispers in my ear and I laugh at all the mean, terrible thing he says and how bad ass-ly he says them. And it really, really helps.

*BEFORE YOU WATCH THIS VIDEO* They don't call him Swearengen for nothing. There are a lot of swears in this video. Do not watch it if you have an aversion to foul language and reference to vulgar acts in a wild west saloon setting. Do watch it if you need to know how to rant like a champ.

 (Other pocket-size friends I wish I had include, but are not limited to: Eddie Izzard, Gloria Steinem, Ina Garten, and Dolly Parton.)

-I love it when a staff member from another department comes into our department and takes the treats we are sharing without asking and without being there for any specific work related task. It really lends credence to my theory that she just walks around the place eating free food instead of doing, say, her job. It gets even better when she complains about our selection of free goodies. 

-As I work on my list of items to make for people for Christmas I would like to know why I was cursed with two pretty, sociable sisters who have increased the size of our family with their boyfriend and husband and baby (respectively. Laura is not cheating on Aaron. And if she does, I am not making her other man anything for Christmas. So there). Then I realized that it's genetic because I am also pretty and sociable and have waaaay too many close friends.Why, oh, why couldn't we have had ugly, mean parents?

It was at this point of the morning that I realized I was complaining about loving and being loved by too many people and I snapped out of my funk. Also, watching Swearengen videos can really help a girl out.

*So. Many. F-words.*

Monday Beloveds

1)Song and dance dream sequences.

Something like this:

  

 2) The Dead Weather

I've known about this band for a while and liked what I've heard. But as I was trying to find stuff to listen to on YouTube while I work I put on a few videos and it just hit me in a certain way. I'm now in full on obsession mode.

  

The thing that brought The Dead Weather to mind was the preview for AMC's new Western Hell on Wheels. I don't have cable at my house (thus my obsession with DVD's I can get through the library like Moonlighting) so I didn't see the premiere last night. The previews do kind of make my Deadwood-loving heart beat a little faster so maybe I'll watch the show online or when the DVD's come out. But back to the point, the song on the previews for Hell on Wheels had me humming and straining to think WHAT ON EARTH IS THAT SONG until I finally got to a computer and with some creative Googling re-discovered my favorite Dead Weather song:

3) Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

It took me 50 pages and at least two zombie nightmare before I decided I liked this book (and that I probably shouldn't read it before I go to bed). It's weird and can be a little jarring sometimes if you're really familiar with Pride and Prejudice but if you're willing to take it for what it is, it's a pretty enjoyable read. There's some gross zombie action, some country dances and gossip, something for everyone!

Happy first Thursday in November

This weekend I have knitting on my mind: I'm knitting a gift (I don't dare say more about it until it's given, just in case), knitting samples for my November/December classes, finishing a design for submission to a book (I am so excited! But again, I don't dare say anything more until it's finished. It's just a submission, there's a huge chance it won't get in. But just the thought that it might!), and starting what I like to call the Christmas cast-on: wherein I get way too ambitious about making gifts for friends and family for the holidays. I am hoping (hoping) this year to pare down my grandiose ideas to something more achievable. The theme of my holiday gifts will be thrifty, handmade, loving and reasonable. Although, as I type that I can hear the tiny voice of my more reasonable self saying, "J'accuse! You already have one grandiose idea that is in a medium with which you are not proficient and you are in love with it! Take heed!" Uh, my reasonable but dramatic self, apparently. Annnyway, I'm starting the planning process of my holiday gifts and I'm looking forward to it. I have matured recently as a knitter in that I actually knit gauge swatches and design before I start the actual project instead of during. It's still not my favorite part, my fingers still itch to get those stitches on the needle and just get started already but I have noticed that my designs are better and my finished products are nicer if I take some time to think about what I'm going to do before I do it. Somewhere, my mother just heard a thousand angles break into song and said quietly to herself, "One of the many, many lessons I tried to teach my willful daughters just sunk in to one of their thick skulls! Glory, glory!"

In case any of you knitters out there haven't seen this yet, feast your eyes on this video. And if any of you non-knitters actually made it through a paragraph about nothing but gauge swatches and designing, you will still appreciate this:

It makes my vision blur just thinking about knitting on a scale that small. And the colorwork on some of those pieces... I am in awe.

Other activities for the weekend: watching Coraline, cleaning and cooking, a party for a friend, an open-house at JoAnn Fabrics (if you live in the Mt Pleasant area and want to take a class at JoAnn's (not just knitting, there are lots of other classes offered) come sign up this Saturday for 50% off! And if you don't want to take a class, maybe you just come and visit me!), cinnamon buns/coffee/knitting at Erica's so I can meet her new kittens, and playing Boggle with my Grandma. And if the Interlibrary Loan gods smile upon me, Season 3 of Moonlighting will come in and I can spend some more time with David and Maddie.

Hungry cats: nature's alarm clock

Here's what's getting me going this morning on very little sleep:

1) Hungry cats. (there's no sleeping through that)
2) These music videos

3) O'course the coffee

 8 o'clock all the way, baby. I once accidentally referred to it as "8 mile" which has a whole other connotation.