Domestic Geek

While browsing around the Internet yesterday, I found an article that September 12th is International Crochet Day. I wish I had found this sooner.

So, what did I do to celebrate? I had planned to go to the park at crochet, but Mother Nature had other ideas with the arrival of some much-needed rain yesterday and today. Oh, well. I crocheted in front of the television while watching Regis and Kelly and I'll crochet in public later when Marcus and I go to Wing Stop for dinner. I always bring a knitting or crochet project every Friday night. I still have my crochet sun hat to finish (though my plans of having it finished before Summer was over are shot to heck). Either that, or I'll keep working on my Rust Goes Green market bags. I didn't like the way the colors I had picked out were looking together, so I found a better match for the variegated and will get some more green to make a second one solid.

Speaking of plans shot to heck, I didn't finish squat for the Summer KAL-CAL. Between the surgery and work, I didn't complete either of the bag projects I started. Oh, well. There will be a Holiday KAL-CAL, so hopefully I can finish something for that.

Speaking of crochet, Robyn Chachula is going to be in the Denver area in late September. I'm particularly interested in taking the crocheted sock class she will be teaching on Friday, September 26th down at Purls of Wisdom down in Parker. I'll be signing up for that class tomorrow when I head down there to visit.

One thing I'd like to complain about: The variety of colors of cotton yarn in this town kind of sucks. The national craft store chains carry a very limited number of colors of the Sugar 'n' Cream, as does Wal-Mart with the Peaches 'n' Cream. Even most of the yarn stores carry very little cotton and the ones that do carry the higher end stuff. I'm not making dishcloths and the like out of good yarn. It's kind of a pain when you have a particular idea in mind and can't find the yarn. I hate ordering online without seeing it first. I'm thinking I'll have to get one of the Peaches color cards.

Guess who turned 42 today? Duh, ME!

It should be a pretty good day. I don't have to work. Dad's coming over in a bit for some Wii bowling. I may take my free birthday entree coupon from Noodles & Co. over and get some free lunch as well as some free ice cream at either Cold Stone or Baskin Robbins. I've got knitting and crocheting to do. We're going out to dinner at Texas Roadhouse this evening.

We actually celebrated last Saturday. We had BBQ Steak on a Stake over at Mike and Nina's house. We played some Wii - Mike has some really cool game where you knock stuff down. Marcus and I got Mike Rock Band for his birthday. That game is actually quite fun! I had to sing first, but after I got over myself, I actually had a good time. I got the first season of The Big Bang Theory DVDs (I LOVE that show) and a Frank Sinatra CD from Mike and Nina. Marcus got me a new Superdrive and a G5 Jive and an adapter card to add extra hard drives to my Mac. I'm going to install them this afternoon and rip the cd to iTunes to see if it all works. Marcus already ripped TBBT for me and we've been watching them all week on the AppleTV.

I can't believe that seven years later, I'm still getting comments about my birthday being on September 11th. I was at a quilt store last Friday taking advantage of my birthday month discount when it last happened. I had to produce my driver's license to verify my birthday and the clerk commented that it must be tough to have a birthday on "that day." Uh, not really. The only thing that's rough is dealing with the people that make such comments. I admit that my birthday in 2001 sucked. I, like every other caring person in this country (and around the world) was in shock and upset over what happened. Horrible things happen all the time, though, and unfortunately these fall on somebody's birthday. If I met someone whose date of birth was December 7th, I wouldn't say, "Oh, how sad to have a birthday on the same day Pearl Harbor was bombed."

Anyway, off to enjoy my day!

ETA: Heh, Laura sent me this ecard she found:

Yeah, I haven't been in the mood for blogging lately. Can you tell?

I think of things I want to write about when I'm at work and can't. By the time I get home after a 12 or even 14 hour shift, I'm too freaking tired to do much more than check my email and read a few Ravelry forums while I veg in front of the television trying to unwind so I can sleep. On my days off, I'm either too brain dead to bother or I'm busy knitting/crocheting or hanging out with dad. Maybe one day I'll get back in the blogging groove. Until then, I guess it is what it is.

So what have I been up to?

Work. Sadly, that's taken up a lot of time. There are only two people in my department and when the other dude went on vacation the last week of August, I got to cover his shifts, too. Nothing like one day off in 10½ days to burn you out. I can't wait to see what the final overtime tally was when I get my paycheck on Friday. I do know that I'm going to be majorly pissed at how much of it is eaten up with taxes. I also hate my job now. It's not just the new position, but a lot of other crap, too. Also, the guy that used to have my job is such a control freak that he's trying to do his new job and mine, too. I'm so sick of it. Even the $1/hr raise I got yesterday doesn't even begin to make up for the lame crap I have to deal with everyday now. I have really got to figure out what the heck I want to do with my life and do it.

I seem to have recovered from the surgery. I still get pains around the scars, but I hear from others who had the procedure years ago that they still get pains. Whee! It's still hard to get comfortable in bed some nights, though. *sigh* I talked with the rep from our health insurance about how much it would cost to add the coverage that would pay a percentage of my salary if something like this ever happened again so I didn't rush going back to work. It would be about $70 a month and they wouldn't pay out for the first 14 days of missed work. Yeah, I didn't sign up. I would probably be better off just putting money into a savings plan or something.

I've been knitting and crocheting a lot, but haven't finished squat. I have got a case of startitis. I have tons of projects started, just can't seem to make myself finish anything. I also got myself a pattern for my birthday to make a quilted tote bag. I think I'll use the Debbie Mumm Creative Woman fabric I have stashed for it.

We're having raccoon trouble again. Stupid things have been hanging out by our front door. I hate those things.

Marcus got us a new DVR just in time for the new fall tv season.

Marcus and Mike did their annual Pikes Peak climb the weekend before last. Nina, Dave and I went down on Saturday to pick them up at the top. I got some really yummy plums, peaches and Colorado honey at the farmer's market. I got some good pictures with the camera Marcus got me. I'll have to get those posted in the gallery soon.

I had other things to write, but darned if I can remember any now. Like I said earlier, work makes me brain dead. Maybe after a night's sleep, I'll remember the rest.

Sorry I keep forgetting to post. Twelve hour work days and wanting to punch co-workers to knock some sense into them makes me brain dead.

Dad and I had a blast at the Stitch 'N' Pitch event a couple of weekends ago. I got to sit next to a guy that wanted to actually talk about the game — the WHOLE GAME! Sadly, I didn't get as much accomplished as I had hoped. I did add several rows to my crochet sunhat and a few rows to my alpaca scarf. I was bummed that there were going to be no "goodie bags" this year (as I didn't even know about the event to go last year). Fortunately, since it takes Dad so long to get around, we got there really early and I got one of the leftover bags from last year. Yay! We got a copy of the Fall Interweave Knits, a nice purple Rockies cap and free yarn from Knit Knack. If only the darned Rockies would have won. Hrmph.

Well, I don't know if it will be done by the end of the Summer Kal-Cal, but I'm finally making headway on my Market Bag. I'll try to remember to snap some progress pics tomorrow and post them. I've done about a dozen of the 70 rows of knit stitch I need to do (after finishing the Intarsia arrows) until I reach the top of the bag. Then I need to make the handles, felt it and I'm all done. I looked all over town (even the army surplus store in Arvada) for the slide buckles the pattern calls for. I even was willing to use something similar, but just couldn't find anything local. I finally ordered some online from a place called Creative Designworks. The site actually sells supplies to make pet collars. Shipping was included and they took Paypal. Hopefully they will arrive soon (at least by the time I get to making the handles).

To help out keeping track of where I am row-wise, I purchased the Clover row counter I've been wanting at Hobby Lobby. I've been waiting for what seems like weeks for Needlework stuff to be on sale so that I could get it. I splurged on the more expensive one because it has a lock button. One is supposed to wear it around one's neck, but I put a keyring on it and attached it to the beginning row marker. Hopefully, I'll remember to add a row as I move the marker (that's the plan, anyway).

Speaking of Hobby Lobby, they are so stuck in the 20th century. Why in the heck would that company invest in a new cash register system, but still not take advantage of technology that uses the bar codes? Everything is still priced with price tags, all merchandise is rung up one at a time by hand and now they have to pick an appropriate department for each item. Cashiers keep asking which department you got stuff in (if they don't know). Also, it's getting old "reminding" the poor cashiers that certain items are on sale. If they would utilize freaking scanners and a computer database, they would have all that information at their fingertips. It's one of the reasons that their checkout lines get so long. More than once I've dumped items at the front and just left rather than dealing with the checkout hassle. Lame.

Speaking of lame, I can't remember if I already posted this, but the Hobby Lobby on Monaco/Mississippi no longer has a fabric department. What did they do with the extra space when they remodeled? Added more gaudy home decor crap. Like the world needs more of that junk.

OK, I'm super tired and can't keep my eyes open (now who is lame?). Off to bed.

I've been thinking about my mother a lot lately. It started (not surprisingly) while I was in the hospital. I admit that I've had a nagging fear in the back of my mind that I'll die early like mom did (she was in her early 50s). Even my grandmother was not that old when she passed. True, I don't smoke and am not diabetic, but still that fear. Being in the hospital was the wakeup call that I need to take better care of myself. It was embarrassing that two nurses had to help move me after surgery because I was too heavy. I'm turning 42 next month and I would like to have way more than a decade left to enjoy my life.

While Dad and I were walking back to the car after the Stitch N' Pitch ballgame Saturday, I got to thinking about my mother again and got a little sad.

My mother hated knitting, but she could crochet up a storm. She also was really starting to get into computers. She would have so dug going to yarn shops, attending knitting groups and surfing around on Ravelry. I wish she was still here so I could share all this stuff with her. Heck, with circular needles, maybe she would have even given knitting another go.