Black and Blue

Today was the Breast Cancer Walk. I would just like to express my sincere hopes that the organizers might think that June would be a good month to switch to having the walk. It rained and snowed. We only walked 3 miles, but because I was soaked and cold, I think I've had more muscle pain than I normally would. (Six ibruprofen has not put a real dent in the pain yet). I walked with my mother-in-law, Joanne (in the pink hat), my aunt-in-law Debbie (white hat), and my cousin-in-law Kelly.

Joanne went to Target and picked us up some pink gloves which were much appreciated. I also realized today that I don't have any sort of rain coat or windbreaker. I know I had some dollar store ponchos I keep on hand for NH Sheep and Wool (it rains every year), but I couldn't find them. I brought umbrellas but the wind keep turning them inside out, so there really wasn't a point in using them. It's amazing how soaked a Wellesley sweatshirt can get.

I've done the walk in Concord several times over the years, but I have not ever done one in Manch Vegas. We started at the Fisher Cats stadium, and the march started with the local chapter of the Ancient Order of Hibernians playing the bag pipes. I took really sucky pictures of that, and they remain sucky after I've cleaned them up on photo shop, but I'm putting them here anyway.

In other news, I finished Shawn's really boring hat. I slept oddly on Saturday night. I dozed off around 7 pm and then slept till 1 am, and then I was up from 1 am to 4 am, then slept from 4 am to 7:30 am. So the three hour stretch between 1 am and 4 am while I was watching random stuff on the History Channel allowed me to finish Shawn's hat. It was a quick knit even on #5 needles and sportweight, as I finished it in seven days. Well, eight I guess since it was done 4 hours after midnight. Doesn't Shawn look so thrilled to be modeling it??

I also ripped the sock back for the second time and picked a new pattern. I'm pretty sure this one is going to work this time though. If not, I'm sticking this yarn back in the stash to age for a bit until it can tell me what the heck it wants to be.

Evening Falls

The short answer is that I think I'm fine. After another mammogram, and two ultrasounds, I was told that they think it's fiberous/glandular mass, and I got a letter with the box checked that says (I kid you not) "Probably benign (probably not cancer.) Recommended for repeat mammogram in six (6) months." This sort of thing does not engender confidence in one's health care providers. I somehow don't really feel much better. I'm sure I'll get to the point where I can ignore it again until the next mammogram in six months, but honestly, at this moment I'd like to just get rid of them altogether. I know this is probably not a healthy viewpoint, but I just view them as ticking time bombs. If it does ever happen to me, I'm telling you, I'm not screwing around, it's going to be an immediate double mastectomy even if I have to pay for it. And I know that they say that doesn't always prevent it, but in my viewpoint it sure couldn't hurt. There'd be less tissue for anything to develop in.

But anyway, on to more cheerful topics. I went camping with some of the knitters this weekend at Paula's family's camp area in Ossipee. Fred make amazing mortadella, prosciutto, onion, tomato, and mozzerella paninis over the campfire for lunch, and a meatloaf in a dutch over, baked potatoes and grilled zucchini for dinner. He made homemade marshmellows for smores and I brought the Jetboil Helios and made chocolate fondue. We also used the PCS and my Flash prototype to make hot tea and cocoa, as it was unbelievably freaking cold.

Here's pictures of Fred playing with the Flash and working with the panini maker for the fire.















It was cold. Unbelievably cold. Hard to knit cold. Alison trying to wrap a scarf around her head to keep warm cold.















It was really fun, but despite a long sleeve shirt, my Wellesley double thick sweatshirt, a fleece, a shawl, hat and mittens and two sleeping bags, I barely slept because of the cold. I kept looking at the clock every hour or so, and I think I finally nodded off for a bit between 5 am and 6 am. Given that I had to work the next day, when it got light, I packed up my tent around 7am and headed home to try to get some sleep.

It was really fun, but I think next year we need to do it when it's warmer.

The Thin Ice

Okay, I know I'm being overly dramatic, and that it's very common to get called back in for more pictures after a baseline mammogram, but that doesn't mean that I'm not still wigged. Apparently I have an area of density in my right breast. I thought I was pretty dense all around, but whatever. They warned me at the appointment before the pictures were taken that they might have to call me back in and I should not panic or worry about it at all, but in what world is that possible exactly? Since I got the call this afternoon, all I can think about is Liz, and that it will be six years in January since she left us. So I'm having my little spaz, venting here a bit, and then I'm going to pretend that everything is fine and that I don't have that pit in my stomach until I get the results after my new appointment on Monday. It's okay, you can move along now, nothing to see here, show's over :)

The Rainbow Connection

It's morning and I have to be in the shower in 15 minutes so I'm not late to work, but I wanted to post pics of my friend Alison modeling my shawl. There were some funnier ones, but I'll spare her. Plus the shawl looked fuzzy in them (I do have my priorities here).









I also wanted to give an update on the writing, although I have on Facebook already, so some of you may have heard this already. I broke 10,000 words! I currently have 10,238 in the computer, which doesn't count the pages I've written in my notebook when I'm out and about.

Okay, gotta run, but hopefully I'll post more soon.

At Last!

At last the freaking swirl shawl is done. It's on my lovely $10 foam insulation blocking board improvised with duct tape (even in my color) which works really well. I'm hoping that it will dry quickly so I can get some pictures with someone wearing it, but for now, I'm just happy the damn thing has been put to bed.

For the knitterly among you, the next time I start one of these projects where you all roll your eyes at me and ask me if I like punishing myself, will you remind me of this moment and threaten to take my needles away from me??? I know, I know, I probably won't listen since I appear to be a masochist knitter, but try okay?

The Long Way Home

I'm continuing with the titling the blog with song titles. I feel like I ought to give a prize if you guess, but I know all of you will just google it, so it doesn't count. And yes, I mean you, don't you look all indignant!

I know I haven't posted in a millennium. Okay, I know that's exaggerating. Things have been odd and interesting at the same time here. Shawn has been doing a lot of training for work and has spent most of the last two weeks in Chicago. Which he has apparently not enjoyed much, although he did get to go to two organized sporting events. Which makes him happy, so good. Thank god I didn't have to go.

I've been writing quite a bit. Not this weekend because my mother was here, and that forced me (and poor Shawn) to clean for hours on Friday night. I know many of you deride my lack of motivation in the cleaning arts (Laura V, I mean you), but I just don't think I'm going to be on my death bed thinking "I wish I'd cleaned more." You know, I have a hell of a lot better things to do with my time than clean. I'm not talking about filth here. Filth gets cleaned. I'm talking about clutter and laundry, and possibly dishes (until they become icky and I must clean them.) I think we all have to choose our priorities, and let's face it, cleaning is damn low on my priority list. Why clean when I can knit, spin, read, write, or do almost anything else?

To some extent it'd be nice to have beautiful space with everything in its place when people come over, but not if I actually have to do it, pay for it, or sit in it. I live in my space and I use my stuff, and it doesn't always get put away because I'm going to use it again. I have always felt uncomfortable in house beautiful type spaces. It's not lived in, it's not relaxed or home. (I think the bad guys from the Stepford Wives are going to jump out and get me.)

I think most of my friends like me for me, and not for for what my living room looks like (yes, Laura V, probably in spite of what my living room looks like, just getting that out before you do ;) ). And to some extent, my obnoxious, rebellious nature thinks that if some really care all that much what my living room looks like, to the point they'd judge my character over it, we don't probably share the same world view and it might be better to keep it to yourself, because mine's not going to change any time soon. Now, you might be getting the idea that my Mom cares what my apartment looks like. She doesn't, but I do prefer that my apartment is in the minor pit state, rather than major catastrophe, when people other than those that live here come into it. So I do cave to some societal pressure to have the place somewhat presentable for the comfort of those visiting, but this does not occur very often without such prompting.

I don't know why I'm blathering on about this, but recently someone asked me how much I sleep because I seem to do a lot. (Although I'm always lamenting how little I get done of that I actually intended to do.) Well, I sleep much more than I used to after recovering from my former life. I now am able to get between 6 and 7 hours a night, but it's still mostly six hours a night. But the thing is, I tend not to clean unless necessary either. So that gets you a lot of time. Now I still waste it on dumb things, Facebook, trashy novels, Cartoon Network, Ravelry.com and random shows which are not edifying (Monsterquest) on the History Channel, but those things still outrank cleaning every time.

So, speaking of not getting enough done, let's talk about the writing progress the last couple of weeks. I feel oddly amazed that I have 9,236 words and about 30 double spaced manuscript style pages. I have been a bit lax this week about writing, but I did purchase a blank book for my purse that I can just leave in there and jot notes here and there. I did manage to write some pages by doing that. It's weird because I then have to spend time typing them, but it gets me to write more later as well. This week I do need to get more back on track.

We had our first writing group meeting and I was very happy with how we conducted the meeting. I also think it was very helpful to have other people's perspectives on what I wrote. It makes it easier to remember that I do have to explain things to people who have not seen them. For example, at one point I had to go back and add a description of Moody's Diner, because I forgot that not everyone knows what Moody's Diner looks like. Oh, the novel's set in Maine. There's too much material and too many stories I've been telling for years not to fictionalize some it and use it. I might finally benefit from my childhood :)

In other news, I'm plugging away on the swirl shawl. I have 69 swirls done out of 82 and I only have 13 left to go. I have to say, I'm ready for this one to die. It's been interesting, but I'm ready to move on to the next project. I'll post pics when it's blocked.

This has been an editorial and probably reflects this station's opinion at this moment in time.

Message in a Bottle

This week seemed to be pretty busy. I didn't write as much as I should have but progress was made. I'm up to 4,138 words, and we had our first meeting of the writing group. Six people showed up and I think it will be fabulous. We even came up with a name, and a possible funny hat, but we did not get to the secret handshake. I think it will be helpful. We have our next meeting set up, and two of us volunteered to provide material to review at the meeting.

The night before, I went to my monthly knitting meeting at the Ewe. Angie got a practical knitting tattoo. I tried to take a picture with my cell phone, but my phone really sucks. Just at the base of her toe, you can see a black line. This line is to tell her that if the sock she's making is at that point when she tries it on, she's to start decreasing for the toe. I thought this was great. I'd probably just use a permanent black marker, but I have that needle thing, so a tattoo is just out.

I am still working on my swirl shawl, I am on the third row and have 38 out of 82 done. I'm closing in on half way finally. I like it, but I think it'll be much better when it's blocked out. Right now it looks kind of blobbish.

I tried to write for a while this morning, but I didn't really get anywhere. Well, I did, but I didn't. I began the story with some material I had from an online writing class I took just before I left Bianco. I've changed the direction and added stuff, in particular, making a side character more of main character and adding a character althogether. So I did their character development sheets this morning. It's a little three page long set of information about the character, both to help me figure out who they are, and to remind me what I've already decided, so I don't say he has blue eyes in one part of the story and brown in another. But I did it for two characters this morning. So no net writing, but good work done today. I have Monday off, so I'm planning to use to write.