Hm, long time...

So it's been rather a while since I have managed to write anything. Let me explain.
[pause]
No, there is too much. Let me sum up.

Summer, fall, winter off, job in spring, summer fall, off in winter, spring, summer, job in fall.

Okay, that's pretty short and sweet and leaves a hell of a lot out but that's okay.

The high points of the time have been being home with Rod and my menagerie, which has also changed in the last couple of years. We have added two more to the mix - Zooey, an odd little dog if I've ever seen one, we think is a cross between a British Springer Spaniel and a long-haired dachshund. She has tiny little legs that turn out at the front and a long, long body that can leap a four foot high staircase in a single bound if she's got enough speed going into it :)

Our other new addition was really, really new when he was brought home. One of Rod's drivers found a kitten in a crate when he was on a delivery job and brought him back to the shop. Rod was helpless in the face of tiny kitten whiskers and ears and especially the plaintive cries of a very hungry little boy. Rod named him Meep and we took him to the vet that night, before bringing him into the house, wanting to make sure that he posed no risk to the other animals. He was given a clean bill of health by the vet and we brought him home along with formula to feed him.

I've managed to knit quite a lot as well, lots and lots of socks, a cardigan, some shawls, and have managed to acquire a whole lot more yarn as well. I've come to the conclusion that I have to start really using the yarn I have - not that I haven't been, but my purchases have outstripped my knitting for a while now and my stash is epic. I have so many things I want to make and only so much time to knit. Dammit.

Summer Plans

The clock is running and it's time for today's maunderings :-) I was just messaging with a friend about how things are going and she's busier than ever even though, like me, she's (happily!) unemployed. Luckily both of us are in the situation of having a partner to help out, so the lack of a job isn't much more than a small pain in the behind at the moment. We were supposed to get together last week to go see the movie Chernobyl Diaries but what with one thing and another we didn't end up going and the next couple of weeks don't look very promising either. It kind of sucks because I'm not sure how long it will be in the theatres but oh well, I'll just pick it up on dvd when it comes out if we miss it entirely.

This summer is just filled with movies I really want to see - Men in Black 3, Snow White and the Huntsman, Prometheus(!!!1!!!!!1!!), The Dark Knight Rises, the list goes on. It looks to be an awesome movie summer, that's for sure. I'm sure I'll be knitting lots of plain or ribbed socks for movie watching :D I still think the best part about knitting at the movies is the looks that I get from other moviegoers - too funny!

I'm participating in the Tour de Sock again this year, and I've finished the first stage of the "race" as of this afternoon - the pattern was wonderful and the socks look just awesome :-) I used yarn from Sheepy Time Knits, the May colourway of the Time Traveller's Club and it's just perfect for the pattern, a lovely pale yellow that showcases the twisted stitches and lace beautifully. Now I'm waiting for stage two to begin, which isn't until Sunday morning, so I think I'll do some drop spindling in the mean time.

I started drop spindling back at the end of April when I took a class at the Downtown Knit Collective's annual Knitter's Frolic - that was a blast, both the class and the marketplace. One of the pics I posted yesterday was of the yarn that I had picked up there - there were so many vendors to look at and so many gorgeous yarns to fondle and squeeze! I picked up some Indigodragonfly, some Viola (which doesn't exist any more as the dyer was selling off all of her stock in preparation to move out of the country), some more Malabrigo and some pencil roving from a somewhat local yarn and fiber shop called The Black Lamb in Port Hope. I have some fiber from a small fiber festival that I had gone to in Port Hope the weekend before and that is what I'm planning to spin up next, in between stages of the TDS.

That's all for now,

Later.

Tuesday's Fun

Today's time has begun and I almost missed it - eep! It's ten past eleven and I only just realised that I hadn't written today's post. I was actually somewhat productive today, as I managed to clear out another half dozen boxes and bags out of the room downstairs. I'm trying to sort through everything ruthlessly as I unpack it due to the limited storage space round here and I think I'm managing not too badly but I'm sure we have too much stuff even without what's left of my things.

Other than that it was a rather ordinary day - got an issue sorted out with my unemployment, thanks to my friend Tammy and her contact at the office and I should finally have a payment coming in by the end of the week. Yay, money!

I spoke to my sister for a little while and found out that she wants to learn to make jam this year :-D I'm planning on going strawberry picking soon-ish for exactly that purpose, though first I have to contact a few farms to enquire about the price per pound for pick your own strawberries - one place has their price listed at $2.10/lb!! yikes!! - and this week I can go get apricots from the grocery store to bottle up some sunshine for future toast. I love apricot jam, especially on a toasted bagel with some cream cheese for breakfast. I'm also planning on making himself some blueberry freezer jam, maybe with a little lemon in there for fun, with the sugar free mix that I bought a while ago. I have some little one cup plastic jars for the freezer jam, and I've managed to excavate my canning jars, the rings and the countertop electric burner that I have for boiling the sealing rings. The outdoor burner is in the shed, and there's already an extra 20 lb canister of propane waiting for just the purpose of making jam and I found the blanching pot for later in the season, when it's time to do up the tomatoes for sauce and perhaps freezing some cauliflower and broccoli. I may take the summer off but I don't plan to be entirely lazy ;-)

Just to finish the post, here's some yarn porn, a small sample of what I've managed to get my hands on in the last few months.

Later :-)

Inadvertent Hiatus

So I was reading Sam of Yummy Yarn Studio's blog the other day where she mentioned how long it has been since she wrote anything and it kicked me into the realization that I haven't written anything in over three months myself. I don't really have an excuse as it's not like I have a job at the moment or anything else really pressing to do, so here I am again stealing borrowing ideas from elsewhere - namely the attempt to blog for fifteen minutes a day for the month of June. Yes, it's the fourth already, so I've already fallen down on this but I'm going to give it a shot for the rest of the month. One thing I will do is actually attempt to write for that fifteen minutes - any pictures I want to show you I will upload after I've done the writing.

I haven't been up to much for the last few months - I've been knitting quite a lot and since mid April or so I've been working on getting the front and back yards beaten into shape and planted with flowers for the front and small veggie gardens for the back. I've been pretty successful which is awesome, and himself helped me out a lot when I got stuck into doing this stuff on the weekends.

I have planted three tomato plants, three cherry tomato plants, two pepper plants, butternut squash, two zucchini plants, two watermelon plants - yellow ones! yay! - cucumber, beans and peas. I've only planted a few of each type, two or three, because I don't want to be overwhelmed by produce so that we end up not eating all of it, plus I have the CSA membership for the summer from Willowtree Farm to supplement our veggie and fruit requirements :-) That starts up in about two more weeks and I'm really looking forward to getting our first box of goodies. I also bought a meat membership from the same farm which we'll get once a month and will contain approximately ten pounds of chicken, beef and lamb.

My zucchini plants are getting huge!!

As for projects, I've finished about three pairs of socks and a huge Clapotis shawl out of SweetGeorgia CashLuxe Fine in last June's club colourway. It is stunning and I can't wait for slightly cooler weather to wear it and just snuggle up in it.

Well that's my fifteen minutes for today, so I'll be back tomorrow with another update :)

Later

Reorganization

It's been almost three weeks since I've put fingers to keyboard, for the purpose of blogging anyway. Trust me, there's no way I've given up my computer entirely for three weeks, it's just not possible :-P I can't even plead being busy unpacking things because I haven't really done much of that either. Mostly I've been somewhat depressed due to the circumstances surrounding (not)work and so I've done some baking, some cooking, a little bit of visiting and watched what I'm sure would be considered far too much tv.

I've also finished some projects, made headway on Rod's Halloween socks (finally past the heel on 'B' sock - yay!!!) and gotten some more lovely yarn in the mail. It's a good thing to be in the clubs I'm in - they're already paid for, so it's like free yarn ;-) Not really, I know, but still it's wonderful to get packages in the mail :-)

These first two are from Apothecary Yarns and are the first shipment in the Pure Imagination club, a six-month club with two skeins of yarn each month as well as swag. Each month a different Tim Burton movie is chosen as inspiration for the colourways and the first one was drawn from The Nightmare Before Christmas. The top one is Jack & Sally, a lovely melding of the colours from Sally's dress and the grey and blues of Jack. The bottom one is Jack's Lament, taken from the iconic pose of Jack against the moon. They're beautiful colours on beautiful bases, J&S is merino/cashmere/nylon and JL is merino/silk. Somebody suggested some sort of patchwork pattern for J&S, reminiscent of Sally's dress but that's a pattern that would most likely have to be created as I don't think there's one like that out there.

I also received some more yarn from Tri'Coterie - I got the rest of my grab bag from January and they're just lovely :-)

The top is superwash Aran merino, two skeins, and I'm thinking I may make a lovely scarf out of it. I found a pattern on Rav that looks like it would be really pretty. The middle one is Sterling sock, which has little silver threads running through it and as yet I have no idea what to make with it. The last one is lace weight and is just gorgeous!

They came along with these two that I had ordered - rainbow stripes :-)

There are a few more that have shown up, but I don't have pics yet as they seem to show up on days that aren't sunny enough to bother with pics. I also need to get some white poster board from Staples or wherever to have a decent backing when I do take photos of my new yarn. I have a feeling that at least some of them are overexposed, but maybe some day I'll manage to take a class or course on how to use my camera better than I do at the moment. I get lucky with some of my pictures, thank goodness, but I know that some are really not so good.

Other things I've managed to do include give my puppy girl a trim finally. Her hair was getting way too long and she was developing some matts which are not a good thing for a poodle-y girl. She looks adorable as always, and I'm going to give her another bath on the weekend, I think, and a proper trim with the clippers this time instead of the scissors.

I finished Leigh's socks, and I hope she's got them by now. I sent them out about two weeks ago now, but I haven't heard from her as to whether or not she's received them. I guess I should message her and find out, shouldn't I :-)

I also made a pair of socks for my friend as a thank you for helping me move, and a pair of fingerless mitts for my other friend for helping me pack up the apartment.

The other thing we've managed to do it get rid of the old hutch in the back room and put up one of my bookcases and the two dvd shelves and put all the movies we have on those shelves. This opens up the back room quite a bit and clears the path for the door more than it has been.

That's about all for now, I'll try to come up with something more entertaining for the next post :-)

Later.

February

I'm sitting here, watching Sanctuary and trying to decide what to say in this blog. I have many thoughts and opinions about what's been going on in my working life but I really don't think that it would be a very good thing to air them publicly. I have started to write it all down in a separate file, and maybe someday I'll be able to post at least some of it here but for now all I will say is that we're still screwed. The other two bargaining units have gotten acceptable contracts from their employers and I wish them all the best, but we're still sitting here waiting for some sort of resolution that will allow us to move on.

Having said that, moving on... I am completely out of my apartment though I still have to hand over my keys, and that I will do tomorrow when I have to go up to Newmarket to pick up my cheque. My upstairs neighbour should be home and I'll just leave them with him. My mail has been on redirect starting as of last week, so I doubt there's any of that there, but I could really use a lovely package of yarn to perk me up. Having said that, I have been going through my stash and photographing it so I can properly catalogue it on Ravelry. It's nice to know what I have when I'm cruising through the patterns looking for what to make next :-)

Here are a couple of my latest acquisitions:

DK Merino, colourway Ravenclaw (yes, that one, from Harry Potter)

Sock MCN - Even Cowgirls Get The Blues - so soft and squishy

BFL Sock - Storm Chaser - gorgeous colours...

The first two are from Maylin at Tri'Coterie from a grab bag that I bought in her end of year clearance. I had paid for a $100 grab bag but only got a $50 one, so she's sending some extra stuff in my next shipment to make up for the mistake. Her January colours are rainbow stripes and were just too delicious to pass up. I ended up selling one of my Fresh From the Cauldron colourways to fund it. I had bought it in an update last September and it still wasn't growing on me as a colour to love. I thought perhaps I should give someone else who would adore it more than I a chance to fondle him.

It was this one:

The last one up there is the January club selection from SweetGeorgia (obviously). It's called Storm Chaser and I'm trying to figure out what to make to best show off the wonderful colours. I made a Sockhead Hat (Rav link) with the October skein and it's great - really floppy, but so soft and comfy.

The webcam pic is kind of crappy and I'm sorry about that, but since it's actually not a bad pic of me, I thought I'd stick it in here. Let's see, what else have I been working on... Oh! My Happy Socks! They're awesome :-D

They're almost knee socks, except that my legs are too pudgy to pull them all the way up :-P I've also been working on some socks for my friend that I had started back in the summer. I ended up putting them away in the time out basket because I was trying to work the pattern toe up and it just wasn't computing for me at the time. I'm pretty sure I can convert it now that I've done it the way it was originally written, which is cool since I really prefer to use all the rather expensive yarn I have a habit of buying.

This is the first one, I managed to finish it in just a few days and I started the second one yesterday. I'm down to the foot already and should hopefully finish it tonight. I managed to get my friend's address today - I had saved it from the lovely Christmas card she'd sent but since moving I can't find a damn thing - so I can send it off when they're done. I really hope she'll like them.

Anyway, that's all for now. Time for some lunch.

Later.

I Hate Moving

I'm sure there are people out there who either love the opportunities that moving provides or just happen to be inclined towards a minimalist lifestyle anyway and so moving isn't a particularly traumatic event for them but for me, it sucks. I like to nest, apparently, and it didn't help that I was in my apartment for just over three years and so had accumulated far more than I thought I had. This past weekend was the big day, moving the large items out of the apartment and into my guy's house, and it was not as bad as it could have been, I suppose, but it was still very stressful for me.

It didn't help that I had a bad customer service experience with an idiot at U-Haul Truck Rental on Friday, the day before I was supposed to be uprooting what was left of myself and I was already freaking out somewhat. While I will admit I was not the picture of politeness myself, the tone and responses I was getting from this guy ended up leaving me wanting to cry. That's not something I usually do anymore, so it was not a good sign. At the suggestion of my guy I ended up calling Ryder Truck Rental instead, and for the same price - a little less, actually - I was able to get a truck two hours earlier in the day, with a full tank of fuel (so I wouldn't have to guess how much to put back in there) and a lift gate instead of just a ramp. The woman I spoke with on the phone was very helpful and professional and the complete opposite of the asshole from U-Haul. It gave me great pleasure to call that idiot back and cancel my reservation.

Now that it's all done, all that's left (ha!) is getting everything organised here. This is not going to be an easy task, that's for sure. We have two households worth of stuff, and one small house to put it all in. This is going to require some serious purging on both our parts, and one idea I've come up with so far is "the kijiji box". Anything that is a duplicate or something that is still serviceable but no longer wanted (and is worth asking some money for) goes in the kijiji box. This is Kijiji.  He's purchased some stuff from there, and we unloaded the big TV from the front room on that site last Friday as well, so I thought we could try that first before just donating the stuff. I don't really want to hang on to anything long enough to wait for spring and garage sale season, and besides, I'm sure that would be more work than it was truly worth. My idea is to put together a "kitchen starter kit" with a coffee maker, a toaster, a small crock pot, a juice jug, maybe a couple of baking sheets and some other assorted items we have and ask $50 for the lot. I don't know if the idea will work, but it's worth a shot anyway.

Yesterday I did manage to get some stuff done, and got some of the kitchen organised as well as cleaning the small fridge and the chest freezer so that we can start using them. I let them sit for the required 24 hours (closer to 48) to let the coolant settle and so we were able to plug in the fridge last night before going to bed. It was loaded up with water and some pop this afternoon and is now back to serving as the drinks fridge. The freezer hasn't been plugged in yet, though it's ready to go, because we can't get to the outlet at the moment as it's covered by boxes. I suppose those will have to be the next thing I move. I'd like to get the freezer going to take the pressure off the one on the fridge, and so that I won't have to consider how much freezer space I have when I find a deal at the grocery store that I'd like to take advantage of.

After all that, I need some happy. I spent part of last week cataloging my yarn stash and while it was a lot of work (yes, really, it was) it was also a lovely excuse to fondle great quantities of gorgeous yarn. As well, I received my October and November yarns from Maylin of Tri'Coterie Yarns. I have to say they are truly stunning. I know my camera didn't capture the colours perfectly, but I'll show you anyway.

"Smoke on the Water" - purple and two shades of grey, self-striping, in Aran MCN. I have a third skein of this still coming, and it's beautiful. I'm looking forward to having a matching set of hat, mitts and scarf made from this.

"Violet Vampire" - self-striping royal purple and black, on MCN sock. This was from the waifs and strays selection because there's a break in the yarn according to Maylin's note on the tag.

This is "Glacial" - a graduated double skein of merino/tencel lace, starting at white and going to deep blue. I have a plan for this one, and it's going to be stunning.

 These two are both superwash Bluefaced Leicester wool (BFL) and nylon, a very nice sock yarn. It's pretty fine and requires small needles, but the socks will be great. The top colourway is "Army Brat", and the bottom is "House Stark" - a Game of Thrones reference, for those who don't know it. I've listened to the first book on audio, and have listened to most of the second book as well but the narrator's voice makes me nuts. It sounds like he's gargling rocks while he's reading the story and I can only take it in small doses.

These last ones are "Lunatic" - the top one is a graduated skein of merino lace and the bottom one is merino/tencel and also from the waifs and strays because the skein has very little white in it, mostly the graduated purple. It's also a different shade of purple than the top skein, though both are very pretty.

I've managed to change my address at the post office, so hopefully I won't miss any of my shipments, though I know my upstairs neighbours will watch out for them for me, and John has said that if any arrive after Feb 1 he'll just send a quick email to let me know that it's there. I will miss them, though not the elephant noise of their kids quite so much, but they really are very nice people.

Anyway, that's all for this evening.

Later.

And There's the Knife...

We got some interesting news yesterday - I say "interesting" and what I really mean is shocking and extremely disheartening - the Region has pulled the contract from our employer so they are no longer running the buses for the Newmarket/Aurora area. In short, we no longer have jobs.

I'm sure there are many people out there who think that this is the least that we deserve, for having the nerve to stand up for ourselves and tell our employer that they no longer get to treat us like crap and that we deserve to make more money for the very real responsibilities that we have when doing our jobs. There is the rumour that we will still have a job with whichever company it is that gets the new contract from the Region, but honestly, talk about getting stomped on. Not only will we not get the raise we were looking for, but will almost certainly take a pay cut, and those of us who have stuck around for a while will lose our seniority and (the only thing we really have that we value) our vacation weeks. I've been with this company since August 1998 and as such am entitled to four weeks a year - with the new company, I'm sure it will be back down to two. Benefits will probably be downgraded, and we'll all be back to split shifts. For me this is more of a dilemma, as I've had to give up my apartment in Newmarket and move an hour away, in with my guy, so with the potential reduced wages, split shifts and the fact that it's a two hour/day commute (and a quarter tank of gas), it's going to be something for me to really think about and decide if it will be cost effective for me to accept the job.

Of course there is also the fact that we're going to be vilified by the passengers for ages, again for having the nerve to go out on strike. They'll happily gloat over the reduction in circumstances and before you think that I'm just not giving people the credit they deserve, trust me. I've been driving in this town for over nine years, and you do not get the people who are happy with the service saying anything. You get insulted and abused by the ones who are nasty and unhappy with the slightest of things - and this is not the slightest of things. We've been out for almost three months and a lot of people are (understandably) pissed off. I don't begrudge them their feelings, but I know the kind of crap the drivers will have to deal with when service resumes and it won't be pretty. If someone is so petty as to call in a complaint that I apparently "rolled my eyes" at her (behind my sunglasses, no less - she must have some pretty sweet x-ray vision going on there), then you can just imagine how it's going to go when service resumes.

I'm still pretty down about this - I truly didn't think it would come to this, and our union leaders assured us that this wouldn't happen as well, so it really came as a surprise. What's even worse at the moment is that our union president is not returning any phone calls, and has not issued any kind of statement to the membership or called an emergency meeting to tell us what the hell is going on and what our options are. Nothing like being left twisting in the wind.

In the meantime, I have managed to get my apartment almost completely emptied of random stuff, with the assistance of a couple of my friends from work. The only thing left to do besides moving the furniture (that's this coming weekend) and cleaning (next week) is to take down the closet fixture, fill the holes and paint over them. I've already  done that for pretty much all the other holes in the walls, so that shouldn't take long.

There's still a whole lot of stuff I have here that I haven't unpacked - I got lazy last week and haven't even finished unpacking the car completely yet. I'll work on that the rest of this week, and then somehow we need to figure out what to do in the front room. We have nowhere to put the stuff that's coming in as yet, so it's a bit of a quandary. I'm sure we'll figure it out, but it's still some more stress.

To have some happy news for once, I've finally managed to photograph a good chunk of my yarn stash and am in the process of cataloging it on Ravelry. I'll put some yarn up here, too, so you can share my happy.

My first Wollmeise yarn! :-) It's a gorgeous semi solid purple. I bought it in a destash from another Ravelry member, and it came in today. The picture is actually pretty representative of the true colour, too. Go me!

Another gorgeous yarn from GothSocks on her Laudanum Lache base, which is my favourite - merino/cashmere/nylon. It's super soft and squishy and I'm thinking will make an awesomely comfy pair of socks.

I'll feature some more yarns in the next post, as my wrist is getting a bit sore from all the work I'm doing tonight (still doing the upload to Ravelry, too).

Later.

January, Week One

I hope everyone has had a lovely first week of the new year. Everyone always goes into the new year with such hope that it will be good, or better or even just different than the previous year, but honestly most of the time the only difference is that you now have to write 2012 at the end of the date instead of 2011. I always screw that up at least a few times :-)

As you may be able to tell, little has changed for me although I have been attempting to set more structure back into my life as one of these days I will have to go back to work (ugh). So I've been zooming about the house, tidying, finding places for things, clearing things out, either into the garbage or into bags to take to Goodwill. Merging two households is a bit of a bitch, I must say. I'm very lucky in that he just says "Do what you need to do," and lets me have my head when it comes to creating space or reorganising anything. Obviously I don't just fling things in garbage bags without checking first, but in some instances (the kitchen!) it does make it much easier. Even so, I still have to go through the kitchen again to reduce the amount of stuff we have - I swear, I have enough plastic containers to store lunch for a small army, but I can never find the size I need when I need it. What's with that?!

One of the things I did on Monday, the second day of the new year, was finally get my crap organised at the front door. I put up four hooks that I had brought from my apartment for our coats, so they're no longer hanging off the back of chairs all over the place, and another little wooden coat rack that I've had for ages was put up to hold the leashes and dog coats and so on. I also swept and mopped, and put down the new mat I had bought so that we won't slip on our butts coming in the front door, as well as boot trays on either side, one for me and one for him.

I went to see The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo on Tuesday night while himself was off at the Tuesday Night Music Club (TNMC for short). He didn't really have any desire to see it, so I quite happily went alone. I wanted to see it because I've seen the original twice (I bought the trilogy) and I was wondering how the English version would hold up against it. It was pretty faithful, though I can't make a comparison against the book because I haven't read it - I'm not sure I'd make it through the books. I didn't like Rooney Mara as much as Lisbeth Salander, there seemed to be a little too much vulnerability in the character that didn't work as well as Noomi Rapace's portrayal as the hard edged girl. I had heard someone say that the English version was even more shocking than the original, but honestly, other than one scene in a nightclub, everything else was on about the same level. There were style differences, of course, David Fincher being the director that he is, but other than the actual casting changes, it was very close. There was one change at the end that I didn't like, and that leads me back to the vulnerability in Lisbeth's character in this one. I didn't think it was a good way for it to go, but I suppose we'll see how that works out. For future instalments I think I'll just wait til they are released on blu-ray and I'll watch them then. While I was at the movie, though I did manage to get about six inches done on a sock ;-) I had done the toe at home, before going out, and by the end of the movie was at the length where I needed to put in the marker for the afterthought heel - lol. You should have seen the looks I was getting from the girls sitting beside me.

Life on the picket line continues. Two of the companies involved (neither of them the one I work for) went to the Ontario Labour Board to force a vote on their latest contract offers, believing perhaps that our union leaders had not been telling us what was in those latest offers (the only difference from the previous offers was the addition of a $350-$400 one time signing bonus, ooooo) and the first of those votes was held yesterday. I am happy to report that the workers told the company to go stuff themselves, rejecting that offer with 83% of the vote, with a 92% voter turnout. That's a pretty overwhelming "NO!" in my books. I'm so proud of them. Believe me, I sympathise with the folks who are very quickly running out of money (I'm one of them, too) but after this long if we go back now, with the current offers that are on the table, we are doing nothing but condemning ourselves to crappy treatment forevermore.

There isn't much else going on, I have been trying to stay organised with lists of things to do and trying to get in the habit of various daily tasks around the house so that there aren't any real omg moments when someone drops by. Bathrooms are wiped down daily, kitty litter cleaned daily, kitchen cleaned, dishes put away, laundry (semi)organised, etc. Also when I bring stuff from the apartment I try to find it a home as soon as I can, that way I can take the boxes the stuff came in back to be refilled the next time I head up that way.

That's about all there is in my boring life. I have been knitting, of course, I just haven't finished anything yet and so have no pretty pics for you to see.

Later.

Happy Ho-Ho and Merry New Year

I had a blog started on Christmas Day, wishing my dozen or so readers a merry Christmas and extolling the virtues of my cooking and what we had planned for the day but after at least half an hour of trying to get pictures to upload so I could show off what I had been doing I got a little ticked off and just put it aside for later. I didn't mean it to be a week later, but, well, here we are.

So now in addition to the merry Christmas that got lost in the ether, I wish you a happy new year and all the best for 2012. It seems there was a lot of unhappiness last year, for many people and many different reasons, big and small, and I hope that things will be looking much brighter for everyone this year.

I was rather down last weekend, as Christmas is usually a big thing for me. I enjoy going present hunting for my guy and my sister but that was out this year because of finances, and I have fun cooking a big(ish) dinner - can't really be too big, there are only the two of us after all, and I don't want the food going to waste, but even so it's still something that can be fun. It wasn't as much fun this time, but that was because of my mood more than anything else. My poor guy, I warned him in the morning that I wasn't in a very good mood and he took it wrong, thinking it was him that had caused my bad mood so he said he'd leave me alone, not realising that what I actually wanted was a really big hug. We got that sorted out though, and that part of the day was better at least.

I did see my sister before Christmas and was able to give her the little gifts I'd made for her - let's see if I can get the pics to post this time. I've put them up before, but let's consider this in the nature of a test.

Well well, what do you know - it finally worked. It took a little bit of futzing about, waiting for it to load, but hey, at least it worked. I've been trying to load pics to Ravelry for the last week too, and it's been a bitch as well. Anyway, she seemed to be very happy with her presents, and I got a text a couple of days later that she was wearing the hat and was really happy with it. This is a good thing :-)

Since the pics are working, let's try another one or two -

The stuffing I made for the 9lb turkey that himself won at work :-) I'm not the world's biggest fan of turkey, mostly because I don't like eating leftovers for weeks on end, but this was free food - never turn down free food.

I also managed to get a good picture of Boo while I was mucking about with the camera, one where she's actually looking at the camera and not off to one side or moving from one place to another.

Christmas night we went to see a movie, one of three we've seen over the holidays. That first one was The Darkest Hour, an alien invasion movie of a sort. It was more entertaining than I'd had reason to hope, considering that none of the cast are A-list actors and the publicity wasn't really all that great. I only ever saw the one trailer for it, and the ads they ran on tv were just a shortened version of that trailer. It was done in 3D, and they did a really good job with that aspect of it. It was really only used to add depth of field to the surroundings and it did that to great effect. There were even a couple of vertigo-inducing scenes in there, which is the mark of some decent 3D.

My guy was off until Thursday, so we had a very lazy week of staying up way too late and getting up rather late as well. One of the things we did was continue with our Babylon 5 marathon :-) We just finished season three and it's one hell of a show. It still gives me chills watching that show, it's so intricately constructed. There are things going on in season one that aren't explained for two or three years but once they are it's like a revelation when all the pieces fall into place.

When he went back to work on Thursday I got up and picked up my friend Mary and we went off to Newmarket to pick up our cheques. After that we stopped by my apartment where she helped me pack up some more stuff and fill my car to bursting with my clothes drawers and what was left out of the kitchen. After that we went to another friend's place for a potluck lunch she'd organised for the six of us. It was a blast, especially since even when we are all working we don't get the chance to just sit and chat and laugh like that. Tammy made us what she calls "smoothies" - adult slushies, I call them. LOTS of booze, mostly rum, a whole lot of frozen raspberries and some water and Crystal Light for sweetness and added flavour. Oh wow, were they ever good. I could only have one or I wouldn't have been able to drive home, but it's because of her that I went and bought a Magic Bullet Single Shot for myself. I had all the ingredients, I just needed that little blender because I've just about fried the motor on the one we have. When you can smell the burning rubber when trying to make a yogurt/berry smoothie it's generally not a good sign. I made a slushie when I got home from hunting down the Magic Bullet, and oh boy was it ever good :-D

 Saturday we had no plans for New Year's Eve, we don't socialise much at all and have little to no desire to go out and about on such a crazy night. In the past we've gone out for dinner, or out looking for a R.I.D.E. program but that was just not what we wanted to do this year. So instead we went to see a movie in the afternoon - Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows - good movie! Lots of fun, though I'm still really not sold on the soundtrack. I didn't like the music for the first one all that much either, though I really did try, and this one is just as twangy with the harpsichord line in there (or whatever it is). Otherwise, though, it was a lot of fun, and I got some work done on his Halloween stripey socks too, until I made a mistake and had to stop knitting because I couldn't see to fix it :-P

After that we went hunting hors d'ouvres for dinner, and we had cheese and shrimp puffs as well as little mini quiches. We had some cheese and crackers as well, and boy were we stuffed. Both of us had some tummy upset actually, so we put away the rest of the stuff we had and just spent a quiet evening in. I got some more work done on my Warlock Socks (Ravelry link), I'm up to the ribbing on the cuff and I'm doing it in 1x1 twisted rib. I'm thinking of making a row with yarn overs in it to create holes for ribbon laces to keep the socks up, I just have to decide where to put that row.

That's the first sock, they're both that high now and they're very matchy-matchy, too :-D

Today was also very quiet, though we did head out for breakfast and while we were there he asked if I had any interest in seeing Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol, which of course I did. Turns out he'd gotten tickets for that yesterday at the same time that he got the ones for Sherlock Holmes and was going to surprise me with them but then had to tell me, because he just had to share. It was also a good movie, I enjoyed it quite a bit. I couldn't knit again, because I messed up only a few rows in - I have to make sure I take knitting that uses slightly thicker yarn than these Halloween stripey socks because it's just too thin to work with easily, even when I have lots of light. That's okay though, the movie was entertaining enough that I didn't miss it too much.

Anyway, that's enough for now :-)

Happy New Year to everyone,

Later.

Fruitcake

Are you running away yet? ;-) It's okay, there's a brief reprieve.

Today was somewhat better than yesterday, thank goodness. At least I didn't have a leaky pipe in the basement that I had to call a plumber to fix. I did, however, slightly lose my nut on the poor guy at Fido (my cell provider).

I upgraded my phone a few days ago, and have been waiting for it to be delivered by UPS. While I was on the phone doing the upgrade, I had them change my address so that it would be shipped here, but no, that part of the call didn't stick and delivery was attempted to my place in Newmarket. I'm there only sporadically these days, and I'm not going up there to hang out for a day hoping the UPS guy is going to show up. I called to get the delivery changed to here and was told to call UPS directly to do that, and so I did. It turns out that I can go pick it up, and though it's out of my way to do so, I'd rather do that than wait til next Thursday to have it delivered. They're closed on Mon and Tues next week for the holiday, it would take another day for them to get their act together and so it would be Thursday before it would get here.

Also, my data plan was changed from a Blackberry plan to a different one because the new phone is an Android. This would not be a problem if I had already had my phone when they switched it over. They switched it at around noon on Tuesday, but it's now Thursday and I still don't have my new phone. It will be another day until I have it, yet I'm paying for a data plan I can't use. I was rather offended by that and let the guy have it. He ended up turning my Blackberry plan back on for me, and gave me a credit on my next invoice for my troubles. I'll have to call them tomorrow to get it changed back again, and then probably argue with them again about the length of my term. I deliberately went with a two-year term as opposed to a three-year one because I just can't cope with the thought of being stuck that long. I don't anticipate changing providers, but who knows how badly they'll piss me off between now and then.

My new toy, which hopefully will be in my hot little hands by tomorrow morning :-D I'm looking forward to having some fun with it.

The other thing I did today was make a big mess in the kitchen. I'm late, but I had to make my fruitcake this year. I had a very pretty moment while making it and inadvertently doubled the fruit but luckily I caught it before making the cake batter. So I wound up with four fruitcakes instead of two, though I do have a plan to get rid of two of them. One is going to a friend at work and I think another will go to my upstairs neighbours at the apartment. They're British and so enjoy the dark fruitcake at Christmas. I gave them one last year and John, at least, enjoyed it very much.

When I say fruitcake, I do mean fruitcake - there are four kinds of raisins and four different kinds of dried fruit in this recipe. It's somewhat bastardised from the one I got from my stepmother, because that one calls for a pound and a half of candied peel and cherries... ugh. I don't like those at all. So, I used Thompson raisins, sultanas, Lexia raisins, and currants as well as dried mango, apricots, peaches and strawberries. The rest of the recipe is just fine, but I really have to sub the fruit for the candied crap. The downside is that in cutting all that stuff up, I've gotten a blister on my finger from the knife rubbing against it for the time it took me to do the chopping. (It took quite a while - chopping dried fruit is tough.)

The sad part is any time I mention fruitcake most people I know run for the hills because they're thinking it's something like the garbage that's sold in the grocery stores and re-gifted forever and ever. If I could only get them to try the one I make, I'm pretty sure they'd change their minds. If they didn't like raisins they'd be pooched, of course, but if they do I think they'd like this one. Even my guy said earlier when he tried it, "That's good!" in a tone of surprise. He should know better :-P
 
I have been checking the online news sources regarding contract negotiations and the like, and I have to say that I really need to navigate away from the pages before I get to the comments section. The ignorance and rudeness of some of the people commenting is frustrating and hurtful. If I were to tell you that Joe Blow down the hall from you at work is making 40% more per year with better benefits and better working conditions while doing the same job that you do, would you not be a little pissed? We're not asking for the full wage gap to be made up, but half would be a good start. As for pensions and benefits, the only pension I have is what I can put away in an RSP for myself, and we pay quite a bit for the benefits, and Manulife keeps upping the premiums and cutting the benefits that are covered, just like every insurance company around. Regarding working conditions, a lot of our drivers are working an eight hour day that's spread out over up to 15 hours. How is that good, in any way? It contributes to fatigue and to more stress in the home life than is good for anyone. Driving distracted and driving while fatigued can be just as dangerous as driving impaired. Those are a form of impairment actually, and I heard that from a provincial police officer. The comments about being happy we have a job, and the "Pay me $15/hr and I'll go do it" just make me want to slap that person upside the head. We do a specialised job - it's not glamourous, but most of us do it because we love to drive. We're being paid to do something we enjoy, and that does make some of the rest of the garbage easier to take, but when we're offered a contract where the increase over the next three years isn't even enough to buy a medium coffee at Tim Horton's and our benefits are increasing in price, we had no choice but to say, "No. We are worth more than that. We are more deserving than that."

That's all my rambling for today,

Later.

Christmas

I just have to put this out there, get it off my chest - this year, Christmas sucks. There are a variety of reasons, one of which, of course, is that fact that neither of us has much in the way of money and so presents have been put on hold. So there's nothing to get excited about there. No wondering what to get for him, or what he's gotten for me, and that's rather sad. I had plans, too, of what to get him. One of the things that's becoming a tradition is to adopt an animal at the Toronto Zoo. They send a certificate with a picture of the animal, a little brochure with information and the recipient's name goes on their wall of donors at the front entrance of the zoo. It's really neat to go there and see your own name on that wall. I hadn't decided which animal to adopt for him this year - in the past I've adopted a red panda, a polar bear and a black panther for him. The year I got him the polar bear I also found a framed print of a mama polar bear curled up with her two cubs which seem very serendipitous. 

There's also the fact that we're in week nine of the strike and there still doesn't seem to be an end in sight. On the news website this morning it was announced that one contractor had approached the union with an offer, but that's not our employer or union so it doesn't matter that much for us. It matters in that whatever they're offered, we will be offered as well by our employers, but if the offer sucks then, well, that doesn't do any of us much good.

The weather has been really weird, warmer than usual, and while I'm not complaining because I'd rather be out picketing in temps over 0C than under, since I do live in Canada the weather does shape our perceptions of the holidays and with rain, not snow, and temperatures above 0C, it just doesn't feel like Christmas. When I lived in Australia I had a hard time at Christmas because it was summer and that just seemed so wrong to me. I'm sure if I had stayed I would have gotten used to it (and there are times now when I wish I still lived there - sun, beach, warm weather...) but at the time it just felt really strange. There's the point too, that we've had very little sunlight for the last couple of weeks and that does start to get one down after a while. All around it's rather depressing.

To add insult to injury, one of the pipes in the house developed a crack - the one leading from the kitchen sink and dishwasher - and has been leaking all over the floor in the back bedroom, causing mould to develop and just be icky in general. It went unnoticed for a while because there was a table in the way, and I just didn't see the carpet getting wet, but when the mould sprang up (in what seemed to be) almost overnight I freaked. I found it at 3 am when I had to get up to check on Honey, and when I turned the light on I happened to be looking directly at the area in question. Ugh. I couldn't sleep in there after that, thinking that every time I breathed in I was inhaling mould spores. My biggest problem with it is that that bedroom is where I escape to if I can't sleep because he's snoring. I can be a very light sleeper, and I have a hard time *getting* to sleep, too, so sometimes it's just easier to go sleep in there than it is to get grumbly and antsy and really irritable.

To finish this off with something much more pleasant than my whinging so far, here are the photos we had done of the four-feets earlier this fall. Our local pet store had a photo competition for the cutest pets and if you spent $50 or more in the store you got to book an appointment to have the glamour shots done and have your pet entered in the contest. After it was all over and done with, you could order prints from the photographer which is what we did. Here they are :)

Aren't they lovely girls? It would have been nice to bring the cats too, but probably only Milo would have made the trip successfully. Maybe next year :)

Later.