Kiss My Knits!

Lately I’ve been getting to bed at a semi-reasonable hour, but last night I was up far too late. As a result, I don’t want to go running this morning, but I do want a bagel and a mocha so bad I can taste them. That’s how it goes – when I don’t have enough energy, my body craves the things it knows will give it energy, even if only in the short term. I’m okay with not running, since I walked Em to school this morning. On the return trip it was so misty that I had to take off my glasses. Back on the horse tomorrow.

I’m contemplating a fundraiser for my daughter’s school. There was a Donors Choose proposal that didn’t get funded before deadline, mainly because I didn’t see it until a few days before the deadline. I’ve talked to the teacher since then and she says that no, it doesn’t have to be that exact press, and no, she doesn’t need all the varieties of ink she asked for immediately. I think this project could be brought in for under $500, easy.

I’m debating whether this should be another “Jayne hat proceeds go to this project for a limited time” or just a ginormous stash sale. The stash sale would have the bonus side effect of also reducing the amount of clutter in my home. And really, I do have some nice things. Sock yarn from Creatively Dyed (one skein pictured at right), Koigu, Lorna’s Laces, Noro, Debbie Bliss, Mission Falls… it’s almost criminal that it’s going un-knitted. The last stash raffle I did raised over $200, but I might do just a straight bargain sale this time.

I’m still mulling over options, but what do you think? Straight sale or $10 raffle? Shall I release some of my gorgeous stash into the wild?

Em: There’s a potion you can drink that will make the whole world animated! Then it will turn back live action again. But they haven’t made it yet.

I’m pretty sure they have, honey. Fortunately, you’re too young to know about those kinds of “potions” yet. Ahem.

Late this morning I picked up my new glasses, pictured right. They didn’t feel right at first, but then, new glasses never do. You have to get adjusted to them. Things may look weird or distorted as your brain and eyes get used to the new view. However, my new glasses don’t normally make me feel nauseous.

I lived with them for a couple of hours, then called back up. They checked their records, and apparently the optometrist wrote the prescription down correctly, but the optician transcribed it incorrectly. Instead of the 2.25 correction for astigmatism in my left eye which I should have, these glasses have a 2.75 correction. That’s odd, because it seems like the right eye sees things blurrier than the left with the new glasses. In fact, the right eye seems to see things worse overall than with the old glasses.

Anyway, I can’t get back up there today, but I’ll go in tomorrow morning and hopefully we’ll get this all sorted out. In the meantime, back to the old glasses!

Day 3 with the Nike iPod revealed a couple of problems. Number one, while the workout screen is up, I can’t scrub through songs, only jump to the next or previous one. This is a problem because for some reason, my C25K playlist was randomized. So when Week One came up, I couldn’t just jump right to week 2, which was the next item on the playlist. Nor could I select an individual song from the playlist. Hitting the “next” button brought up a different section of Week 1 for some reason, so I had to keep mashing it Playstation style to get it to go to the next song. Which was not, of course, Week 2. Week 2 never did come up, and I was tired of standing there on the Greenway punching buttons on my iPod like a caveman trying to figure out a cell phone. I just found any song and let it play, then estimated the length of time I’d been walking and running.

A couple of times, the same song would come up very close to each other, or Week One would rear its ugly head again, so I’d have to fiddle around on my iPod to go to the next song. And remember, until my armband gets here later in the week, my iPod is in my bra. I never look my best when running, but rummaging in my shirt really added that extra touch of class. The songs that randomly came up, though, weren’t bad, in terms of pep.

Our Lips Are Sealed – Go-Go’s
(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher & Higher – Jackie Wilson
The Girl Can’t Help It – Little Richard
Austin Powers (soul Bossa Nova) – National Youth Jazz Orchestra
I Want You Back (Single Version) – Jackson 5
Remind Me (Radio Edit) – Royksopp
Choo Choo Ch’Boogie (1946 Single Version) – Louis Jordan & His Tympany Five
So They Say – Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog
Lust for Life – Iggy Pop

In spite of the problems, though, there was a little bonus I wasn’t expecting. As I hit the “end workout” button, it repeated back to me how far I’d gone, average speed, calories burned, etc. And then a male voice came on. “This is Lance Armstrong. Congratulations! That was your longest workout ever!”

Casey the wii fit instructor could take a few tips from Lance.

Okay, time to hit the showers and then pick up my new glasses! Yay!

My fever is down, but I’m still rocking a pretty good headache. Rather than wind and pack germy kits, I’m taking a day off from the Jayne hat mines. Also, I’m still waiting for my new glasses to come in, so I can only look at the computer so long before everything goes blurry. I’ll try to answer e-mails tonight.

In the meantime, here are a few links.

Take heart! You’re not fat, you’re just really smart.

Frankentoile. Love it.

Military warnings worth heeding.

Alternative uses for Post-It notes.

I’ve nearly finished turning the heel on my first S’Mores sock, so as my eyes permit, I’ll be doing that. Also, calling the optometrist.

Later, taters!

Running, attitude, and hidden causes.

Okay, I tried and tried to get the text to wrap, but I don’t know enough about Flash, so instead I have this gigantic white space around a tiny window. Oh well.

I went out last night when it was drizzling and did Couch to 5K week one up my street. The forecast was for rain today, so it seemed prudent to go ahead and get out there while the getting was good. Today it’s clear and beautiful. Of course.

There are a lot of variations from peak to peak and valley to valley because as you may recall, I live on the slopes of a hill we have named Mount Doom. A portion is pictured to the right. Also, apparently you have to program in your weight for it to give you an estimate of calories burned, which I didn’t realize before starting. It tells me I burned zero calories. Call me crazy, but that feels a little low to me.

I need an armband or other device for holding my iPod. I had it in my pocket, but the cord to the earphones wasn’t quite long enough to reach my head without the earbuds popping out of my ears. I finally had to stick it in my bra. It was in a protective neoprene glove, but still, I can’t recommend this. I kept thinking that the screen was going to come on and give me a kind of E.T, chest glow through my shirt.

The iPod’s positioning obviously made it difficult to gracefully change tracks. I went all the way through the Couch to 5K podcast for week one and had to listen to part of week two. The public domain electronic music that makes up those podcasts isn’t going to win any awards, so I usually get out of the podcast after I’ve done my final run section. I know from there it’s all walking so I might as well just listen to whatever I want. Being able to access the control wheel to change it would be nice.

This was fun, though, and I look forward to trying week two on the greenway.

Instant messaging with my husband late this afternoon:

Me: You have a package from Amazon.com
Me: Why would you go and buy something from Amazon this close to your birthday? You don’t make things easy!
Him: Actually, it’s not for me!
Him: SURPRISE!
Me: What??
Me: Um, sorry about busting your chops, then.

Yes, turns out my wonderful husband bought me something I’d been talking about for a while now, the new Nike + iPod. It’s a little dealiebop that attaches to your shoe which you sync with your iPod Nano (which I have one of, thanks to the lovely and generous Ellyn Ritterskamp of TV game show fame). When you sync your iPod with the internet, it transfers all the data from the last time you worked out and creates graphs of your performance, calories burned, etc. You can join up with online groups (runners for Obama, anyone?), download customized playmixes, and generally nerdify your workout however you like.

Goodbye, plateau!

Mr. Tvini, after I opened it and went nuts: Well, you’ve been a little low, and you’ve been talking about this, and I thought you deserved something nice as a pick-me-up.

I’m the luckiest geek girl ever. Let’s hope the hurricane only skirts us so I can try this baby out tomorrow morning!

The last few days I’ve been launching into the day full speed. Did you know that the grocery stores don’t have their bananas out at 7:15 in the morning? Slackers!

I’m trying to decide whether to go running this morning. It’s still fairly cool, but even though I did get to bed at a reasonable hour last night (see, Mom? Your Mom Guilt^TM worked!) I’m still pretty tired. Something had me kind of sickly last night, and I think I’m still recovering a bit. So maybe I’ll let it go, since I did run yesterday and since the Greenway smells like dead skunk.

This morning: I’m stamping more padded mailers, knitting a hat for a guy in Belgium, and watching Becket. I may also stop by the hardware store and pick up some PVC pipe for a side project that I’ve wanted to get underway for some time.

At right, for no particular reason except that it amuses me: a cat’s reach should exceed his grasp, or what’s a heaven for?

After my comment yesterday about not leaving socks on the floor, this happened. I brought in some hand-knitted socks from the line. I was called away before I had a chance to put them up, so I put them on a plastic bag on a stool and walked off. I heard the bag hit the floor, and sure enough, there was the cat. Caught her red-pawed.

Lot of stamping of boxes, etc., this morning, for Jayne hats and kits. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, it’s not the knitting that slows me down, it’s all the other assorted stuff. Also, I’m almost out of shipping materials, so it’s time to order another gigantic box of boxes. Our house may never be free of clutter.

I did find time to go out and run the Greenway this morning. The rains of last week flooded the stream. It crested over the bridge, and there are still bits of straw and debris stuck through the railings. It’s been a week, and now there’s a wet, rotting smell in places. It’s definitely motivation to keep running – on the way back, at least, to get the heck out of it.

The Office Season 4 releases today, and yes, I will find time to grab a copy. Can’t wait for 30 Rock to come out, too. If I’m knitting Jayne hats in the mornings, it’s nice to have something new to watch. Although I did pull out Bowfinger for the first time in a long time, and it was just as funny as I remembered. Love that movie. I’m baffled that it didn’t do better at the box office. Last night was The Last Emperor, a favorite movie of mine. A Jayne hat bound for Massachusetts came off the needles during that one. It’s a long movie.

Time to eat some lunch and go stamp up some more padded mailers. People need kits!

Final question: the spider at left is living in my rosemary bush. It’s big and it’s pretty, but what is it? Anyone know?