Snow!

The only topic that anyone who lives around here (the DC area) is talking about is SNOW! One of the local stations has preempted their regular programming and is just talking about SNOW!

The snow around here started around noon (apparently earlier in Fairfax, because my friend, Nancy, has a lot more snow on the ground than I do here), and it's been going strong ever since. Until about 4 pm, not much of it was actually sticking to the ground, it was just making things damp. The cars were covered first, and now it's starting to get to the point that you can't see the ground through it. Maybe the ground was just colder in Fairfax.

We're supposed to have about a foot of it today, and more tomorrow! Maybe lots more!

They said it would be another wet, warm, heavy snow, but so far the flakes have been tiny and light. The people on TV are talking about drifting, and the kind of snow that's coming down makes that likely.

So far, this story is pretty boring.

The fun started yesterday, when I went to Safeway.

The first clue that something was up was that there were NO shopping carts out in front! The store was jammed, and there was almost no milk (just a few containers of no fat) in the store. I didn't check the bread, but that was probably low, too. It was difficult shopping without a cart. V8 is hard to hold onto when you've got your arms full of groceries! I got 4 cans of Campbells chunky soup in chicken broccolli cheese flavor for only $5 on sale, though. It seemed like just what I want while watching the snow fall.

Still pretty boring, huh?

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Well, there's not really much of anything else I have to say today. I just wanted to let people know that I'm still alive.

Have a great snow!

Happy Groundhog Day/Candlemas/Imbolc/St. Bridget's Day!

I know, that's a lot to pile onto one little day of the year, but there it is.

I put up links about Groundhog Day, Candlemas and Imbolc yesterday. If you missed them, go back and check on them.

First of all, there were mixed results about Groundhog Day. Read about them here.

And, although I didn't have a handy groundhog to prognosticate, if one had been around, they would have seen their shadow up until about 1:30, when the sun went behind the ever-present clouds, and after that, he would not have seen a shadow. Part of the reason for that is that we're expecting snow flurries (or a winter storm, depending on which source you listen to) tonight and tomorrow morning. I'm hoping for flurries. Decorative, fun, and not a bother.

So, no good, solid answers here. But I'm still knitting winter gear, so I'll be ready in case of the worst.

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It's also Saint Bridget's Day! The Wikipedia entry for her says that it was yesterday, but I've seen it given as the second of February in many places. There's more information about her here, and here.

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Lost is back tonight! There's an hour of bringing-you-up-to-date, followed by the first two hours of the new series, and the beginning of the last season!

I just can't tell you how excited I am about this!

And there's really nothing else worth watching this evening. Well, except Groundhog Day, which is on Bravo and just started.

Have a fun evening!

Welcome to February!

The year just started and January is over already!

Over at Crazy Aunt Purl's blog, she's reporting in on how well her New Year's resolutions are going.

I don't want to talk about mine.

You can tell it's not going well. But I plan to suck it up and get moving on them.

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Tonight, we have new episodes of: Chuck, Heroes and Castle!

Tomorrow night, we have the return of new episodes of Lost!

Get Lost again!

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I finally figured out how/why my DVR is erasing programs that I don't want to part with.

I watched two episodes of Supernatural yesterday. One was a continuation of the other, so after watching the first part, I went on to watch the second part without erasing the first (in case I wanted to check back on something in the first one). When I was done with them, I erased the second one right after watching it, went back to the list of programs, highlighted the first one, and erased it. When I went back to the list of shows, the first episode of Supernatural was still there, but Lost (from last week, which I hadn't watched all of) was gone.

In other words, when I highlight something and choose it, sometimes it actually opens something that was NOT highlighted. I think (because a program was highlighted and I chose it) that that's what I got, but it has actually opened something else.

Just another malfunction of this piece of junk (aka a DVR) from Comcast, and another reason to get TiVo! I'll have money on Wednesday, and will be ordering my TiVo then, and I can't wait, believe me.

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To get you into the spirit, and brush up on your lore, here's some information about Groundhog Day, which is, of course, tomorrow!

Groundhog Day is also know as Candlemas, and the pagans call if Imbolc. Study up and impress your friends tomorrow!

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I keep talking about lots of stuff to do today, and wind up putting it off, but I really do have a lot to do, so I'm going to keep this short.

Happy February, everybody!

A Sunny Sunday

The snow stopped sometime last night. I think we got about 4 inches. And it's been clear, sunny and beautiful today.

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For all you Steve Canyon fans out there, there's a new post up on the blog, all about George Stover and his help with the project.

So, get on over to the Steve Canyon blog and read all about it!

George was in Invader, which I worked on, and he sat in front of me in a scene in New Genesis (aka Twilight of the Dogs).

Here's George in Twilight. He's the second from the left in the front. My friend, Wendy Joines is directly behind him from your viewpoint, and I'm to your right of Wendy.

It's funny about the names of films. Every film has a working title, and when it's done it gets a final release title. Sometimes the final title sticks, sometimes it doesn't. The working title for Invader was The Killing Edge. The moment I heard the name Invader, though, I stopped calling it anything else.

Twilight, on the other hand will, it seems, always be Twilight to me. When I do refer to it as New Genesis, I always have to stop for just a second and think first before I say it, whereas Twilight just pops out with no thought whatsoever!

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Speaking of names, here is a batch of the funniest jokes about the most famous name from the last week. All this was hysterically funny earlier in the week, but it's wearing thin already.

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Io9 has a post up about the Dollhouse finale on Friday. They don't seem to think that Dollhouse is over.

I hope they're right!

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The CW will be showing two episodes of Legend of the Seeker tonight. The first one will feature Jolene Blaylock, and, judging from something on Attack of the Show, the second one will, too. Check your local schedules and check it out!

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Everett sent me six emails, each with 50 photos (that's 300 photos, folks!) of the RenFair and other stuff. Once I have a chance to wade through them, I'll start getting some of them up on the blog.

Hope you had a great weekend!

Brace yourself! Here comes the week and a new month! May you have a wonderful one!

The Very Last Dollhouse Is Tonight!

Well, as you know, Fox has gotten rid of another fabulous Joss Whedon creation, and tonight is the very last episode of Dollhouse.

I doubt that Fox will be generous enough to rerun them, so tune in tonight for Armageddon! If you've DVRd them and still have them, go back over the last few episodes.

Tonight, we're out of the Dollhouse and into the real world, and it's going to get nasty!

This is the episode they were filming when Eliza broke her arm! She tweeted about it as she was leaving the hospital, wondering if they could cover the cast with wardrobe. She only had the very last day of filming left to finish it completely. We'll see what happend.

We also have a brand new Ghost Whisperer (on at the same time as Dollhouse--I hope you have a DVR or TiVo!), and Medium on CBS, and a new Caprica on SyFy! Immediately following Caprica, SyFy will be rerunning an episode of Warehouse 13, which is always a treat, even though a rerun!

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One order from Knit Picks arrived on Monday! I got the book from Holly for Christmas: Continuous Cables, and my copy of All New Homespun Handknit! I have a copy of the original Homespun, Handknit (somewhere), and it's one of my favorite knitting books. Even in projects that I'm not interested in making, there are so many slick and easy ways of doing things that it pays to really read the patterns. I've looked through the new Homespun, and there are projects that I like, and some that I love! I haven't had enough time to really read through the whole thing, but I already found one slick tip: how to make a crochet provisional cast on, which, when unzipped, leaves you with all your stitches on a lifeline, so you don't have to pick them up as you unzip it! That's almost worth the price of the book right there!

Soon after I placed that order, I realized that I'll be finishing the Christmas presents soon, and will then need something to knit, so I ordered the yarn for Holly's sock and some light grey Palette for a wimple for me, and there's probably enough of it for mitts, too. That order arrived yesterday, but I lost track of time, and didn't realize it was after 4:30, and too late to pick it up. I got it today, and it's all ready to knit, and the first thing I did was cast on with the new provisional cast on I learned from my new book.

One thing that I forgot to mention is that in the new Knit Picks catalog, they have cable connectors, at last! Add a pack of them to your next order if you use Options Needles! They mention that you can use them to make extra long cables, but you can also use them to substitute a different size cable for the one you're using in your project. Just unfasten one tip, add the size cable you want to switch to, put the tip you just remove on the other end, and pull it through your work. Then, remove the old cable and put the tip from the old cable on the other end of the new one, and you're done!

All that has me happy with Knit Picks, but I submitted a design for their designer program, and they turned up their nose at me. It was the hat that I made for my friend's daughter.

OK, so they don't have eyelash yarn available, but the basic design doesn't have to be made that way. Anyway, I plan to write it up (and do a few more samples) and publish it myself. New pattern coming up!

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The weather people are saying that it's going to start snowing late tonight, and on into tomorrow, and I'm wondering if I need to go out and get any supplies today. Then again, maybe it would be fun to walk around while it's snowing. Actually, I don't think I need anything, but I need to go assess the situation.

The overcast that's happening now, and the snow that will be happening later are going to make it impossible to view the first full moon of the year, and the best one we can expect all year! I'm disappointed!

I have lots to do, so that's all for today!

Have a fabulous weekend!

New Knitting Product!

Yesterday, while I was out, I picked up my mail. Tuesday, the mailbox was full of trash. I sorted through it and it all went in the trash can. But yesterday, I got a pile of catalogs, including a special sale yarn catalog from Herrshners!

Now, I used to get some catalogs from them in the mail, and they had a lot of stuff for cross stitchers, paint-by-numbers, and a few, junky acrylic yarns. Well, asking for their catalog is a good deal because from time to time, they have big yarn sales and those catalogs have some really nice yarn, and some of it at amazing prices!

Well, I paged through it quickly last night, but then looked at it again today, which is when I noticed that they had a new product for sale. As it turns out, they've sold out of most of it, but Jimmy Beans Wool has the same thing at the same price.

The new product is Regia ABS Latex, which is intended to go on the soles of slipper socks or the palms of knitted mittens, gloves and mitts! It's available in black, blue and red, and there is a stencil to create interesting and decorative designs with it. The drop down menu has the other colors and the stencil, which also has some flower designs that you can't see in the photo.

The hearts and the star are great, and the cat paws are just too cute. The flowers are very pretty, but I have no idea why someone would want to put a car on the bottom of their sock or palm of a mitten. I suspect that if this works, I'll want to make a whole stencil that has several shapes with overall dimensions that are perfect for a mitten/glove/mitt palm. A group of stars for me, hearts for Holly, Kyle and Malaia, and maybe rows of dots or wavy lines for other traction situations.

There is a pamphlet available that comes with it on other sites, but that wasn't mentioned at Jimmy Beans. I ordered it anyway, because that was the only place that had it. I desperately wanted to order one each of the colors, but since it's approximately $12 each, that would have been $36 plus shipping. Also, the frugal part of me wants to try it out before ordering two more colors. So, since I'm about to make some red mitts for a friend, and am almost finished the stigmata mittens for Robin (which have a red mark on the palm) I opted for the red latex, even though I may not have anything else to use it on. By the way, the stigmata mittens have a matching crown of thorns hat, both of which are threatening to turn into WIPs in the bad sense.

So, anyway, the order is in, and I can't wait for it to arrive! I'll let you know how it goes.

I tried the puff paint that was suggested to the Yarn Harlot for the bottoms of her felted shoes, but it didn't seem to provide much traction. It's chief feature was the texture that it provided, but I can't imagine it actually would prevent you from sliding on a slippery floor or help you grip a steering wheel.

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More knitting news about an episode of NCIS. The person who wrote the article is (obviously) a knitter and has gone ballistic (I would, too) about an episode which has someone killed using a knitting needle on a plane!

First of all, as any knitter who has flown would know, they won't let you take those kinds of knitting needles on a plane! And (I didn't see the episode) the killer is apparently not a knitter. So where did he get the needle? How did he know a knitter would be on board?

I can understand that the show might not want to keep a knitter on as a consultant, but you would think that they might ask a knitter before considering putting on a show like this.

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January is Thyroid Awareness Month. You may be getting tired about hearing about this, unless you have read the list of symptoms. It's estimated that over 40% of Americans have hypothyroidism. If you've been having strange, nebulous symptoms or have been told by a doctor that there's nothing wrong with you, you should read the symptoms. Then go to your doctor with a list of the symptoms you have and demand a (T3 and T4) test (if you have many of the symptoms).

Apparently, there was something on TV today about it. They didn't cover the subject fairly, but they did a better job than most, from what I heard. I missed the actual broadcast.

But you can read about it here!

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While we're on the subject of health, check out this post about drugs you might not need! OK, I can understand that a pre-disease might not be a disease, but it does seem to be common sense to try to prevent it from becoming worse and developing into a disease. However, taking Fosamax is very counterproductive!

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Now that I've gotten completely off my usual track, I'm going skipping off into the sunset, while wishing you a wonderful evening! Have fun!