This Is Bizarre

Check out this news story from China. You'll have to follow the link. I can't possibly do it justice. 

I've seen this in a couple of places where people can comment, and the comments are all very mixed. The general reaction seems to be bouncing back and forth between horrified and laughing.

The weirdest part is that I knew someone who probably would have pushed the man off the bridge. My family will know immediately who I mean, but I don't want to admit it publicly.

***********************

My package from Knit Picks arrived today! Such an event is always cause for rejoicing! I got a pair of Harmony tips in size 6, and three balls of Merino Style in fog. Or mist. Or something. It's light grey, and it's going to be used to make the copy of Hermione's hat from Half Blood Prince. It's for a class in the Harry Potter House Cup KAL. I intend to wear it to the movie, too.

The first thing I have to do on this project is write the instructions. So, I'm going to get busy and do it.

**************************

There's a brand-new Reaper on TV tonight, and unless I'm mistaken, it's the season and series finale. There are a lot of people who are very unhappy about this. I'm not terribly enthused that it'll be off myself.

There's a rerun episode of the The Mentalist tonight, too.

And tomorrow night, there will be the Monster Quest episode about the Jersey Devil on the History Channel. I grew up with Jersey Devil stories, so I'm looking forward to it.

Have a great evening! I hope the weather people aren't promising you three more days of rain to go with the two we've already had like they're doing here.

A Little Progress

I've been swatching for the shawl I'm knitting for the Harry Potter House Cup KAL on Ravelry. Well, I've been finishing up some Mrs. Figg String Bags and swatching.

I have the pattern settled for the beginning of the shawl, but I still don't have a good pattern that I like for the border around the bottom, and haven't even started to try anything about the edging that I'd like to put on. I could, conceivably, just do a picot bind off, but I'd really like a nice edging.

But I finally got impatient with not starting. We're more than half way through the month, and I have to be at least a quarter of the way through the project by the end of the month. I'm doing an OWL for Charms. OWLs are a three month project. So, I do have time, but still have to be about about 18 inches along, measured on the front edge by the end of the month.

Since I do have a pattern designed for the beginning, I thought I ought to get started on it. Here's what I've got as of this morning:

I'm using Knit Picks Options needles with the nickel finish, but I'm thinking I might like to use Harmony tips for this because they'd be just a little less slippery, so I ordered a pair of tips in size 6 today. Getting another set of tips in the right size will let me experiment with stitch patterns for the border without having to keep switching the tips from the shawl to the swatch, too.

I already did a project for the regular charms class, and I have another small project planned. They asked for projects that could be worn in the muggle community without making the wearer look odd to muggles, but that would identify that person to the magical community as a witch. I'm planning to make a lucet cord which can be tied into a bow around almost anything that the person is wearing/carrying in blue with silver knitted stars on the ends. It seems obvious to me that tying such an article to my handbag (which is blue) would identify me as a member of Ravenclaw. Not to mention what a great Christmas ornament it would be!

I'm planning to make another project for muggle studies. We were asked to make an item from muggle TV or movies to help us look more like muggles and blend in. While placing my order at Knit Picks, I ordered three skeins of Merino Style yarn in fog to make a hat like Hermione will be wearing in the  new Half Blood Prince movie which will be out this July. 

This is the only photo I've been able to find of it so far. There are instructions for copies of the hat that I've seen, but I didn't think that any of them looked enough like the photo to suit me, so I'll be designing my own for this one, too.

Sorry to put all the science fiction and stuff in yesterday's post and all the knitting in this one, but that's the way it worked out.

Have a great evening! Oh, and there's a new The Mentalist on tonight along with a new Reaper!

Earth Day Is Tomorrow!

Earth Day will be celebrated tomorrow, and I thought you might want to know about it ahead of time so that you could pull together some way of celebrating it, even in a very small way.

Here's a picture of the Earth Day flag. You can find out lots more at the above link.

***********************************

I haven't been ignoring you. The weather has been changing around here, and it has consequently been very warm in my apartment. It cooled off Friday night, so it was a reasonable temperature here on Saturday morning, but when I got home on Saturday, it was over 90 degrees and rising.

And I've been neglecting to take enough medicine, so I've been feeling bad enough that between the heat and the discomfort, and the tree pollen that comes in the windows because I have them open to try to cool off, I haven't been sleeping well.

The medicine is very long-acting. I can back off quite a bit and not feel the effects for a couple of months, so it's easy to lose track.

Tree pollen doesn't usually cause allergic symptoms for me (unless I do something to irritate my eyes), but I am allergic to it, and what happens is that I build up lots of histamine in my system. Which makes me sleepy. Histamine is a big cause of tiredness and sleepiness. A healthy person usually has some histamine circulating in their system. It assists in wound healing (which is why a scratch or cut itches during part of the healing process). That's why people love caffeine so much. It's a histamine blocker, and wakes you up in with your morning coffee.

I found out about the heat in this place. It turns out that during the construction of the building, they ran water pipes through the cement, and the place is heated by a boiler that pumps hot water throughout the building. So, even with the heat turned off, the heat is still turned on in the building. The floor in the kitchen was quite warm yesterday and it's not warm today, so maybe they've decided to turn off the heat today. I'm told it takes about 8 hours to turn it on or off, so it's not something they want to do on a daily basis. I can't wait until they turn the air conditioning on!

So, I haven't been doing much. Anything that I can do makes me feel warmer and more uncomfortable. So, there hasn't been much to write about.

*******************************

One big thing that I did yesterday was to do some more art for John. I put together a poster for the Steve Canyon series of DVDs. I did a smaller one for him to take to the Reel Stuff Film Festival, and he said it was very popular and there was spirited bidding on it. I'll let you know when it's available.

********************************

On Saturday, Holly and I went to Occoquan and walked around a bit. We went mainly to see Off the Beading Path, which is a wonderful store full of beads there. I bought some number beads to make a counting device for knitting, a beautiful goldstone bead that's black with lavender sparkles, and another pewter charm, the latter two for stitch markers.

Holly bought me a tiny pewter "pocket piece" that says "Wishes Come True" on one side and "A Wish for Success" on the other side.

I'm really tickled with it.

Later Saturday, before the heat got to me really badly, I pulled some fingering weight yarn out of my stash and did a practice piece for the shawl I plan to knit. This will look much more open in the lace yarn I plan to use.

This is my own design, not the design from Knit.1 magazine, so I want to test it first. I knitted more than this, but didn't take a photo of it, and it's already been unraveled (to scavenge the beads).

The shawl in the magazine had two panels, and I thought that it wouldn't have a straight edge across the wide side if done that way. As you can see from my sample, two panels produce a slight point in the long edge. I know that they relied on blocking to make it straight, but I thought I might like three panels better.

When I got this far, I realized that the long edge would be close enough to straight that it could be blocked straight without much of a problem. But then, when I went to unravel it, I like the handkerchief hem it'll have with three panels.

So the design process favored three panels, then I changed my mind to two panels, then back to three.

I learned several things from the sample: I will have to run a lifeline every so often, I have to do another sample of the stitch I invented for the border, and I want to design an edging for the bottom, which will need another sample. So, there's still a batch of work on this before I even start knitting. I think I also want to cast on more stitches to start and graft the long edge border together.

The yarn for this is probably sitting downstairs waiting for me. I didn't check mail yesterday. I was too busy (or unbusy)  trying to cool off (and doing the poster). The first batch of yarn was shipped on a Wednesday and arrived on the Monday of last week. This batch shipped on Wednesday, and so I think that there's a good chance that it arrived yesterday, or maybe today. I have to pull myself together and go check.

********************************

While trying to cool off, the "activity" I've found that generates the least heat is lying down reading, so I've been doing lots of that.

I'm currently reading New Moon, the second book in the Twilight series. I got mixed up. I don't know if it was Amazon or me, but I thought it was the third book, so I've already read Twilight and Eclipse (which is the third book), and now I'm back to the second. I have Breaking Dawn requested at the library. I was number 30 on the list to get it when I requested it on Sunday, and number 24 yesterday and I'm 23 on the list today. Even though that sounds like a long wait, they have 35 copies of the book, so it will not take too long.

I finished Turn Coat, and loved it. It's a typical Dresden Files story, so how could I not love it? If I say anything else, I'll start into a description of the plot and dump a lot of spoilers on you.

****************************

There's a new Reaper and Fringe on tonight!

I have to get going and do something to cool down.

Tax Day

Happy Tax Day. 

If that's not an oxymoron.

I went through tax day yesterday. 

Back in January, the IRS sent me a copy of form 1040 with an instruction booklet to help me fill it out. I quickly read through the part that said that I have a small enough income that I don't need to file taxes, and put the envelope aside.

Then the IRS sent me a certified letter. A certified letter from the IRS is something that's enough to make me certifiable. It said that they had discovered that I owe them taxes from 2002, and they've assessed interest and penalties, and therefore doubled the amount I owe. They wanted about a thousand dollars instantly.

Since this is more than my income for a month, I didn't have it.

Since I didn't have it, I am now saddled with an agreement to pay them some money every month and file a return and pay taxes owed every year. So, now, suddenly, at the last minute, I find that I need to file taxes.

I spent the whole day yesterday filling out 1040EZ, finding out I owed $79 (which I don't have), then reading it again and finding out I'm not allowed to fill out that form, tracking down the correct forms and information online (because I didn't keep track of forms I knew I didn't need), doing more arithmetic than a math lesson, and finally finishing up last night with the discovery that I actually don't owe anything, and getting the whole mess in the mail.

I still have more stuff to fix with them, but it doesn't have today for a deadline.

I hope it was a better experience for you than it was for me.

**********************

I ground my teeth, bit the bullet and sent another order to Knit Picks to replace the yarn that I have to return to them. Not that I can afford that, either. I chose the (I hope dark) purple shade of Gloss Lace called Pinot. This would work even if I'd already bought the beads.

I've been repeating to myself over and over all month "I'm saving money for the Sheep and Wool Festival." It hasn't helped me save any money so far, though.

In the meantime, I'm knitting socks from the yarn I bought at AC Moore almost a month ago now, and have almost finished the first pair. There's enough yarn for another pair.

**********************

I got a comment from somebody at ReaperDMV yesterday thanking me for my mention of Reaper and asking me to fight for a third season. If you're a Reaper fan, get on over there and join the fight! Even if you're not a Reaper fan, get over there and click on the link to save a whole list of other shows (including Dollhouse), and there's also a lost cause category for shows that are not just in danger of cancellation, but that have already gotten the ax. The catch is that you can't vote for Chuck, Reaper, Dollhouse and Life. I wanted to vote for all of them, but you can only pick one. It will ask for your email address and password, but you don't have to be a member to vote, just fill in your name and the little box with the word they give you.

Lost is on again tonight! A new one, following Better Off Ted.

Have a great Wednesday! Remember, if it's Wednesday, we're half-way to the weekend!

Disappointment

I ordered three things over the Internet and two of them arrived yesterday and were both wonderful and disappointing.

The first was a corded headset for my G1 phone. It came, and it had a USB plug (as promised), but I discovered that there are a lot of different USB plugs on the market, and if I want to use this, I'll need an adapter. It has the original USB plug on it, and my phone uses a different one, I think mini B. See this explanation, and scroll down to "Types of USB connector." So I can't use it yet.

The other order was from Knit Picks, and it's the first time that everything wasn't superlative about my order.

I bought some of their stitch markers, the flexible ones and the ones that look like little safety pins, and they're both wonderful. The stitch markers look like dark purple in the catalog and online, but the ones that look like white are really a pretty shade of grayed-out lavendar. I got a set of their double ended crochet hooks, and they're great, too.

The problem came with the black lace weight yarn that I ordered. It looked black in the catalog, and black on the screen on their site, but when it arrived, although it was very dark, it was green!

Green really wasn't what I had in mind.

I have to return it.

So, I don't have yarn to start knitting the shawl I wanted to knit.

I'm bummed about that.

The quickest thing would be to return the yarn for a refund, and place a whole new order. But that requires more money. And time.

*********************************

I watched Arabian Nights on SciFi today for the first two hours. It's recorded on my DVR, so I'll get a chance to see it later. The SciFi Channel is having movies on all week during the day.

Fringe is back tonight with a new episode!

Also new tonight is Reaper. And there's also a rerun of The Mentalist.

I have lots of stuff to do today, so I'm going to cut this short.

Have a great evening!

107 Days Until Half Blood Prince

There are 107 days until the premier of The Half Blood Prince!

For all you Harry Potter fans out there who are knitters: have you started your knitting projects so that you'll have something Harry-Potter-themed to wear to the movie? If not, you need to get started in time! You don't want to go to the movie without your Dobby socks, dark mark scarf, snitch sweater and other stuff. It's a shame it'll be during the summer instead of in the winter like some of them have been.

If you're on Ravelry, search there for Harry Potter projects, otherwise, you'll have to use search engines. Whatever you do, there's a lot out there, so get those needles clicking!

Don't forget that there is a count-down timer at the bottom of this page. It not only tells you how long until the movie, but it also has a link to Mugglenet, which is filled with all sorts of wonderfull Harry Potter news!

**************************

Which reminds me that I have to have my mobius hood finished today to turn in as homework for the Harry Potter House Cup KAL/CAL! All I have to do is weave in some ends and take a photo. Oh, and get it up on Ravelry. 

So, you can expect a photo tomorrow.

****************************

This will be a short post. I've just finished putting the barcode on the cover for the second volume of the Steve Canyon DVDs, and I'll be uploading it to a server in a bit, so I can't hang here too long. I may be wrong about this, but the sense I get from it is that John has all the files and stuff he needs to dump it on the DVD manufacturer, and it's about to be out of his hands for a bit. I'm sure that will be a big relief to him. Then all he'll have to do is wait for the DVDs and feverishly ship them out when they arrive. 

I'm really enthused about this!

*************************

Comcast messed up NBC all last night. This is so run-of-the-mill for them that you may wonder why I'm even mentioning it. For three hours on NBC (and maybe more--I only watched it for three hours), the picture would periodically freeze for from one to 5 seconds, sometimes followed by the picture breaking up into large pixels, which then smashed up and slid off the screen. The sound was going in and out, and the story was interspersed with blackouts of sound and picture for several seconds. I got to watch Chuck, Heroes and Medium in that messed-up way. Castle was playing OK, though, and at least I got to see and hear that without all the mess.

There is no Fringe on tonight, but it's supposed to be back next week. I don't know what's wrong with TV networks today. They only have short runs of shows (Star Trek used to have 25 shows per season, now we only get 13 episodes of a series if we're lucky), they interrupt them with other stuff rather than showing the whole series, change the times of shows, and generally do everything they can to sabotage their own series, and then get rid of the series as though it's the fault of the series. It's disgusting!

There will be a new Mentalist on tonight, along with a new Reaper, though.

I have to run.

Have a great Tuesday!

Happy Craft Month!

March is craft month, as all the advertising sent to me has made perfectly clear. So, do some crafting in celebration, and don't forget to check those sales! Most of the craft stores are having special sales, and this is your chance to cash in on them.

*******************

A brand-new episode of Reaper is back on TV tonight! I like Reaper, and I'm glad it's back, but if I had a choice, there is a long list of programs I'd much rather see back, such as The Dresden Files, The Middleman, Firefly, Blake's 7, Babylon 5, Red Dwarf, Probe, and lots more. Oh, well, we take what we can get.

There will also be a rerun of The Mentalist. I'd like to see some new episodes, but I'm very grateful that they're rerunning them. So many channels are showing a series, and then it disappears. I'd like the chance to watch them again and to catch up on ones that I've missed (such as the entire Middleman series, which Comcast managed to show entirely without closed captioning). Comcast is so inept!

The best thing on tonight will be an episode of The Universe on the History Channel (I think) about alternate universes. I haven't seen an episode of this series that I didn't like, but this is my favorite.

So, check it out and have a fun evening!