I'm Excited About the Celtic Festival!

After all that, Holly got an email back saying that Everett was all excited about the Celtic Festival and couldn't wait to go on Saturday! It's going to be a full car, and lots of fun! I can't wait!

I've been trying to get geared up for it. Yesterday, I had some errands to run, and combined them with a trip to the WalMart down in Dumfries, which isn't as bad a ride on the buses as I was afraid it would be.

I found the right size sandals in the color I had previously wanted and bought them. The part that left me sad was that they also had them in navy blue, which I would have rather had. The problem was that they didn't have navy ones anywhere near my size. But at least I did get a pair. Now I have to go and return the ones I bought the other day. I'm thinking I should wear the new ones when I go and do that. Then I'll see if there will be any problems with them during the first extended wearing. I don't want to turn up there and limp around with a batch of blisters. I don't think I will. The sandals are pretty comfortable, but it would be nice to know.

I'd also like to get some new (lighter weight, cooler) pants. Some new T-shirts wouldn't hurt, either.

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Monday night, the SciFi Channel showed some episodes of Star Trek, the Next Generation, and they had the Tin Man episode on. This was written my my friend, Dave Bishoff, and I remembered how excited I was to see it the first time.

After Dave wrote it, they made some changes to it, and the credits only reflect the names of the people who worked on it most recently, so Dave's name doesn't appear on the credits, but he wrote the original story.

To find out more about how this works, you can read Trouble with Tribbles by David Gerrold. In fact, if you want to write for TV, this is a must-have book. It follows everything that David Gerrold did to get this episode written and sold, the whole long, strange trip.

Anyway, I enjoyed it all over again.

When I first met John Ellis, he had just moved up from Florida, and was sharing an apartment in Adelphi, Maryland with two others, one of whom was Dave Bishoff. Later, John moved out, and he and I shared an apartment right around the corner from Dave's place.

This time around, I noticed that they referred to one of the other ships, and the other ship's name was the Adelphi. I thought that was neat.

Oh, well, you're probably bored with this by now.

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I hope you got to see the rerun of the first episode of Leverage last night. It was as good as it was the first time. If you missed it, the DVD will be out three days from now, so you can catch up on the whole season all at once, if you want.

There's a brand new Burn Notice on tonight! Check it out on USA.

I have to go!

Have a great day, and if you read this early enough, enjoy Tru Calling on SciFi!

Finished Objects 2008 Part One

I noticed that some other people are posting year-end photos of what they've accomplished knittin-wise during the past year, and it seemed like a good way to make myself feel better, even if nobody else cares.

So, here's the beginning of what I did this year, not necessarily in chronological order.

Multicolored watch cap.

Cotton towel for Towel Day.

Dickie. This was actually finished around the beginning of the year, possibly last year in December, so it might be cheating.

Feather and Fan Socks. I made four pair of these.

Tour de Fleece spinning.

Ravelympics wimple.

Wool Shawl.

More tomorrow!

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Tin Man will be on the SciFi Channel tonight. There won't be much science fiction competition for it.

Tomorrow, the SciFi Channel will be showing Dark Kingdom: The Dragon King starting at 8:00 am (here). It's the story of Sigfried and Brunhilde, it's a classic, and this version is very well done. Worth watching if you haven't seen it, and maybe even if you have.

There will also be a new Eli Stone and a new Leverage. Check your listings!

Have a great Monday! I have a dentist's appointment tomorrow, so you may not get a post then.

Twenty Days Until Christmas!

But if you celebrate Twelfth Night, you get an extra dozen!

On that cheery note, here is a photo of my progress so far on the first Christmas stocking I'm knitting as a commission.

That's the sample stocking on the left, some of the yarn bought for the stockings, and the small amount I've gotten done so far. For nonknitters, you should understand that stockinet stitch (which is what this is) tends to roll until it's blocked. That's why the bottom is rolling up over the date. I'm actually about to start the icicles at the bottom of the white section at the top. This seems like slow progress, but since I haven't yet found the yarn for the Santa face on the other side, it's just as well. The upper left hand ball of yarn is the fuzzy stuff for Santa's beard and the fur on his hat. I thought I'd have trouble finding something good in the store, but it was almost the first thing I found. Instead, it's the skin-tone yarn I'm still looking for.

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While I was out yesterday, I got some rechargeable batteries for my camera. I had planned to get some of the new, ecologically superior hybrid ones from Amazon, but saw these in the store and snapped them up.

The fine print on the package was very fine, and I didn't discover until I got home that their claim to ecological superiority depended on the fact that they used slightly less packaging materials (thus saving a bit on landfil) and the fact that (like all the other rechargeable batteries)... they're rechargeable! So you don't keep using and tossing non-rechargeable batteries.

Bring your glasses and read the fine print when you're shopping.

Now that they're home, I'll keep them, because I really do need batteries, but I'll get the better ones from Amazon in the next month or two.

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Tonight, we have the usual, but all new episodes of Ghost Whisperer, Stargate Atlantis
(along with a rerun from last week in case you missed it) and Sanctuary.

The SciFi Channel is doing a dragon theme on Saturday, and they're rerunning Dragon Sword along with the rest. For you fans of really, exceptionally bad movies, you'll want to tune in to Grendel. It's truly horrible. I couldn't stand to watch much of it, but several other bloggers did, and wrote glowing reports of it's total hideousness.

On Sunday, they'll be running Tin Man again, and later, a movie called Tristan and Isolde. I haven't seen the later movie, but I love really old stories, so I can't wait to watch.

Of course, don't forget The Legend of the Seeker on the CW on Saturday evening, Harry Potter all weekend on ABC Family, and The Librarian movies (afternoon and evening) and Leverage on TNT on Sunday. As usual, check your local listings.

I came across some really neat SF stuff on the internet, too.

There's more about The Librarian series on io9 here.

There's some Doctor Who fanfic (?) from the BBC site at Planet Galifrey. I haven't read all of it yet, but the little I did read looks interesting.

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I played around with my camera the other night (the first night that there was no cloud cover) and snapped this photo of the moon.

One thing I discovered was that even though it's got an anti-shake scheme, you still need a tripod to photograph something this far away. But I like it. That's the full frame, nothing cropped. I love this camera!

I know I keep saying this, but I really have to get the apartment reorganized and set up for Christmas.

Today!

Well, at least started today.

I hope you have a great Friday, and a wonderful weekend!