My Goals* for the Weeked

* denotes hopes, dreams, and other unrealistic aspirations

1. Finish the damnable shawl!
2. Clean the house!
3. Get all the recycling done!
4. Get the games room tidied up so that Mike and I can do physio exercises there!
5. Cook gourmet food every night!
6. Wake up not feeling exhausted!

My More Realistic List of Goals for the Weekend

1. Get the body of the damnable shawl done.
2. Get the recycling and composting to the depots without putting my back out or otherwise hurting myself further than I already am.
3. Possibly sweep/wash the main floor's floor. Maybe clean the bathrooms. Maybe. Definitely clean the fish tanks.
4. Push stuff to the sides of the games room so there's some space to exercise.
5. Pft. You're kidding, right?
6. Wake up. Despite the pain, I'm glad to do that every day.

Silver lining help, please

I would have posted last night, but I wisely decided I was too upset to do it justice and not come off as whining. I'm still not sure I can, but I will try.

I am knitting a shawl to go with my dress for my sister's wedding, which is coming up in a month. When I picked up my needles for a couple of rows last night before cooking dinner, I had over a foot and a half of shawl, and was about 10 rows into the second of five balls of yarn. The shawl is knitted on 1.5 cm diameter needles, so it is loose and lacy, and looks wonderful. But that looseness ended up being a bad thing, as half-way through the row, my elbow slipped on the chair, about five stitches slipped off the needle, and the tension wasn't there to hold them in place. The shawl unravelled down the middle.

Perhaps if I was smarter, or a more experienced knitter, I could have rescued it. Mike and I did try to unravel it down to the last demolished row and put it back on the needles, but to no avail. Even trying to get the stitches on the needle was enough to pull out more along the row. In the end, I cut a piece of cardboard to wrap the yarn around, and tried not to completely break down in tears of frustration as I unraveled the whole thing.

I am looking for a silver lining, but it is eluding me. This is the fourth time I've had to restart this shawl, and the yarn that's been cast on and knitted four times is starting to show the wear. Unravelling the shawl put me back between 8 and 12 hours (estimated), and my hands aren't yet well enough to handle knitting for hours on end. Yes, I will likely have free time on my upcoming business trip to sunny Olds College, but I had hoped to make great steps towards finishing the shawl there, and now I'm the above 8-12 hours behind on that goal. Not to mention that the wedding is a mere four and a half weeks away.

I completely realize that there are wars going on in the world, that my family has had to deal with two deaths in recent months, that Mike has started physio and will be in a lot of pain for the next little while, and that there are far more important things to become upset over than a silly knitting project. There must be a silver lining. It's silly to be upset over something so trivial.

...

Cast on 60, knit. *sigh*

Garden

Some of you may not have believed me when I said that our garden was running rampant, but growing. Indeed, it is, and it's so rampant, I'm starting to find it almost ugly. Not that I'm a huge fan of the perfectly manicured, exquisitely trimmed and formed garden, but this is getting ridiculous. The trouble is, I don't know what to do...



Here is the front of the house, with lilies, sandhill cherry, ground cover, and other things. I think we need to trim the cherry, but I'm not sure how, and the lilies are massive! I don't think they can be cut back.



Our uncentred "flower bed" in the lawn. I hate this bed. I don't hate the hostas or the lilies, per se, but I abhor the bed completely. Almost more than the ground cover that's "lining" the sidewalk blocks.



The side of the house, with more sandhill cherries, and a climatis that isn't doing so well.



This is perhaps the most distressing part of the rampant garden. There was a stump here all winter. Now that it's summer, it's become a bush. The stump refuses to give up.



Not only that, there's a hosta in there, getting buried in all the bush-ness of the reincarnated tree.



Last but not least, the lilac bush. This bush did receive a judicious trim in the spring, but it still has taken over its immediate area. My car makes friends with it every morning. It rubs against the side of the house with any strongish wind. And we did trim it! I swear!



I'm not entirely sure what to do about this problem either. *snuggle*

These pictures are posted as a cry for help. While I realize that we needed to see what came out of the ground this year, I have no idea what to do now that things have come out of the ground. Any assistance or advice is most sincerely appreciated!

A possibly scary post

If you don't want to hear about my breasts, stop reading now.

So the dress that I bought for Sheila and Nathan's wedding is lovely, but with a low-cut back. I realized upon buying it that new "hardware" was required, and would probably have to be ordered, so yesterday, I trundled down to the local specialty women's garment store with the dress and the thought of having to spend at least $150, if not more, on something to support me for a day. I showed the dress to the salesladies, and they both gave me frowns.

"Put it on," they said. "Let's see what we can do."

So I did. First try was an extender sort of thing, but that didn't bring the straps down far enough at all.

"Bustiers won't go down any lower either," they said, "and with an 'E,' strapless is next to useless."

We thought for a while. "Just..." one of them said. We looked at her. "Take the bra off," she said. "See how that looks."

Okay then. But you know the reason I'm here is because I don't want/can't go without, right? Back to the changeroom, some contortions, and then I came back out.

Their consensus was that I looked fine. "I know it feels heavy," said the one. "But you don't really need one. You're young. Your breasts are perky."

...

Perky?!

"Spend some time walking around the house like that. Get used to it."

sigh

So instead of a $200 bustier, I walked out with seven pairs of stick-on nipple covers for $7. I felt, then, that I could justify spending close to $100 on materials for a knitted shawl, as the one I was working on was turning out, but just not the way I'd hoped for the dress.

Those of you who are coming to the wedding will now know my deep, dark secret. But it's hard not to share a word like "perky."

Waiting for the next shoe

On the heels of my grandfather's passing came a few other, not nearly as large and encompassing but still, bad events.

Ferrari, our bad-tempered red bulldog of a betta, went to that great big rice patty in the sky the weekend I was in Winnipeg. We believe that his jump out of the tank and to the floor during feeding time a few weeks before was a mitigating factor. He is sorely missed. However, rather than break down the tank, since it was already cycled, we brought another betta in to fill the void. Beamer is a mottled turquoise character, who can't seem to decide what on earth is going on. He is a little skittish, but he's settling in well. Ducati, I'm happy to report, is doing fine, though we've had some deaths in our 20g tank as well. We are less emotionally attached to those fish, but I wish I could confirm that it's the heat that killed them...

Also the weekend I was in Winnipeg, Mike was reinjured at work. After a couple of days off and an aborted attempt to return, he is back on Workers' Compensation until at least the end of the month. Around the same time, my back began acting up, so neither of us have been getting much in the way of sleep for the past two weeks. On a brighter note, Mike has been whittling his way through a list of small, light chores while he's been at home, and my back seems to be stabilizing again. I have actually been able to get books back into the library, and non-fiction is organized. Progress is slow, but steady. It's just... the house isn't clean. Maybe this weekend...

Perhaps I'm starting (starting?) to get a little paranoid, but I can't help but be looking over my shoulder waiting for the next thing. Someday we'll catch a break, I'm sure, and it may be because I'm so tired, but I feel like I'm just waiting for another shoe, another bad-luck thing. I think I should stop that, but I'm not sure how right now.

Perhaps I should try to dwell in the happy news? Mom returns from Denmark this weekend, and my grandmother has been moved to a nursing home, so the whole family can stop worrying so much on that note. We've discovered the wonderful Saturday St. Albert Farmers' Market. I bought a dress for Sheila and Nathan's wedding (no shoes, though), and have started knitting a shawl to go with it. Hopefully that turns out. The weather is nice. Our garden is running rampant, but at least it's growing. I'm getting used to the colour in the bathroom, though I'm wondering about doing the touchups once we reseal the vanity. Chores are getting done, slowly, piecemeal. All my books are out of boxes. We go to Calgary the August Long. I'm taking a week off at the end of July.

...

*Ness peers over her shoulder. There must be something coming...*

Timing

Phone calls are funny things. They change character depending on when you receive them. For example, any calls during business hours, or during the early evening, are completely normal and fine. Any received between 10 pm and 12 am are a little suspect. Between 12 am and 6 am immediately put you on guard. And between 6 am and 8 am, say 6:45, for example, also fall into the suspect category. Caller ID also changes them. An unknown number in the suspect time periods leads to confusion, as it's perhaps a wrong number. But familiar numbers are different. Say, your parents' number. 6:45 in the morning plus Mom and Dad's number equals Bad News. Equals your mom calling to tell you that your grandfather passed away sometime last night.

Mom says it's a relief, and I suppose it is. He was a shade of the man he was last summer, who in turn was a shade of the man I saw in 2000. Physically, at least. Mom said he hadn't eaten in three days when he had a small heart attack, which was all it took. But he was still witty, and smart, and amazing. His body just couldn't... anymore.

And then I think about timing. Mom said that they'd just gotten word that they had a place in a nursing home, finally. What timing. We're painting our bathroom this weekend in part because I wanted to take pictures of the new window with the new colour around it to send to Mormor and Morfar, since they provided the funds that helped us replace it. I wanted them to see it before... because I knew it wouldn't be long. We put it off too long, maybe, except we really didn't. Again, timing. I am happy at least that they got the picture of Mike and I before...

Mom leaves either today or tomorrow to go to the funeral, and to help get everything settled with my grandmother. And I am disgusted with myself, because I feel, somewhere between hope and fear, that sick, disturbing point right between them, that there may be a second funeral before she returns.

I will try to find some closure. I will try to be glad that he is no longer in pain and suffering the machinations of a failing body. It's just so fresh right now. Despite a continent and an ocean and a language barrier, he was still my grandfather, and I miss him.

The Return of Friday Hair, and Baffling Bathrooms

Some of you may be pleased to know that Friday hair has made a return! Yes, I got out of practice wearing my hair down with moving, a more casual workplace, and winter, but the last two Fridays, I have made an effort to return to the practice of Friday hair. :)

I've mentioned before that I simply don't understand one-ply toilet paper. Could there be anything less efficient? Well, I've discovered something else that just boggles my mind. Stop for a moment, clear your thoughts so you can fully appreciate the uselessness... Wait for it...

Quilted one-ply toilet paper.

...

On the subject of bathrooms, last weekend was a study in oddness, as Mom, Dad, Sheila and Nathan drove up from Calgary, and Mike and I drove down from Edmonton to meet in the middle at a cabin by a pond. The weekend was completely lovely and relaxing, but none of us could quite get over the bathroom. You see, the toilet ran with hot water. And not just hot water, steaming hot water. Again, stop for a moment and think about how that might feel... While the manager's explanation made sense (the septic system ran better with the hot water), it was still... odd.

And more on bathrooms, as tomorrow I got to Home Depot to see if they rent power sanders, as we have to sand our whole upstairs bath before patching, priming, and painting. I've come to the conclusion that the previous owners did a combination of the following three things.

* They didn't even try to match roller texture before painting it the current colour, simply putting a smooth roller texture over a heavy roller texture.
* They patched, but didn't sand (or didn't sand well) before painting.
* They did a mediocre job patching in the first place.

All of this means that, if we want the bathroom to look good when the teal goes up on the walls, there's going to be a lot of dust involved before we can even prime. And since we have friends coming up to help us paint next weekend...

Stay tuned.