Personal

It’s such a pretty day today. Cold, but pretty. Still all sunshine and no wind (unlike on Thursday). I would be outside, if I knew that I’d be moving around, but all I want to do is sit and knit or read. Again, it’d be the perfect day to do that and eat strawberries on the beach, except that it’s too cold to stay still. So I’ve got the strawberries next to me, sort of a lunch/snack while I catch up on my blogs and knit a bit more of my SSS. :) And now I want some sock yarn in a strawberries and cream type colorway. I’m sure there’s something on The Loopy Ewe.. Still need to wait two weeks before I can buy yarn though. It’ll be a tough wait. But in the mean time, I’m working my way through the stash; slowly but surely it’s getting smaller. :)

Speaking of staying still, I haven’t! I’ve been trudging up the hill at least four times a week, mainly because I have dance class four times a week (I don’t always go to the Friday one) and then my English lit class on another day. I’ve been up to the Sports Center so often that they know me at the front desk by now. I don’t even need to show my membership card anymore. ^_^

My social life has begun to pick up as well. Derya came over yesterday for some knitting time, then Ruth and Gabe are coming over tonight to watch Narnia, tomorrow’s the pub quiz… It’s a wonder I can force myself to work on my essay (which is a third done) when there are so many more fun things to do. And that my sleep cycle was interrupted last night when someone, who was most likely drunk, set off the fire alarm again. Grr. I liked waking up at eight! Now it’s all messed up again because I didn’t wake up until 9:30. Which is pretty early compared to when I used to get up, but still… I had an odd dream again. This time it had Ian Somerhalder, aka Boone from Lost, in it and he had this ability to fly and we were trying to get away from this huge red robot thing… then there was some green gas that took away the black mold that was growing on everyone’s teeth and… it was just weird. Maybe I should stop watching Lost…

I know I know, been quite for about a week now. Not much has really happened though, just the same stuff. Oliver’s birthday was on Saturday. We spent it at the Sheffield competition. Got to have lunch at Nando’s; something that never happens at other competitions because we don’t know where places are in the towns they’re held in. I bought him three DVDs for his birthday, I picked one that I knew he’d like and then I had him pick out two more. And I also got myself The Last of the Mohicans on DVD since it was only £3.

Yesterday I spent dancing. An hour in the morning, then two more in the afternoon. My feet are feeling mutinous. But that’s because my shoes I use for dancing aren’t proper dancing shoes. They slide around alot on the floor (which makes it very tricky to do the jive successfully). I think I might need to buy some gel pads or something before the next competition. Speaking of, it’s next weekend! Eep?

For some strange reason I keep waking up before eight. Like the whole of the past week, it’s been before eight. No alarm (except one morning when I had to get up early). It’s like: “Oh, I think it’s time to get up now.” So I sit up, look at my watch and see that it’s eight am. It’s really weird. Then again, I have been falling asleep before eleven as well, so that might be a reason why. I have a theory that the dream I had last night was my body’s way of telling me to wake up. It wasn’t really a nightmare by “normal” standards, as in no scary-ness, no panicking, etc. What happened? Well, in the dream I was wearing my Isabella, the tank top that took me forever to knit. I took it off and there was this huge gaping hole in the side! Like a moth or something had eaten away at it. Except that it’s made out of cotton, so it wasn’t that. And no matter what I did, I couldn’t fix it and the stitches just kept dropping and unravelling and… it was bad. So yeah, I think that’s my body’s way of telling me to get up and check on my knitting. XD

I’ve finally begun writing my &%$(* essay. I so don’t want to do it. Nothing is inspiring me, I have no opinions about the texts. Well, actually, I do have an idea about one of them, but I’m going to use that one for my second essay where we have to compare a text from the first part to a text from the second part. So now, I’m just muddling along writing about death and desire and how those two elements make Romeo & Juliet a tragedy. I know, not very original. But it was one of the questions set by the teacher, so he can’t really complain at me about it.

I sent off my MA application yesterday. Now it’s just a wait-and-see game. No idea when they’ll announce their decision. I mean, first they have to receive the transcripts and reference letters which I mailed yesterday and then they’ll probably take a month or two to decide… I also mailed my grandfather’s birthday present. Silly me forgot to take pictures before sending it so now that project is blank on Ravelry… Oh! I know what I’ll give Auri for her birthday! Not telling you all because you might blab. Plus, I think she reads this, don’t you Auri? :P

Derya, another Aber knitter, might be coming over later today. We’ve made tentative plans, but she too has an essay to write and some of her friends might be coming over to Aber today, so we’ll see. If not today, then we’ll meet up sometime next week. We were planning on knitting on the beach, but it’s gotten kinda cold again. Still really sunny, but the wind has picked up and makes it feel like it’s below freezing when it really isn’t. At least Sunday-Tuesday they’re predicting +10C and sunny skies. From Wednesday onwards it’ll be colder and more rain though…

Well, today was a first: there were more guys than girls at dance class today. So I got to dance with Alan and Ludwig (the French guy). ^_^ Ludwig is a really really good leader. And he applies the right amount of pressure and has enough force to make sure that I spin enough and… he’s just a very quick learner. *grin* It’s just too bad that he’s too busy to compete because he’d up Aber’s chances of getting into the finals of various dances. Plus, he’s really nice, good smile, smart and smells nice too. :P It was actually kinda fun teaching him how to do certain steps that I knew how to do and he didn’t. Like I said, quick learner. It’s such a shame that our Wednesday slot got taken away. I’m always so happy after dancing for two hours. Sure, my feet really hurt because I haven’t worn my dance shoes in like a month, but it’s so worth it. Ooh and we learned a new dance today too. It’s called the Gay Gordon. Really fun, but very very dangerous to one’s ankles when the high heels keep slipping and sliding on the floor (seriously, I’ve got no traction; even Alan knows that and is prepared to stop me from winding up on the other side of the room when I’m supposed to stay near him).

Gotta leave to catch the train. Get to see Oliver tonight! :D

The fire alarm woke me up at 7:30. Stupid drills they make us do. They saw all of us out there last night when it was raining! Someone obviously doesn’t know how to cook. But at least it was an actual fire that they managed to put out before the fire department got here. And how do I know all of this? The smoky smell had wafted on over to our flat and from outside I could see that the kitchen window of the neighboring flat were all steamed up. Still. People, this a Public Service Announcement: Do Not try to cook when you’re a) drunk, b) high and/or c)forgetful (or more likely Stupid) enough to leave stuff in the oven/on the stove unattended. It’s common sense.

On the brighter side of things, because I was awake at 7:30, even if it was not of my own volition, it’s not even noon yet and I’ve already done today’s quota of working on my Writing Project. Over 5,000 words now. About 500 words ago, I was thinking that there’s no way I can fluff up my story to be 6,000 words. Now I’m thinking that the remaining 1,000 won’t be enough to finish it. I just had an idea of a great twist to add to it and that’ll most likely take me over my limit (which is actually 6,600 words since we’re allowed to swing 10% either way). Ah well, I can edit it later. At least it isn’t due until mid-April.

I’ve finally begun using my blow-dryer that I got for Christmas: Awesome. Especially the little cold air button that sets the hair in place when I’m wanting a more straighter look than what it is naturally. ^_^

Well, I’ve finished Clue 5 and started Clue 6 of the SSS. I’m still wanting to buy sock yarn. Still resisting. I made a Foliage hat on Monday. Had a marathon session of Desperate Housewives and made the hat in one day. It’s so cool. I used the Rowan felted tweed yarn that I got from Anji for Christmas. Didn’t even use up one ball of it. Okay, so the pattern says worsted or bulky weight yarn, but I used sport-weight with 4mm circs following the worsted weight pattern. So lacy and so pretty. Here is a pic of the one I made. It actually kinda goes with my Branching Out scarf. I guess it’s just leaves all around. Last night I was thinking about designing my own scarf because I want to make one, but I can’t find any patterns that I like (besides the Branching Out which I’ve already made). So, I already do have an idea, now I just need to swatch a bit and figure out exactly what I’ll be doing before I knit it up.

I haven’t been in a proper thunderstorm in ages. Love love love thunder and lightning. Which is why I kinda miss Florida. Okay, so the hurricane warnings and stuff weren’t that fun, but the lightning and booming thunder that came every July? Awesome. I wonder what it’s like in Hawaii…

Apparently over 10,000 homes in Southern Finland are without power because so many trees have fallen down (onto the power lines I assume). Trees just falling down in a forest and knocking out power that way would be kinda odd.

I heard from Michelle today! She was my roomie during my first semester at Montana. It wasn’t a very long e-mail, just a quick catch up, it was so nice to hear from her. :)

Still haven’t decided what to cast on next. I’ve got about 600 yds of Jaeger’s Baby Merino (four-ply) in this lovely peachy color that they’re calling Magnolia and about 400 yds of Rowan’s 4-ply soft in cream and a warm brown. I’m thinking that I could combine those (since they all get pretty much the same gauge) and try to make a sleeveless top, but I haven’t found a pattern that I like. I might just wind up using the Isabella pattern as a template for all of the shaping and trying to design something that’ll work with my yarns. In the mean time, I’ve got my SSS to work on. I’ve got about twenty rows or so to go before I can start the next clue (which comes out tomorrow).

I am trying to knit from stash. Because I have quite a bit of it. And I don’t want to carry it around with me as much as I do like yarn. I feel that it has to be made into something, otherwise it’s just in the way. But, and there always is a but, I have a slight problem. The problem being that I want to knit a pair of socks. I don’t have sock yarn. *pauses so that everyone can wrap their minds around the idea* Yes, that’s right. NO SOCK YARN. And sock yarn doesn’t even really count as stash! The little remnants that I did have have all gone into making the Clessidras (which still aren’t done, btw but I’m working on it, I’m working on it). And OMG are those taking forever. But that’s what I get for making knee socks. So those don’t count. And it’s beginning to look like I won’t have enough yarn to finish them either. I want sock yarn. Can’t get anything but really overpriced Regia at my LYS. The John Lewis in Sheffield that I frequent quite often has the same Regia, some Cygnet and they used to have Jaeger as well, but I think that’s been discontinued. So the fact that I’ll be in Sheffield on Friday doesn’t really help me. I could buy sock yarn from online. The Loopy Ewe has a great selection, and if the shipping costs are over $16, they’ll pay whatever goes above it. And I know that if I go to TLE, I’ll want some Lane Borgosesia lace yarn as well as the sock yarn. If I go to Lisa Souza, well, I might be able to keep it to two skeins of her Sock!, most likely the Aww-Tum and Mars Quake colorways. And the shipping would be about $10 I think. But, seeing that I am a student and no one in Aber wants to hire me since I won’t be here during the summer, I really don’t have money to spend on yarn, even if it is something I don’t have. Which is why I’m knitting from stash. And whining about not being able to make socks.

I’d forgotten how much fun dancing is! Especially when there’s a surplus of guys instead of girls. XD So yes, today I got to practice with Alan again (and danced a bit with Tom too). I thought I’d forgotten it all, but it came back to me. Neither one of us, meaning me & Alan, can remember our Rumba or Cha routines. And those are the ones we’ve practiced! No clue what we did for Rock’n’Roll since that was kinda made up on the spot at the Manchester competition. It was literally about fifteen minutes before we had to compete that we got shown the “routine” by our team captain. Anyway, we did pretty well today. NUDC should be good. We’re not going to compete at the Keele competition which is this Sunday because Alan can’t make it. Ah well.

Alan thought my Evangelines were cool and my Branching Out scarf was “complicated.” It think it’s just the color changes that made him think that. XD

Met Derya, a fellow knitter, today for some tea before dance class. I managed to convince her to come try it out with me. She seems nice, kinda quiet, but then again this was our first meeting. We met through Ravelry and figured that since we’re both students here (she’s doing an English MA) and we knit, we should meet up. So we did. Teh internets is good.

But it’s also a sad place. I just heard that MommaMonkey passed away. She’s the one who wrote the wonderful pattern of my Bellatrix socks. I’ve got some of her other patterns waiting to be made and now I feel like making a pair in her memory. *goes to dig through stash* It’s not that I knew her, unlike some of the other knitters I’ve gotten to know through the L&V message boards or Ravelry, it’s just sad that another knitter has gone. Especially one who pretty much gave away her hard-worked patterns just because she loved the community that much.

In other (personal) knitting news, my Tempting is on the cusp of completion. The body is done, the short sleeves are attached and seamed, all of it has been bound off, I’ve tried it on (fits great!). Now I just need to knit the sleeves a bit longer, possibly all the way to my wrists, and them it’s just weaving in the very few ends that I’ve got. Oh and I’ve also got to find the perfect ribbon to go with it. None of the ones I have are any good; the one that would be okay color-wise is just too thin. So off to John Lewis I am (very Yoda, I know) next week. And if they don’t have anything, then it’s Hobbycraft. Maybe John Lewis still has yarn in the huge discount bins… Not that I need it or anything, but the completion of this sweater sorta makes me feel like there’s a void in my stash that has to be filled. Ridiculous? Maybe to some, to me not really. My stash is a part of me! But I’ll try to refrain from buying yarn anyway. XD

Back in Aber and yep, I’ve showered! It’s so nice being able to just hop in the shower and wash away all the dirt whenever I want. It is admittedly an awful shower for two reasons: the water pressure/temperature combo doesn’t work well (the hotter the water, the less pressure there is) and it’s icky icky icky because it looks like no one here has cleaned it for the month that I’ve been away. Good thing I’ve got cleaning supplies just itching to be used in my laundry corner of the room. After my first shower, I just kept repeating at random intervals: “I’m clean!” in the sort of squeeing voice that Lime & Violet get when looking at yarn. Oliver thought it was funny the first few times, but then he kinda began chalking it up to me being my weird self and stopped reacting.

So yes, Oliver came with me to Aber. ^_^ We got here on Thursday evening, since they wanted him to come in to work in the morning. We had planned on taking the 8:53 a.m. train, but with the deadlines looming… we did get here eventually. :) I’ve forgotten how uncomfortable it is sleeping in a single bed with another person. Especially in this bed, which isn’t the comfiest to begin with. I guess that could be one reason why I keep waking up earlier than usual.

I’ve lost, no, misplaced one of my needles. I put it in my suitcase and now it’s not there. :( It’s okay, I’ve got two extras, but it’s still sad. Now I’ve got three dpns, instead of four. What am I going to do with just three dpns? Well, keep knitting my shawl, obviously, but what if I had wanted to make a sweater in the round with these? When one dpn of a set of four has gone AWOL, the remaining three are kinda useless… Oh, never mind, disregard that paragraph. I found the needle in the suitcase. It was hiding from me. Probably thinks it’s funny to annoy me like that. Silly 2,25 mm dpn.

I’ve only got two hours a week of classes this semester. o_O Seriously, what?? I love being a student, but this is getting kinda ridiculous. And I don’t even have any lectures. I miss them, just sitting there and listening while others talk to me and not expect me to comment on anything. For the first class, we have to have read Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet. I’ve never actually had to study it, so it’s my first time reading it. I started on Friday and now I’m already into Act 4. Should be fine for Tuesday afternoon. I’ve also been thinking that since I’ve got practically nothing to do, I might as well try to get a job. I’ve seen some vacancies being advertised in shop windows, so if they’re still there today (and they’re open obviously) I’ll go in and ask about the positions. It’d be nice to get back to earning some money.

I’ve found a new podcast to listen to: Stash & Burn. I think they were advertised on L&V at some point, but only just now have I begun listening to them. I figured I needed something new since I’ve listened to all of L&V four times now and all of Cast On twice. I did try out that Australian man’s knitting podcast, but it just didn’t grab me. Haven’t actually listened to a whole podcast yet, since I’ve been hanging out with Oliver, but I will once I’ve got that ridiculous amount of free time.

Okay, so there are these ads on the sidebar of my browser. They’re kinda funny actually. The first one is about scrapbooking and other sorts of paper crafts, the second is “10 Rules Losing Belly Fat”, then pole dancing and burlesque lessons, then “Burlesquercise DVD” and finally, “Wedding 1st Dance Lessons”. Maybe someone thinks I need to lose weight and I’d do it by dancing? XP

I don’t know if I’m competing this Sunday or not. I haven’t heard anything from Alan, my partner. And seeing as it is a Sunday, not a Saturday.. wait, it doesn’t matter since I don’t have class on Monday. Oh well. So it now depends on if Alan can make it or not. We’ll see.

Didn’t go to Leicester this weekend. Mainly because everyone else who was going had already made plans to go to clubbing, and that’s not really my kind of way of spending a weekend. So instead Oliver and I went to eat at Pizza Express on Saturday and then just hung out, watching movies in his room. Speaking of pizza, on Friday, after Oliver tried to help one of his mom’s friends set up a router for her laptop (turns out she only had a router, not a router/modem thingy), we went to get pizza from Pizza Hut. While we were waiting for our order, a man with a collection tin and some roses comes out from the restaurant section. He’s collecting donations for children with leukemia (I assume it was to help them and help fund research) and for £2 you get a rose. Oliver was about to say no, but then he changed his mind and gave £2. Picked out a deep red rose and gave it to me. That’s the first time ever that he’s bought me a flower. It’s in a vase on his desk right now. :D

I’ve finished reading Suzannah Dunn’s The Sixth Wife. Now I can’t decide should I read Alison Weir’s Innocent Traitor or Lauren Weisberger’s Everyone Worth Knowing (she’s the one who wrote The Devil Wears Prada so I expect this one to be similaryly good). More historical fiction or funny fashion-y type world? Whatcha think?

I know I moan about not being able to shower. And I know that one of Oliver’s mom’s friends has said that I can just go over to her house and shower there if I want to. But the thing is, I feel really odd doing that. I don’t really know her in the sense that I can feel okay about using her shower. Even when I was a kid, I didn’t want to shower over at my friends houses during sleepovers because it just didn’t sit well with me. I pretty much always waited until I got home to shower. It wasn’t until I was a teenager that I felt that I could shower at my best friends’ places. Now, well, this showering thing has gotten a bit better. I feel fine showering over at places where I know I’ll be for awhile. But just going over to a neighbor’s place to shower? Not quite there yet. Maybe one day I will. Maybe I won’t. But hopefully, I’ll never have a non-working shower again without a spare being available.

Clue 3 of the SSShawl is done. Just finished it about an hour ago. Good thing I only have to wait until tomorrow to get Clue 4. There is a small mistake in the Bird’s Eye part where I had dropped two stitches and they’d unraveled to the next row before I caught them. I didn’t know then, and probably still don’t, how to fix it so that it’d look like the rest of the pattern, but I did make sure that they wouldn’t continue to unravel. I just wish that when people see that I’m concentrating on my knitting, especially when I’ve pointed out before that it’s a complicated lace pattern that I haven’t done before so I didn’t quite have the hang of it yet, that they wouldn’t try to draw my attention away from my counting or whatever it happens to be that I’m doing. That’s how I dropped the stitches, I was being talked to and I don’t want to be rude so I try to listen and then I mess up. And since I was getting kinda eh about working on just one project, I decided to use the Mirasol Hacho (in Peacock Ripple) yarn that I got from Anji for Christmas. At first I thought about socks, but then decided that since it is DK weight, I’d rather make something else out of it, like fingerless mitts. I didn’t find anything from the only knitting book I had available for perusal in Sheffield (Stitch’N’Bitch Nation by Debbie Stoller), so I tried to design my own using the Clover lace pattern that was used in a wrap sweater in the book. Didn’t look too good, so I went on the Net. Knitty didn’t really have any designs that I liked either. Then I remembered Magknits! Front cover of the latest issue? Yep, I’m making Evangelines. They’re so pretty! I’ve already done the left hand one and I’m halfway through the second one. I also modified the pattern just a little bit. I’m doing the long version, and while I was knitting the first one, I forgot how many repeats of the cable I was supposed to do before the thumb hole. Then when I checked the pattern, I had done one too many. Not that I mind, of course. So now I’ve got a total ten repeats instead of nine on my gloves. The second modification is the number of stitches. I added eight stitches to the underside of the glove since my yarn is thinner than the yarn the designer used. So they’re a bit snug, but that’s okay. I can’t wait to wear them when I won’t need a big poofy coat anymore. :)

I did some more writing today. Past the halfway mark now. As long as it’s quiet, maybe with a little music playing softly in the background, it comes to me really easily. Especially when I get to sit at a table or desk (but that’s only now, sometimes it’s easier if I’m sitting on the bed on leaning against the radiator in my room; it just varies). But when everyone’s home and the TV’s blaring and people are talking over the already loud TV and there’s cigarette smoke wafting about…

The power went out yesterday. First, my laptop stopped receiving power from the socket it was plugged into. I thought that maybe it had come loose so I checked all of the joins in the power lead. Then the lights in Oliver’s room went out. But the lights in the rest of the house were okay as was his computer which was plugged into a different socket. At first we thought it was because his dad is currently in the middle of redoing the bathroom and he’d done something to it. Everything else was fine upstairs though. Turns out that a fuse had blown because the washing machine, stove, oven, kettle and TV were all on and using the same fuse. Oliver’s dad fixed it so that the washing machine would use a different fuse from now on.

Going to the movies tomorrow with Oliver and Shaun to see Alien vs. Predator: Requiem. Not really my kind of movie, but they want to see it and Oliver’s willing to pay for my ticket, so I’m not gonna whine about it. A movie’s a movie. Even if it is kinda scary and it’s got weird creatures slowing killing off each other and the humans that get in the way…

The SSShawl is going swimmingly. I just completed row 80 of Clue 2. Of course, others have already completed Clue 3 which came out on Tuesday. Oh well, I’ll catch up to them eventually. The shawl is uber pretty. The alpaca sometimes gets kinda stuck on the needles, but only if I’ve been holding it in my moist hand for awhile. I say moist because they’re not really sweaty, but not so dry as to make the yarn slippy on the needles. Which is actually kinda good in the sense that at least my stitches won’t be randomly jumping off into the ether where the only rescues available come in the forms of crochet hooks and tinking. I do not frog lace. Too risky.

They drained my arm today. Took my life essence. With my permission of course. But now my left arm is kinda achy at the join where they stuck the needle. Apparently, I’m a quick bleed. XD

I got permission to change my Writing Project story and I’ve already got two fifths of it written. It’s so cool to be able to write about knitting and fibre and stuff in a really odd way and then be graded on it too.

I’ve finished reading Suzannah Dunn’s The Queen of Subtleties and have started on her older book The Sixth Wife. So far, the Anne Boleyn story was more interesting, but I figure that there’ll be some juicy bits ahead if the blurb on the back is to be believed. Here’s hoping. *crosses fingers*

Went to see Will Smith’s “I Am Legend” yesterday. It was pretty good actually. The dog in it was so adorable. Reminded me of Mocca. Kinda figures since both are German Shepherds. But Mocca is way blacker than the dog in the movie. Oliver’s dad said that he can’t see us, meaning me and Oliver, not owning a pet. Well, we have been talking about getting a puppy once we’ve got the space for one, but right now, we don’t even have enough space for ourselves. It doesn’t help that the only bathroom in the house is kinda unusable at the moment. I mean, the toilet works just fine, but because they’re redoing it, they’ve taken the tiles off the walls around the bathtub so that the plumber can fit in the new bathroom set in about a week’s time. Meaning that the shower can’t be used because the water would leak into the kitchen. The tiles were taken off last Wednesday. Which means that I haven’t been able to have a proper shower in over a week now. I have managed to wash my hair bent over the tub and just washing up in the sink every morning, but that’s still not the equivalent of a shower. When I first heard that they’re redoing the bathroom I was kinda looking forward to seeing the new one. I figured I could deal with not being able to use the shower for a week. But then they switched plumbers and the fitting was pushed back by another week. And said that next Wednesday the plumber is half dismantling the toilet so instead of pushing the lever to flush it, we have to use a bucket. This is England, but not medieval England. I’m a city girl! I like nature, yes, but do you see me going camping? No, I only go on hikes because I know that I need to use modern day facilities at the end of the day. So this actually gives me something to look forward to next week when I go back to Aber on Thursday. Oliver feels the same way about the whole bucket thing, so he’s trying to get time off so that he can come to Aber with me. Another thing that’ll make me happy! Aber’s starting to look very good. A hot shower and alone time with Oliver. XD

Ooh, just remembered. We were invited to go to Leicester this weekend. So I might be able to shower at Russel’s… I hope I can. I knew immediately that the Christmas gift (two Westlife CDs) I got from Shaun & Russel was picked out by Russel. We’d had a little talk about Westlife the last time we saw each other in about October (maybe it was November?) and he remembered! ^_^