School stuff

Drat. Dratdratdrat.

I just got a message from my landlady. She can’t come over tonight to deal with the outside drain that keeps getting clogged up because her son is sick (which is sad and I hope he gets better soon). So she’s coming over on Friday instead. Which is fine. Really.

But it also messes with my people watching plans. I was going to spend Friday afternoon in Starbucks and hope I see/over hear enough to get me inspired to write again. I *need* my writing mojo back. It’s been on a longer vacation than my knitting mojo! So, Friday was the day I had set aside for that. Now, I have to stay home. I guess I could finish off my coursework that’s due in a week and a half instead, but still.

Drat.

I can’t seem to get inspired by my WIPs. I’ve got two pairs of socks and a mitten. Well, the mitten only needs the thumb and then the pair’s ready. I just so don’t feel like working on it though. And this whole having three projects at the same is driving me nuts. I prefer to be a monogamous knitter, two projects at the most if one of them is a bigger one like a sweater or a shawl. At least one of the sock pairs is almost done; both of the socks just need the foot and toe doing, then they’re done. The other socks just have half of the leg done on sock #1.

Plus I have homework that I feel I should do. There’s the first coursework piece that’s due in December, and now I have to come up with a story for 10 yr olds. And I’m coming up with nada. At least I know what I want to submit as coursework for Fiction and Children’s Fiction in January. Haven’t written it yet, but I do have ideas. And since I have no portable projects right now, I’ve designated the train commutes as reading time. I seem to be flying through The Duchess by Amanda Foreman (about half way through I think). I’ve also decided to alternate between non-fiction and fiction books. I’ve got two more non-fiction books (Alison Weir’s The Lady Elizabeth and one about the Mayflower pilgrims) but a ton of fiction books that I want to read as well. Now I just need to pick what I’ll read next.

O’s parents are coming over in a bit. I can’t wait until I get my own car so we won’t have to depend on them to give us a ride to the supermarket. I could walk to the supermarket get all of the food that I need, but O likes to buy lots of soda and other heavy and/or awkward things (like pizza and potatoes). And I can’t carry that stuff up hill in the awful weather we have here. I mean, I could, but then it’d take me all day (okay, just the morning) to do it and I feel it’d zap my creativity that occasionally strikes. That’s another thing that I noticed this week: I get the creative ideas of what I could write for class and stuff only to find out that there isn’t enough space in my notebook to write them down. I’ll have to start carrying around my peach colored multi-purpose notebook again. So far it contains sections of various knitting patterns, genealogy research stuff, writing ideas, general notes to myself…

Ooh ooh! I’ve got a picture of my first “proper” handspun! It’s all done on a drop spindle too. It’s about 180 yds in fingering weight (about 15 wpi) 100% wool. No idea what to make out of it though. Not enough for a full pair of mittens, but I might pair it up with something else to make mittens. Or I could add it to my scrap entrelac scarf I plan on making after I’ve gotten my WIPs done. With that scarf I’m basically trying to use up all of the leftover sock yarn I have hanging around. Still haven’t decided if I should knit up all of my sock yarn before I start it though. I’ve got about five skeins of various sock yarns hanging around (four of those will be socks, one might become gloves). We’ll see. Anyway, here’s the yarn.

The house is still a mess, but tomorrow I can finally vacuum again! Then it’ll be exactly 14 days since the exterminator came the second time and this time I hope the bugs stay away. I haven’t really felt like cleaning up when I’ve known that I can’t vacuum so tomorrow’ll be fun! And no, that’s not sarcastic. I actually do like to clean, especially when I’ve got good music to listen to while I do it. The first room I’ll tackle is the living room, then the dining room, then the kitchen and finally the bedroom & bathroom.

I’ve been trying out my Happy Housewife scents and so far I really like most of them. There are a few that I don’t like, but that’s the fun of being in a club. Get something new that I wouldn’t have thought of ordering and be happily surprised (lovelovelove the club exclusive scent! Will very likely be getting a bottle of that) and then there’ll be stuff that won’t work on me. And I don’t mind that, it’s just how body chemistry works. Like my sister has found her signature scent that smells wonderful on her, but when I tried it? Nuh uh. So I’ll be gifting some of my non-working scents to someone. I’ll offer them first to my sisters and if they don’t want them, I’ll have to find someone who does. :)

One more thing! I have dance shoes! They feel kinda low compared to the shoes I used to dance in, but I’ll get used to it. Lol, a 2 1/2 inch heel low. I used to think that was plenty high enough, but apparently not anymore. Anyway, at least these won’t have my slipping and sliding around the floor while doing the Jive and almost killing me. :D

Augh so tired.

Went to Nottingham yesterday for the induction day. Had to get up at 7 am to make it there for 11am. Was okay, nothing too interesting.

Had day school there today. Again, had to get up at 7, even though I had to be there by 10:30. The train gets in at 10:25, so I missed about 30 mins of being shown how to use the uni’s search engines. Did figure it out by myself from the handouts though. They’ve got some really good stuff! The classes were really fun. Won’t go into too much detail now, maybe later on when I’m not practically falling asleep. But fun was had.

The downside is that I’m really beginning to severely dislike public transport. Especially the trains with all of the delays. And the bus schedules so don’t mesh with the trains. Class ends at 8pm on Monday, the next bus is at 8:15, gets to the station at 8:34 and guess what time my train’s supposed to leave? 8:34pm. Hrmph. The next one is over an hour later. Oh the joy. I can’t wait to get my license and car. Still need to master reversing around a corner though.

Term doesn’t even start until Monday and already we have been given an assignment: reading three 3000 word fiction pieces and critiquing them for Wednesday’s class.

Right, going to bed. Need sleep.

We’ve got ’em. Carpet beetles. *shudder* It started out with me finding holes in my Hedera and then snowflake lace socks. I looked through the bag where I kept them, didn’t find anything and checked that the rest of my handknit socks were okay. They were so I didn’t think much of it. Fast forward for a bit and I’d found some munching on three of my swatches made with Lane Borgosesia’s Cashwool. Not too bad, I didn’t really want to keep them anyway. Icky, but not heart-breaking. Then I found out that they’d gotten into my underwear and sock drawers. And one of my handspuns had been affected too. Killed ’em, vacuumed thoroughly and left it at that. Then I found a dead adult carpet beetle downstairs. At that point I contacted our landlady Debs, who is awesome btw, and we arranged for her to come over the next day (since it was a Friday night that I e-mailed her). We dealt with the woodlouse problem and she gave us some spray to use up in the attic bedroom. That was two weeks ago. Today, one fell out of my hair! Ew ew ew. After I made sure that it was a carpet beetle larvae, I killed it and vacuumed the whole house. I was going to vacuum today anyway, but that’s neither here nor there. I contacted Debs again and within half an hour she got back to me to say that the council’s environmental services are going to come out once they’ve verified what the pest is. So now I’ve got a live larvae in a sealed food container waiting for Debs to come over tonight to pick it up.

Dancing has started again. Well, the give it a go sessions are over now, the actual lessons start next week. I’m still looking for a partner, but while I’m waiting to be paired up with someone, I’ll be standing in for Oliver’s partner Jo. She’s been told by her doctor to basically not to dance until after Christmas, but she and Oliver are thinking about just entering the ballroom dances since they’re not as exhausting as the latin ones are. If they do decide to do that, I’ll just dance latin with Oliver and both latin and ballroom with my partner (if I ever get one!). The pairing up will be done on Friday at 7pm then there’s a mini-social thing for all the team members.

I also have to go to Nottingham on Friday for induction talks and deal with other enrolment stuff. I think I need to go on Saturday as well, but they haven’t sent me any info about that yet, so I don’t know. I was checking out the train times to see what next week’ll be like (classes start next week!!) and since my classes end 8:30pm, the next train that I could make would be 9:42pm. Hrmph. I’d be getting in to the train station at Sheffield 10:55 and by the time I catch a bus and get back home it’ll be near midnight. I sooooooo want my license and car. When I am able to drive to Nottingham and back I should be back home by 10pm at the latest.

Knitting? Yes, lots of it is getting done and has been done. My Corona sweater is done, I’ve already worn it loads. I’m knitting socks right now from my Jitterbug (colorway 66-mist) in the Dragon’s Breath pattern. Still on the first sock, but I’m already planning on making these next.

And Debs just sent me another e-mail asking if I could go check out the roof space in the attic bedroom to see if there’s a visible reason for the infestation. Just the thought is making my skin crawl, but I still need to do it. *shudder* I hate bugs that eat my yarn.

I had decided to make meatballs tonight. And make them I did. Except that I didn’t have two of the ingredients that were called for in the recipe that I got from my mom. So did I do the neighborly thing and ask next door if they had any? Nope. I improvised. And they taste pretty good too. They just aren’t meat_ball_ shaped. I’m calling them BBQ meatflats. Because they’re flat. Y’see, the first batch that I tried frying up crumbled all to pieces. But the next ones I smooshed flat with my fingers before I put them in the pan and they were fine. Weird. But still, they taste good. And that’s the main thing.

Went for another hike today. Just my luck that the moment I get to the access land the sun goes into hiding and the wind picks up. As soon as I get back in the house (which was like two hours later) the sun comes out again. Didn’t stick around for very long though; the rain chased it away. So it’s a good thing I went hiking when I did. Took more photos. Will post them later. Just wanted to say how nice it was to find a woodsy area where I can just listen to the wind rustle the leaves instead of having to drown out the traffic with my iPod.

Oh and I’ve accepted a place at Nottingham Trent for next year. Apparently I’m expected to write at least 3000 words a week. I’m pretty sure that’s a target I can reach without too much difficulty if I’m in the groove (that is to say, inspired). Unfortunately, at least in Aber, that didn’t happen very often. Then again, the workload there was very light, unlike in Montana where I was writing constantly (mainly essays though). But still, it was writing something.

The TO LET sign is still in our front yard. Maybe I should call the estate agents and ask what to do with it.

Planning on going to a carboot sale tomorrow morning. Except that the washing machine repair man is coming between 9 and noon. Oliver’ll be in though, which means that I can go browse other peaople’s junk, so hopefully the repair man won’t ask too many questions about what’s wrong with the thing.

Right, time for some cheesecake ice cream while I watch Grey’s Anatomy. Weirdly enough, a pint of Haegen Daas was cheaper by over a £1 than a pint of Ben & Jerry’s. Usually they’re the same price…

Not that much has happened in the last week or so. I left Aber and came to Sheffield on Friday. My dad was almost afraid that we wouldn’t get everything to fit in the car, but we did after a little rearranging. ;)

Then Saturday was spent looking at cars. The Ford salesman would not stop talking and that pretty much put me off of getting a car from there. So after about five hours of sitting in various cars, I decided on either a Smart or a Mercedes-Benz A-Class. A Smart would be better in the city (since it is tinier) but an A-Class feels safer on highways. And I will have to use highways to get to wherever I’m studying at next year. I have received a conditional offer from Aberystwyth (need to get a 2.1, which I’m pretty sure I will) and Nottingham Trent wants to interview me. Don’t know yet when the interview will be, but I’m hoping that they’ll tell me soon.

My dad and I checked out a few apartments while he was here. There’s a one bedroom fully furnished brand new place that I did like for £475/pcm. It’s within walking distance of Oliver’s work and all it needs is a washing machine (which the realtor said that the landlord will probably provide if we just ask). The only downside is that there is no parking available for it. So Oliver and I are going to go take a look at it tomorrow and see what he thinks. Last night we were looking through the property paper and found a three bedroom terraced house (part-furnished) for £500/pcm in an area that’s quite nice and nearby to everywhere we want to go. It’s also very very hilly. So having an automatic transmission instead of a manual is an imperative (for me at least). ^_^

I got practice driving while my dad was here. I have my provisional licence and so we just went to buy some L-plates and then I got to drive! We first practiced parking in the parking lot. Parallel parking was a whole lot easier than I expected. After awhile we then decided to go back and I drove from Morrissons to Oliver’s. I don’t care about not learning the manual on the wrong side of the road (and they are on the wrong side over here in my opinion). As long as I get to drive without having to stress about stuff like clutches and the car stalling, I’ll be happy. So an automatic car for me it is. :) What still scare me slightly are roundabouts. O_O

I have finally finished my modified Bad Penny. Decided to make it all pink with picot edgings at the hem and sleeves and a single crochet edging on the neckline. I’ll probably wear that to my interview actually. Or then I might wear my Isabella. Haven’t quite decided yet. Then after that top, I wanted a super quick project, so I made a teeny tiny bear. It’s shorter than my hand. :D After that I started some socks because I haven’t made a pair in ages (I swear, sweater knitting to me is becoming almost as addictive as socks). I’m making Fawkes from my Aww-tum Sock! Merino yarn. It is soooooo yummy. Gorgeous stuff.

And now it’s time for breakfast. Yes, I know it’s past 11 am, but I’ve been knitting and watching Oliver play Oblivion on the XBox 360 since 9:30… Hunger is winning now. :P

Just thought I’d let you all know that since I’m leaving Aber on Friday, I’ll be busy until Monday. Not that I’ve been really active here lately, but still.

In knitting news, still working on the Bad Penny. Did the lace and then the increase sections. Tried it on and ripped it out because it didn’t look nice. Mind you, I didn’t rip out the whole thing, just to where the lace began. So it’s back to nicely mindless stockinette that I can do in the car on Friday. :D I’ve also made a Clapotis scarf from Regia Silk. I ran out of yarn just as I was about to get to the final rows, so I used up some ends that I had in my stash. I don’t really like the way that turned out, so I’ll be ripping out what I’ve dubbed the Hufflepuff tail (because the leftover colors that I used were black and yellow) and just do a different kind of bind off.

Handed in my final essay of my BA career today. In the three years that I’ve been a uni student, I have never sent myself the wrong version of an essay to be printed. Until today. *rolls eyes* First time for everything, eh? I did luckily have the sorta correct version in my e-mail as well, so I didn’t have to go back down the hill to send myself the right version.

In between all of the packing I did manage to spend over an hour on the beach this afternoon. Read a few chapters of This Sceptered Isle. And I also bought the Highway Code so that I can start studying up for the theory test. Hopefully I’ll have my licence by early September. ^_^

I’ve still got the Barn Dance stuck in my head; both the song they played for it at Manchester and the actual steps. It was one of my fave dances. And we’d be doing it at practice on Friday when I’m not here. *sniffle* I did meet a really nice guy named Chris who dances for Warwick during the first round of it. At the end of the dance we were supposed to hold on to our partners and dance a Rumba with them. It was during the same round that I danced with the guy from Our Favorite Arguing Couple (a couple from Manchester that constantly argues at competitions). He was a very good dancer, but I didn’t get the nice vibe off of him, unlike Chris. Then during the second round of the Barn Dance I wound up with some advanced guy and were supposed to dance some Salsa afterwards. I told him that I didn’t know any salsa and he was like: “We’ll do it anyway!” and started just twirling and spinning me around the dance floor, very energetically I might add, for over three minutes. Ooh, and I swear, the judge was trying to kill me when he put us through to the second round of Jive. It was tiring enough to do it once, but during the second round something went wrong with the American Spin and I almost fell flat on my face. Luckily Alan caught me in time.

I handed in my Writing Project yesterday. As a reward, I didn’t do any work on my other essay. I worked on my letter of application and spun some yarn in instead. I’m getting better at it. It’s still that lumpy thick’n’thin arty yarn stuff, but it looks good. ^_^ Now I just need to spin some more and then get Jenni to show me how to ply it together. For some reason I just can’t get it to work, even though I know the theory behind it. I’m still working on the Bad Penny. Decided to add in some lacy details instead of cables. Still haven’t decided if I want to make it a long-sleeved sweater or not. Since it is bamboo-cotton it can work as both. We’ll see.

The weather here is wonderful. Sunny and warmish. Maybe I can convince Gabe to come sit on the beach with me today when we’re supposed to meet for a cup of tea. For some reason it’s been really hard to find a time in our schedules when we’re both free. But we did settle on today at 4pm.

This morning has been… well a bit annoying, but mostly okay. I sent off for my provisional driver’s licence. I took the bad pictures that always come out of those automatic machines. It cost £4.20 and I only had four pounds on me, so the guy that was fixing it gave me the 20p I needed. Such a nice old man. ^_^ But the man behind the counter at the post office was just… gah. I needed a postal order to send with my application so he printed out one for me. I get all of the special delivery envelopes so that they can send me my passport back securely and when it’s time to pay? The wrong amount comes up on the machine. Then he tells me that I need to pay for the postal order with cash. Like I have any, everywhere I go I pay with a card. So he sets things aside and I run across the street to the cash machine and get the £50 I needed. I come back and he’s like: “You do know that there’s a fee with this, right?” I nodded my okay and again, I was about to pay with my card. Nope, he asks if I have any more cash on me. *rolls eyes* Something wrong with the machine that takes cards. I need to run across the street again to get more cash. Geez, he could’ve told me all of this sooner! And because he got me running around, I forgot to write my name on the back of the postal order and get the special delivery number of the return envelope. Hrmph. Although I have had pretty good experiences with the special delivery system of the Royal Mail so I’m not too worried. It’s just the regular letters that get lost into the ether. Could be either Royal Mail’s fault or the USPS. Oh well. But yay, that’s done. I should have my provisional licence in a few weeks! o/

My Writing Project is done. I’ve had people read it, point out the missing words (which is something that happens no matter what medium I’m using to convey my writing, seriously). And all of the typos too. I’ve got the folders for it and now all it needs is to be printed. Which I will do on Monday. I only have one more class next week and then I’m done with all of those too. One 3000 word essay to write, well, now only 1500 words left and once that’s been handed in, I can leave Aber any time I feel like. ^_^ I know I whine about writing these essays, but last night while I was struggling to write about Donne’s poetry, I realized that I actually do enjoy it. It’s fun to learn of various perspectives on things. But it’s also annoying to be “forced” to do it. Then again, if I didn’t have these deadlines to write the essays, then I probably wouldn’t do them at all.

I’m still knitting my modified version of Bad Penny. I added in shaping and some cables because let’s face it, plain stockinnette for a whole sweater gets very boring very quickly. But because of my modifications getting the right stitch count is driving me batty.

Ooh! Yesterday after dance practice I was chatting with Alan about my knitting and he was just wondering at the complexity of my scarf (really, it’s not that hard once you know what to do). So I offered to teach him how to knit. And he said okay. Tomorrow at our final dance competition of the year, I’ll be teaching him how to knit in between dancing. Speaking of, at this one we’re participating in more dances than before. We usually do Waltz, Quickstep, Cha and Jive. Occasionally Rumba. This time we’re doing all of the above and Tango. I’m also doing Samba with Jenni. I am so bad at leading (since I am the taller one of us), but at least it’ll be fun. :) Another thing! Alan and I have been moved from B Team Quickstep to A Team Waltz. Squee! :D

Okay, going to go have lunch and get some more reading done for my essay now. Some of that stuff that I need to wade through is so mind-numbingly dry that it kinda makes me want to not do the essay. But occasionally I do find good quotes to use. ^_^

Okay, now that I’ve gotten back into the swing of things, i.e. having to churn out writing on a regular basis and actually using my brain for something other than deciphering knitting patterns and watching the History Channel and Grey’s Anatomy, I thought it would also be a good time to write in here for a change. So yes, I’ve been gone for about five weeks. Not from the net, just from updating. So what have I been doing that’s been so enthralling that I haven’t even bothered to yammer on about on here?

1. I went to Blackpool for the InterVarsity Dance Competition where all of the universities go. It was pretty fun. Waltz was mine & Alan’s best dance, got to dance four rounds of that. Then came a tie between the Quickstep and Cha with three rounds. And last, as usual, came the Jive with just the first round that everyone gets to dance. For some reason lately we just freeze up when it’s time to do the Jive and well… let’s just say that it was entertaining for the audience. Seriously, we knew half way through our attempts at our routine that we weren’t going to get through. Still, even though our Jive bombed, we were still the beginner couple that did the best from our team. Yay us. ^_^

I was over at Oliver’s for three weeks after Blackpool. I watched a lot of History Channel (there was this thing about Henry VIII’s wives) and knit. I also edited my Writing Project and now it’s ready to be handed in. I just still need to re-read my commentary and then it’s all completely done. And I’ve got a week to spare too. Oliver also bought an XBox 360 while I was there so we played a lot of Star Wars Lego. I’m not that big of a gamer, but there are some games that I quite enjoy. Like pretty much all of the Mario Bros. stuff and this Lego thing. Oliver also bought me the game Lost so I’ll be playing that once I go over there again. :)

The last week of Easter vacation I went back to Belgium for a few days with a few days spent in Finland in the middle (I, ahem, enhanced my stash a bit while I was there). At home I watched a lot of Grey’s Anatomy. I was aiming to see all of seasons two and three while I was there, but I still have three discs left of season three. At least now I know what I’ll be doing again while I’m over there.

Oh coming back from Belgium was not my ideal journey. Firstly, there was traffic and I was afraid that I wouldn’t make it to my train on time. Then we get to the Channel Tunnel and there’s a power outage. The conductor decides to go in anyway and try to get through it slowly. We get to about the middle and discover that there’s a train in front of us that has, and I quote, failed (I just love it when foreigners come up with inventive ways of describing situations). Failed how? I don’t know. Maybe it had just failed in its attempts at achieving train-ness. :P Anyway, I get to St. Pancras three hours late and guess what? There’s a “reported emergancy” so they’re evacuating everyone. When I got to Aber I learned that there had been a suspect package, this is according to the Eurostar website anyway. But! I race all the way to Euston with my very large and heavy suitcase. I have to buy a new ticket since my old one isn’t valid anymore and then I wait for the next train to Birmingham. I picked the train that had fewer stops and crossed my fingers that I might make it in time for the 2:33 train. Nope, I get there five minutes too late. The right platform, but five minutes too late so I have to wait two hours for the next one. *rolls eyes*

And now that I’m back in Aber I’ve been doing what I pretty much have done before. I watch DVDs, climb the hill quite a bit, dance and just now I began writing my final essay of my BA career. Already have my introduction written. The hardest part was deciding what to write about. Oh and another thing that I have to write is my PhD application letter thingy. I’m still waiting to hear from my tutor about specific questions about doing a PhD here in Aber, mainly if it’s possible to do it without having to live in Aber since I want to live in Sheffield with Oliver, and then I’ll hand that in as well.

Knitting-wise? I found a wonderful yarn shop in Sheffield called The Wool Baa during Easter. I went there and bought a hank of Lane Borgosesia Cashwool and a hank of Araucania Ranco Multi. I’ve already made a pair of Freya socks from the Araucania yarn. Then last night I began knitting Bad Penny with the bamboo/cotton yarn I got from Finland. The ballband doesn’t give the color a name, but it looks like an old dusty rose. Very pretty. I’ve also designed a pair of fingerless mitts. I’ve knit one and I figure that when I get bored with the Bad Penny I’ll just make the other one because right now, I’m loving the ease of just stockinette stitch compared to the colorwork I’d have to do on the mitten. Plus, it makes it easier to watch DVDs when I don’t actually have to look at what I’m doing. ;)

Oh oh oh! The shower’s fixed! On Monday when I got back I went to take a shower and it wasn’t working (as in no hot water), so I went downstairs and told the porters and then on Tuesday morning a guy came to fix it. It’s so nice to have a hot shower again. And it doesn’t feel like a certain someone has been fiddling with it since, so double yay. ^_^