WIP RSI??

So I have been working quite feverishly on my giftie scarf since Andreas's birthday was last friday, and I think I may have a Repetitive Stress Injury to show for my efforts (besides an almost done scarf). My left hand pointer finger knuckle hurts like mad and since there is no visible bruise, and its been hurting since friday when the hardcore knitting began, I think its knitting related pains and not accidental whacking into something pains. So I think to solve this problem I need to knit faster so I can be done with it and move on to a new project (:{
Like a hat for my poor cold head.




Here is the progress as of Saturday. Its actually a lot longer but I couldnt get a good picture of it.


















Speaking of cold body parts and hats, well, ok, speaking of outer clothing, I've decided I need a new coat. My current coats are 5 and 2 years old. And neither are quite appropriate for this new, warmer, winter due to the Global Weirding. The pea coat is more of a "nice" coat and as such I dont want to be wearing it every day. The Columbia coat is for super duper cold weather (the kind we used to have here all winter long) and I've been sweltering and sweating profusely in it. Which, oddly, doesn't stop my forehead and ears from freezing off. I have also come to loathe the Columbia jacket due to purchasing idiocy on my part. I really dont know what kind of drugs I was on when I decided to buy a lavender colored coat in size large. I dont like lavender. I want black. I stick out like a weirdo on city streets in a giant lavender coat. When its too warm to be wearing a giant coat. whine whine and yes i'd like some cheese with it. I also thought I'd need extra room for all those bulky sweaters I'd be wearing except for the fact that it no longer is arctic winter here (well, ok, we still get air streams from the arctic, but they are warmer now) and the coat itself is so damn warm that I cant wear sweaters with it. So its huge for no reason.

So goodbye resolution #5, hello new coat when my tax rebate arrives.

Also, tomorrow I will be saying goodbye to Flat Stanley who was sent to me by Jonathon (sisters-fiances-son) for his kindergarten project. Flat Stan had a good time here in Boston and in Philly and now its time to go back to the Illinois and tell his story to Jonathon's class.



Here is "Pocket Stan" hanging out in his fav spot in my coat.





















One of the neater picts taken of Stan at Trinity Church on a fun day out with Anne.
















Stan at a marker for Elfreth's Alley, the oldest residential street in the USA in Philly.




Bye Stan! Hope you had fun!

the day after

Well, yesterday was my first true test of Resolution #7 and I have to say, I passed with flying colors. Not only did I refrain from opening a bottle of wine (which Always leads to finishing the bottle of wine) but I also refrained from drinking all my beer. In fact, I didn't drink at all.

I did, however, totally wipe out on a patch of ice on my way to the gym, and feel a little pathetic for staying so long at the gym w/ all the muscle dudes (most people were running in and running back out again), so the day wasn't totally awesome. But at least I'm not so pathetic to answer the requisite e-mail from an ex-boyfriend on Valentines. Seriously, if any guys read this, stop e-mailing old flames on Valentines day, esp if you've already emailed them in the past and they no longer answer!! Gah! This time it sounded like he's on some sort of 12-step program and needs to apologize to everyone he may have hurt. It was weird.

Anyhow, in the past couple days I've made major progress on my exchequered giftie so hopefully it will be done soon!

Sneak Peeks

Without internet at home its been hard to find time at work to sneak a post. I am *eventually going to post a long sad story regarding the Endpaper mitts and all their woe, but just like I was procrastinating fixing them and finishing them, I am procrastinating writing that post. But, they ARE FINISHED. Which is a huge accomplishment in and of itself.
As proof, see sneak peek picture below.





Pretty colors distract from the real danger these mitts pose.

















One good thing (among many) to come out of the completion of the Endpaper's is that I've finally gotten my knitting mojo back! For the first time in a long time I actually Want to knit.
And what is it that I'm staying up late to work on lately? Why a scarf giftie. Its a double - knit scarf and I've heavily modified the pattern, but so far its coming along splendidly. Hopefully it will be completede soon and I'll have more FO goodness. After this I'm going to work on some mittens for my sister that I started ~2 years ago and a hat for myself. B/c my poor head is cold.



Checked goodness!



















* A mid Feb update on other life type things:
Had an interview at Drexel Med, I think it went really well. I'll hopefully hear from them in 6 weeks or so.
The weight loss was going well (I had lost 3 lbs since Dec) until this past week where I did a complete 180 and gained it all back. Which nearly sent me to tears in the gym on the scale. After seeing the numbers slowly go down since November it has been heart wrenching to see them inching back up for the past 2 weeks. I really hope I can get back on track and reverse this recent trend. (And no, its not muscle gained. I'm back to not being able to fit in my clothes. And besides I'm not doing any weight lifting right now).
I made an appointment with a physical therapist for my neck and shoulder, hopefully my insurance will decide to cover therapy so I can get back to weightlifting and have less migraine from neck strain.
My Uncle made it through brain cancer surgery and is amazingly not paralyzed. Chemo / radiation will start soon.
Still dont know if it was sepsis or endotoxemia that killed my mice.
Spent some quality time with Amanda who was visiting Boston this weekend and bought some nifty fabric that I hope to one day make into WIP bags.
OK, back to work!

hey, can we stop?

I've had a very trying week. i know life is hard and such but really. come on. a girl can only handle so much. no internet at home (i know horrible!). the mice i immunized with vaccines i've used before went into shock and sepsis and are dying. its so horrible ive never seen anything like it and we tried frantically to save them (couldnt) and tried frantically to collect as much data as possible as to why it was happening. today i thought finally the week is over i can take a one day break and breathe b/c Anne is visiting tomorrow and i dont even have to think about the horror awaiting me at work. but then i got a call from my mom. my favorite uncle has brain cancer. doctors gave him 3 weeks if they dont operate. they are operating monday. they're not sure he'll make. its a fast growing primary cancer that's eating his brain at an alarming rate. i mean seriously. its not bad enough i have to watch my poor mice suffer and die and am helpless to stop it? emotionally, i think i might explode.
and no, i havent been knitting. my poor little brain cannot process.

odd thoughts, weird musings

Not sure if my thoughts are currently odd, but considering my recent bout of insomnia, everything seems to me odd at the moment.

A couple nights ago I tried again to get into Armand Marie Leroi's book about human Mutants and genetic variety and sadly it failed to put me to sleep or to stir up my booklust (booklust = the NEED to read a certain book until its finished due to its fabulousness). I dunno, maybe I'm just not excited by genetics right now. I've been trying to find a book I could lust over without actually buying a new book since A. I own plenty of un-read books, B. I'm broke, and C. I miss reading, but nothing has struck my fancy. Until friday that is. On fri I saw my PI and he gave us our christmas presents (I left town to early to get it before), and since its always a book, I knew it would be a book. In the elevator down from his office I tore into the wrapping and squealed with glee to my coworkers that I had wanted this book- I just kept forgetting to buy it. And now I have a serious case of booklust. I dont think I've been so excited about a book since the last great book of 2007 (A Feast for Crows), which I read forever ago. And what is this book?? Microbe Hunters by Paul De Kruif (orig pub 1926 and w/ a new intro by F. Gonzalez-Crussi). Its pretty much a classic in microbiology and its interesting enough that I think pretty much anyone would like it. There's a lot of really neat info in it about all of the original discoverers (some who are more obscure than they deserve to be) of all things too small to see w/ the naked eye. I especially love that De Kruif and all of the first hunters call the things "wee beasties" and "animalcules." Tee hee


I try to not follow presidential races too far in advance because I personally think our politicians should be doing their tax-paid jobs instead of campaigning constantly for 2 years but since the MA primary is coming up in Feb I have of late been trying to decide who to vote for. (Disclaimer - if you are a relative or close friend do not continue reading. I'm following my fathers' philosophy that politics and family do not mix and can cause ridiculous pointless arguments) Lately I've been back and forth between John Edwards and Barack Obama. Now, its not that I think we shouldn't or couldn't have a women in office, and its not that I dont like Hilary, I'm fine with her, I just dont think that she has the power to win. And really folks, this time we Liberals need a winner. Its pretty clear that our country has gone to shit under the idiots currently running the show and if we want to avoid irreparable damage we need a winner this time around.
So just for fun I did the candidate calculator I found on Amanda's blog and to my surprise the candidate I most identify w/ on issues is Dennis Kucinich. Then comes Christopher Dodd, Mike Gravel, Clinton, Joseph Biden, Obama, and finally Edwards to round out the Dems. Obviously I really didnt match w/ any of the reds. Now, does this mean I'm likely to change my vote - not really because I personally think that only Obama, Edwards, and Clinton have enough "star power" to make it out of the primaries.
I think that an Obama/Edwards ticket would be very powerful and hey wouldn't it be neat if we had a black president from Illinois, the same state that produced President Lincoln who abolished slavery?

Ok, so political diatribe is over. whew, what a long winded post about nothing this is.

FO: white snowflake star ornaments

Last year I made ornaments for just about all of my family members (grandparents, aunts/uncles/cousins, etc) using heavy card stock and embossing (one day i'll post some pictures - it was pre-dig camera so I dont have a picture of all of them sadly), it was painstaking work and for some reason I decided to make ornaments again. And I started like 2 weeks before Christmas, stupid me! Sigh. I dont know why I'm such a masochist.

Project Name: white snowflake-star ornaments
Pattern: Snowflake Star by Judy Gibson, free Here
Yarn: J&P Coates Knit-Cro-Sheen Size 10 crochet cotton, white
Needles: US size 2 metal dpns
Pattern adjustments: None. Made 5 pointed stars with 5 repeats.
Notes: Although I am still not a huge fan of the Emily Ocker cast on, I continue to use it. I found this site with pictures to be very helpful in learning the cast on. I also think that it might not be such a bad technique if we didnt have to cast on 12 stitches! I might try 6 and just do one more round of yarn-overs next time just to see what it looks like. Also, the closer I got to Christmas the less time and less yarn I had so I started to make 4 and 3 repeat stars. Which came out quite nicely as well I just dont have pictures of them for comparison. (I do have pictures of the smaller stars in the silver yarn but that's a separate post). I also used Niagara starch I picked up at CVS for less than $2. I pinned the stars out, sprayed on the starch, made sure all parts of the stars were wet, and re-pinned the wet stars with a little more stretch. After about an hour I ironed the back of them to quicken the process so I could get some off the board to pin out more. I found that for the all cotton stars this worked quite well and they kept their shape and once dry in the morning had just the right amount of stiffness. (different story for the ones with silver ribbon running through them)
They also took a long time b/c I had to consciously think about not knitting too tight or binding off too tight or the star looked scrunched and didnt block nicely. So I am considering using larger needles in the future to help this out. It also might make it look "lacier."
Anyway here are some pictures for your enjoyment!

The blue snowflake in the left corner is a crochet one gifted to me (:{















Not so extreme close-up!

2007 Year in Review Quiz

Just one last 2007 ditty and then we can get back to the FO parade. w00t. I stole this from Amanda btw.

1. What did you do in 2007 that you’d never done before?
Dyed yarn; learned to crochet; threw closed-top ceramic objects; a couple of different sex positions; picked berries; pet an Alpaca.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
I did not make resolutions last year but I did make some this year.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Two of my cousins had kids.

4. Did anyone close to you die?
Sadly, yes. My Grampa died a couple weeks ago (Mom's dad).

5. What countries did you visit?
None, booo.

6. What would you like to have in 2008 that you lacked in 2007?
A career path.

7. What dates from 2007 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
The day I met Kev, the day I got my tattoo, the day my Grampa died -- all for obvious reasons.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Getting published for the first time.

9. What was your biggest failure?
Being rejected from medical schools, twice.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
I was incredibly ill the first two weeks in January, I was in the hospital last New Years Eve.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
My digital camera and my Zen V Plus!!

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
Nothing particularly strikes me.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
El presidente and many other american politicians

14. Where did most of your money go?
Rent, medical school application fees.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Being published in a scientific journal.

16. What song will always remind you of 2007?
Starlight by Muse

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
a) happier or sadder? 
b) thinner or fatter? 
c) richer or poorer?
teensy bit happier, a lot fatter, and a lot poorer

18. What do you wish you’d done more of?
Bicycling in the summer, exercising in general, being out in the sun on nice days.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Worry about my future, argue with my family.

20. How will you be spending Christmas?
I was in the Illinois with the family.

21. Did you fall in love in 2007?
I did, even though I never told him, and fate is keeping us on separate continents, its ok b/c he proved to me that I dont need to lower my standards to find who I'm looking for. (This could be a bummer in the short term considering I havent gone on any dates since he left).

22. How many one-night stands?
That's personal information thanks.

23. What was your favorite TV program?
Well that would be different depending on the season. First Deadliest Catch, then Planet Earth, then Pushing Daisies.

24. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?
I dont think so.

25. What was the best book you read?
A Feast for Crows by George RR Martin

26. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Muse and Silversun Pickups

27. What did you want and get?
To prove that insufflation of mice works.

28. What did you want and not get?
Acceptance into medical school.

29. What was your favorite film of this year?
Tie: Pan's Labyrinth and 300.

30. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I was 25 and I went to my favourite restaurant with my favourite people. It was probably one of the best birthday's I can remember.

31. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
To have the TB paper accepted somewhere, and to live in the same vicinity as Kev so we could have actually had a real relationship.

32. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2007?
Wear whatever doenst make me look like a pudgeball - it involved lots of black.

33. What kept you sane?
My friends! And my co-workers who are friends!

34. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
fancy? as in think is cute? or just like? ummmmm well I always like Johnny Depp

35. What political issue stirred you the most?
the same one that always does: the Environment and Global Weirding

36. Who did you miss?
Everyone who doesnt live near me: Kev, my brother and sister, Anne, Amanda, Liz.
My old bosses Sam and Jyothi.
My Grampa.

37. Who was the best new person you met?
Kevin fo' sho'

38. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2007.
Even if you've wanted something since you were 3, when you cant have it, it may turn out that you dont actually want it anymore.

39. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.
"Follow through / make your dreams come true / dont give up the fight / you will be all right / because there's no one like you in the universe // Dont be afraid / of what your mind conceives / you should make a stand / stand up for what you beleive"
Invincible by Muse

Add One

I need to add a resolution.

7. I will not get drunk as a skunk if I'm home alone and feeling lonely. It only leads to depression and irrational behaviour.