ABT: All But Toe*

There is a problem with my jaywalkers: See that sad little tail of yarn there? That's all that I have left; the rest is in storage in Tennessee. I have no idea what I was thinking (I probably wasn't thinking -- I did all of my storage packing in rush the morning we were supposed to leave), and because of my negligence I have only one project to hold me over until my stash and I are reunited. Jamesey, it's just you and me, baby. I have quite a few new projects planned, and most of them would require new yarn. So when thinking about (or actually doing) all of that ribbing starts to eat away at my soul, I'm comforting myself with plans for new yarn and a potential yarn store trip. I've started to worry, however, that I may be overbooking my knitting time. Let me ask you, oh internets, if you think I could finish these things before Christmas without losing my sanity, ability to move my fingers, boyfriend, and/or funding. Keep in mind that I have a shameful history of biting off more than I can chew (and never admitting it), so even if you all tell me not to, there's a damn good chance I'll try to do this anyway. 1. Jamesey 2. Something gorgeous for my grandmother 3. Hat (I'm thinking crazy fair isle) 4. Branching Out (Note: the friend I'm making this for is so much more stylish than I am. Branching Out is the only thing I can think to knit that won't horrify her, but I'm open to other suggestions. What would you knit for your Burberry wearing, Louis Vuitton carrying friend?) 5. Clapotis, probably not full size 6. 2 basic hats for 2 nice guys #3-6 would need to be finished before Christmas so I could mail them, and #1 and 2 would need to be washed and blocked before I flew home (so no frantic knitting on the plane). What do you think? Do you normally knit this many items for the winter holidays, or am I just completely out of my gourd? * Title for this entry taken from The Lone Knitter. If only we got diplomas for finishing socks, eh?

Barbie's Dream Cake

-- 14 hours of driving. More if you include the time spent driving around the city. -- $120 in gas. At least. -- 1 terrifying spider in the hotel bathroom. (I still maintain that it was a Brown Recluse, although The Boyfriend disagrees. Don't click that link if you're scared of spiders or are my father.) -- 4 Arby's mozzarella sticks. -- 2 hours of DIY Network watched at the hotel. I now know how to plant raised flowerbeds, lay shingles, and install track lighting. -- And 1 very odd apartment that is all mine. It was a fun trip (more fun than the last), and I've ended up with an apartment that (while quirky) I don't entirely hate. Although there is one problem: The living room is yellow. Custard yellow. Custard yellow stucco. Let that sink in for a second. I liked it when I walked through the first time, but upon reflection I think that living inside a hollowed out lemon cake might drive me slowly insane. Luckily, my landlord said that he wants me "to be happy," so I don't have to sign a lease until I've been there for a month or so. This means that if the stucco keeps me awake at night I can scramble to find another place. We did look at one other place. (We were supposed to look at three, but the other realtor didn't show up because of a tenant's death. This is a damn good reason and made me feel incredibly guilty for pacing outside the apartment and leaving increasingly annoyed messages on her voicemail.) This other place looked nice, but the girl showing it to us completely put me off. Note to apartment management: getting your giggliest, most darkly tanned sorority employee to show me an apartment is not going to make me want to live there. It does, however, make me glad that I never once thought gold eyeshadow was a good idea. At any rate, I'm relieved. Maybe now that my stress levels are down by about 50% my skin can stop breaking out, I can start sleeping through the night, and TB and I can get on with enjoying our time left together and in Columbus. Oh, and I have some socks to finish:

Where the image breaks down.

Bessie, Van of Love, Update: She is fine. Apparently there was something wrong with the fuel injection (I KNEW IT). A switch that had popped up had to be pushed down, or something equally simple. Trip has been replanned for Monday - Tuesday, and all is well. I also had a poke around on the good 'ol Internet and there are many, many apartment complexes in Knoxville. I am now breathing normally again and hope to resume functioning as a non-shrill human being within a few hours. The Boyfriend is thrilled about this, as are the cats. I know panic-stricken blog posts aren't the greatest thing to read, and I will make an effort from now on to keep my neuroses and fretting to myself. Next time: thoughts on grad school and hopefully another sock. If you have any questions about grad school that you'd like me to address (get me, I'm writing an advice column) just shoot me an email at the new blog account: specsknits at gmail.

Philosophy can wait.

I'd planned to write a witty entry branching off of The Harlot's observations on writing. I had a list of things I wanted to mention, including observations on the nature of politics in graduate school, the difference between undergraduate English studies and grad, and the downside to doing what you love 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I was going to write this, but something went horribly wrong. I'm supposed to be in Tennessee right now. I'm supposed to be at the hotel, having just finished a dinner at Tomato Head with The Boyfriend, stuffed full of pizza, watching Animal Cops and getting teary over the skinny kittens. But I am in Ohio. I am in Ohio because this morning, after we loaded the van up with stuff to put in storage down Sawth, the van refused to start. Moments before we tried to leave for our long drive, TB had taken her to the gas station with no problems, so this was completely unexpected. We got out of the car, came inside, called a tow truck, and I cried. I am just so nervy right now, and I'm terrified that I'll end up living out of a hotel, my van, or a small, damp cardboard box, if I can't find an apartment soon now. None of these situations would really help me settle into a new city and impress the hell out of my new professors. Unless they associate the scent of desperation with academic brilliance. I'm calmer now, largely because I decided to deal with this by finishing a sock. And check out this heel: Very cute, yes? I finished these while watching the news and trying not to cry over pictures of Lebanese orphans, and not to think about what could possibly be wrong with my van. ("Carburetor. We could have a broken carburetor thing. What about fuel injection? Do we have that? What if the fuel isn't being injected properly? Or at all? Why don't I know anything about fuel injection? I have failed Adulthood Test #347!" and so on.) Anyone know anything about cars? Or have a large cardboard box I could borrow for a few weeks?

A little rant disguised as an explanation.

Last night I made Ashley's Cucumber Martinis, and they are fantastic! Gathering the ingredients for these was a bit of a trial, as it necessitated buying martini glasses and a shaker, the combination of which makes my kitchen look like a swingin' 1960's pad. I also had to go to THREE grocery stores before I found white cranberry juice, and it took two days to work up the courage to go to the liquor store and buy two whole bottles of alcohol. I have some kind of bizarre hang-up about alcohol that I blame entirely on growing up in a small, conservative town. My friends were girls who squealed "eewwwwwww!" whenever sex was mentioned until the age of 17. (At which point I lost touch with them. I think some of them still probably squeal and vehemently deny wanting to kiss boys.) They had similarly dramatic reactions to alcohol and drugs: anyone who drank was Going to Hell, and anyone who smoked anything was Damned for All Eternity. I'm not entirely kidding about that either; they were good Baptist girls (except for my lone Catholic friend, but all my Baptist friends secretly thought she was a slut because she had a long-term boyfriend and made out with him at dances) and weren't afraid to vocalize their opinions on where our classmates were going to spend their afterlives. Anyway, as a result, I still feel a little guilty buying alcohol. I have some idea that there's a master list of alcohol buyers, and I'm on it. "Oh my," the little old ladies who compile the list will say, "Did you see that Specs bought two bottles of hard liquor today? Tsk. She used to be such a sweet girl. Oh well, cross her name off our List of Decent Human Beings." And I've discovered that I have a hang-up about drinking before 6 pm, too. Drinking with dinner is fine, and drinking during a night out is great; but drinking in the afternoon seems wrong. The Boyfriend and I have discussed this after his return from Japan, and it seems to be an entirely American obsession with the evils of drinking. In Japan, you're allowed to drink on the train (I did this once and couldn't stop looking over my shoulder for an old man sadly shaking his head at the gaijin), drink in public (The Boyfriend had champagne in the park with friends), and generally drink whenever and wherever you want. I know people in the UK who drink during lunch, go out for drinks on weeknights (or schoolnights, as I always think of them), and they generally think I'm strange for being shocked by these practices. In conclusion, I blame YOU small-town America, for giving me a life-long weirdness about drinking and buying alcoholic beverages. Tune in next week as we discuss how my concepts of sex and gender roles were warped by having a bunch of Baptist girl friends, but somewhat salvaged by being involved in the Texaco Star Academic Challenge.

There and back again. Again.

Went to Knoxville. Completed paperwork at the university. Looked for apartment. Failed to find apartment. I'm less than pleased with the trip, but I'm not unhappy with the town. It seems sleepy and stagnant, but I've been assured that this is because the population decreases by 40% when students aren't around. Back again later this week.

Specs presents: something resembling a sock.

Could it be? Yes! We have a Jaywalker! Well, part of one, anyway. The lighting is horrible, but it's been raining here for the past few days, and should rain for a few more. I wanted to just take a damn picture and post it, so sorry for the poor quality. You can't really tell, but there's a lovely shade of Slimer green in there, which I either love or hate, depending on how whimsical I'm feeling on any given day. Slimer-sock #1 is past the heel and well into the instep decreases, so I hope to have another one by the end of the weekend (she said, glancing at her stack of "to read" books). Speaking of this weekend, The Boyfriend and I are taking a hurried trip down to Tennessee in the hopes of finding an apartment. The cats will be on their own for a night, the van's brakes will be tested on the mountains of the southern Appalachians, and I will hopefully return very happy and optimistic about the next four years. I've been shifting through the online apartment ads and listings (I found a house with a jacuzzi in the living room, people), and I've realized that as well as being very desperate for a place to live, I'm also very, very picky. This doesn't sound like a good combination to me, either. Things I want in an apartment: 1. Second floor or higher. We're on the first floor now and we've had at least one close call with someone breaking in (which resulted in me sleeping with a hammer and a Susan Bates #13 by my pillow). 2. A balcony. I just want one. 3. No crazy elderly neighbors who come over to my apartment in their underwear. This happened several times in last year's apartment. I plan to knock on the doors of potential neighbors and keep track of how many answer in an unacceptable state of undress. 4. A bathroom with a ceiling that stays a ceiling, and doesn't suddenly decide to become a powdery floor decoration. 5. A bathroom sink that has only one faucet, and not two separate taps for hot and cold. This is more annoying than I can possibly describe -- when I wash my face I have to decide if I'd rather be scalded or frostbitten. 6. A kitchen with cabinets that are in tact and a floor that isn't covered in 50+ years of grime. 7. A bedroom with a window that faces East. I've been sleeping in disgustingly late while living in my current apartment, and I think it's because our only bedroom window faces north and is dark for most of the day. My mind is boggling with all the things I could accomplish if I had the power of the sun to wake me up in the morning. I think that's it. I welcome all suggestions for other things I should ask for (or demand -- I could take the #13 and the hammer with me) in a living space.

Say hello to the new guy.

Well, we wanted a 1 year old female and we left with a 3 month old male. Everybody, say hello to Otto! He isn't really named after anyone, but I was thinking of the Replacements song and one of the Holy Roman Emperors when I considered the name. And now I can't stop singing the song to him, which I think is going to warp him somehow. I've been knitting, but I'm not feeling very inspired to post anything lately. Sooner or later I'll finish a sock (I finally started some Jaywalkers in some not-so-hideous knitpicks sock yarn) and then I'll have something exciting to show you. Stay frosty!

Either she's dead or my watch has stopped.

I'm alive! I've been busy with academic things lately and haven't had much time to knit, let alone time to post about the knitting I'm not doing. In lieu of any exciting knitting content, please accept this list of unorganized observations and thoughts: It's hot here. And when I say "hot" I mean temperatures in the 90's (30's if you're not American) and lots of humidity. The cat has taken to sleeping in the bathroom behind the toilet, as apparently that's the coolest place in the apartment. I'm considering shoving him out and sitting there myself (if I'd fit -- I'm also considering a compromise that involves sitting in the bathtub with a Mojito). I hate knitting big projects only. I'm working on two sweaters right now, and I'm starting to resent them both because of the heat and the slow progress. Stupid ribbed sweater. I hate ribs. Ugly, time consuming things with their silly little up-and-down bits. I'm currently having vague thoughts of sending my mystery sweater (see previous post) into Knitty or Magknits, so I'm afraid there won't be any more posts about it for a while. Although this is assuming that I can find a way to knit while in the bathtub. We're thinking of getting another cat. Last night we went back to the Cozy Cat Cottage where we adopted Dmitri and had a look around. Before we walked in, we rehearsed our plan: we want a female, about a year old, same size as Dmitri, and not black and white (ok, this last bit is mine because I have some bizarre hang up about the cats complimenting each other). When we left, we were trying to decide between three cats: all female, two tiger striped -- one is 2 years old, one is about a year -- and one is a calico kitten. You can see the two year old, Dulcinea, in the upper left corner of the page, but the others aren't listed on their website. I know we should get one of the older cats, because she'd get along better with our boy Dmitri, but this is technically my cat, and I'll be taking her with me to Tennessee in August. So I'm very tempted by the calico kitten. But then there's that practical appeal of getting an older cat, as they stand less of a chance of being adopted than the doe-eyed little kittens. So, dramatic and tense, I know. Such is the life of a grad student: always danger, drama, and cats. Stay on the edge of your seats, try not to bite off all of your fingernails, and return next week to see if we get a cat, decide on a cat, or just call the whole thing off. Oh, and have a gratuitous photo of Dmitri eyeing my frozen berries snack.