Taking Stock

I am going to be 27 in a few weeks. That’s creeping up on 30, I live alone with two cats, am getting divorced, have a small mountain of debt, and work in a library.

I feel like this is the part of my life where I’m supposed to be figuring out what I want to DO WITH MY LIFE, and starting on that.

Only thing is, I ain’t got no damn clue what I want to do!

I like to knit, and paint, and draw, and build things. I’m good with numbers and graphs and money. I’m not so good at fashion, I don’t think I want kids, and I’m a staunchly pro-choice liberal feminist. I like people, but they annoy the shit out of me too. I’m pro-union. I like to cook, but I’m not very good at it. I’m not any good at being “professional”, and prefer to work in smaller businesses despite the fact that I currently work for a subset of the gub’mint.

I’ve thought about doing social work, but I don’t particularly want to devote my life to something that emotionally draining. I’d like to do something that helped women. I don’t want to change diapers. I want to be creating a positive change in the world, even if it’s a really really small one. I’d like to travel and make friends.

What should I do with my life?

Winter is Coming

Well, after all of the Yarnharlot's talk about mittens, and the actually CHILLY weather that we've been having all week, I've decided that Texas just might go ahead and get cold again this year, so I should probably be prepared. I already have my handspun socks ready and waiting to warm my feet when I get home, and my frilly green Beetons that I made last winter (when it snowed! It actually snowed!), and Galveston does double duty as a lacy silk scarf, so I figure it's time to perhaps actually make myself a damn hat (I think we all know how that's likely to turn out - how is it that I've made so many hats and STILL don't own one?).

So tonight I'm going to pull out my DPNs, and some sock yarn, and start making a hat that will be TOO GOOD for me to give away. I'm thinking colorwork, and fingering weight yarn in squishy, lovely colors. I'm not sure what all else will be involved, but I know I want a damn hat already, so it's time to suit up and get to work.

In PSS news, I've decided to knit on, working in the slightly-differently-colored yarn as I go so that hopefully the color difference won't be too noticeable. If that fails, I think I'm going to have to hire someone to dye it.

Testing? Testing?

So, it was brought to my attention that my archives did not work. And since Blogger had upgraded their template formats, it wasn't going to work. Ergo, I had to change my template. What do folks think? I'm not quite happy with it myself.

In other news, Ripley has been really, really affectionate today, and I'm worried that she's going into an early heat. She's just about four months old (counting her birthday as May 14th, 6 weeks before the day I took her home), so it's possible. She goes to the vet this weekend.

And speaking of this weekend, I had been going to go out of town and see Gamerboy, a friend of mine who has recently become something a little more than that, but my car, she is not well. I turned the ignition, it started, and when I looked in the rear view mirror to see if I was clear to back up, I saw that there was a bunch of white smoke coming from the back of the car. Of course, I turned it off right away, and when I went to investigate I couldn't tell if it was coming from beneath the ass-end of the car or from the exhaust or what, but it smelled like burning rubber.

Clearly, no long trips for me.

I'm going to have my friend Danny look at it, since he's quite good with cars, but this has me worried. I hope it can be fixed, and cheaply. I certainly can't afford a new car, or even to make payments on a new used one. If I was able to get a good amount for the car, maybe I could afford a small vespa-like scooter?

Warhammer 40k

Well, folks, I did it. I bit the bullet. I started playing Warhammer 40k.

Over the years this blog has been the home to my knitting and life stories, and frankly, I don't want to mess with that. So, I've decided to keep my 40k stuff elsewhere, since I know that the Feminism/Knitting/Nerdy/Gaming/Wargaming crowds do not really overlap as much as I might hope.

So if you're interested in reading up about my Ork armies, go check out Memory's Orks.

Not Enough Yarn for PSS Prime!

Well, I did the math today, and I definitely don't have enough yarn for my Persian Star Shawl, or at least not all in one skein. If you'll recall, I'm using a cone that's 2200 yards of cashmere from Colourmart UK, in an undyed fawn color. I do have another cone in a slightly darker fawn, but it is definitely a different color.

Right now, I'm just over 50% finished, at 90800 stitches, and there are 83968 stitches to go. I weighed my cone (3.4 oz), my shawl (4.0 oz), and the full cone (7.6 oz), and then checked the website to see how much of the cone weight was actual yarn (5.29).

That means I have a little over an ounce left, and need three more to finish. Obviously isn't going to happen, and I'm more than a little miffed at myself - in fact, it would be fair to say that I'm pretty fucking pissed at myself for not swatching more carefully, not getting a second cone, and blithely assuming that since Galveston (knit on 4s) used around 2200 yards, that of course I would be able to knit PSS with that same amount, on 2s.

I am clearly a moron.

So, I'm debating on what to do now. I'm coming up to an area where I could possibly do intarsia, big chunks of it. Does that work in lace? Is that a stupid damn idea? Should I really divvy up my remaining ounce into one-eighth balls, do the same with my darker fawn cone, and go to town that way? Or should I go dig out the cashmere yarn from that Old Navy sweater I recycled a couple of years back, whose color matches fairly exactly but which is an entirely different yarn? They seem really similar, enough that were they I given samples I couldn't tell them apart. I want to not have to do any extra weaving in, but I'm worried the intarsia option would be both insanely complicated (I'm not very good at intarsia - in fact, I suck), and the only way to get a consistent drape through the whole project.

This is going to take some major thought.

No More Naughty Curry?

Today I found out that my very favorite cooking website, Naughty Curry, has finally lapsed into oblivion. They had stopped updating a while back, but as the archives (and more importantly, the recipe list!) was still up, I didn't think to copy the lovely, spicy morsels of information into my own recipe box.

Today I went to look up their recipe for Madras Shrimp, thinking to make the sauce and serve it over some chicken and rice for a houseguest I've got this weekend, and horror of horrors! The website was finally gone.

So after a little light flickr-stalking I hopped on over to the Wayback Machine, and lo and behold! The Madras Shrimp recipe was mine once more.

So after lunch today, with the continued aid of the Internet Archive, I will be spending my evening copying over every recipe of theirs I can into my personal recipe boxes, into Google Docs, and saving them as word files on my computer to boot. I urge you all to do the same. These recipes are too good to be allowed to float off mindlessly into the ether. So go, please, and cook up something spicy for someone you love.

Heed is Well

It was the food change. He's got pills and liquid medicines to take for a week, and if that doesn't work then he goes back to the vet. My savings account is empty again (thank god I had even slightly filled it), and payday is at the end of next week. Bring on the ramen, and the half-price hot dogs! I'm living poor in style.

Poor Heed!

So Heed threw up this morning. Normally this wouldn't worry me, as he has the occasional hairball, and I did just change his food yesterday, but last week I noticed some blood in his poop. It was bright red, and thin, and there wasn't a lot of it, but enough for me to notice (to be fair, I noticed because he actually shit on the *side* of the litterbox - my boy doesn't always realize when he squats down that his butt is sticking over the side).

Again, I've been changing the food fairly often lately, trying to find something that's good for him AND the kitten, that's fairly natural, and high quality. He loves the hell out of the Purina Naturals food, but I really like the Solid Gold brand stuff, their dog food made a huge difference with Maggie, even though she stank to high heaven for a few months when she first got on it. BUT, the food changes could cause constipation or puking, or any number of weird stomach-y things.

So, blood poop + vomit = vet visit. First thing in the morning. I'm super paranoid, even though it's entirely possible that nothing is wrong. I made the mistake of googling "cat rectal bleeding", which is like going on WebMD when you have a funny shaped freckle, because everything you read tells you it's cancer. I know it's likely nothing serious. But I'm freaking the fuck out.

Holy Fuckbunnies

So, Mr. Ex and I work for the same company, on the same floor, and his new boss is my old boss. Boss-lady asked me, when Mr. Ex and I separated, if I would have a problem still working on the same floor as him, and of course I said no, because I don't.

Most mornings, he comes and says hi by my desk, which is going pretty out of his way, and he tells me about the things going on in his life and asks about the things going on in mine. Some things I tell him, some things I don't, but I thought we were working on the whole being friends thing. I haven't even been rushing on the divorce paperwork, because I've been waiting on him to close out the joint banking account that's got all his money in it - until that's closed, I can't file the papers, and I've been telling him since May to please close that account.

Today he came by and told me that he's resigning from his job. I had no idea he was going to do this, and he didn't talk to me about it beforehand. He doesn't have a new job lined up yet, though he says he has a number of prospects he's looking at. He says it makes him uncomfortable to work around me, and he's been having stress enough that he's puking blood again, and all sorts of other horrible things. His family is going to help support him until he finds a new job, and if he hasn't found one by the time his lease is up next May, he'll be moving back in with them.

I am freaking the fuck out.

Part of me is certain that folks around the office are going to blame me for his going. I never had a problem working with him, I never had a problem seeing him around or even hanging out with him socially.

Now I'm freaking out, I'm asking him to close the joint account TODAY, I'm getting myself off his lease TODAY, I'm filling out all of the paperwork TODAY, because I can't afford to let his decisions (whether I agree with them or not) fuck up my finances. I can't do it. I have two kitties to support, and Heed is not exactly a light eater.

So today, I get the ball rolling on actually divorcing Mr. Ex. I'm more than a little nervous, especially given how much of my stuff is still at his house, but I know I need to do this and I need to do it NOW. Wish me luck.

The Old Heave-Ho

Today, I rant about cleaning my apartment. I need to clean my apartment, in general. Once I've got it all done, I'd like to make it more homey, and maybe post pictures.

I need to get some shelving for the living room, and put that up. I need to get my other bookshelves from Mr. Ex's place, and go through boxes there and fill those bookshelves. I need to sort the kitchen and get all the dishes put away at the same time, as many as I can fit, and find a new home for the ones that I don't have the space for. I need to clean out the fridge.

I think I want to paint, but I don't want the hassle, and I don't want to have to redo it later. Still, light green walls would make the place seem much more welcoming. Part of me wants to do a mural, but I would have to paint over it when I moved.

I need to re-organize the yarn cabinets, so that I can fit all of my stash, yarn AND fiber, into one place. Either that, or I need to put up shelves in the bedroom as well, for fiber.

I need to get a better system for feeding the cats in place. Their bowls worked well when it was just Heed, but now that Ripley is a growing girl, I think I need to get one of those larger bowls with the food reservoir, in case I don't notice right away that she's inhaled her body weight in kibble once again.

But life is good. I'm glad that I have these nesting urges, because it means that I'm liking where I am, and wanting to stay here for a good long while. And that's certainly true - I want to set up part of the living room as my spinning nook, and part of it as my reading nook, and maybe actually plug in the television that my dad was kind enough to give me.

So today, I think I shall invest in a hammer and some nails. Or drywall screws. You know, whatever works.