now I have Spinal Tap’s song “Sex Farm Woman” stuck in my head.

I tried knitting the sock with three strands of the lopi held together on Saturday but I think that on 10.5 needles that is for much stronger hands than mine. I think I’m going to try it again later on but on larger needles - like 13 or 15s. Or maybe single strands. Not sure.

In the meantime I dug around in my stash and found four skeins of unclaimed kureyon (yes I really suck) so I cast my hand (so to speak) at fuzzy feet on Sunday. And it went quickly. In fact I cast it on when “Girl Interrupted” came on tnt and was done with it by the end of “Unfaithful”. So, two movies I’d never seen and a humongous sock. Not bad!

It took a little over a skein of kureyon. See the two blue rings on the toe? That’s where I had to start using a second skein. Then when I realized I had plenty left over I picked up the stitches at the top and made it a little taller. So the two blue rings at the toe and the green and first grey ring at the top are the second skein. In between those is an entire skein. So I’d say it doesn’t even use 1/4 of the second skein, even with the extra rows on the cuff.

And they’re not kidding about how huge these puppies are.

So I’m turning the heel on the second one now and should be done with it tonight. I think it’ll be a good “pick up put down” project with the trick or treaters.

I did my annual trimming of the bushes and sweeping of the sidewalk for the kids today. I get worried about them stumbling over the rocks from the xeriscaping or getting pricked by our scary bushes. I couldn’t find the hedge trimmers though and had to use scissors. Now I have prickles in my fingers and a giant blister. Poor me. But the kids won’t get hurt walking up to our door tonight so that’s good.

I tried to get photos of Phunq and Kurry since it’s Halloween and they’re my black kitties. But black kitties are very, very hard to photograph. Especially when they keep moving around. So these are what I got.

This is Phunq (as in George Clinton). He’s a sweet boy.

This is Kurry’s butt.

This is Phunq and Kurry. And a copper kettle on the brick hearth. Hoo hoo witchy woman.

Kurry at a distance

Phunq again. He likes to pretend that he’s a really cool lamp. He’s a photogenic guy.

And Kurry being blinded by the flash.

Then the batteries ran out. So there you go. Black cats on Halloween.

Be safe tonight.

I’m a big dork but I’m excited I just made my first yarn sale at my Etsy shop! People like my stuff, Mom!

I added the yarns from yesterday and the autumnal crossover scarf to the shop. I pulled the October Song yarn because I want to make a hat out of it now. This is the attitude I’d really like to keep about it: if people buy my yarn, great! If they don’t I’ll just knit something fun with it eventually. If I put that up for sale and it sells super! If not, I have a readymade present for someone.

I spun the yellow and orange yarn for Mr. Tong’s birthday Jayne Cobb Hat but the red roving I’d bought wasn’t quite the right color for it - a bit more wine than rusty red but it’s beautiful anyway. In fact, it’s probably my favorite yarn so far. I’m already calling it Muscadine Wine. So back to ebay to find a more suitable red for the hat.

Erin and I have joined the Fuzzy Feet Along. I just happened to buy some lopi for that the other day at Good Fibrations. I’ll be holding three different colored strands so it should be interesting. And super thick! Which is good the person I’m making it for has really cold feet. I should go get it started now so I won’t be trying to join three strands in the round at the knitting group. I never do well with joining in the round if I’m distracted.

I don’t plan on bringing the wheel to the group today. But I might bring the hedgehog.

Because I’m tired.

Here’s some merino I spun and set a few weeks ago. I’m already running out of creative names for yarn so Cody has dubbed it “Romantic Bruise” for me.

This stuff is gorgeous and super soft.

This is some pink, yellow, and purple alpaca that I spun last weekend. Without Cody here to name it I’ved been calling it Pepto Party.

Spinning alpaca is a very different proposition than spinning wool. It spins sooo fine though. I’d say this is almost sportweight but is mostly dk.

I also finished the ornaments for the aunts’ party.

And I’m thinking about printing this photo for holiday cards

I also knit two very silly novelty yarn scarves.

This was last week’s. It’s a silly glittery fishnet pink fuzzy boo boo kitty kind of scarf that Dr. Frank N Furter would kill to have.

And I knit this one yesterday. It’s another dropped stitch crossover scarf on bigger needles with this supersuper soft novelty two ply from the Hobby Lobby store brand called Yarn Bee.

So that’s what I’ve been up to. Oh, and Winter has been getting cold (she’s a very shorthaired dog) and they just don’t make very many sweaters and things in her size. I have plans to knit one and she has a great polar fleece coat from Orvis. But she just needed a little extra, it’s not quite cold enough for polar fleece yet. So she’s been wearing some of our old t shirts.

I got that t shirt free when I bought a pair of docs in some weird downtown Sydney shoe store sometime in 92. It’s shrunk significanty since then but it fits Winter nicely. I just have to tie the shirt at her waist a bit but she seems to like it. And she looks so cute. My little punk rock mohawk sporting dog. She calmly puts up with all kinds of silly humiliations at the hands of her mom.

Ok, naptime.

I’m just busy knitting tiny mittens and socks for the annual aunts’ ornament party. They’re having it early this year. Really early. Like a week from this friday when they usually have it the weekend after Thanksgiving. The one aunt who lives out of state will be visiting so they wanted to have it while she’s in town. But that put a bit of a crunch on me since I was planning on handknitting the ornaments. So I’m busy knitting ornaments and chenille washcloths for the present exchange instead of knitting in fun autumn-y colors like I want to. But I’m almost done!

It’s been a fairly quiet week other than that. Had some tooth pain a few times and had to take a few prescription pain reliever-induced naps. One of my crowns came in early and I went to have it put in yesterday but one side wasn’t as flush with the other tooth as much as it should be so back to the lab it went. The temporary crown is working fine anyway I can chew on that side without getting stuff stuck in that little crevice. But the other side is still a pain. God I hate my teeth.

I had a lot of fun on Saturday though. The Knitters Not Quitters group is so much fun the way it expands and shrinks every week. Always interesting people and conversations. And the Napoli people are so nice about us moving furniture and using our spinning wheels.

Beverly and I had a great time chatting about books and knitting and taking a short roadtrip to Good Fibrations on the other side of the east mountains in Edgewood. She and her sister are going to be in Rome at the same time as my sister and her husband so hopefully they can all go out to dinner. Those with higher English degrees unite! Odd, isn’t it that I’m surrounded by word people? My husband, my sister, her husband, Erin, her husband, and now Beverly. Even one of my favorite online buddies is an English professor. Not something you’d expect from a slightly verbose visual arts chick.

I found out we’re going to have visitors from San Francisco the week of Thanksgiving which is exciting. So we’ll have to do some tidying and clean up the guest room - which is the usually kitty room so it’s full of hair and scary cat emanations. But I’m not going to worry about that until after the ornament party. I’m not sure but I think I’ll do the half-assed Furr’s precooked thanksgiving meal kind of cooking. All I know is I’ll be delighted to see Jocelyn (whom I haven’t seen since March) and get to know her boyfriend better (I’ve only met the guy once before) and have someone to eat turkey with since Cody will be working that night, as usual. So that’s exciting.

If you already have a costume for yourself and your pet. Don’t forget one for your ipod.

Includes costumes for ipods, ipod minis, and shuffles. None for the nanos.

Via Mighty Goods.

A very typical scene with my two most frequent knitting companions and a lovely hello yarn shawl in progress. I’d set the alarm on my computer to remind me when Adrian was updating and managed to snag the Maisy Day Pumpkin Patch kit.

We went to Wal Mart for the first time in months and months because it was the only place where I’d seen US 50 needles. Those suckers are HUGE I’ve already knit a really amusing scarf with them. I haven’t made anything with the US 35s I picked up at the same time. I also found that pink and chocolate brown quilt in a bargain bin for eleven dollars. A bargain bin at Wal Mart. Yeah I’m feeling real classy now. It’s an amusing quilt anyway.

Here are closeups of the two members of the let’s follow mom around like she has veal in her pants brigade.

Oh, I watched The Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy last night and Lords of Dogtown today. Meh. They were ok. I think the people who made the Guide to the Galaxy had an appreciation for different things with the Adams books than I did because they took out a lot of the good throwaway lines that are my favorite part but kept a lot of the false Zen hippiecrite stuff that annoys me about his books. Complaining about the general yuckiness of the human race is fine. But it gets awfully tedious after a while. I did like the scene where everyone on the Heart of Gold turned into knit figures and Arthur Dent barfed up yarn. That was cool.

I hate to say this but I liked Lords of Dogtown better. Nice skaterboy eyecandy although I felt like an old pervy woman the whole time. And there were a bunch of invented dramatic devices that were a little weird for anyone who knows the real story. All in all it wasn’t nearly as fun to watch as the Peralta documentary.

Odd that both screenplays were written by the original guys and I didn’t like them as much as I wanted to. But Ann Rice wrote the screenplay for Interview with the Vampire and it sucked hard. Mostly because of Tom Cruise.

Oh and I watched Harold and Kumar go to White Castle the other night. And liked it. I know, shame on me. I had no idea what it was about when I started watching it. I’d thought it was a weird indie flick, I probably wouldn’t have watched it if I’d known what the real Dude Where’s My Car type plotline was. But I usually will watch the whole movie once I’ve started from the beginning. And I did like it. Mostly because of Kumar’s domestic fantasy scene with a large bag of pot. That’s probably the funniest thing I’ve seen in some time. I think it reminded me of old stoner boyfriends.

Sideways is coming on in a few minutes so I’m finally getting to see that too. Lots of new (to me) movie watching. I’ve been actually returning the Netflix and paying attention to premieres on the premium channels.

Claude Monet was obsessed with light and its effect on color. He’s probably best known for his waterlilies paintings where he painted scenes from the garden of his home in Giverny at different times of day. But I think his most revealing work is the haystacks series. It really shows his appreciation for light and color, painting the same object several times but always in different colors to reflect the changes in the light.

My finished object today isn’t terribly impressive. It’s just a scarf and headband set. But there are a few things about it that make it more than a plain old scarf set.

Firstly there’s the yarn. This is my first time using Manos de Uruguay and you can bet your butt it won’t be the last. This stuff is soft and thick and warm. The colors vary from inch to inch (and skein to skein) and make a gorgeous robust knit. The fact that it’s produced by a collective of women in South America who are earning their own living makes it even more special.

Then there’s the stitch pattern. This is not an easy stitch, basically you’re doing a decrease but slipping an extra stitch in there every time. I cast this on maybe about two months ago and it’s taken me a while to finish because the progress seemed very slow. But in the end it makes a beautiful crosshatch that’s particularly nice with the variegated yarn and produces a nice, thick scarf.

And there’s how much the colors change with the variations in light.

I didn’t have enough yarn leftover from the scarf to make a hat but I wanted to make something with it so I made a headband / earwarmer. It’s not all that wide really but is thick enough to really keep the ears warm on a cold day. I was worried that it might stretch out or be too small so I made a series of eyelets and sewed on some small wooden beads I got at the infamous estate sale to make it easy to resize. It could make a good small neckwarmer too.

Winter also makes a very patient model and photography assistant.

No modeling today though she’s a bit stinky and needs a bath.

Before Sunset

I happened to catch it coming on last night just as I was sitting down to spin the last 4 ounces of Adrian’s gorgeous moody garden roving. I had a few thoughts about it.

Completely superficial observation: Ethan Hawke has aged very badly. What the hell was Uma doing to him? Or did he do it to himself? I dunno but he looks like he’s spent the last ten years in a very dark bar in a dry climate drinking whiskey and chainsmoking in between sessions of making hugely animated faces while singing the blues. Frequently forgetting to wash his face, allowing the dirt and smoke to grind right into his pores, carving lines that make him look far older than his early thirties. I mean damn I never had a crush on him but I had friends who did and I’m cringing on their behalf. Probably as they are on mine about Benicio’s aging process but he was never what someone would call pretty - which to me was half the charm.

Julie Delpy on the other hand looks great. I think she’s actually gotten better-looking with age. I particularly enjoyed her singing and the little dance she was doing at the very end. But she comes off as pretty charming even when she’s playing a werewolf.

Have to say that I didn’t really like Before Sunrise when I watched it ten years ago. I thought it was dull and self-indulgent. Or maybe that’s how I felt about Hawke. Either way it did feed some Vienna eyecandy, a place I’ve wanted to visit since I was an early teen reading old John Irving novels. It was so dull though that I haven’t watched it since.

But I enjoyed this one. It might be because I’m older and have a much better attention span. Or it might be a better movie. I couldn’t say. No, I think it’s a better movie. People in their thirties are generally more interesting to listen to than people in their early twenties, even to people in their own age group. (*SPOILER* Even when they’re smack in the middle of a cliched failing shotgun marriage and aboug to cheat on their wives with an old French flame */SPOILER*) No offense twentysomethings.

And Richard Linklater, whose movies usually direcly hit or completely miss with me, can pick a hell of a soundtrack. In Before Sunset’s case a lot of it was so subtle you didn’t even notice there was music but it added something. But it’s hard to mess up with Nina Simone, hell even that American La Femme Nikita remake was good primarily because of her music.

Finding Neverland

I didn’t really get to appreciate the visuals as much as I think I should have, but I was doing crafty stuff. This is also why I haven’t watched a subtitled foreign language movie in the last eight months. I’m usually looking elsewhere but am listening intently. So I guess I listened to Finding Neverland the other night, not exactly watched it. And in that regard, Johnny Depp nailed that Scottish accent down to the friggin ground.

Almost twenty years ago I was clandestinely taping 21 Jumpstreet, watching the tapes late at night in my room. Now he’s making these interesting characters come alive. And making it look easy. On the other hand, twenty years ago I made no effort to hide my crush on Nicolas Cage, punk rock boy and crazy 20s era mobster. Now look at his stupid action movie sap ass reproducing with women half his age and naming them after comic book characters (and not even the interesting ones!) self. One of my friends in Santa Fe had a theory that seems more plausible each year about how Cage sold his soul to the devil so he could be an actor, one that specified he could be in good movies for the first ten-fifteen years or so then he would have to spend the rest of his life making absolute crap. Spooky isn’t it?

Finding Neverland was good. Very good. Sweet and sad and charming. Kind of like Peter Pan. Julie Christie almost stole the show too. (She certainly did in Afterglow) And Kate Winslet didn’t. Which was kind of a relief, sometimes she can make a movie exhausting. This isn’t her fault really she’s just got a light inside that takes over sometimes - which can make watching a movie with her very tiring. I think as she’s gotten older she’s learned to control that a little. Which is nice.

Oh there’s an IMDB poll today about which Robert Altman movie is your favorite so go vote. I, of course, voted for Gosford Park. My sister will probably vote for Nashville. Which Altman movie is your favorite?

Ok I’m done now. I’m fantasy shopping at Patternworks. If you haven’t subscribed to their catalog you really really should because it’s like KNITTING PORN. And really GOOD knitting porn because you could open the catalog to any page and find something desirable. Try that with any other catalog or knitting book. Or porn if that’s your thing. I’m not here to judge. Not you anyway.

and gets the CRAP beat out of her gums! Yeah, ok I deserved it. I don’t take nearly as good care of my teeth as I should and ok, yeah I haven’t had an in-office cleaning since 2000. Mix this with the genetic lottery number I pulled (which includes great intelligence, naturally good skin and hair, a penchant for rich foods with a comparatively small metabolism and extremely high maintenance teeth) and I shouldn’t expect anything less.

Lucky me I get to have a crown that’s already been drilled through for a re-root canal replaced and two other crowns put in. YAY!

When I start to think about how much money has been spent on my teeth over the years what with the pediatric cavities, braces, wisdom teeth extraction alone I start to get a bit woozy. Or maybe that’s the killer pain meds the dentist prescribed for me.

The good news is I think we’ve finally found an acceptable dentist in the state of New Mexico. He seemed hyper-aware of my low pain threshold and was equally appalled when I told him about the dentist in Santa Fe that told me to drink a bottle of wine rather than prescribe pills when I complained about tooth pain from his last filling. This new guys’ hygienists were very nice (considering what they had to do) and his bill wasn’t completely outrageous, well, for what all is going on. So anyone in Albuquerque that needs a new dentist I TOTALLY recommend Dr. Tom Heflin.

In other news I added a few things to the etsy shop.

Winter is a very patient knitting and spinning companion. As long as there’s room on the loveseat for her.

And a 15 meg video of Zola eating some wet cat food (her favorite special treat)