Category Archives: Weather, Seasons, & Celebrations

Fifty-Two Months Old!

The boy has become quite the Lego expert. He builds wonderful little vehicles, my favourite of which was the steampunk car that had a propeller on top. He completely gets this from his father, because I think very poorly in the cube-based three-dimensional manner Lego requires.

We have had some very enthusiastic pretends lately; this past weekend saw him romping through house with stuffed owls and bunnies (“I have new springs!”) being chased by pretend crocodiles. The maturity level of his playing is becoming more complex, as are the situations he sets up for his cars or trains or stuffed animals. He uses his imagination, which resides in his head right above his right eyebrow, I am told.

He’s still interested in cooking, and will drag his chair over to help me use the stand mixer. He is especially enthusiastic about cracking eggs. (The success rate is about fifty-fifty. We’re getting there.) We made cookies for our at-home Thanksgiving dinner and when we put the first tray into the oven he went and got his little chair and set it in front of the oven door so he and Blackie could watch them bake.

The relationship with Blackie is… evolving, I suppose. His first can’t-be-separated-from toy was Bun-Bun, the stuffed rabbit Roo gave him when he was about seven months old. Bun-Bun was replaced by Blackie-Whitie this Easter, and the boy will pretty much always insist on bringing Blackie out of the house with him. The problem is, once out, he often forgets to collect Blackie and bring him back to the car or the house. Sometimes he tries to shove Blackie into our hands so he’s free to do whatever he intends to do, but we’re working on getting him to understand that he has responsibility for whatever he brings with him.

Naps are still happening, thank goodness, although he misses one now and again. They’re down to an hour and a half. He’s still sleeping about ten hours at night. The bad cold he had this past month had him waking up at least once a night for a good two weeks straight, and lately he still has a tendency to wake up around three or four in the morning. Then again, we all do these days, so it’s not so surprising. He gets put back to bed, and while he is upset at the time he falls asleep quickly.

The boy whistles better than I can. It’s both cheer-worthy and annoying.

He’s getting quite good at photography. As we have had one camera damaged already in the past three years, we are kind of jumpy about letting him use this one, but when he’s calm he’s pretty good with it. We’ll be looking for a secondhand one for him for Yule. I think I was about six when I got my first camera, a little Kodak Instamatic. Allow me to share one of the coolest artistic photos he’s taken so far:

He also took the pictures of me spinning. He needs to work on keeping people’s heads in the frame, and thinking of faces as the focus, but in general he’s not bad.

Perhaps not surprisingly, he picks up music extremely quickly. I’ve noticed it in the car, where he can often sing most of the words of a song after two cycles of the CD, but his teacher has noted it as well, saying that he often has new songs learned after one go at circle time.

He has suddenly mastered zippers, getting his arms into coats, and doing up belts. Getting socks on is almost there. He’s trying valiantly, but we often have to set them on his toes so he can pull them over his foot and up his leg.

Reading: he knows more than he’s letting on. This is frustrating for us. I understand that he doesn’t want to lose the closeness of an activity like reading together, but nothing we say or do seems to convince him that we’ll keep reading to him if he admits that he can read on his own. His language skills are noticeably developing more and more. His inflections and sense of humour are really emerging. He’s starting to engage in wordplay, which is hilarious. There are a lot of “Why did the chicken cross the road?” jokes going on, which are funny because they’re not funny, if you know what I mean. ( “Because his knitting was on the other side!” will kill your audience because you’ve missed the point of the joke.)

There were two big events this past month. The first was his first trip to go apple picking. We had a wonderful day out with the Aubin-Murphy clan, helping the kids find the best trees, the highest apples, and enough ladders so they didn’t have to keep taking turns. The second was the harvest ritual at Rowan Hill Farm, which was the first ritual he was old enough to actually understand and participate in independently. Both events were full of enthusiasm, love, running around outdoors, and absolute joy. It’s when I see him running around in situations like this that I can’t help but feel joy as well. It’s catching.

Dull

First, a pretty picture: I’m currently spinning some Louet Northern Lights in the Cactus Flower colourway. It’s my first foray into spinning dyed fibre, and it’s fascinating me. I probably wouldn’t have chosen this to spin, but it was a test done with fibre on hand, and it turns out it works rather well for a project I had in mind. More on that later, though. Show and tell first!

Okay. Now for the less than cheerful stuff.

I seem to be at a pretty bad fibro low. The cold/flu thing that tag-teamed me through September really kicked me hard, and getting back on my feet is a very long drawn-out process that’s not much fun at all. It’s also that time of year where I’m restless, but don’t want to leave my office. I want to be out being distracted by things, but I don’t have the energy to either do it physically or mentally, since dealing with People At Large requires a heck of a lot of energy. And as I no longer have the car, going out via public requires more time and physical energy as well.

So I’m spending a lot of time flipping dully through stuff on the internet hoping for inspiration, researching spinning and testing stuff out because it relaxes me and doesn’t draw a whole bunch of energy from me, and getting frustrated because I can’t work. Work is… draining. It’s at the point where I’m not being fulfilled by it, and it’s just a paycheque. Which is not a bad thing, because I never set out on this particular freelance gig seeking fulfillment; it was always intended to be just a paycheque, because money is good. It’s just really hard to open these documents and run a review on them, because most of the time they’re poorly written and poorly laid out, and that’s really depressing. I have to muster up a huge amount of energy to deal with them, and that’s draining on a whole other level. What would probably fulfill me more is actually writing, except that whole finite amount of energy and currently low levels means I need to direct the energy towards paying/deadlined work first. I feel exhausted just thinking about writing my own stuff, and not terribly inspired. What I need to do is rethink how I handle these assignments. Maybe read through them entirely before starting to pull out the broken elements for the report, then handle the report at the end rather than starting with it at the beginning of the read-through, because it slows things down.

Cello is feeling kind of sloggy at the moment too, because I’m trying to internalize a whole lot of stuff that’s coming up in lessons, mostly about technique, and as a result a bunch of other stuff is breaking down. This is not unusual; very often we have to unlearn things, or take things apart in order to reassemble them properly. I know this intellectually, but my emotional awareness just sees things I was playing decently now being played horribly and piles on the self-confidence crisis. Orchestra is a slog too, because I’ve been dealing with the take-apartness issues (I’ve played everything on this program before, so why can’t I do it now?), the past month I’ve been ill and unable to focus properly, and I’m experiencing issues with bringing things up to tempo. I can play them sub-tempo at home, and I’m not up to speed yet at rehearsal, which, let me tell you, is frustrating and embarrassing when you sit second chair right in front of the conductor. (I am very specifically not looking at the Beethoven, here. I know, I asked for a Beethoven symphony; I’ve changed my mind. How about some Haydn? Or some Boyce?) So rather than being excited about cello the way I was in the spring and early summer I’m dragging my feet.

There’s a wedding this Saturday for which I’m trying to muster up the enthusiasm to attend. It’s Thanksgiving, which means there will be a visit to the in-laws. Perhaps that’s part of my trouble; we usually visit my parents at this time of year, and maybe not going is messing with my seasonal pattern.

Ultimately it all comes down to being frustrated because I don’t have enough energy to handle everything I need to handle. I want to go out; I stay home because I know that if I go out I’ll exhaust myself for an undetermined period of time. I can’t focus on work. Cello is at a not-rewarding point.

The one good thing that’s happening is spinning. I am so thankful I discovered it at this particular point, because it’s productive and creative while being not overly demanding energy-wise. I just started my first spinning with colour experiment (see above), and it’s brilliant. Ceri got the fibre as a sample when we took our spindle class together in May, and found it while she was looking for something else during the crafting weekend. The bag of roving was a bit garish, but I test-spun it and lo and behold, it’s exactly my goddaughter’s favourite colours: hot pink, deep greens and blues, and some purples. The colours soften and blend so much during the spinning process that the single is quite attractive. I’m so glad, because finding a yarn for the wrap I wanted to knit for her as a Yule gift was becoming quite a trial (not that I was looking for a colourway with all her favourite colours in it; this was pure serendipity). I’m spinning a fairly fine single, and fingering weight (what the pattern calls for — well, actually it doesn’t, it calls for laceweight, but I’m knitting a heavier wrap so I’ll be using fingering weight) will be no problem at all. Thank goodness my beloved LYS Ariadne Knits had another couple of the small 2oz bags in stock; they’ve got those aside for me, and all together that will be 6oz and more than enough (she said, crossing her fingers and looking sternly at the spinning wheel, which is totally innocent). Of course, once it’s spun up and plied I’ll have to knit the thing, which is another kettle of fish entirely. I am also planning to knit a hat with earflaps for the boy, so we shall see what all these good intentions bring.

Noon

Four loads of laundry done (okay, the third’s drying, the fourth’s in the washer), the freelance polishing is almost complete, and the sun is actually out today. I feel slightly more human, though folding the first two loads of laundry wiped me out for a good half hour.

HRH turned the heat on in the kitchen last night, as it’s central so would take the chilly edge off pretty much everywhere, because the temperature went down to three degrees C last night. Seriously, October? Three degrees already? Come on, Indian summer!

ETA @ 2 PM: Laundry done, and freelance thing done. Going to go fall into bed now, because I’m dizzy and have the chills.

Weekend Roundup

So very tired. This cold is kicking me, and dealing with the boy’s cold and being home 24/7 is draining me even more. Plus it was a packed weekend (of course).

Before the weekend roundup begins, it is important to note that on Thursday night, I rejoined the Thursday night gaming group for the first time in, oh, possibly almost a decade, because HRH rearranged the basement office to make room for a table and chairs and the gang came over here so that both HRH and I could be in the game at the same time. I’d originally dropped gaming because I was burnt out, and then there was the boy and someone needed to be home with him, so even though the spirit was willing, getting a babysitter every Thursday night was not remotely possible; besides which, the fibro over the past handful of years (pre- and post-diagnosis) makes evenings out doubtful. But the compromise of being in one Thursday night game a month(ish) and in my own home is very doable. MLG has launched a new Star Trek game which promises to be very exciting, and it was very flattering to have so many people thrilled that I was back. I’ve missed the gang, and it’s great that they’re willing to move that one game in the four-game rotation to a place where I can participate.

I got an e-mail Friday afternoon from the freelance coordinator, who congratulated me on my patience and courage in handling the horrific project I’d handed in Thursday night. And my new assignment landed, which is a lovely little 23K word general fiction manuscript to evaluate, which I suspect was cherry-picked for me after the nightmare, bless them. HRH came home at lunch on Friday, and Friday afternoon we went to HRH’s parents’ house to belatedly celebrate his mom’s birthday. It was much more relaxing than I expected it to be, and I got another inch knitted on my lace scarf. I had a good cello lesson on Friday night, too, which helped. I was upfront about my lack of energy and focus, so after we worked a bit of Mooney we sight-read the Mozart duet that M and I are playing for the recital this December. It’s just lovely, and amusingly/conveniently enough it hits all the things I need to work on: smooth bow changes, listening, timing, and expression. I didn’t hate everything I played, which I tend to do when I’m tired and can’t remember new instructions from one moment to the next. The pretty melody helps a lot with that. I love to play it. I’m so fortunate that my teacher understands that I have a condition with fatigue and focus issues, and is willing to work with me through them.

Saturday morning we did groceries and I baked. I made a double loaf of herb bread with half white and half whole wheat flour and an apple cake to take to the harvest ritual at Rowan Tree Farm that afternoon. HRH headed off belatedly to deliver things and pick Amanda up and didn’t get back till half an hour after I’d wanted to leave. As RTF is an hour and a half away that means we got there an hour later than the suggested target time. We had a lovely harvest ritual in which we counted our blessings, and then t! and Jan feasted us with local venison and boar sausages, lamb sausage, locally sourced beef, and the side dishes the guests had brought. We had to flee around seven-thirty because the boy had to get home and HRH had a bachelor party to attend back home. I felt rushed, which on top of the cold and increasing fatigue due to said cold and small boy being home sick made me disinclined to be social.

Sunday morning was Pagan playgroup, which HRH attended with us because I was too fatigued to drive safely. The coordinator was delighted to see him, especially since half the kids were missing. It was a really nice low-key day. On the way home we stopped at a pharmacy so I could finally pick up cold medication for myself. After a chat with my mum and a light lunch I napped while the boy did, and then Ceri came over for a wonderfully quiet afternoon of knitting… which neither of us did. I spun another threeish ounces of Corrie, and she crocheted. And the boy learned how to use the ball winder, an event he has been looking forward to for ages. (How many four year old boys do you know who can correctly identify a ball winder in a catalogue?)

He was very excited about making ‘yarn cakes’, and stacked three of varying sizes into a wedding cake-like configuration. Ceri got to use the skein winder in conjunction with the ball winder too, which was very exciting once we figured out the angle necessary so the thing would actually turn to wind off the skein while she wound it into a centre-pull ball. And we discovered that if I mount the skein winder on the wheel post backwards, I can keep spinning while it’s being used. Efficiency!

HRH handled dinner and let me have a bath, for which I was extremely grateful because the fatigue was getting worse. After dinner we put the boy to bed, Blade came down to be the Designated Responsible Adult On Site, and we headed out to our monthly steampunkian horror game chez Tal. Everyone was tired, so it was a very brief focused game in which yet more puzzle pieces dropped into place and important info was added to the clues we already had.

This morning the boy is home yet again, because his nose is still unpredictable and every few hours there’s a nasty coughing jag. As bronchitis popped up at the school twice in the past couple of weeks, I’m taking him to the doctor today (if there’s an appointment free; can’t call till nine, and the line will be swamped with everyone calling in after the weekend, grr) to make sure all’s well with him. If I can’t get an appointment, I’ll try sending him in tomorrow.

Speaking of which, I’m off to brave the phone lines. Wish us luck.

ETA: Forty minutes to get through… and the doctor’s not in this week. The nurse asked if he had a fever (no), if there was anything alarming (no), was I giving him anything for it (yes, an expectorant syrup), said that a lot of the viruses (virii?) going round left lingering dry coughs that weren’t indicators of anything serious, and to take him to a clinic if it hasn’t cleared up by the end of the week. Fine; Plan B it is! Keep him home today, send him in tomorrow.

Ten!

On this day ten years ago (TEN!), in the company of family and dear chosen family on a spectacular autumn day, I married my best friend.

We have now officially spent a quarter of our lives together!

Today also marks the twelfth anniversary of HRH and I doing our first road trip together, one of the joys I have continued to experience with him throughout our marriage. I’ve been told that the true test of a couple is if they can paint a room together without killing one another, but I suspect the ability to survive a road trip better attests to their ability to co-exist harmoniously.

I received an exquisite handmade wooden rose as an anniversary gift, and my parents sent us a cheque for a dinner out (thanks, Mum and Dad!). I’m exhausted and fighting this cold, and have the boy home for a third day in a row, so I don’t have much energy (there’s also a family dinner and a cello lesson ahead of me; I hope my teacher understands my inability to process much tonight), but I do have enough to say:

I love you, HRH. We’ve put up with a lot of ups and downs, challenges, and obstacles, but I think things are paying off in some sort of stability. We still have a way to go, but I can’t imagine traveling the road ahead with anyone but you… accompanied by the boy, of course, and any number of stuffed rabbits.

Weekend Roundup With Bonus Monday Material

Sushi Friday night! This was a long-awaited treat. We went to our favourite sushi restaurant with Jeff and Paze, and as we went out after the kids were in bed there weren’t tables when we arrived. We chatted at the bar for about half an hour or forty-five minutes, and when we finally got a table the chef sent over a treat for us as a thank you for being so patient. It was one of his personal creations, not on the menu, and was delicious: a roll of salmon around tuna and what may have been red snapper, all wrapped in nori and lightly sauteed so that the first five millimeters or so of the salmon were barely cooked, all drizzled with a gingery sesame-chili-green oniony sticky glaze that we all scraped up with our chopsticks after the roll was gone. Oh ye gods, it was all heavenly. The tiny bit of cooked salmon contrasted so beautifully in taste and texture with the raw. I want to be kept waiting for half an hour every time now. We also learned that they’re expanding! Finally, after a decade of going to this tiny restaurant that seats maybe thirty people, they’re taking over half of the next space in the mall, so we’ll be able to bring a party larger than four people, which currently strains the seating. (Perhaps they will also take reservations. You never know.) We’re very excited about this, not only for our benefit, but because it means the restaurant is doing so very well. They opened two new locations over the past few years, one in Vaudreuil and one in Laval, but this one has stayed tiny and intimate. I can’t say I’m thrilled with their switch in music from jazz classics to modern pop, but everything else more than makes up or it. Dinner was, of course, delicious.

Saturday morning I headed out to my cello lesson, which was pretty intense in the focusing department. It was also very physical in that we spent a lot of time talking about back muscles and doing various exercises in order to isolate their movement. I also got to choose between two pieces for my solo in the upcoming Christmas recital, and I chose another duet with M, a lovely two-cello arrangement of Mozart’s ‘Canzonetta sull’ aria‘ from Le nozze di Figaro. I get to play Susanna! The lesson was good, but by the time I headed home I was drained, exhausted, and dizzy, and when I got in I knew that I was going to be useless for the rest of the day. This was problematic because I’d scheduled a very necessary grocery run and various errands, most birthday-related, and then had to drive to the south shore through a detour around the reserve to get to my in-laws’ house for HRH’s mom’s birthday dinner. (HRH was being picked up by his dad that morning in order to go help put a new fence in.) Well, the day got shafted because I couldn’t focus enough to drive, which made me even more irritated than the original irritation about being downed by the fibro. The boy and I stayed home all afternoon, napping together, watching movies, and making cupcakes. In the end we rescheduled the birthday dinner for next Friday night and HRH’s dad brought him back home again, going above and beyond the call of duty by crossing the bridge and traveling the associated detour four times in total.

I was climbing walls by that point, so HRH insisted that we head out to make an appearance at Scott’s birthday gathering after the boy was in bed. As I didn’t have to drive I agreed, with the proviso that the moment I felt not-good we had to leave. Things went rather well, and there was excellent company. I spent a couple of hours watching people play the new Beatles Rock Band game while HRH drummed or sat out, and he even pulled off a very impressive vocal performance of ‘Yellow Submarine’. We came home to bed at a reasonable hour. Blade is to be commended for being the Responsible Adult On Site two nights in a row.

Sunday morning we went apple picking! I have never done this before. Formally, I mean; I’ve pulled an apple here and there from people’s trees to eat as a child, but I’ve never done the full-out trip to an orchard. We met the Murphy-Aubin clan at an “apple forest” near Oka and had an absolutely fabulous morning. The weather was glorious, the company was excellent, the apples were delicious, and the kids had a great time running around, up and down ladders, in and out of branches so laden with apples that they bent to touch the grass below. It was spectacular. I ate more apples in one day than I have over the past year, and every single one of them was indescribably delicious. We now have twenty pounds of apples. It was a lovely way to celebrate the first day of fall, although one day early.

Back home we napped, and then the boys took me to my group cello lesson, which was great fun. While I was there they did the groceries, then they picked me up and brought me home again. We had sausages and eggs for dinner, I called my mum to chat, and went to bed. I slept poorly again, though, and only got about four hours, which made Monday kind of hard.

The lack of sleep wasn’t the only thing making Monday hard. I opened my latest freelance assignment to find a 172,000-word manuscript presented in a font composed entirely of capital letters. (I am serious. The author screamed this novel. All five hundred pages of it.) Not only that, the classification was wrong; it wasn’t a fantasy novel, but religious fiction, which isn’t one of the areas I work in. After calming down I debated sending it back, but figured no, I would just be focused and ruthless like I’m supposed to be. I tend to give a lot more time to these evaluations than I ought to, and I need to learn how to be more precise and efficient. This is as good a place as any to begin. And I began by changing the damn font to Times New Roman and putting a big note on the front of the evaluation saying that in order to be read and evaluated the font had to be reformatted, and all page references were according to the new pagination. (I am still incandescent about it.)

Last night we had a Harvest ritual, focusing on celebrating our achievements over the past year. B brought a small bottle of ice cider, and we used our horn for the first time (although we offered the horn to the gods, ancestors, and spirits and used small glasses for ourselves, as most of us had colds). I am really enjoying how our coven is exploring a different way of celebrating, rather than using standard Wiccan format. We’ve chosen to explore the Germanic aspects of our tradition and heritage, and we’re finding that the philosophies reflect our goals and directions very well.

Today I finish up the evaluation, and if I have time, I may prep some more fibre to spin, or I may crack open the black roving I got with the wheel, or even try some of the silky BFL I have left over from spindling.

Weekend Roundup

The weather’s turned crisp. Nice cool mornings, sunny days that don’t get too hot, and cool nights. I love this time of year.

Busy weekend!

Saturday morning I had a cello lesson, where I couldn’t hold more than one thing in my mind at a time. I warned my teacher that I was on the low end of the fibro scale, and she was patient with me, but it was rather amusing in a rueful sort of way to observe how I forgot about left hand when focusing on right elbow, and that sort of thing. Anyway, we have reached the Lully Gavotte, which amuses me for some reason. I think I’ve heard enough other people talk about working on it that it has stuck in my mind somehow.

When I got back HRH and the boy were in the garage, tuning up HRH’s bike and the trailer; they were heading out for a ride. They picked up hot dogs and french fries for us from the local drive-in, where the local hospital was doing their annual fundraiser. The boy charmed everyone by wearing his Superman shirt, his cape, and his bike helmet.

After lunch Ceri picked me up to head out to Ariadne, our favorite LYS, so I could pick up a magazine they had aside for me and she could choose sock yarn for a Christmas project. When we got there MA looked up and said, “Oh hey, I just got a cryptic email from UPS. Apparently they have received a 23-pound box from Louet for us. Now, I could be wrong, but something that heavy sounds like it probably has a wheel in it.” “Either a wheel, or a whole lot of yarn,” I said, but inside I was jumping up and down and squealing, “MY WHEEL MIGHT BE HERE THIS WEEK!” I did say, and MA agreed, that I’d believe it when I see it, and I am somewhat tired of hoping the wheel will arrive sooner rather than later, but I am cautiously optimistic.

I did recon on colourways for a Yule gift I’ll be knitting, and alas, they don’t have the one I want in the weight I need, so I shall have to track it down elsewhere or order it. I squooshed yarn and offered opinions on colourways while Ceri decided on her sock yarn, and we kept wandering back to the shelves of spinning fiber to pet them all. Ceri also bought me… er, my wheel… a gift of beautiful Lorna’s Lace fibre, lovely squooshy strokable superwash merino wool top in the Baltic Sea colourway, a lovely misty green/brown/heather symphony that I adore. (It may be my monitor settings, but the actual top is more subdued and has more grey in it than the linked page shows.) I cuddled it a few times in the shop, and told her that when I had my wheel and was proficient enough to spin sock yarn, I was going to buy it and make yarn so she could knit me a pair of socks. And she picked it right up with a grin and carried it to the counter to buy it. I am a very, very lucky person in my friends. I take the fibre out of the box I hid it in and pet it every once in a while. I would leave it out on my desk to admire, but I have cats who think fiber is stuff to sink teeth into and pull apart with joyous abandon.

We got home and knitted companionably for a while, with HRH and the boy wandering in and out. Then Jan and t! stopped by, later than I had anticipated. t! had called me earlier to ask about construction in the area, as he was going to be driving through on his way to the south shore for paperwork, and upon hearing that he was going to drop Jan to wander aimlessly around from mid-afternoon till the concert later that night I told him to drop her here instead. Due to the incredible space-bending and cardinal point-switching properties of the borough in which we live they got turned around and were late, so t! ended up very sensibly canceling his paperwork errand in favour of calming down instead of rushing and being stressed before the show. So there were a bunch of us knitting and eating brownies and drinking beer or other refreshing beverages, and it was an impromptu party. Then t! left for the gig setup and sound check, and the three of us knitted or sewed until Ceri went home for dinner. HRH’s parents showed up and we all ordered pizza from the local pizzeria. The boy settled down to watch a film with his grandparents while Jan and I worked on the back deck till it was time to leave for the concert. I don’t get to see Jan very often any more, and I miss her, so it was really nice to spend quiet time with her and chat.

The concert was fantastic, of course. We’re always predisposed to enjoy ourselves at an Invisible concert, but this was particularly good. I’m so proud of the guys for further refining and developing their sound and skill. The band was relaxed, the songs were tight, the new songs were lots of fun, and the company was of course excellent. I’d made the decision to not dance, as I’ve been suffering from low energy and low-level pain (no love, fibro) as well as the exciting back spasms, but when ‘Sheena is a Punk Rocker’ started playing and the rest of the Random Colour girls present leapt to their feet, I knew I couldn’t let them or the band down, during both that song and ‘Poor DeeDee’ which followed it. I seem to have survived the rash but enthusiastic decision quite well on the fibro side, but in the realm of non-fibro-related mishaps, while dancing I whacked my right hand against the lead guitarist’s headstock when he’d jumped off the stage to dance with us. I discovered the mild sprain in the car on the way home: a swollen finger that wouldn’t bend. The next morning it was an interesting shade of dark purple, still swollen and not bending. It gradually improved, and the swelling has now completely vanished, although it’s still mildly discoloured and is creaky when I bend it. It’s just not a punk concert unless someone gets injured. Fortunately it’s my bow hand, so it hasn’t interfered with fingering. I can’t count the number of times I was asked if I missed performing at the concert, and the answer is, yes, I do miss it. I always miss it, and it’s worse at the shows themselves. But I don’t miss the stress and the struggle to perfect things. The further away we get from working on music together, the more I understand what a huge challenge we set for ourselves in trying to arrange music for the selection of instruments Random Colour comprised. It would be interesting to work with a different set of instruments, or on a different kind of music.

Sunday was lazy, lazy, lazy! I couldn’t fall asleep till about two in the morning after the concert, and I initially woke up at five something, so the boys let me doze in bed for a good long while. When I finally dragged myself out of bed we all decided that we were having a really relaxed sort of day. We had nowhere to be and nothing pressing to do until HRH left to help ADZO move some heavy appliances. The boy and I napped, then watched some TMBG DVDs and read books. My mum called, back from a wonderful visit to France with her sister, and it was great to hear about her experience.

There; that was our weekend. Today has been an exercise in lack of focus and self-discipline, although I did bake a batch of bread and one of cinnamon buns, edit a review, and practice (hello Lully Gavotte!), as well as setting up for the next freelance assignment that is due on Friday. I’ve been fighting bad fibro lethargy for a while now, and while the lower back spasmy thing has pretty much passed, the exhaustion that follows physical illness or injury is still happening.

On Saturday I finished the increases on the yoke/cap sleeves of my short-sleeved sweater. The next row I get to bind off the edge of the sleeves, and then the next row I cast on shorter rows and join them to the front and back to start knitting the body of the sweater. Progress! I may even finish it before it gets too cold to wear short sleeves, although at the rate the weather is going I doubt it. The lace scarf is progressing nicely.

That’s all the news that’s fit to print at the moment. Maybe something more exciting will happen tomorrow, although I doubt it.