Category Archives: Cogging for Kibble

Destined For Great Things… Someday

From a recent Ravelry exchange with Ceri:

    A: This is just gorgeous: [links to a pattern for a simply stunning knitted silk top]

    Ceri: Oh, lovely! I saw this at the bottom. Gorgeous: [links to a pattern for yet another stunning knitted lace top]

    A: Stunning! I want that, too! Wah. I have not the skill to do this, and I suspect I won’t for quite some time.

    Ceri: Well, you only get better by trying harder projects, right?

    A: Well, yes, but you’re talking to someone who hasn’t successfully purled yet.

Which means there’s nowhere to go but up, really.

In the ‘overdue assignment I just got yesterday’ news, I’m about a third of the way along. Trudge, trudge, trudge…

Slightly Fuzzy Proof Of Recital Fun

My stand partner just sent me a couple of pictures taken at the recital. See? I’m smiling! I’m having fun! It’s slightly out of focus but a cheerful souvenir anyhow.

Not as much fun: Being told that you’re a week late on an assignment that you never got. No initial contact regarding the assignment, no file in the FTP folder, just an automated “you’re late” notice. My contact has apologized for the glitch but wants to know if I can do it anyway. Sigh.

Day’s Summary

My site was down earlier and I could not blog! So here’s the day so far in one shot.

8h47: I am very achy. Not as achy as yesterday, thank goodness, and my focus is better. I was so achy yesterday I couldn’t even knit. This damn freelance assignment is getting done today, come what may. Because, well, I did nothing on it yesterday. Not for lack of trying, though. And I handled lots of other things that needed to be done, many of which were overdue to be handled. None of it was stuff that would yield a paycheque, however.

9h35: I have now spent an hour and a half trying to figure out what yarn Mousme used for Bodhifox’s Ravenclaw scarf. I think I have it tracked down by comparing the recommended yarns in the pattern and the pictures she posted. The name she gave me wasn’t correct (which she suspected when giving it to me) so I went around it the long way. (No, I am not yet working. Shut up.)

10h25: Ceri has just given me the correct name of the yarn! I was completely wrong. Are those angels singing? And I’ve just found a replacement for the discontinued shade! Now to track it down in person at one of my local yarn shops, many of whom carry yarn from this manufacturer.

11h47: Oops. I overcooked my chicken nuggets and smiley fries. They probably shouldn’t shatter when you bite them.

12h31: Facebook is a good place to divert frustrated blogging energy when attempting to work-avoid.

11h30: The rest of the LCO fall concert has been posted on Youtube:

Vivaldi concerto grosso part 1 (first and second movements)
Vivaldi Concerto Grosso part 2 (third movement)
Brahms Hungarian Dances part 1 (dances 5 and 6)
Brahms Hungarian Dances part 2 (dance 1)

My comments? Nice cello work at the beginning of the fugue in the Vivaldi part 1, with a bonus shot of my face while playing at 2:42! (Actually, this video was taken from the first violin side so there’s a lot of shots of the celli from face-on through part 1 and part 2. Even though I am often blocked by the conductor.) Nice cello work through out this entire piece, really. Oh yay, we all finished the third movement together, and with conviction. Stick the landing!

Around 2:20 of the Brahms 1: Look, we have a percussionist! Just below her and to the right is the music teacher from my old high school doing a guest turn as a trumpet player for us. (I can’t rightly call him my music teacher from high school because I never took music.) One thing I really like about these videos is being able to see everyone in the orchestra t different times. Most people in the audience only see the first couple of rows, and those of us in the orchestra are usually staring at music or the conductor.

Also, I could be wrong about the order of the Brahms dances, but I’m too lazy to track down my scribble in the concert programme. There were three, and we played 1, 5, and 6, but not in that order.

15h15: FINISHED! Yes! Now to query about the slight mess the identification numbers are in and an issue with uploading the completed assignment. Also to ask about the invoice I submitted two weeks ago which hasn’t been responded to, so I have no idea if they got it or not.

Which brings us to now! I should probably think about something for dinner. No, wait; tacos. There. Assuming we have shells or tortillas for soft tacos, that is.

Halfway There

The day, I mean, not some sort of wonderful goal. Sorry.

I’m about a quarter of the way done this assignment. Ravelry completely sucked me in this morning and suddenly it was two hours later. I remembered that I needed to start the pizza dough before I left and that it would no longer be a case of tossing everything in the machine and letting it knead it for me, so I’ve just done that. Now I have to change and suit up and do battle with the lovely world. And by that I mean the piles of snow, the lousy drivers who are panicking because they’ve all forgotten how to drive in winter (how is this, I ask you? we have snow eight out of twelve months a year!), the masses of cranky people on public transport, the late buses, being too hot in the buses and subway cars because of heavy winter gear and indoor temps turned up to warm for the drivers and workers who wander around in short sleeves, and that awful trudge across the never-ending parking lots to get to HRH’s office.

Then it’s warmth and cellos and collecting the boy from the local grandparents and I’m afraid I’m going to have to insist on picking up a cappuccino along the way. Then pizza-making and -eating, then I get to suit up again and do battle on the roads on my way to a cello lesson tonight (which takes place directly behind the West Island’s biggest and busiest mall, and it happens to be the second-last Friday evening before Christmas, gah).

Also, I knew in my head but kind of forgot that I have a recital this Sunday. My lack of angst bemuses me.

A Day Of Squee

My Ravelry invitation just arrived! Only four days after they said it would!

This, of course, is excellent news, but also poorly timed, because I have work to do. I wanted to get it done today, too. Oh well, it’s due next Wednesday; if I don’t finish it today I can at least get the rough draft done and do the polish on Monday, and still get it in ahead of deadline. Muah-hah.

This is also the day when I get to go take a look at the new 7/8 cello that’s arrived chez my luthier. And I get a bonus extra hour of work before I do, because HRH wants me to meet him at his office after work in order for him to drive me over there instead of me doing the public transit thing to his parking lot and absconding with the car to get there myself. Apparently even more people have forgotten how to drive because oh noes, more snow has felled!!1! So I cheerfully accept both the extra hour of work and the chauffeur.

Huzzah!

My feeds are being picked up again by the RSS readers that recognised them before the new theme! Woo-hoo!

Sometimes all you need to do is wave sharp pointy and heavy blunt things at the computer and threaten certain doom sleep on it. :)

Of course, clicking on the ‘subscribe to feed’ link still takes you to a page of error messages, but hey. One thing at a time.

At this rate, I may have enough courage to try updating the entire installation again before the end of December. Assuming I can face the potential of Losing Everything Yet Again.

Also? Snow! Lots of it! With a bonus round of freezing rain in the middle! Winter is very definitely present, judging by the size of the ploughed snowbanks at the end of the driveway.

And… I have half a scarf. Go me!

ETA: I’ve just had a report that a reader can’t comment because the comment box doesn’t show up at all, in either Firefox or IE. Anyone else having a problem? If you don’t have one of my private addresses scribble a quick note to owldaughter AT gmail DOT com. (I can’t fix this one, or take the blame; this is a prepackaged theme that I have not messed with in any way, shape, or form. It’s also not the theme I wanted, though, so it’s not my Theme of Choice or set in stone.)

More new stuff: ‘Catastrophic’ low voter turnout for the provincial election this past Monday (no, really? what with election fatigue, a general hatred of government after the federal fiasco, and minus forty-after-windchill temperatures?), and apparently we had 17 centimetres of snow last night on top of the however many we got during the day.

Success!

Another freelance assignment turned in! Once it’s approved, I can invoice for it and the previous one and the cheque may arrive before Christmas. Every little bit helps. Of course, we are generally in need of money just as my cheques come in, so my little bit goes toward a bill instead of into my 7/8 cello fund, but still.

And now, I will go knit. Yes, I should write. In fact I’m going to post a brief update on the writing community I’m in first. But I am fed up with the computer thing, so knitting it will be. I probably can’t handle purling at the moment, though, so I shall cast on Mousme’s Hat v2.0!

Hmm. I seem to have missed posting my month-end book roundup. Tomorrow.