PZS Rocks OK

Last weekend I went to the Portland Zine Symposium! On the Library's dime! They sent me! Isn't that rad? All those zines I made in high school are finally paying off. Just like I knew they would...

OOOH! Smell those radical politics:





What? People are still making zines?

Basically, the library system is in the process of adding zines to the collection. One of the large branches is trying them out and if it goes well there, then the other branches that want to will be able to have zine collections as well. Our main zine librarian couldn't make it to the symposium so she asked me if I wanted to go instead. Did I ever!

The PZS did a lot to renew my interest in zines. One of my friends volunteers at the Independent Press Resource Center in Portland and she's been asking if I'd like to do a zine with her. Well, now I certainly do! It would be a lot of fun if we could get it off the ground and have a table at the PZS next year.

Walking around and looking at all the tables was pretty awesome, but I really almost liked the workshops better. I didn't get to go to all the ones I wanted to because several of them were happening at the same time (curses!) but I did manage to attend: Multnomah County Library Tour, How To Do Everything, Queer Zine History, Zinester's Guide to the US Mail, and Bi-Weekly Madness. I also think it would be cool if next year all the zine librarians got together as a panel and did a workshop for all the zinesters who are interested in getting their zines into library collections. But eh, we'll see.

First Sweater

Here it is:



This is the Wicked, finished, blocked and modeled. This is my first sweater, started in January and finished in August. Despite the pooling, I am very proud.

In one of my recent posts one of my friends commented that the trouble I had had with Wicked has convinced her to never start knitting. Whenever I hear someone say something like that I have two very strong gut reactions. One is, 'More yarn for me!'. The other is, 'How sad. You don't know what you're missing.'.

Yes, this sweater took forever and yes, I had to rip it back a lot and try things again. It was a straightforward pattern, but it wasn't easy for me. I struggled, it's true. But now look what I have: I have a garment made with my own hands to fit no one else but me. I have a sweater made from 100% wool, which is tougher and tougher to find these days. My sweater is warm and soft, thicker than anything store-bought, and it clings to me where I want it to. The sweater's boat-neck is nice and wide, and it sits on the edges of my shoulders just the way I hoped it would. The sleeves are comfy and over-long, which is my favorite way for sleeves to be and which I can almost never find in a store-bought sweater. Roll your eyes if you will, but wearing this sweater feels like wearing a warm hug. It feels just right.

And you know what? My next sweater will probably be a lot easier and will go a lot quicker. There is a learning curve for these sorts of things. Just look at my first pair of socks, for example: they took forever (May 2006-January 2007) and they came out weird and too big and at first I thought I would probably never knit another pair of socks again because they were such a pain. But now I knit socks all the time, they're not that hard and they don't take too long and THEY'RE AWESOME! And maybe it'll be like that with sweaters too: the first one takes a while but I learn, and it gets better.

So. I also wanted to share that last night another friend had a New Kitten Party to honor her new kitty. It was of course lots of fun and there was dancing and wine and snacks... and these:



These are Cat Poop Cupcakes. I made them firstly to honor the new little cat but also because I promised I would and because they crack me up. They were, you can imagine, a big hit. The original version is over here.

Wicked Finish

I'm done. Last night I bound off on the Wicked sweater and I am finally, finally satisfied enough to call it done, and to say that I knit the best first sweater I could. I will weave in the ends, block it, and post pictures once that's done. I may still overdye it with black in the future, but that's a different adventure. For right now, the sweater is done.

Ghosts and Gurus

First, I must show you the very cute little ghost-in-a-tin that I received from the lovely Sara in the Monster Living in a Tin swap I was in. He's a bookworm ghost, and he's very cool.



Alright, so remember when I said that the Wicked is my guru? Well, the problem with gurus is that they test you. Observe:



Looks like the sweater's pretty much done, right? Just a few ends to weave in and then... But wait....
What's this?



It's the hem. It looks like it's...



Why, yes. It's rolling. It's goddamn rolling! The seed stitch hem called for in the pattern is all F'ed up. So I'm going to, say it with me, rip it back and knit it again. How many times have I ripped back on this sweater? I've lost count. When I reknit it I'm going to do it in the crossover ribbing of the neckline and cuffs on a size larger needle. This means that almost nothing of the written pattern has worked out for me. I have changed almost every detail on the pattern. But it still looks like a Wicked, doesn't it?

Also, look at that pooling! Geez! Why why why didn't I choose a solid color? Blech. So, should I leave it the color it is, or should I try to overdye it with something darker? Any thoughts? Vote now!

I drive because I have so much money to burn.

Not really, but sometimes it seems that way. This week NPR ran a story about how Tucson AZ has the lowest gas prices in the country. Meanwhile, the Pac NW seems to have some of the highest.

But here I am, throwing caution and money to the wind! Not only do I commute by car 2 hours every day to and from work, but I also drive on my weekends! I'm a wild woman! Not really.

Last Monday I had the day off, which is rare, so Nico and I drove up to Seattle for a few hours to do some regular touristy things. We went on the Space Needle, which was the second time for me and the first time for him.



Mmmm, Seattle...



And we also went on the monorail. Being on the monorail is, of course, being in the future. The monorail is the TRANSPORTATION! OF! THE! FUTURE!!! Srsly, in the future we will allllll be on the monorail. Sigh. The monorail in Seattle goes for only 1 mile. And it's been there since the 1960's, so they've had plenty of time to expand. This does not bode well for the future, my friends.

So, here's us being very happy on the monorail:



And then we walked around the Pike Place market, bought some wine jelly, ate lunch, walked around again, and went home. It was ver' nice.

Today we'll drive down to Portland because some friends just got a new house and we must see it! Yayyy! Housey.

Also, my pepper plants have a little pepper growing! Whee!

AAAAAAUUGHH!!!!

Because it is an election year, because our country is at war and because it is the 4th of July, my plan had been to have today's post be thoughtful and political. And just so you'd know I wasn't too stuck up, I was going to start the whole thing off with a Morrissey quote.

But plans have changed. When I woke up this morning and stood in the kitchen drinking a glass of water I noticed my cat crouched at the back door, making little cat grunts. I followed her gaze and saw a bunny sitting out in the grass, rapidly inhaling some dandelions. And then I notice something else...

This:



And this:



And this:



Something ate my pepper plants! Gah! And they were ALL flowering or JUST ABOUT to flower! They were getting so tall, and just last night Nico had commented that the peppers were exploding with growth. And now they're stubby and it will take them forever to recover.

What creature was the culprit? Was it rabbits? We've seen deer walk past outside, was it a deer? An ambitious squirrel? Something else? Was it the hand of God reaching down to pluck the flowered crowns off my beloved plants? Who knows.

I'm very sad.

So far, the 4 peppers that are in the ground rather than in pots are still there...



I have to cover them up with something so they'll be safe. Sigh. I'm not used to this.

One Year

One year ago today I started work at the library feeling nervous, enthusiastic and relieved. A year ago last week Nico and I drove into Washington state from Arizona, happy to be away from the heat and somewhere green and cool.

One year, but it seems like more.

Some parts didn't take long at all. Falling in love with Portland and Seattle took less than a day, each. Driving to the ocean took 30 minutes. Learning that a six pack of Guinness costs more here than we're willing to pay on a regular basis took about 5 seconds. And coming to the full realization that we lived in an ostensibly rural area, with all that encompasses, took a couple of months, three at the most. This fact might have been immediately obvious to others, but I'll admit I was a little slow on the uptake. I've been called a Pollyanna by a couple of my coworkers.

Other things took a lot longer. It took 8 months for Nico to find a job that paid a living wage. It took 4 months before we found a restaurant we really liked within a half hour's drive, 4 months before I found anyone who could qualify as a friend outside of work. It took a little longer than that to realize that the town we lived in was a hole, that we could never make it work for us in even a temporary way no matter how hard we tried. It took us 10 months before we were able to move someplace else.

And some things that I expected to happen still haven't, whether through chance or my own lack of action.

I still haven't driven the loop of the Olympic Peninsula...


I haven't visited the Hoh Rainforest...


And I STILL haven't seen a banana slug! Damn! That was the one thing I expected for sure to see.

Summer Projects

Have I mentioned how much happier I am since moving to Oly? I am so happy that I've even begun to get back to my old ways of having little (food-related) projects going on! In fact I've got three different projects going right now! Woohoo! I feel good.

There's the sweater of course, that's one. Knitting is always a good project and the best thing about it is that you can put it down and totally ignore it for a while. I have to admit that I'm not making the headway on my sweater that I should be. Part of the problem (if you can call it that) is that the weather is finally starting to behave! We're getting more sun and more warmth and I loooooove it! For a little while there I was thinking we wouldn't get a summer AT ALL. It's not that summer is my favorite season, autumn is, but how can you enjoy the cool crispness of autumn when you haven't had the sun and heat of summer? It would be impossible. Everything in season.

Then there's the beer. Nico and I stumbled through our first batch of home-brewed beer; a stout. It's bottle aging right now, and in another week we'll take the first taste, but I'm betting it will need longer than just 2 weeks in the bottle. I'm sort of itching to begin a new batch tomorrow, if I make it down to the brew shop to buy ingredients. I've found a bunch of good-looking (extract) stout recipes online, and they all use at least twice the DME our kit came with, so now I'm convinced I need to immediately begin a heftier stout. I can't stand the thought of doing it wrong, you see.

And my third project is that I am back to growing chile peppers! Yayyy! I've got 4 generic types in the ground outside, and then another 4 in pots - 2 jalapeno and 2 cayenne. They've started to make progress since the weather's gotten sunnier.



As you can see, they've still got a ways to go and we're already pretty late into the growing season, but these two at least have begun to flower, and I'm hoping the worm tea will help them make up for lost time.

Worm tea?

Yes, worm tea. This morning my upstairs neighbor gave me some extra worm tea since he noticed I've been growing plants. Imagine - vermiculture in an upstairs apartment! That's pretty hard-core. I've never used the stuff before, but I've heard all about how it's the super-magic-grow-formula for your plants, so how could I resist? The guy also told me that he's trying to drum up support for a community garden to be added to the new city park being built down the street, so I promised him I'd whip up a little letter about that.

Other than that, I've got a couple awesome dinners planned for the weekend. Right now I've got chicken strips marinating and later we'll skewer and grill them, serve them with some fancy-pants rice I'm going to make and some mango salsa. Maybe some sliced avocado and some salad greens too. And margaritas, since it's finally margarita weather. Tomorrow we're going to marinate some skirt steak, which Nico will grill and chop up to make a burrito bar. Yum! I wish we could eat like that every night.

And meanwhile, the books are biding their time.

Wonderful Thing

I got tickets to see Nick Cave in September! This is fantastic. I can indulge my old Seattle fantasy of a sophisticated and sexy nightlife. Maybe. Except that I saw a recent-looking picture of Nick Cave and he had a scary little mustache. Hmm.

And speaking of mustaches, last night I had a work dream where in order to answer someone;s reference question I had to consult Mustaches of the Nineteenth Century. Which would, of course, never happen. I never get patrons or questions that cool.

It is another gray Juneuary day.

Vengeance Deferred and Domestic Interests

So my plan had been to make a vengeful blog post to judgementally lay the smack down on a former Bookman's manager of mine (let's call her... mmm.... Kaia) who apparently got her BA by having her husband write all her damn papers for her. Yes folks, that had been my plan, and it was going to be a long blog post complete with full names and seething rage. But then I got teh intestinal flu all weekend long and I was shown the humility of all mortal flesh and my plans changed.

So.

Now I'd like to talk to you about sweaters and other domestic things. I'd like to talk about my Wicked sweater, in particular. When last you saw my Wicked I had decided to rip it back to the shoulder increases because it was too big. And I did that. And I knit it some more, until I got to a point where I decided that this time around the damn thing was a wee bit tight. So at that point I balled it up in a bag somewhere and focused on packing and moving. Then last week I did what I knew I had to and ripped it back again.

I ripped it all the way back.

I knew that there were things about this sweater I would change from the very beginning, and I decided that if I was going to spend this much time and energy on the damn thing (and let's not forget money; good yarn is es'pensive) then I might as well do it my way from the beginning.

I cast on more stitches than even the largest size called for because I like a wide neck. And then I made the neckband itself narrower so as to be a little comelier. Now I've been working diligently on those shoulder increases, but this time I don't feel strained or impatient. This time I think that perhaps the Wicked and I are reaching an understanding. We are making friends. Last night I tried on what I had and at that point it was still less of a sweater and more of a yoke, I suppose, but I could see that we were headed in the right direction. I am reaching a sort of first-sweater-zen, and the Wicked is my guru.

Also this weekend we had our new mattress and shelves delivered from Ikea. The mattress? King-sized! And after over a month on a full-sized camping air mattress it feels like the height of luxury. Mostly I just want to writhe around on it and make snow angels in the sheets because IT IS THAT BIG! And folks, sometimes bigger is better.

And the shelves? Huge also. They are taller than I am and wider than my wingspan. They look great and they totally dominate our living room, but you know what? Not. Enough. We unpacked all our books yesterday, and most of my books hadn't been unpacked in a year. Now, when we bought the shelves I knew we'd have to double-stack some of our books, because I'm a pessimist and I just knew the shelves wouldn't be big enough. But apparently I'm not enough of a pessimist, because I didn't think that we'd have to double-stack our books on every shelf just to fit them all but that is indeed what we did. We could've bought two of these shelving units and filled them both up. Easily.

Our books outnumber us. They definitely out-weigh us and they might just out-mass us as well. God help us if they ever revolt.

Food, but no picture.

Earlier this week Nico made a very impressive dinner that he had never made before: linguine with red clam sauce. Ohh la la! I didn't take any pictures but it smelled and tasted great: spicy garlicky seafood and pasta. Very good.

Since I'm the one commuting now, Nico has a little more time and energy and so he's going to start doing more of the cooking. This is great and I'm really pleased. He's been saying that he wants to increase his cooking repertoire which I can totally understand. I've been wanting to increase my repertoire too, since the kinds of things I used to make pretty often (beans and rice, salsa, onion soup, etc) are either a little too 'single vegetarian' or a little too oniony (he's got that onion allergy after all).

So last weekend I bought a new cookbook: Express Lane Meals by Rachel Ray. And you know, I felt a little bit like I was giving up on being a good, or at least diy, cook. Like, here I am, believing myself to be so into cooking and then as soon as I get a little tired I give up and buy the cookbook aimed at the lowest common denominator - whatever's easiest.

But I guess I was just being a snob. Again. And I really should give Ms Ray her due. She does have good recipes that aren't overly complex or time consuming. The cookbook is well-organized, and most importantly, Nico was interested in actually using the recipes in it. The linguine with red clam sauce was awesome. And I did base my good roasted salsa recipe off something she made.

Tonight it's my turn to make something from the cookbook. I'm doing warm chopped chicken piccata spinach salad. Nutrition assured.

Moved?

Yes we are. In the new place in Oly! And internet finally just got hooked back up today. Slowly unpacking. Bought some generic chile plants and planted them in the rocky dirt next to the back door. They will probably die. Everyone at work keeps asking about my commute, but it's really quite nice. Last night took a walk down by Capital Lake. Ahhh. This is more like what I imagined living in the Pacific NW would be like. For the first time since leaving Tucson life feels normal and comfortable again. Now if only we had a bed.

Pictures will happen as soon as we make the place into something other than a mess of boxes. It could be a while.

Engagement Ring

My engagement ring came on Monday. Squeeee! OK. Ahem.

There are stories that go with getting this ring. When Nico and I got engaged in February we went to one of those jewelry stores in the mall to get our fingers sized and to see if maybe, just maybe, there was anything good. Of course there wasn't. The first store we went into didn't have anything I liked, and they couldn't size Nico's finger because they only sized up to a 15. And the one thing they had that he might've liked couldn't be made in whatever size he was. So we went to another jewelry store in the mall, where a gaggle of tiny jewelry store clerks all told us that it would be next to impossible to find something in Nico's size. At the time we guessed that he might be a 17. A 17! The store clerks' eyes practically bulged out of their heads. And as we were leaving the store they actually laughed at us. Yeah. Nice.

So I began looking on Etsy, and there were some great rings but the one I really liked was made only in titanium. I thought that would be fine, until I found out that titanium cannot be resized. Not really. OK. But I had an idea for a design, and we decided to go to ye olde jewelers here in town. Buy local, support your community, yadda yadda.

So we go in to this place, and I'm trying to describe what I'm thinking of to the sales-lady, trying to bounce some ideas off her, that kind of thing. Her response to pretty much everything I said was, "No, you can't do that, no, no, I've never heard of that." She managed to find a plastic ring-sizer and estimated that Nico's finger is a size 19. And then she showed us an ugly pre-made band that she thought she could slap a diamond on and sell us for a thousand. Um. No. This is my engagement ring. I want to wear it forever. I don't want to hear "can't do," I want "can do!" Can do!

So we went home, I wrote up a description of what I wanted and we posted it on Etsy's Alchemy page. We got several bids and we got to pick and choose among them. We went with a ring and jewelry maker in the UK, Nico paid, and several weeks later we got the ring in the mail. So now I have a ring I designed, we supported an independent artisan (though not local) and I get to laugh at all those jewelry store clerks because I got exactly what I want for a hell of a lot less than they would've charged. CAN DO!



This is the best I could do with the camera. It's a white gold band with a tiny 2mm ruby drop-set, and an even tinier diamond also drop-set. I love it! I think it looks very modern and slightly minimalist. We're going to add other tiny stones to it for special occasions and anniversaries.

Oh yes. The seller we went with on Etsy is Fluid By Design. She's got some pretty stuff, you should check her out.

T-minus 4 days until we move to Olympia!

No Joy in Sweaterville

After some soul searching, and perusing the pictures of other people's finished Wicked sweaters on Ravelry, I have come to the conclusion that my sweater is just too damn big. I will be ripping it back to those shoulder increases and re-knitting it from there. Sigh.

Stoopit sweater.

Progress in Sweaterville

There has been some progress in Sweaterville. I am speaking of that sweater I began back in January, my very first sweater ever, that took forever with the shoulder increases and where I thought I was going to run out of yarn. That sweater. Well, it's coming along. I'm not crazy about the way the yarn is knitting up, and it's just a bit too big on me, and I think I should've done fewer of those shoulder increases because the neckline doesn't fall where I'd like it to. Ahem.

Here's the sweater from over a month ago:



And here's the sweater where it stands today:



Sexy, no? Bleah! But it'll look better when it's done. I hope. And if it doesn't, well, it's my very first sweater and it's allowed to be a little sucky. I can always just wear it at home. I already know a few things I'll do differently if I knit the pattern again.

I also went out and bought the yarn for my next sweater, which I'm thinking will be a sort of cropped cardigan. I love the color of this yarn, although it will look awful with my coloring. Oh well. Acid green cardigan, you're next!



And let's not forget that there's also been some progress in Sock Town:



This is an upside-down version of the Monkey pattern done in Cherry Tree Hill Supersock in the Tropical Storm colorway. Upside-down Blue Monkey.

Also, next month Nico and I are moving to Olympia (I will still commute to work every day). Also we're engaged. Hot cha!

Spring? Sucker!

So for a while there it seemed like spring was in the air, what with all the daffodils and sunshine we were getting. I took these pics a little over a week ago in our side yard on a bright Saturday morning:







Daffodils, somethin' pink, and more daffodils. Really the damn things are everywhere. I'm more of a tulip girl, myself.

So then what happens? A week of nasty, windy, snowy-rainy-sleet-and-hail hellish weather. At the end of March. Ick.

Is it over yet? I'm afraid to look. Yesterday it was nice, but cold and a little breezy. Today it looks nice too: sun, blue sky. But it's April Fools Day. It could be snowing by noon.

I've got some finished socks to show off. First are the Red Whale socks I made from Mountain Colors Bearfoot in the Rosehips colorway. The pattern is Azure from the winter issue of Knitty.



Next are the socks I made from some self-striping DK weight yarn I bought from Lovesticks Sock Yarn, a seller on Etsy. It's just plain stockinette stitch with a toe-up heel flap. The colorway is called Green Tea, and it was a lot of fun to knit with.



Other than that I've started another pair of socks and made some progress on my sweater. More on that soon.

The library is twisting my perceptions.

So this past week was a busy one at my library. I'll skip the big patron-related news in favor of the small but weird incident that happened on Thursday.

Lady comes in, wants to get a library card and also wants to get on the internet. I hand her an application and tell her that I can get her on a computer immediately, before she gets her card. So I hop out from behind the desk, lead her over to an open computer, and... she's not there. She's still filling out an application at the desk. OK. That's fine, she can get her card first. I'm just so used to people NOT getting a card first. Whatever.

So then she comes back after getting her card, wants help getting on the internet, and then tells me she needs someone to help her cancel an email account. I tell her that I can help her sign on to the computer, help her navigate to a page, but from there she needs to do it herself, she can just follow the instructions on the website. So she sits down at the computer and I'm trying to help her sign on. I tell her to enter her card number in the little box, and she just kind of sits there, gazing up at the ceiling. Um. OK.

Long story short, this woman is just not all there. She called me over for help several times, even though simply reading the instructions on the screen would've gotten her where she needed faster. Whatever. Not everyone understands how to use the internet; the digital divide is a bitch.

So then finally it looks like she's on her way out of the library. Except that instead of walking out the front door she walks back into the staff area, with my boss running after her to stop her. And then she goes into the staff bathroom. How did she even know it was there? So finally when she comes back out my boss tells her that this is the staff area and she isn't allowed to come back there and she's not allowed to use that bathroom. Her response? "Oh, it's so nice to relieve myself." Eeeeuuugghhh!!!!

Now, I will admit that I am an elitist. The reason that I like the staff bathroom is because the patrons are *not allowed to use it!* Damn it. So I used the staff bathroom upstairs for the rest of the day. It was pretty funny, but I felt pretty protective of that staff bathroom.

So that's a new patron. I'm sure we'll be seeing more of her.

And that night Nico and I went out to this little Italian place. It was... actually very nice. The people there weren't yelling or harassing anyone. None of them smelled. The food was excellent. It was almost like being out for dinner on a normal night in Tucson. That's when I realized that my entire perception of this town has shrunk down to the size of the library. My perceptions of this town's people has been twisted by the behaviors of the worst of our library patrons. There are, in fact, nice places here. There are normal people. Most of the people are probably normal, but I work in the library and I don't get out much. I'm feeling pretty stunted right about now. I wonder if I chose the right career.

Brigid in Cyberspace

Today is St. Brigid's Day, and that means you will find poetry posted on blogs all over the place. There's more information here.

So here's this poem I wrote quite a while ago about my mother's cancer:

Forty-nine syllables all for you, mother.
The years of your life run-
ning ragged down this page. Too many
fears creeping into your body
and hardening.
What saints
appeared to you then,
speaking your name?

Our First Cordial

cor-dial -noun
a strong, sweetened, aromatic alcoholic liquor; liqueur.

Last November Nico and I started our first cordial. We went to a cordial-making class that some sca people were having in Olympia and were told that we could use any clear liquor as our base. We used vodka, figuring that it was generic enough and probably wouldn't taste too badly, even though neither of us are really all that into vodka. And to flavor it we decided to use pomegranate and orange.

So the seeds of four pomegranates and the flesh and zest of two oranges went into the jug, followed by one regular and one smaller-sized bottle of Stoli. Cap on tight, shake shake shake, and wait. The vodka began to take on the pomegranates' color almost right away and deepened over time to a beautiful dark red. We let it steep for about 2 months, giving the jug a good hard shake just about every day.

After two months Nico did the hard part of straining out the by now extremely unappetizing pomegranate seeds and orange bits. All in all he strained it 6 times with butter muslin folded over again and again. Then it sat for another two weeks, and during that time quite a bit of sediment settled on the bottom of the jug.

Today I poured the cordial into a pot and threw out the sediment. I put the cordial over low heat and added about a cup of sugar. I kept stirring and as soon as the sugar was dissolved I took it off the heat and poured it into a clean jug.

Here's what it looks like now:



The flavor is pretty good; Nico claims he can taste the pomegranate and the orange separately but to me it just tastes bright and sweet. It's smooth and waaaaay better than plain vodka. I think we did well. I wish it was a little deeper red, though.

Next we might try just a straight-on orange cordial, sweetened with honey. I think that would be good to start now while citrus is still in season. Yum.

The Wages of Knitting Is...

Bowls!



Yes, these are the bowls I received in exchange for the knee-high stripey socks I knit. They came in the mail today and they are very lovely to behold. And my very cool partner sent 5 bowls, when the swap was only supposed to be for 4! I'm getting swap-spoiled all over the place, here.

Check them out. There's this beautiful bluesy-greensy one:



There are these two lighter blue ones, each alike in dignity:





There's this checked one that I absolutely adore:



But my absolute favorite is this one. I think the glazing on this is really sort of stunning:



So there you have it. Who's a lucky knitter? I am.