Kiss My Knits!

ETA: I was going to link to a video, but apparently I can’t, so here’s a link to the post where I saw it. Maybe you’ll have better luck there.

Sorry for the lack of updates. As I wrote, I’ve been ill. However, I finally went to the doctor and got some antibiotics that seem to be having an effect. My cough is decreasing and my energy level is increasing. The trick now is to not overdo it. I didn’t get quite enough sleep last night (sorry, Mom) so I’m running at about half speed today. Still, hats are being knitted, and I hope to start to work through the insane backlog of Jayne hat e-mails that have piled up while I’ve been sick.

Had a little dyeing shindig on Sunday, which was great fun. People produced some really interesting stuff. Much of it was overdye of unfortunately colored yarns, all of which were improved. Alas, I took no pictures.

As you can see, I did take pictures of the hailstorm we had two nights ago. It also knocked a tree onto the roof of my old workplace in Belmont, NC, as well as ripping up a couple of smaller satellite dishes and sending branches crashing through a window.

Interesting stuff on the web… let’s see…

The NYMag site ran a cute little photo slideshow featuring the various factories that the president has toured called “A History of Obama Feigning Interest in Mundane Things”. Comic artist Dean Trippe revealed the truth behind this in a hilarious (to me) Photoshop series of his own called Barack Obama Looking at Awesome Things. (Also at his blog.) It made me grin.

If this seems a bit disjointed it’s because the longer I type, the sleepier I get, so I think I’m going to try to get a nap so I can be fresh for D&D tonight and ready to whip up more Jayney goodness for my waiting Browncoats.

Catch you on the flip side.

Em: You should make me a chore chart. I can do all the chores on it.
Me: Okay, I can definitely do that for you.
Em: What would the chores be?
Me: Well, why don’t we start with hanging out the clothes?
Em: Okay! You can help.

I help, but she does most of it.

Em: What else?
Me: You could do the laundry.

I guide her through the laundry.

Em: What else?
Me: You can use the sweeper in the den.

I give her tips on the sweeper. We get to a “good enough” place and I show her how to empty it.

Em: Okay. You should go make the chart now.

And so I do, adding her regular chores, like “put away clothes” and a field called “bonus.”

Em: What’s that?
Me: I want you to look around the house and find something that you think needs to be done, and then do it.

She settles on feeding the cat.
We mark off all her chores for the day.

Em: And when all my chores are marked off, you can give me a toy.
Me: …

How did I not see that coming?

GM Vaschon: Alright, when last we left our intrepid adventurers… You narrowly avoided a party wipe, cut the throat of 2 crewmen and approached the galleon seemingly undetected.
GM Vaschon: Aleanghi made it an early night, so we’ll see how it goes and go from there.
Val: she started drinking at 6?
Palin: Aleanghi’s aready gone?
GM Vaschon: Yeah, she said around 8 she was wiped.
Palin: Well I’m wiped too, but I’m still here because all you lardasses would get keelhauled otherwise.
Palin: I mean, because I can make a valuable contribution to the party.
Torkal: I’m on and off cooking dinner, but you can guarantee I’ll IM my attack on a totally innocent stranger at some point.
Veracity: Okay, wait a moment. We’re short the cleric and the mage, and one of the killer dwarfs is off eating omelettes, right? Just wanted to be clear before we go forth to die (g)
Palin: I hate to say it, but I’m not doing so great either. This might not be the best night for a major excursion.
Palin: Because I have a feeling this is going to be awesome and I want to be alert and not in danger of crashing.
Palin: And by awesome I mean hilariously disastrous.
Val: we could try to keep things nonconfrontational.
Torkal: I’m good with whatever you guys want to do. I’d rather not proceed if we’re down three people (no Bentein either).

We hate to give up on the evening, so we decide to take things low-key and avoid mayhem. We’re not exactly playing to our strengths there. However, we still have to figure out how to get onto the boat, and since we talk everything to death, that may take all night anyway.

GM Vaschon: You are on the port side of the ship. There is a rope ladder leading up. You noticed a lookout in the center mast’s crows nest. You learned that there is at least one person on deck. The time is roughly 2 am.

Val: so we either pretend to be bringing prisoners on…or we knock heads out quietly. Explain to anyone who is curious that a fight broke out and we narrowly escaped and that’s why we’re missing the two crewmen
Val: I think we might as well try keeping up the charade. I mean, the best way conceivably to climb up into the boat would be the ladder anyway, and they might notice us coming up on that.
Veracity: I have to say, I think it is quite unlikely anyone on the ship is going to buy our story (g)
Val: if we attack someone, chances are if we don’t knock em out right away we’ll be found out
Val: and i bet there’s a bell.
Palin: How many crew do we think are on a ship this size?
GM Vaschon: The crewman that Veracity seduced stated roughly 24, give or take.
Veracity: Hey. Hypnotized, please 😛 Hypnotized!
Val: hm we could take that spread out
Palin: That’s what she said.
Val: but then of course we also need to figure out do we attack or wait until we reach our destination?
Val: if there are prisoners we can potentially use them to aid us
Palin: Well, we could try to capture one quietly and have him call up a couple at a time. We’re so good at capturing people quietly.
Torkal has left this chat.
Palin: Oh, man.

It just gets worse and worse. We talk for a while, but finally, we decide that it’s no good. Torkal’s lost connection, we’re down a mage and a cleric, and then I lose connection… it’s just not in the cards. So we call it a night. It just goes to show you, not every week is a winner. Next week… rested and refreshed, we board the ship!

Last night I dreamed that I auditioned for a part in a stage musical. My voice was very good, but after the song, I realized that given my current weight, I really wasn’t right for the role.

When I have a dream about my weight, it means that my subconscious realizes that I’ve gained a little, whether I know it consciously or not. I weighed myself this morning for the first time in weeks, and sure enough, I’m up almost one pound. It’s not terrible, but it’s not the direction I want to be going in, either.

I’ve been sick, and because of that, I haven’t been exercising. Without much energy, I’m turning more to comfort foods. My comfort foods aren’t exactly celery sticks and rice cakes.

I don’t have much energy and I still have a cough, but really, how bad is that? This time last week I had a raging fever and couldn’t breathe through my nose. Am I resting just because I need the rest or am I also doing it because it’s easy?

When I start feeling like I don’t have much energy, an image sometimes comes to my mind. It’s of my mother, when she was in chemotherapy (she’s fine now, it’s not that kind of story). There was something we needed from downstairs in her house. I would have been happy to get it for her. Her husband would have been happy to get it for her. But she plowed on down the stairs anyway.

As she was climbing the stairs from the bottom of the house back up to the top, she had to pause a couple of times to catch her breath. It wasn’t a long staircase, but the chemo reduced her iron levels and she physically didn’t have the energy to continue for a moment. But she still went down the stairs, and she still went up.

Now, I’m not my mother, and I don’t think I have to do everything she does. I don’t think she’d want me to live my life that way anyway. But the fact remains, I saw her go up and down those stairs. She was poisoned, but she kept living her life as best she could. Because what else can you do?

All I have is a little low energy and a cough. I think I can walk up the street. It’s time to get out and do it.

I need to live life. Because what else can I do?

I don’t know about you, but I went to college because I thought it would be a fun way to get a man.
If only I’d used Colgate my education might not have been wasted!

I can’t seem to quite shake this cold. There’s a lingering cough that just won’t quite go away.

After looking at this 1937 ad, though, I see what my mistake was. I didn’t cleanse my intestinal tract.

I’m sure that would have made me feel much better.

The morning light came in through the kitchen window, hitting the laundry basket just so. I had to take a picture before loading it up with clothes.

It’s an absolutely beautiful day, and I am not happy to have a lingering cough that keeps me from running. Still, I’m not forgetting the first part of that sentence: it’s an absolutely beautiful day.