In a rush

I'm not able to post a real post right at the moment 'cause I'm supposed to be working. I'll try to get a real one up tomorrow (including the knitting meme that I was tagged for). But I had to take a second to say...

6 days to Duran Duran!

A friendly face

My day was pretty good (more on that in a moment), but I had an incident at work that put me in a superbly foul mood - something which appears to be an epidemic judging by the blogs I'm reading. Anyway, to get over my mood I went to get dinner. Of course the place I decided to go to closed as I walked up to the door. I was almost in tears (I tend to cry was I get frustrated), but I still had to order food somewhere (finding food in the financial district of San Francisco is nearly impossible after about 5pm) and I didn't want anyone to see my crying. So I sucked it up, wandered around, and finally found some food. As I passed Stacey's Bookstore on my way back to work I happened to look in and saw Stacy (oh hey, I just noticed that - cool!), who is in my BAWDies knitting group. Stacy is one of the sweetest, nicest, and kindest people you will ever meet in the world and I haven't seen her in ages. I waited for her to come out of the store and we chitchatted for a few minutes about knitting projects. I'm not sure if karma was looking out for me or what, but after we went our separate ways my mood had dissipated and things weren't so bad. I'm not sure if she reads my blog, but thank you Stacy! Our chat was just what I needed!

So, about the good things today... First, I had my breast ultrasound done and the technician confirmed that I have a "simple cyst." I knew from the research I had done that this was most likely the case, but I didn't realize exactly how nervous I had been or the fact that I had been holding my breath until he came out and said it. He said I could have it aspirated if I wanted, but that it would most likely go away on its own eventually. Hmmm... let's see, purposely stick a needle in my b**b or go on my merry way. I'll let you all take a guess as to which option I chose.

After the ultrasound I stopped at the mall to buy a new jacket from Lerner's (who I think goes by New York something-or-other now), because they're having a 70% off clearance sale. Well, I not only got a new down quilted jacket, but a black leather fitted jacket, and a nice fitted blazer - all for $88! They're also having they're "city bucks" gimmick right now, which is for every $30 you spend you get $15 city bucks. I'll be going back on Friday after work to check out their pant sale. Awww yeah!

I also got some RAOK gifties to send. Now I just need to get my posterior to the post office to mail them out (Play on words not intended, by the way. Isn't that an onomonopeia or something?) Optimistically, this will happen tomorrow before or after I get my long-awaited haircut. Realistically, it'll probably happen on Saturday.

In just about a week from this very minute, I will be attempting to hook up with John Taylor - oops, I mean attending the Duran Duran concert. [I know you're all jealous. Admit it, I know. That's ok, I think you should be jealous. :-) ] I have absolutely no idea what to wear. What do you suppose an aging rock star would find appealing?

SOMETHING ABOUT TITLE HERE

My research papers are moving painfully along. I'm supposed to be done writing my first paper, but it's still in the "rough draft" stage. Most of my paper consists of a sentence or two and then "SOMETHING ABOUT BRAZIL'S REAL PLAN HERE." Thankfully, I was able to take a break yesterday and visit a new yarn store in San Francisco, Noe Knit. The store has only been open for a week, so they're still a little light on stock. But I managed to find some yarn that has convinced me to succumb to the Clapotis craze.

Look Terri - colors!!

I've promised myself that I can't start on this until I'm done with school, but that's only six weeks away (silent screaming inside my head at that thought).

In the meantime, I've also gotten some knitting done on my Must Have cardigan sleeves.

I'm knitting both sleeves at the same time, so blur your eyes a little bit and imagine a second sleeve in the photo.

Finally, as I was downloading these two photos off my camera, I discovered the pictures I took of my Knitter's Review Gift Fairy gifts from Liz.

She got me a bunch of great stuff including Lantern needles, A Christmas Carol on tape, notecards, yarn... the same yarn she used to make my ruffle scarf...

I never did get my hubby, er, official photographer to get a picture of me in this scarf. So you get my spastic, blurry, self-portrait instead.

Ok, I'm sleepy and I can sense that I'm going to begin rambling any minute now. Before I head off to my comfy couch (covered in notes and books), I want to let all of my blogging friends that use Blogger comments that I'm having problems accessing the new comment system from my wooo-rking computer that's not at home (as opposed to my computer from work, because that would be bad). Anyway, since most of my blog reading time occurs from this specific computer, I'm not able to comment as much as I'd like. I just wanted to let you all know that I'm not ignoring you!

Also, I have a bunch of friends sitting for the California and New York bars this week. So I wanted to send out a Good Luck vibe to everyone!

Manly knitting

My sisters husband Brad has apparently decided to join in on the knitting craze. However, he has a slightly more, umm, macho way of knitting. First, for those who haven't seen it, here's part of the comment he left in my last post...

"...I'm here to talk about knitting. That's right, I finally heard so much about socks, and the work it takes to make these puppies, special tools, yarn, concentration, I thought it might be something really difficult. Terri took the class, and became so frustrated she..... never mind about that. So I figured, what the hey! I got this one hour drive to work every day, so maybe I should try knocking off a sock and see what the whole thing is about. So before leaving for work, I pulled a couple nails out of the truck bed, a spool of nylon leveling cord, and knocked off a sock on the way to work. No big deal! The nails were even bent, for crying out loud! I ended up doing a pair before I got there it was so easy! On the way home, I misplaced the nails, and had to use a file and a screw driver, but hey golly! They worked too! I'm sending a picture to Nancy to include on her blog, cause I don't think I can put pictures into the comments here, it might just lock up her website or crash it. I'll try anyway, I know she won't mind, she's really understanding about that."

He did indeed send me a picture of his socks and I have to admit that I'm quite impressed.

Not bad for nails and nylon leveling cord (ummm... whatever that is), eh? I think we should try and convince him to make the Mancho next.

Yarn as far as the eye can see

I'm almost at the halfway point in my semester (I only have 10 weeks, instead of the usual 15). So, I've officially decided to stop apologizing for the lack of photos. I'm beyond stressed and figure that a) if something's got to give then it's better to blog sans photos than not blog at all and b) you all are the greatest and won't hold it against me.

I did manage to take a break from studying this weekend to attend Stitches West. Woo Hoo! My sister even flew in from Arizona so that she could attend her first Stitches event with me. Here are some of the highlights:

- Although my sister and I didn't actually eat with the gang, I did stop and say hi to La, Joanna, and Seltsame at Bennigans. There were many more knitters there (La posted pics), but I didn't get the chance to meet or chat with any of them. Hopefully this will become an annual tradition, because I'd love to plan on meeting them all for dinner next time.

- After my sister and I had dinner, we were going to head back to the hotel to relax and knit when I realized that I had forgotten to pack pajamas. It's 9pm on a Saturday night. In a town I only remotely know. Where in the world am I supposed to find pajamas? We start driving around and discover that the area is just a bunch of businesses and hotels (I actually considered stopping by one of the nicer hotels' gift shops to see if they might have something that could pass for pj's). Just as we we got on the freeway to see what we could find, we found a TJ Maxx. In fact, it's a TJ Maxx that's just down the street from the restaurant. I knew it was, because I had to take my traffic school test in the same area and had killed some time here before heading over. Thankfully they were open until 9:30pm, so I had just enough time to run in and grab something before they closed. Even in my haste I managed to find some cute Hello Kitty pj's.

- Stitches itself was great. I actually managed to leave with only a few purchases. I got some Debbie Bliss wool/cotton from Webs and bought a capelet kit. I also bought a book, which I think is called Hip Knits or something like that (I haven't had time to unpack my loot!). And I caved and bought a t-shirt from the Knitter's folks. It says "Eat knit and die." Now, at the time when I ordered the shirt (since they sold out and will have to ship it to me), I knew that the saying was a play on another one. But for the life of me, I just couldn't think of it. Well, I realized yesterday that it sounds like "Eat shit and die." Ummmmm.... now I'm not so sure if I'm crazy about this t-shirt. Especially when I later saw ones that said "Eat, knit, and dye" which is much cuter. Oh well!

- I briefly met up with several of my BAWDies friends including Tina (of KnitWhits), who I haven't seen in ages.

- I got to meet the one and only Rachael! I'm afraid I was a bit of a spaz, but I was just so excited! At first I only thought that I spotted her, but then I spotted Lala and I knew it was definitely her. I went over and introduced myself, feeling like a groupie. They were there with a friend, but I feel bad because I can't recall her name now. They were all so nice and I can say that Rachael is even cuter and nicer than she appears on her blog.

- My sister and I got spinning lessons from Serendipity Spinners. I was surprised at how much my fingers remembered about the process. I'm feeling pretty confident now that once school is over I should be able to pick up on spinning pretty quickly.

- Finally, I got to knit this weekend! I worked on the two sleeves for my Must Have cardigan and I've gotten enough done to see the cable pattern emerging. This is such an addicting knit that it's hard to put it down! This is also the first item that I'm knitting from a chart. I usually write out the chart into longhand. But these charts are actually making sense to me, so I'm just working from them. However, I can see that I'm going to have to make a master chart of all the different cables, because I'm going nuts bouncing between them.

- I got RAOK'd twice!! First, Abby sent me a buttonhole bag that she's donating to the raffle prizes for the Breast Cancer walk (cough :: sponsor me please :: cough). Along with the bag she also sent me some beautiful stitch markers! I told her that I have the feeling she sent the stitch markers in order to lure me away from stealing the bag, which is even cuter in person than it was in her picture. (Doesn't mean it will work, but I appreciate the attempt. hee,hee!) I also got a wonderful gift of Valentine's candies from Kirsten (who lives in Scottsdale, AZ, my hometown!). Mmmmm... candy.... yum! Many, many thanks to you both!

I think that covers the highlights. Even though it wasn't a lot of time (my sister came out on Saturday night and left Monday morning) I had such a great time. Now I'm back to business on my papers. blah!

A knitting fairy tale

You guys are too much fun! I've really enjoyed watching the Gwendolyn's story progress. It was just what I needed to get me out of my doldrums. By the way, thank you for everyone who let me know that I'm not as boring as I think that I am. :-)

As promised, here's the full story (complete with an ending that I wrote). I'm not completely sure if I'll be online this weekend. My sister is flying in Saturday night so that we can go to Stitches together on Sunday. Our hotel room supposedly has a network connection, so with any luck I'll be able to update while we're hanging out. If not, I'll make up for it by actually knitting!

[Edited to add: Sandy added to the story, but I must have been updating my blog when she did it and so her addition got missed. Sorry about that Sandy! This was so much fun that I may have to do another story in the near future, so be sure to keep those creative juices flowing.]

Ok, here's the story. Enjoy!

Once upon a time there lived a beautiful princess, in a beautiful castle, in a beautiful kingdom. Her name was Gwendolyn and she appeared to have everything her heart desired. Lots of money, closets full of clothes, a shiny carriage, and hair and skin any other princess in the surrounding kingdoms would kill for. But alas, as with any other princess in a substandard fairy tale, our Gwendolyn was unhappy. She thought and thought and thought about what she could do to bring happiness into her life. Finally, an idea struck her! She decided she would... knit! Yes, the beautiful Gwendolyn knew that a beautiful princess like herself need not knit, because after all - that is what servents were for. But she longed to do something interesting, and fun, and wild.

She started thumbing through her kindgom's yellow pages for a local yarn store. She found the typical chains - JoAnns, Michael, but they just wouldn't do. She needed a store that would assist a princess in need, a store where the owners would not just recognize her beauty but help her pick out yarns to match, a store where the owners were nice - even to a princess like herself. After hours and hours of searching (it's a big kingdom you know) she came upon Rapunzal's yarn store "Throw me a braid"... She fired up her horses and went off in her shiny carriage to the store... but... just when she thought she was going in the right direction.... she noticed a strip mall with both Michaels AND JoAnns! She decided to stop, "just to look", she explained to her trusty steed.

Once inside the first store, she became confused with all of the plastic flowers, scrapbooking paraphenalia, buttons, zippers, patterns, frames, more plastic flowers, and row after row of bolts of material.

Beginning to swoon in princess-like style, a concerned employee, bedazzled by her beauty, proudly led her to the yarn section, way in the back, hidden from the general public.

And this is what she saw... 3 hanks o' Fun Fur in Hot Pink and 8 skeins of Red Heart Acylic an Puce (think green here). The Fun Fur excited her but she thought to herself "I'm sure this is not all there is. There must be other yarn."

She turned to look at the needles and accessories and was taken aback by the abundance of garish plastic knitting needles. Upon closer inspection, she noticed they were all US15s.

Not wanting to offend the kind employee, afterall she is a princess with impeccable manners, she "remembered" that her carriage was double-parked and left the store.

Somewhat shaken, the princess... reached into her silk brocade bag and pulled out her Patternworks catalog. How beautiful the yarns in the catalog were, so varied in color and texture, fiber and weight. She knew she had to get to Rapunzel's before they closed at 3 pm, as it was Saturday. Damn and blast those shortened weekend hours. The princess told the driver that he was not to stop until she was at the door of Throw Me A Braid. They rode for what seemed like ages, until she saw it, in the distance, glistening like...a beautiful ball of golden silk.

Trembling in anticipation, Gwendolyn stepped through the doorway and gasped, a flutter in her heart, as she beheld the riches before her. Silk, wool, alpaca, cashmere . . . even microfiber! . . . all arrayed in aisles of glorious color, as far as the eye can see (Vertically, that is, since this is Rapunzel's shop.) A voice wafted down, "Let me know if you need any help."

Gwendolyn looked up, up, up and saw . . .gleaming at her from the distance the most beautiful pink cashmere she had ever seen. She had nothing made out of such fine and lovely yarn and decided on the spot that this was the yarn she needed for her first project - yarn fit for a princess. She called up to the voice from above that she indeed needed assistance and began to wander the shop.

After a few minutes she felt a light tap on her shoulder and turned...to see the Jolly Green Giant handing her the pink cashmere. She noticed his multidirectional scarf made from Kureyon and his very attractive Koigu socks in the most interesting shades of orange. When she asked him why his knitted items weren't green, she was shocked to hear him say...because I am a fashionista! Those Queer Guys for the Straight Guy taught me that colors that "pop" will help bring out the rosey tones in my green skin. This pink cashmere is divine and will make a gorgeous Clapotis that will bring out the rosey tones in your skin. You'll need some needles for your project. Do you prefer straights or circulars? The lovely Gwendolyn requested some Latern Moon needles, a box of jeweled stitch markers, and an exquisite yarn cutter pendant as well.

The Jolly Green Giant wrapped her order in some golden paper and said...ho, ho, ho, come on home with the Jolly Green Giant! No, that's what she thought she heard. What she really heard was... "can I help you with anything else?" Gwendolyn just knew that her new passion, knitting, would be even more complete by enjoying it with someone else. Gwendolyn responded by saying "Sure. You can come back to my castle and knit the days away with me." The Jolly Green Giant, who might be a knitter with a flair for style, was also as straight as green giants come. So he agreed and they lived happily ever after.

Now for something completely different

I have to wonder if anyone even bothers to frequent my blog anymore. I mean, I'm even boring myself. Therefore, I've decided to try something today, just for the hell of it. When I worked as a programmer, I used to get unbelievably bored (it was essentially copying and pasting code parts). So my co-worker and I began emailing each stories. You've probably heard of this, but you start a story and then another person picks up the storyline and continues it, and then another person picks up on it and so on. My experiment here is to start a story and then you wonderful guys reading it get to continue it in the comments. You can write as little or as much as you want, or even get as crazy as you want, as long as you keep the story going. If we have an interesting little story going by Friday evening, I'll post it up in its entirety. This experiment will either be lots of interactive fun... or it will fall flat on its face. Shall we see what happens then?

"Once upon a time there lived a beautiful princess, in a beautiful castle, in a beautiful kingdom. Her name was Gwendolyn and she appeared to have everything her heart desired. Lots of money, closets full of clothes, a shiny carriage, and hair and skin any other princess in the surrounding kingdoms would kill for. But alas, as with any other princess in a substandard fairy tale, our Gwendolyn was unhappy. She thought and thought and thought about what she could do to bring happiness into her life. Finally, an idea struck her! She decided she would..."

The first person gets to take it from here!

Edited to add: I can't believe I almost forgot this! Heather sent me the greatest e-card yesterday. The best part about it was that it came after a horrible morning, just when I needed a lift the most! Thank you Heather!!!

3-Day Walk update

I've been locked away in my tower (better known as the King Library at SJSU), so I've gotten no knitting done. I cast on for my Must Have cardi last week and it's been untouched since then. And, because my photographer and I haven't been home at the same time as each other, I also don't have any scarf photos. So, I thought I would give you an update on the 3-Day-I-must-be-nuts-for-thinking-I-can-walk-60-miles Walk update.

First of all, on the training front, I managed to walk 4 miles on Sunday. I was unbelievably sore Monday morning, but I was proud of myself for getting as far as I did. yay!

Second of all, on the incentives front, Brooke, Eva, and I have been brainstorming about raffle prizes. We already know that we're planning to knit items as prizes. Brooke is planning to make the beautiful Shedir cabled hat Knitty's special Breast Cancer issue.

And Eva is making a fun scarf and hat set. I'm thinking of making the besotted scarf or the heart scarf from Knitty's Breast Cancer issue. I'm also considering the Booby scarf from that issue as well. I'm not actually sure that anyone would want to win this, but I think it would be fun to announce that the "booby prize goes to..." (Does anyone else ever feel so juvenile at times that you just know there is a 13 year old boy trapped inside somewhere?). AND, the wonderful Abby is going to donate one of her buttonhole bags to the list of prizes.

Is she great or what? Finally, I'm sure I'll be donating some yarn (I'm thinking ArtFibers) and some other items to the list of prizes. Plus, Brooke and Eva are cooking up some other ideas.

Of course, now that I've been talking up the prizes, you just know there has to be a pitch, right? The three of us have decided that for every $20 you are able to donate, you will get an entry into the raffle. If you would like to contribute, but just can't donate $20, I'm thinking of having a special mini-raffle that will include all of my walk sponsors. The prizes wouldn't be as significant, but this way no one would feel left out! Anyhoo, I'm at $350 right now, but I have a long way to go to meet $2100. (Read this as: until I meet $2100, you're going to hear me beg and plead - a lot).

Finally, on the what-this-is-really-all-about-front. I went in for my "female exam" today. It looks like I have an "encapsulated" lump in my left breast and I have to go in for an ultrasound. I had a benign cyst removed when I was 18 and I'm positive that this also a benign cyst. But I have to admit that my heart skipped a beat when she first went "hmmmm..." I have breast cancer in my family history. My maternal grandmother died from it and my sister has been diagnosed with pre-cancerous tissue. I've been lucky that this is as close as it has touched me... so far. Many of my sponsors have told me that they are sponsoring my walk in memory of a loved one that they have lost to breast cancer. This has made me realize just how many people this cancer affects. One of the goals of this walk is to raise money for the fight against breast cancer. It's also about honoring the people who have survived and lost the fight. And... it's about realizing that any of us, or our loved ones, could be in this fight in the future. Today's exam was a major wake-up call for me. Please, please, please do your self exams. And if you're over 40, be sure to go in for your regular mammograms.

Ok, I'm stepping down from my soapbox. I'll be sure to have a cheerier post next time!

Tagged (twice)

Both Wendy and Elisa tagged me for the music meme (For those who are non-bloggers, I have no idea what meme stands for, although I did at one time and am too lazy to look it up. Basically, it's set of questions that everyone answers on their blog.)

Before I answer these, though, did anyone else notice in my last post how I managed to go from the subject of knee pads to Duran Duran? Hmmmm....

Ok, here goes:

1. What is the total amount of music files on your computer? I honestly have no idea. I meant to turn on my computer last night to look, but again, that lazy thing kicked in. I just got a 40 Gig iPod last November, so I'm slowly adding music to it. Slowly because my hard drive is almost full so I can only put on so much music, transfer it to the iPod, and then I have to delete it to add some more. Aren't you glad you asked?

2. What was the last CD you bought? I haven't personally bought a CD in years, but the last one gifted to me was Duran Duran's latest CD Astronaut. My hubby got it for me for Xmas and it's very cool because it has an bonus DVD which has live performances and other goodies.

3. What was the last song you listened to before reading this message? I can't actually remember what the last song was before I found I had been tagged, but the last song I heard on the radio this morning was by Los Lonely Boys.

4. List 5 songs you often listen to or that mean a lot to you. Really, there's only two songs that I feel are worth mentioning. At Last by Etta James was the song my hubby and I danced to at our wedding. And Bittersweet by Big Head Todd & the Monsters because I remember dancing to it in my hubby's apartment when we were dating. It was the sweetest thing, because he had just bought the cd and we were listening to it while hanging out and he just grabbed me and started dancing.

5. To whom will you pass the stick and why? Oy, this is the toughest question, because I know some people really don't like to deal with these things. So... I'm going to tag my three walking buddies, because this might be a good way to get to know the people I'll be trekking 60 miles with (and they're hopefully good sports and won't kill me). Brooke, Eva, and Shannon... you're it!

Spaghetti, meet Sauce

I worked at the community college library last night (this is the same place where I interned last semester and they've hired me on as a substitute reference librarian - very cool!). Anyway, I went over to the cafeteria to grab a bite to eat and the sign for their special of the day said "spaghetti meet sauce". All I could think of was the cook introducing the spaghetti to the sauce. I know, I know, but I was tired and this really struck me as funny. I desperately wanted to be even more juvenile and write in a comma after spaghetti (to further ensure that others would read this as I had), but I was the only one actually in the cafeteria at the time (aside from the employees) and it would have been a little obvious.

Sadly, this is the most interesting thing I have to talk about today. I did try to take some pictures of me in my scarf (the one that my Gift Fairy made me!) this morning, but I discovered that either my arms aren't long enough or just not coordinated enough to take a photo of myself. At least not from a distance so that you can actually see what I'm wearing. I was going to try the bathroom mirror shot, but our bathroom is tiny so I couldn't back up far enough to get a decent shot. So I'll have to wait until I can have my official blog photographer take some pictures of me with the scarf. While I'm at it, I'll also have to have him take a picture of me wearing a scarf that my niece Shauna made for me over Xmas. It's very glam!

Since I don't have much of a life right now, I'll have to tell you a quick, funny story. Hopefully this will be funnier than the spaghetti story. {grin} The night I signed up for the 3-Day walk, I announced to my hubby after clicking on the submit button, "Well, it's official. I'm doing the 3-Day walk." My hubby said "I hope you have some good knee pads." I paused for a minute. Knee pads? What exactly did he think I'd be doing on this 3-Day walk? He recovered pretty quickly, though, and followed up with "You know, for raising the money."

By the way, did anyone else see Duran Duran on Good Morning America this morning? I can't believe I'll be seeing them in concert in a month! sigh...