No no no no no no no

Ralph confessed today that he wants to keep the dog, even though we both know that we absolutely cannot. Gah! With any luck, we'll either get a call from the owners, and if not I've got a co-worker who thinks his daughter might take her. Third option is another co-worker knows of a no-kill shelter that she's willing to take her to.

Totally changing the subject, we've got a local election coming up. There are three candidates, all of whom have first names beginning with J. One also has a last name that begins with J. What really amuses me, though, is one of the candidates is named Jack and one is named Jill. It gets better, though--Jill's last name is Hill. You can't make this stuff up, folks :-)

Good Eats

Lately I have been overcome with the desire to learn how to cook. Oh, I can make a few things such as Welsh Rarebit & Shake-n-Bake pork chops, and I can bake pretty well, but when it comes down to actual cooking I pretty much suck. So I've gone through my cookbooks & bought a couple cooking magazines only to discover that either a) all the recipes use 500 zillion ingredients, b) they use tiny amounts of really expensive seasonings, or c) they sound/taste nasty (NOTE: "dinner on a budget" recipes that call for cheap ingredients will not taste good). I only found ONE recipe that tasted good & had reasonable, easily-obtained ingredients.

Only one, that is, until yesterday, when out of desperation I pulled out a cookbook that Lizard bought me years ago because she thought it was funny: "Mary Ann's Gilligan's Island Cookbook" by Dawn Wells et. al. Thumbing through it, I found several recipes that looked good and did not have an intimidating ingredient list. I went shopping for a few ingredients, and last night made "Skipper's Simple Chicken" which really is more of a home-assembled meal rather than home-cooked. It only has 5 ingredients: chicken, a little oil in which to brown the meat, two kinds of canned soup, and cooked rice. It was sooooooooo good. I served it with peas to round out the meal. Then this morning I made the "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde Casserole," a very breakfasty concoction with bacon, hard-boiled eggs, noodles, cheese, and a milk-based sauce. I was a bit leery of this one since I'm not a fan of hard-boiled eggs unless they are smushed into egg salad sammidges, but I was pleasantly surprised at how tasty it was. Tonight I think I'll make "Ginger's Sweet Red Pepper Sauce" (oh, rats, I forgot to buy onions) and serve it on some angel hair pasta.

Today I realized I never got a picture of Hali wearing the legwarmers I made for her (she's got arthritic knees) so I forced them on her this morning (she reeeaaally does not like wearing them) & got a couple shots. Please ignore the fact that the carpet hasn't been vacuumed yet; with four dogs and a cat in the house it's hard to keep up with all the fur.

Whaddya mean, vacation's almost over?

Still haven't found the owner of the stray dog. She is so sweet; I hate to think that we might have to take her to the pound. Unfortunately with three dogs in the household already, we just can't take in another one no matter how small and cute and fluffy.

Finally made it to the Madrona Marsh today. Turns out they are having an Environment Fair in the parking lot of the nature center, so we spent most of our time there. It was rather hot & more people than normal in the preserve which meant not as many birds to see. Not a single frog, either. I did get a rather nice shot of a captive owl, though, if I do say so myself.

Need to do some grocery shopping today, especially if we intend to have dinner tonight. I plan on making Pasta alla Puttanesca (which translates roughly as "whore's pasta"), which is an almost-but-not-quite vegetarian dish made with tomatoes, garlic, Greek olives, and anchovies (thus the not-quite-vegetarian). Actually, if you leave out the anchovies I do believe it would be a vegan meal, not just vegetarian.

Not much else going on. I've completed about 40-some-odd rows on the HP square, and cast on for a new hat. The hat seems so simple after all the intarsia pieces; just stockinette in the round for the most part. It will have a turned, pleated brim & a ribbon hatband with bow when finished though.

Change in plans for the day

Well, looks like we'll be spending at least part of the day trying to find this little girl's owners. She just showed up in our yard this morning, bold as brass. Very friendly pup, and after a few minutes of deep suspicion is getting along well with the other dogs. Even the cat isn't too alarmed by her presence, and she's made no attempt to chase him. Hardly even seems to notice him, really. She's got a collar but no tags so that makes things a little tougher. We've printed some fliers & will have her on a leash with us when we put them up.

Good start to the vacation

It has been a very relaxing past few days. Saturday we just lay about the house like slugs. Sunday we puttered around the house, went to the bookstore & pet shop, and lay about the house like slugs. Monday we got the trailer hitched up, did a bit of housework, and headed on out to Mount Baldy for a short camping trip. Once there we met The Boy, The Girl, and Lizard for dinner at Mt. Baldy Lodge.

The weather was beautiful, if a bit chilly at night. The place where we stayed was practically deserted; I think we saw three people the entire time we were there. This is a *very* dog-friendly campground; you're actually allowed to have the dogs off-leash as long as they are well-behaved. The girls loved being able to run around & climb on the rocks. We spent our time wandering around with the dogs, reading, knitting (for me), playing computer games (for Ralph) and laying about like slugs.


Today, of course, we're back home. Mudgie was *very* glad to see us, alternating between cuddling & scolding us for having dared to go away. Had a shower for the first time since Monday (power issues with the trailer prevented us from turning on the water heater, which is the main reason we didn't stay longer) which felt wonderful!!!! Our basic plans for the day are reading, knitting (for me), computer games (for Ralph) and laying about like slugs. (Are you seeing a trend in our vacation plans yet?)


Tomorrow we will probably head out to the Madrona Marsh. Also thinking of going to the Pirates Dinner Show either tomorrow night or Friday, which is like Medieval Times only with pirates instead of knights.

The purple flower is the one & only blossom on our wisteria, taken on Monday right before we left. It's mostly open now and is starting to have a lovely scent.

I admit it. I caved.

I was NOT going to start any new HP squares until I finished the backs for the ones I've already done. Of course I caved, and started Fred & George last night. It's not at a point where they are even vaguely recognizable yet (I'm on row 15 out of 111) but here's what it looked like right before I cast on. Since I'm on vacation this week I should be able to get a lot done. I've also got a new hat pattern to try out when this one gets too mind-boggling & needs to rest, so to speak.

I've got a loaf of lemon bread baking in the oven. Mmmmmm--starting to smell really good in here!

Graph Jam

I totally want to post this in the kitchen at work:


see more Funny Graphs

Posting time

Hedwig is done! Well, off the needles anyway. I still need to block it, make the back piece, buy the pillow form, and put the whole thing together. The little stack of yarn next to the piece is the 400 snippets from weaving in the ends. Yes, 400. I counted them. However, I have since learned a way to "float" the yarns so you can cheat a little & cross over several stitches without having dangly strands going across so that will, I think, make the next piece have less bobbins/ends to weave in. I'm going to make the backs to the finished pieces before starting a new Potter square, though.

Ralph's eye is doing better. Oh, what's wrong with his eye you ask? And well you may. On Saturday he was working on the pond, bent over, and a reed went right into his eye. Scratched his cornea which was rather painful for a few days. The doctor gave him some antibiotic ointment & he's feeling fine now.

Lizard has a temp position starting up soon, hooray! It's at a place where she has worked before (and liked very much) and is supposed to last three months. The last time she worked there it was supposed to be for three months and ended up lasting over a year, so I've got my fingers crossed for her.

Why, yes, I *am* a dolt. Thank you for noticing.

So I stayed up late (for me) last night reading a ghost story/murder mystery. Ralph had gone to bed early; the house was dark except for the one light on next to me. The house was making the normal creaks and groans that every house makes when it cools off at night. Did I mention it was a ghost story? Yeah, you see what's coming, don't you? I managed to spook myself so badly that I didn't want to turn out the light & go to bed. I finally plucked up my courage, turned out the light, patted the dog for comfort & successfully navigated my way across the living room without getting waylaid by Hatchet Jack. Ralph's coat, although hanging in a suspicious manner on the back of the hallway door, failed in its attempt to slay me as I walked past. Of course, once I was safe in bed I felt like a right fool. Needless to say, though, it was a very good ghost story!

I'm 3/4 of the way done with the latest Harry Potter square, and I think it's quite recognizable now. Mind you, I think it looks better in the photo than it does in real life (I feel that way about all three HP squares, actually), probably because the stitches look smaller & the detail shows up more.

Ralph has been having problems with the computer. He's managed to fix it partially; that is to say, it works on my sign-on but not on his. Windows will pull up, then after a few seconds will switch back to the sign-in screen. Very strange.

Looking forward to my upcoming vacation time. We're planning to spend a couple days camping at Mt. Baldy. No other concrete plans, just some vague ideas of maybe going to Knott's Berry Farm (I have a half-price coupon) one day, and perhaps visiting the Madrona Marsh. With all the rain we've had lately, I'm sure there will be lots of frogs.

Create Your Own Title

I've had one person correctly guess who is on the new square, based on the photo in today's post. I've come a bit further since this shot was taken & I think it's getting to be obvious. I'll have to take another photo soon.

My work went on a field trip Thursday to visit a few of our communities. It was a lot of fun. We walked the models at two different locations, did a frame walk at one & walked a completed production home at the other. Lunch was provided--cheeseburgers, hot dogs, green salad, potato salad, chips, cookies, soda & water. The meat was cooked on a grill and everything that I had tasted wonderful. We had some extra time, so we detoured to one of our brand-new land deals & had a bit of a drive-through.

One of the best parts of the day was all the time we spent on the bus, because I was able to knit the whole time. I decided to start on the backing for the McGonagall pillow since that's plain stockinette & I didn't have to focus on it. I got literally half of it done: 55 rows out of 110. As you can imagine I was quite pleased about it. I did three more rows yesterday before work. Last night I remembered that I did McGonagall on size 5 needles, not size 7, and the backing is going to be way too big. Sigh. After sleeping on the possibilities, I have decided to go ahead & finish it. I've got a couple Christmas motifs I can use to make a different front piece and I'll have a nice new holiday pillow.

No big plans for the weekend, except going to see "Alice in Wonderland" at some point.

On to the next

McGonagall is almost done. She's off the needles, however there are still a half-dozen ends to weave in plus she needs blocking. I also managed to skip a row somewhere along the line. I think it might be in the right eye, as that looks a little wonky to me. I'm not 100% happy with the finished project, however I *did* do her as a practice piece so I'm not too worried about it. If I do make Prof. McGonagall again, I will know what to do to make it better.

I've also cast on for the next Harry Potter square. The photo is at 4 rows completed plus a bottom border, with 17 (!!!) bobbins in use. Can you guess who it is yet? :-) I managed two more rows this morning (it's taking me about 20 minutes to do one row, yikes!), was able to remove two bobbins but had to add three more. Sigh.