Friday Unrelated Information

1. Neko Case didn't disappoint. She wailed for an hour, played fantastic NEW SONGS from an album coming out next March, and made charmingly awkward small talk between songs. My favorite? Introducing a song by Harry Nilsson, she said, "I like to think that his spirit haunts pinball machines."

2. I have the day off! I'm going to try to finish a dress, so I have a new fall dress to wear immediately after Labor Day, just like the movie Picnic.

3. Science news of the week: Researchers have discovered that crows (and probably other corvidae) can not only recognize and remember human faces, they can hold a grudge. Don't piss off a crow!

I Hope We're All Planning On Going To The Neko Case Concert Tonight

Neko Case, who's been described as sounding like "the angry ghost of Patsy Cline" and whose lyrics resemble an American Gothic fairy tale, is playing the FREE Twilight Concert at the Gallivan Center Tonight.

If you couldn't tell, I'm going, and you should go, too. Everyone should go! (Actually, if you're 17, pushy, and wearing a page from the Urban Outfitters catalog, you can stay home. I don't want a repeat of the last Twilight Concert I went to.) Everyone ELSE needs to go, though. You can come stand with us. Maybe we should bring some flowers to throw at her.

Check out a couple songs and a video here if you don't want to take my word for it.

Now With More Poems!

I found another good one on Writer's Almanac last week. I've never heard of Barbara Hamby but she sounds more like Kerouac than Kerouac did. (Any poem that can combine "hallelujah" and "coreopsis" is all right by me.)

It's a long one so I'm linking to it, but go read it and be happy at the sheer sound of it.

"Thus Spake The Mockingbird"

Tuesday Project Roundup: "Thank God For Sheep"

That's what knitting guru Elizabeth Zimmermann said, and I agree. It's so nice to work with soft springy apple green wool instead of flaccid cotton. (Although with that descriptor, who wouldn't prefer wool?)


Here's about 1/3 of a sweater from a pattern said Elizabeth thought up for a baby, modified for an adult (not by me, though; by this knitter). It's a delight to knit and I've been stuffing the ever-growing thing in my purse so I can do a pattern repeat on my lunch hour. I've realized I don't wear the bigger things I knit, just the scarves and gloves and hats, so I'm hoping this one will break the trend.

As Elizabeth said, "Knit on."

Monday Report

1. The tomatoes have finally decided to ripen:

2. Toby is back to normal, watching birds and wanting to play.
(Here's the view right outside that window--attack of the tomatoes!)

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Go listen to some cowboy music today because it's my dad's birthday! He's lived by The Cowboy Code his whole life and taught me to do the same. To celebrate today, he's probably going to ride his bike 100 miles or something, because he's tough like that. Happy Birthday, Dad! (Edited to add: Yes, he is actually doing a century ride today, and it's Ray Bradbury's birthday today, too.)

2. Mark your calendars--if you want to exhibit anything in the State Fair, the Home Arts division is accepting entries next Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. (Other dates to keep in mind: The State Fair's demolition derby is September 14th, and Blue Moon Ranch is having their Open Farm Day September 27th and 28th.)

3. Speaking of State Fair, I watched the musical in its entirety Wednesday night and oh, the costumes. And oh, the flimsy plot. And oh, how musicals have their happy endings. Up next: Meet Me In St. Louis.

Cats Do Not Eat Bubble Gum

I meant to give a Toby update at the beginning of the week, but by the time I got the quotes and Tuesday's project out of the way, he wasn't really getting any better. Friday's trip to the vet was pretty major--three shots and fluids in a kitty IV, none of which went well--and I hated to take him back, but back he went yesterday. All I can say is, it's a good thing I can take the top off of his kitty carrier, because he wasn't about to come out of it in the office.

It's an even better thing that he doesn't appear to have swallowed any of my crafty supplies and that we think we can get him better with more antibiotics. I'm still giving him tuna-flavored medicine and now I get to squirt pink medicine in his mouth, too, that's bubble-gum flavored. Which makes me wonder: "Who in the hell thinks that cat medicine should taste like bubble gum?"

Here's the little tyke in the happier times of early last week, before someone tried to squirt things in his mouth three times a day: He's improving already. He just doesn't like the taste of bubble gum.

Cute Animal Story Of The Week

This actually isn't that heart-warming, but it had the best line of my internet reading yesterday. Apparently, an emperor penguin has been part of the King's Guard in Norway since the Edinburgh Zoo let them adopt one in 1922. The latest penguin (they're all named "Nils Olav") just got knighted:
"During the ceremony, Nils had a sword dubbed on each side of his head, where his shoulders should be, to confirm his regimental knighthood."

Tuesday Project Roundup: "Nothing Is More Chic"

I thought I should wear all black, the universal sign of sophistication, to my high-school reunion, but I hate wearing black and sewing it is even more boring. So I decided on navy blue, since, as Cecil Beaton said, "Chanel demonstrated that nothing was more chic than fine linen, navy-blue serge, and lots of soap."

I had a pattern from my mother's stash that wanted to be made for a special occasion (well, it wasn't a muumuu, so it seemed dressy), so I went for the "navy-blue and lots of soap" Jackie O look, minus that back belt:
It actually doesn't look like much on the hanger, but with a tan, pearl studs, and a yellow clutch, it was just right:

"It Was As If Everyone Had Swelled"

And with that Grosse Pointe Blank quote for a title, here's the high school reunion experience...in quotes. I went with Mr. Isbell; the lovely Amber and her Ideal Husband shared in the alienation and hard alcohol.

"Everyone looks vaguely familiar, but only in the way that people who live in Salt Lake all look familiar."

"I expected there to be baby races or something."

"His wife's cute."
"Apparently, she's a good cook!"

"Sweetie, can we have one baby while the first one is still a baby?"

"I have, like, a million ants."
"We have half an acre of ants."
[There were awards for things like "Most Pets." We wanted to win.]

"Look around the room: We have cookies from Costco."
[Ideal Husband went to Judge Memorial and had a guy selling cocaine from the next locker. Amber had a bag of cookies from Costco in her locker during high school. That phrase just summed it up for me.]

Friday Unrelated Information

1. It’s Julia Child’s birthday today. If you’re a procrastinator like me, take comfort in the fact that she didn’t even learn how to cook decently until she was 32.

2. Toby has to go to the vet today. He has what seems to be kitty stomach flu—not too alarming, but enough that he has to go visit kindly Dr. Nan. Send some kitty-get-well vibes his way.

3. After a difficult week—which will be topped off by the vet followed by the high school reunion tonight—I’m going to do nothing tomorrow. I’m not even going to clean or go to the farmers market. Instead, I’m going to enjoy all the sunshine that we have left. And I might think of this Mary Oliver poem, “The Sun.”

Books That Feature My Imaginary Boyfriend

I’ve always been a fan of Sherlock Holmes—to the point where I was accused of having a crush on him in high school—and I’ve been unable to focus on any serious literature this summer. So imagine my delight to find a mystery that features a young lady with mad observational skills of her own who meets Holmes in retirement and becomes his newer, smarter Watson. The book is by Laurie King and there’s a whole series featuring the two, which is good because I was more than halfway through The Beekeeper’s Apprentice in just one day.

I can’t recommend my new discovery enough. If you’re a fan of Holmes at all, you’ll love them—the continuity between the Conan Doyle and King versions of Holmes is perfect, and there’s just enough period costume and descriptions of brandy being drunk. It’s light reading, yes, but not silly. (There’s an excerpt here.)

And I have to say, I think Holmes would approve of having such adventures with a 20-year-old in his retirement.

A Poem For The Housework

Monday's Writer's Almanac featured a Mark Strand poem that I really liked, with the love/tepid relationship with cooking and cleaning that I have. (I like to eat and I love a clean house, but sometimes I get so tired of providing food and order.) (My budget doesn't allow for restaurants. Or a maid. Someday.)

But this elevated things, if only momentarily. From "The Continuous Life":

...O parents, confess
To your little ones the night is a long way off
And your taste for the mundane grows; tell them
Your worship of household chores has barely begun;
Describe the beauty of shovels and rakes, brooms and mops;
Say there will always be cooking and cleaning to do,
That one thing leads to another, which leads to another;
Explain that you live between two great darks, the first
With an ending, the second without one, that the luckiest
Thing is having been born, that you live in a blur
Of hours and days, months and years, and believe
It has meaning, despite the occasional fear
You are slipping away with nothing completed, nothing
To prove you existed.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Morbid Curiousity Edition

So...Friday is my 10-year high school reunion. I'm going, because the curious part of me that "has hobbies and sees what happens" knows that if I don't attend and see how bad it really is, I'm always going to wonder. (Also, I thought, "What if someone in a book I write needs to go to a high school reunion and I don't know the exact feelings of displacement? I'd better go.")

Of course I made a dress for it (pictures next week). But I also decided to make a clutch, which gives you something to do with your hands when you're standing around talking at an alcohol-less event.

Obviously it still needs a lining, but it's turning out well.

Most importantly, it's nice and roomy, as Toby shows...

...because it needs to hold my flask. To quote the best high school reunion movie ever,
"Who needs hard alcohol?"
"I do!!"

It's That Time Again

To look for Elvis at the corner 7-11?
To remember the Alamo?
To go to work?
To celebrate that my parents now have high-speed internet by posting an Animaniacs compilation?
To just link to the video instead because I can't figure out how to embed video on the most user-friendly blogging platform around?

YES!

Enjoy it.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. As soon as I posted about how much I was biking, I got a weird, symptom-less sore throat and had to drive to work two days. Serves me right for showing off, I guess.

2. Speaking of biking, did anyone see Holly Mullen's editorial in the City Weekly a few weeks ago? She thinks it's not cars that are a threat to cyclists, it's cyclists not following the rules. I have to disagree, as long as we get news stories like this: Kamas man charged for swerving truck into cyclist.

3. IT'S A GIANT CHICKEN!
(That was for you, Dad.)

No More Frat Boys For President

I haven't made it a secret that Barack Obama is "my new bicycle" (click on the site to refresh and get a taste of what life will be like with Obama!), but I also haven't really mentioned that we shouldn't vote for McCain because of a host of reasons, not just because Obama is clearly superior.

Consider this one, from the beginning of the week: McCain went to the Sturgis motorcycle rally in S.D. because, well, I'm sure a lot of people there think Obama is a sissy boy [redacted] [redacted]. Easy political points, right? And what better way to win over your new biker friends than to offer up your 54-year-old trophy wife to compete in the topless Miss Buffalo Chip pageant? Dudes love that.

McCain: he'll pimp his wife for your vote--or at least make her laugh uncomfortably on stage while he's being a boor! As a commenter on one of the articles I read asked, "Do they have a dedicated group of fratty morons making up strategy there or something?"

Biking Report

I’ve been biking five days a week lately—four days to work and then to the farmer’s market. When I first started riding to work I was only able to ride two out of the seven blocks (straight) up to my apartment; now I can ride four. I’m getting much better at carrying things home, too: I’ve finally figured out how to get a dozen eggs* back from the farmers’ market unscathed. And yesterday I got two crystal lowball glasses that I bought at lunch (to drink Mad Men-style) home in one piece.

So all in all, I think the bike is working out. Especially since I bought it to be stylish first and functional second.

*Why make a special trip to buy local eggs? Because I read this, briefly considered becoming a vegan, then decided I could do better than than the generic “cage free” eggs in the grocery store.

Tuesday Project Roundup: The Lounging Before The Crafty Storm

Presenting: Lounge pants! These are a vast improvement over my old John Deere green pair from J. Crew.
And lounge shorts! Mr. Isbell really doesn't get any sewing done for him, so when he asked I had to make him something. (Of course, he originally asked for a suit, and couldn't understand why I didn't jump on that project.)
And after I finished these, I went crazy thinking about fall patterns and fabrics and sewing plans and knitting plans and how I could replicate this coat for less than $250. It's like the crafty version of the ant getting ready for the winter, I guess.

Like Christmas Morning

I was going to put these up Friday, but then Karma the alpaca had her baby (named Liza!) and I thought that would just be too much cute. So here's your Monday pictures of Toby, enjoying his new cat house Thursday night.


I understand now why parents can go completely overboard with buying their kids stuff--look how happy he is!

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Karma the alpaca, the one I fell in love when I saw her as a baby two years ago, had a cria of her own yesterday! The baby's name isn't decided yet, but there are many cute pictures here. (I can't help thinking I should have bought Karma when she was for sale while pregnant last fall...I would have double my investment.) (I guess the fact I didn't have $15,000 laying around was a good reason, though.)
2. Druidic holiday alert: Today is Lughnasa, celebrating the end of summer and the beginning of the harvest. Let's hope my tomatoes ripen soon so they can join in.

3. I let myself drive to work today, which is the first time since last Monday. How decadent!