We’re baking, we’re baking...

Support staff meeting this morning, and I volunteered last month. Which means, of course, that I am not in a baking mood, so I cheated. Two boxes of Krusteaz Cranberry Orange Supreme Muffin Mix, a cup of orange marmalade, and a disposable pan. The other volunteer is picking up breakfast tacos from Taco Cabana; nobody is likely to starve.

I drove in yesterday, went to the church bookstore after work and picked up the much-delayed February Ensign, then went to Knit Night for a little while. Got a call during the day from a member of the elders quorum, and another one last night from my secretary (my secretary, tee hee!), informing me that a move within our ward has turned out to be somewhat more complicated than we had anticipated, and we would need more volunteers today.

Back and forth via cell phone with my first counselor, some calls down the ward list once I got home, and more numbers pasted into a Word document to take to work with me today, for yet more calls (because at that point it was too late in the evening). Also a couple of Facebook emails to people whose cell phone numbers may have changed.

Measurable progress on the doll skirt yesterday, and some lovely compliments on it at Knit Night, but it would not make sense to a muggle if I showed you a picture at this point, so you’ll just have to trust me.

I have no idea what I’m wearing for St. Patrick’s Day. All my trusty green stuff is in the wash. No, I did not go do laundry last night. I had a move in the mire, as it were.

Firstborn and Lark are safely home from a whirlwind visit to Alabama to visit Willow.

And I guess that’s all the news that’s fit to print, so I’ll post this and go water my plants in Fairyland. [Stupid bonsai that has me stuck on this level for three weeks. But I’m not bitter.]

We now return you to your regularly scheduled knitting.

A Hatter, but not Mad

Another wee hat completed on the train last night, the skirt well underway, and a fourth hat cast on. A day to make a knitter pleased, indeed.

After dinner I grabbed the shopping list I had printed off from the grocery stores specials and went cherry-picking. I left all those metaphorical “cherries” right in the store. Naturally enough, since it was the day before the special ends, there were only two boxes of strawberries left at buy one, get one free. Neither one of which particularly impressed me. Which disinclined me to take advantage of the specials on bagged salads or my favorite brand of beans. I also priced the Texmati rice, and while not outrageous, it was more than I was in the mood to spend, so I put my cart back and came home.

Oh well, I got some fresh air and a bit of exercise.

I have written up the pattern for the doll beret. The ribbing is nearly done on beret #3. I have fired off a query to the state Comptroller’s office regarding sales tax. If I do end up opening an Etsy shop, I want to make sure that I am compliant with all the laws of the land (Articles of Faith #12).

It’s raining outside, or it was when I woke up about an hour ago. Nice gentle splashy sounds: a really great way to wake up.

Hard to believe that I was so sick, this time last week. It is lovely, just lovely, to be well and to feel well.

OK, I’m officially hungry. I’m going to nuke some pancakes and pack my lunch and get ready to scoot out the door. Y’all be good, and remember who you are...

One of the great things about blogging...

...at least for us creative types, is the occasional glimpse into another artist/artisan’s creative process. Anne Hanson designs amazing scarves and shawls. Her blog, knitspot, remains one of my favorites. In this post she solves a problem: what do you do when you need 40 yards of yarn to finish a project? And the yarn you are using is handspun, and you have used up every last strand of the fiber that went into it? Here’s how.

Graham crackers. I love them. Plain, honey, cinnamon, it makes no difference. Give me a mug of milk and a sleeve of crackers, and five decades slip away. Yes, I dunk them; don’t you? There is an art in how long to leave them in the milk, before they mudslide into the bottom of your mug and you have to go find a spoon. And never mind the two full crackers = one serving nonsense. If you don’t eat enough to wake you in the middle of the night for a sprint down the hall, there’s no sense even starting.

I may have figured out a church knitting project. I grabbed the untouched ball of Hempathy and my bag of DP’s and guesstimated 72 stitches for the waistband of a doll skirt. I've worked five rounds of K1P1 ribbing, which in a non-wool yarn is not particularly springy. And I’ve learned that my wrist is about 1cm larger than Celeste’s waist, which will be handy for fittings when she’s at home and I’m away. The increase from my wrist to my thumb also approximates the curve from her waist to her hip. I will probably need to thread shirring elastic through the ribbing to perfect the fit. But I am going to tackle Intolerable Cruelty, which I think is witty and just on the cusp of bad taste for a human, but OK for a doll. And the large size requires three times as many stitches as I have cast on, so if I take those numbers and divide by three, both lengthwise and crosswise, I ought to get a pretty good fit on Celeste.

@ Anonymous a/k/a Sandie: I didn’t say the first pancakes tasted “meh”. They just always look bland, and a little lumpy. [No dogs, chez Ravelled. No cats, either, as one of my girls is allergic. Just me, myself, and I, and the occasional “meh” pancake.] Just had a plate of re-warmed pancakes, every bit as tasty as the ones I had yesterday and nowhere near as much work.

Lots of lovely sleep yesterday. The nap after church was pure bliss. And then I puttered for several hours and went back to bed. No idea what I want to wear today, and no idea what sort of weather is forecast. Nor have I decided what I want to have for lunch. Doing a spot of VT after our friends have their dinner and Family Home Evening, as she works retail and has a crazy schedule.

I think tomorrow night I may be skipping Knit Night to catch up on the rest of the laundry.

I could drive in every day this week because of all the folks who will be out for spring break (and thus their parking spots will be available). But I just want to hop on the train and knit for that hour each way and let somebody else be in charge.

Good news on the breathing front: I was hardly bothered in our meetinghouse yesterday. And only the merest hint of a tickle in my throat this morning. I really, truly am getting over this stuff, and I am so thankful!

Sproing!

That would be me, springing forward after a good night’s sleep. Thus begins the two- to three-week period of adjustment which is the onset of DST.

As I posted on Facebook, I am so thankful that I do not have to explain DST to a small herd of dairy goats, whose udders ran on a schedule all their own. And who let me [and the neighbors] know if I was one minute later than they thought I should be.

In the spirit of leveraging technology, I just discovered the shopping list feature which accompanies the online weekly specials at a grocery store to which I have a reward card. I opted to read the text-only version, which is neatly categorized, and in half the time it takes me to browse through the print version that arrives in my mailbox weekly, I had compiled and printed a list of three items to take to the store after work tomorrow. I cherry-pick at that store, buying items only when their specials are less than what I would spend at my regular grocery store, or if I need something they carry which is not carried elsewhere. [Which reminds me that I am out of Texmati rice; I need to scribble that on the list as well.]

I have dutifully clicked on the pink button for donating mammograms, which is a nice way to begin the day. Can’t quite decide what I want for breakfast this morning; it’s good to have so many options.

I was talking with my friend Jill about incremental progress on our respective financial goals. I am nearing the end of the first quarter of strict budgeting, and I am looking forward to getting the quarterly statement from my credit union early next month, showing how much I’ve paid off and what remains to be paid. I have an spreadsheet here at home to track my progress.

I can feel myself reaching that point where I tell myself I’ve been good for a very long time, and I deserve a splurge. And bonus time is fast approaching, which tends to knock a hole in my financial self-discipline because all of a sudden there is money!!! that does not have to go for rent or utilities or gasoline or comestibles. It is the time of year when the song of the eBay is heard throughout the land: come away, my love [and bring your PayPal with you].

I think it just might be different this year. She has way more self-discipline than I do, and I am hoping to learn from her good example. One of the things that she does, and I think I want to follow this example, is to put up beans in quart jars for an instant dinner. X amount of dried beans, Y amount of boiling water on top of them, pressure canned for Z minutes. Much cheaper than the canned beans that I love [which are on the shopping list for tomorrow night], and all I would need would be a pan of cornbread to have a complete protein. Plus, the jars are reusable, while the cans need to be recycled. Cheap, fast, and easy. Unlike me.

I did do one small splurge yesterday. I bought a small bottle of pancake mix, the kind where you add water, shake, and pour. Generic, of course. So this morning I have spent half an hour or so frying up pancakes in real butter, since the first ones in each batch are always meh until you get the temperature right. I will wrap up the ones I don’t eat, which will be the vast majority of them, and save them for later in the week. And I will wash and save the container for the next batch.

Mmm, breakfast is was ready, in a small lake of real, grade B maple syrup, which I prefer to the gourmet stuff. And it was good. I will definitely do this again, and soon.

I am going to have to get creative with the church knitting today, as the yarn I wanted to use, needs to be wound into a ball, and my ball-winder is on the far side of the studio with about 15 boxes between me and it, and the needles I would need are midway, inside the armoire which I cant get into because of those same boxes.

And I am going to have to get moving, because I have a meeting with Bishop in about an hour and a half.

Old Mother Hubbard

Ms. Hubbard is sitting in the corner with young master Horner. They are eating malted milk balls, having polished off the Christmas Pie, the leftover microwave veggies, the bowl of cereal that got poured just before we discovered that the milk went sour.

One of my friends at work was eating malted milk balls at her desk the past couple of days. I picked up a carton when I nipped into CVS to get some knee-highs to wear with my skirt at leadership training this morning. I have portioned them out into snack bags, to toss into my lunch over the next couple of weeks. (The malted milk balls, not the knee highs; I don’t think those would be very tasty.)

The cupboards are full. The fridge is full, and not just of malted milk balls. We had a medium turnout for the meeting, so those of us who were there got to play Ruth-and-Naomi and glean the table. I came home with two slices of zucchini bread (the only thing that humble vegetable is good for, and I’m only in the mood for it a couple of times a year) and about half of the leftover cantaloupe chunks, some water biscuits and cheese slices.

I also bought printer paper and have replaced my missing pen with a handful of cheap stick pens, gotten more paper towels and my favorite brand of facial tissues, stocked up on bread at the bread thrift store, brought home another gallon of distilled water for my CPAP.

When we walked out of the stake center, my friend noticed that the right rear tire was low. We pulled out my compressor. Didn’t work. Called Secondborn; 2BDH was just pulling in their driveway from helping a friend with computer issues. They live minutes away from the stake center, and he was there to help us in a jiffy. His compressor didn’t work, either, so we realized it was something with my car. We used his car and my compressor and aired up the tire. While that was going on, he pulled out the bad fuse for my cigarette lighter. If he does not have the right one at their place to fix it, I will stop in at AutoZone after work on Monday and bat my eyes at them.

2BDH then piloted us to the nearest Discount Tire Store, where they found a nail in the shoulder of my tire. Again, the tire was under warranty, so I was only out $10 to renew the warranty. My friend and I celebrated the fact that I did not have to buy a whole new tire, with ice cream cones at Braums.

While we were at the tire store, we made RS phone calls. Well, mostly she did. There was a gorgeous middle-aged man wearing a shirt with a massage therapy logo. Turns out he is an instructor at one of the local colleges. We talked about modalities, about the need to take care of oneself, etc. I was not flirting. He offered his business card, but I told him I have one friend who does Swedish when I just want to relax, and a Shiatsu practitioner for when I let it go too long and need to be broken apart and put back together.

In retrospect, what I should have done was give him a Book of Mormon pass-along card and just trade cards with him. For somebody who shows up at correlation meeting every week, I am not very missionary-minded.

My first counselor is a wonderful example. We were sitting there in the tire store, and she got the inspiration to call various sisters in the ward and leave loving messages on their voicemail. I had it in my own mind that I had been to my training meeting and was done with RS for the day. I was in full-on knitting mode. [Well, until I found something even more interesting than knitting to do.]

If you are local, the new Smashburger on South Cooper in Arlington has great burgers and even more amazing fries. The Smashfries have olive oil, rosemary and I think garlic. Best fries I have ever eaten, bar none. I had the Baja burger, with pepperjack cheese, guac, wafer-thin slices of red onion and tomato, deep green buttery lettuce, and fresh jalapeno slices, which I carefully picked off. This is a Denver chain; does not taste like chain food. There is one in Meridian, Idaho, if you’re near my old stomping grounds.

My friend Francis recommended it on his blog. I will definitely be going back for more. I like the burgers at Kincaid’s better, but I would put these between Kincaid’s and Fred’s (another FW institution) and well above Tommy’s, which is now a distant fourth in this woman’s book.

The doll beret turned out absolutely precious. I am nearly done with another out of my second ball of Noro Kureyon Sock in the teal/charcoal/green colorway. And then I think I will cast on one fora larger doll. I may have to buy another ball if I want to make a pair of socks from it. I have seen gloves knit from Kureyon Sock, where each finger is a different color but it all comes together harmoniously because of his color genius.

It’s been a good day. I’m going to read a little and then go to bed.

Neat Stuff.

By which I do not mean orderly stuff, because hello? this is me we are talking about, and on good days I am a messie-in-remission and on bad days I echo Pigpen in saying that cleanliness may be next to Godliness, but around here it is [frequently] next to impossible.

I am well enough physically to want to spend the weekend puttering. Which is a lovely frame of mind to be in, but I have a leadership training meeting tomorrow morning, and Lorelai needs to get her oil changed, and I popped a nail [last week], and the fridge and pantry have plenty of room for fresh stuff.

I have had two really great days at work, productive, lessons learned, a fair bit of laughter at myself. My attorney and I are starting to have a running joke. I will start with, “In the spirit of being a thinking legal secretary...” and he will either smile or I can hear it in his voice, and then I state Point A and Point B and my conclusions and ask for confirmation, and more often than not I am beginning to be right, plus I have made Rambo grin.

I love it when that happens.

On Wednesday I had transcribed something fairly complicated, and he had assembled exhibits, which he wanted labeled, and then he said, “When you’ve got it assembled, you can show me if you like.” And I said, “Yeah, we’re still learning to trust each other.” And he said, “Oh, I trust you. Just bring it by when you’re done.” And the other secretary and I looked at each other and grinned, and she said, “Yeah, I trust you, but I don’t, yet.” So I put it together, labeled six ways from Sunday, with the judge’s copy tabbed along the side, and he took a quick look and grinned up at me and pronounced it:

“Beautiful.”

Made. My. Day.

Oh, and the beret that I thought was likely to be a disaster? Nearly done, and I appear to have guessed right on the decreases, and I am taking the second ball of Noro Kureyon to work with me, to start one for Blessing. (Because I will have plenty of it leftover for a pair of socks or maybe even gloves, for me.)

Paycheck hasn’t hit my account yet, so it looks as if I will be riding the train this morning. Dinner with Brother Sushi tonight, my nickel. And maybe a new burger place to try, courtesy of my friend Francis. Woohoo!

A Noble Experiment?

Yesterday I noodled away on a prototype beret. I think I will probably end up frogging it back to the end of the ribbing and trying again, with fewer increases. I am reasonably sure that I am going to run out of yarn before I run out of hat. But since I am playing, it’s not particularly upsetting. And this yarn frogs well. It’s not as if it were cashmere laceweight, or alpaca.

Had a really, really great day back at work yesterday. My appetite showed up for breakfast, but not obnoxiously so. I was a little hungry at lunch and satisfied myself with a bowl of cereal. I had some carrot sticks for dessert. It is so nice to eat food that crunches! My teeth and gums were getting a little tired of toast, morning noon and night.

I showed up for presidency meeting, and one of my counselors was out of pocket, so we canceled the meeting. Came home and ate a small serving of my friend’s delicious lasagna, then did a load of laundry, came home again and polished off the last of the lasagna.

I’m driving in today, because I’m meeting my friend at the temple after work. Which means that I have time to fry up a small pan of potatoes O’Brien and a couple of eggs, and of course more toast. And I’ll take what are probably the last of the frozen blueberries to put on my cereal at work, for lunch, and maybe a sandwich for a quick snack on the way to the temple, and some fruit.

I have been really good to myself financially the past two weeks. And I have also been good to myself nutritionally, when I was inclined to eat. All, by the grace of Heaven. The tithing blessings have come through for me: there has been enough, and to spare. Of everything. [Well, not of guys I want to date, but then I haven’t exactly had the energy to be interested in that line of thought anyway. All in due time.]

I even know what I want to wear to work today. And it’s clean!

Gratitude

I don’t know about you, but when I read the March issue of the Ensign, the theme that popped out for me, is gratitude. I certainly needed a reminder. The past month and a half have been challenging. I have felt emotionally vulnerable (which I do not like), and physically frail (which I like even less), and I have wondered if this is what it will feel like to be old. [And here I had actually been looking forward to living to be 100!]

So I was definitely in need of a booster shot to ramp up my gratitude.

The most recent bout of yuck appears to have been the last-hurrah of whatever it was that was bugging me. My head feels clear. My breathing is easy. There is, for the moment at least, no temptation to cough. The rumblies in my tumblies feel like the healthy sort, from a body which has consumed perhaps one-tenth of its normal allotment of calories in the past two days.

I am almost tempted to step on the scale when I get to work today, because I feel about ten pounds lighter, but that is probably just the rumblies talking.

So what did I do while I was home yesterday? Slept. A lot. I also finished a prototype hat which fits Celeste and used up much of the yarn leftover from my latest pair of socks. I think there is enough yarn left that I can make a beret to fit her or Blessing. I am toying with the idea of opening an Etsy shop later this year; whether I will sell doll couture, or patterns for same, or both, remains to be seen. I will have to figure out the legalities (in terms of sales tax, product labeling, etc.) as well as the logistics.

And I would have to improve my picture-taking skills considerably, or ask one of the girls to do the honors.

My census form was waiting when I got home Monday night. I was not inclined to open it yesterday, but I am taking it with me to work and will fill it out there. They have pens at work. My last pen appears to have grown legs and walked off; I hope it is having a lovely time, wherever it is. I have a coupon for $10 off a $20 purchase at an office supply store, and after my church meeting on Saturday morning, which will put me in the general vicinity of said office supply store, I will get new pens, more paper for my printer, etc. Several things to be thankful for in this paragraph.

We are having what I hope will be a quick presidency meeting tonight, to assign the last of the visiting teaching [letter routes] and to hammer out details of our classes for this month and next. And then I will make a mad dash to the Laundromat to do a load of whites.

I pulled this from Barb’s post:



Just what I needed to restore a little humor in my life. I think I’ll watch it again. Love that song. Love to dance to that song, myself.

Breathing: it’s not just for breakfast anymore!

I barely coughed during my early meetings on Sunday, and I asked the brethren at welfare meeting to pray that I would be able to make it through the three-hour block (sacrament meeting, Sunday School, RS) and able to teach my lesson.

They did, and I was.

I came home and went straight to bed, first setting the alarm in case I slept all night. Hey, this is me; stranger things have happened. Slept until about 8:30 and was up for another three hours, during which I wrote a much-needed and long-delayed apology to an old friend. And then back to bed, apparently UNsetting the alarm, because I woke at 6:35 to way too much light in my room.

I almost made it onto my regular train, locking up Lorelai just as the TRE pulled out of the station. So I caught the next one, and I had a pretty good day at work, if you don’t count the sneezing and the collywobbles. I had a muffin and a pint of milk for breakfast. For the rest of the day, I nursed a 20-oz bottle of Coke over ice and practiced my race-walking. I am still apparently practicing for the 2012 Summer Olympics.

Stopped at a dear friend’s on the way home from the station; she had made me a small loaf pan of lasagna, which I heated up. I ate a couple of tablespoons (excellent!) and put the rest of it into the fridge and went to bed. I’m up again for a bit, mostly to rehydrate, though I’ve managed to eat a slice of toast and three bites from another one, which will soon join the lasagna in the fridge.

When I bob to the surface again, I will call in dead; I think this day will be a day for the BRAT diet, if and when I feel like eating. I have the bananas. I have the rice. I have the makings of toast. And I have one ginormous apple in the fridge, which at the rate of my current appetite may last me the rest of the week.

The good news is, I am coughing only occasionally and not as deeply as before, and the sinus which was plaguing me yesterday has apparently decided to stop making my head runneth over. I don’t feel sick-sick, as if this were from food poisoning or the flu, merely [ahem] explosive, and cold, and tired. I feel as if I had swallowed the 1812 Overture. Complete with cannons. [And not of the Pachelbel sort.]

Correction. We have just added toast-as-javelin-throw to our training program. Oye to the veh.

But I was not in the high rise where a shooting occurred yesterday in Dallas (Middlest texted me while I was on the train last night; CNN’s trailer alerted her, and she checked on me). So even if my body is revolting (there’s your straight line), I get to have another day on this lovely earth.

OK, time to brush my toofies and rinse out my poor, abused mouth and put the surviving toast in the fridge; the earlier slice is, well, toast.

Obviously, there will be no Knit Night tonight. But there may very well be knitting, and possibly some reading. But for now, let there be sleep, because I am feeling distinctly unRavelled.

Balzac! (The magnet is back!)

But first, this breaking news! A new comment a couple of days ago on an old, old post of mine: “Just googled ‘flouride [sic] varnish burping’ because I was curious if this is a common issue - ‘solvent’ is the perfect word that I could not think of when explaining my issue to a coworker. Thanks!” If you google same, I am currently the third entry down. Woohoo! 15 minutes of google-fame, here I come.

So, I went to the singles’ conference, and I may have enjoyed myself, and I came home to this in my Facebook inbox:

“How are you doing today. My name is [name], [age] years old...I just joined this facebook and i saw your profile which really caught my attention and i developed a special interest in you. I am a widowed/single man, loyal, responsible, active, loving, caring, kindhearted, accommodating and s*xy. I want a woman with a good heart, one with good knowledge about love and who knows how a man is been [??] treated, age or color difference do not matter to me at all, as long as she loves me, I want a relationship that will last forever and won’t fade.”

I sent him a response that was brief, courteous, and I hope Christlike: “I see that one of your friends is a friend of one of my friends. Are you by any chance LDS? Where in the country (or in the world) do you live?”

To which I got a copy of his original email, with this addition: “Dear, you are such a lucky woman cos you are the only and first woman that has contacted me so far. I feel more comfortable talking to you now on yahoo messenger and my yahoo IM is [name] ... Give me your yahoo I.D and my email address is [address] ... I will be awaiting your swift response. ... Hugs and Kisses, [ApparentPsycho]”

To which I responded: “You haven’t answered my questions, and I don’t chat with people I don’t know in real life.”

As Marian the Librarian said, “I know what the gentleman wanted. You’ll find it in Balzac.”

I guess this was just to see if I was awake and paying attention in the workshop on healthy relationships yesterday. What do you think? If I don’t get a lucid [non-canned, properly punctuated] response from him in the next 24 hours, I’m blocking him.

As I wrote another Facebook friend, before reading this guy’s email, “And there was an email waiting for me here from some guy I don’t know who appears to think I might be the love of his life. ... Is it bad that what came to mind was the Dorothy Parker line ‘what fresh h--- is this?’ ... The irony of this is not lost on me: that I come home from a singles’ conference and find an email from a presumed [non-LDS man], who in the economy of God might actually *be* or become the great love of my life, and now I have to come up with a Christlike response to somebody who may or may not be merely psychotic.”

Well, we see that my instincts were correct. That’s refreshing, and reassuring. And now I have a lesson to prepare.

In the “Life’s Little Ironies” department...

So I went to the temple last night, after heating and enjoying a bowl of clam chowder in the break room once I had logged off. I had already made up my mind that I didn’t want to go on a session; I just wanted to hang out with the sisters and do the preparatory ordinances. [I was physically tired enough that I probably couldn’t have stayed awake during a session anyway.]

While I was changing out of my street clothes in the dressing room, I heard a sister call another sister’s name, softly. A very familiar name. And the voice which responded was one I know well. In the cubicle next to my own, the ex-wife of my ex-boyfriend was also preparing to serve in the temple.

Ordinarily, I would have been delighted to see her; she’s a good woman, with a good heart. Last night, not so much. I was not in the mood to talk with anyone who happened to have that last name. Granted, she may not have that name much longer, but I have never wanted to attend a singles’ conference less than I do now [and I ordinarily enjoy them], so my attitude is a wee bit iffy.

Not so much as you’d notice.

So I was very, very quiet in my cubicle, and I made sure to stay in there until she and her friend were gone.

I went last night, as I will go to the mixer and dance tonight, strictly to be obedient. A friend commented that with my current mindset, I would be blessed all the more for attending. I told her that I would probably blessed a whole lot more if I stopped whining about being there. We both laughed.

I don’t mind being single, in principle. I really don’t. It’s way better than being unhappily married, or in a bad relationship. It’s just that this particular singles’ conference comes right on the heels of a dating situation that went blooey. And I am not the least bit interested in spending the weekend in a large classroom with a bunch of guys who want to date me about as much as I want to date them. Nor do I want to take classes and workshops that will probably be edifying, and even interesting, but nevertheless remind me that I am, oh dear, single.

Repeat after me: the odds aren’t good, and the goods are odd. [And yes, I realize that when I point the finger at somebody else, there are several more pointing right back at me.]

Is it too late to open a convent? With me as Irreverent Mother?

One of my friends is attending the North Texas Irish Festival on Saturday. I am jealous, so jealous! I shot him a note on Facebook to tell him so, and he reminded me about the Scottish Festival in June. I’ve lived in this part of Texas for most of the last 31 years, and I’ve never gone to it, either. But it’s on my calendar now

Bagpipes. Men in kilts. I can just look. I don’t have to shop.

Got my performance review yesterday; specifics about what they like, specific ways to improve, and we will talk about the money in three weeks. I already know that there is a smaller pool of money to share among 36 people this year, likewise the pool for our bonuses. Modest raise beats no raise at all. Ditto for bonus money. I have a job. And I like it. Most days, the fact that they pay me to show up is almost irrelevant.

Five rounds to go on the sock, and still no idea what I want to do next.

Nights in Nystatin

Couldn’t resist posting this again. My closing status on Facebook last night:

Foot’s in Nystatin
Never reaching the end;
There’s a fungus amongus
Getting better, my friend...
(with profound apologies to the Moody Blues)

Some great comments from the peanut gallery on that one!

Yesterday was one of those days when, if people asked how I was, I replied “vertical”. I am quite capable of choking on a spit bubble, and yesterday on the bus I swallowed wrong and spent the rest of the ride trying not to cough, choke, etc. I made it to the restroom in my office building with seconds to spare. Where I sat and coughed and peed for the next ten minutes; grateful, so grateful, that I didn’t have to get on another bus and go back to the station and come home and change my clothes and try again.

I don’t know: do men have stress incontinence when they cough or sneeze? Or is it a frustration only known to the fair sex? I get more than a little frustrated on those days when my Native American name could be Princess-Cough-and-Pee. It was verging on funny when I described my morning to several middle-aged female friends at church last night, more so now that I am sitting here still safely dry and happy, but when I am in the throes of a spate of coughing, and I don’t know if I will cough up a lung or three toes with the next spasm, my sense of humor is almost the first thing to go. Pun intended.

We made one Moby-Dick-sized whale of a lot of progress on the visiting teaching last night.

And I am nearly done with sock #2, something like 15 rounds to go, maybe less. I probably should figure out what I want to do next. And make sure that I grab what I need to get started on it.

In the Glass Is More Than Half Full Department, my renewed subscription to the Ensign, which I thought I had set up to come to the duplex [because I now live someplace where the chance of my mail getting stolen is minuscule] was waiting in my mailbox at work on Monday, and I have been devouring it at lunch all week.

And I am on my third round of Nystatin for my poor sad foot, which is looking promising. I will spare you the visual, but every day I see more pink, healthy skin and less yuck. I have been anointing it with Nystatin three times a day, for four weeks now, and I have only missed a few doses. Amazing what happens when you follow directions...

I am driving in today, so that I can head straight for the temple after work tonight. The meetinghouse which is hosting the singles’ conference this weekend is just off a toll road, and I remembered to check my TollTag balance when I woke up this morning, so as not to have any budget-wrecking surprises. I have automatic renewal, and when my balance dips below $10.00, my debit card gets hit for another $40.00. Ordinarily not a problem, but *not* budgeted for between now and next Friday. Thankfully, not an issue. Whew!

I am also taking a can of clam chowder to heat up when I log off tonight. That way I don’t have to stop and get dinner on the way to the temple. I have not grabbed so much as a french fry in the car this week. I made an egg casserole for breakfast on Monday or Tuesday (which effectively used up the last of that indifferent cheese sauce which had been lurking in my fridge) and have been reheating leftovers since then. Just finished a small bowlful, washed down with juice, and am in the mood for an equally small bowl of cream of wheat. I had a quick can of tuna about 4:15 yesterday and was good to go until after presidency meeting last night, when I came home and had a bowl of spoon size shredded wheat with a generic grape-nuts garnish and a generous sprinkling of frozen blueberries. Dinner and dessert all in one, and I’m sure my arteries were yodeling thank you, thank you!

I think it’s going to be an amazing day. I am almost ready to take it on...

Approximating my patriotic duty...

I was one of the first people at the polls. I was definitely the first one to use the electronic voting machine; they had to set up the privacy canopy-thingie and find me a chair. Nice people. Remind me to do this again in two years.

Results, at 5:26am, are inconclusive, but it looks as if most of the people I voted for, may go on to the general election in November. I was interested to read in this article that there has been a strong local trend to elect conservative women, which I am very much in favor of. I think we need more good women (on both sides of the political fence) in office, from “small” positions on up. I also think that we need to revamp our political traditions (i.e., term limits) so that public servants have a greater incentive to remember just whom it is that they are supposed to be serving.

I have mixed feelings about one of the contests. There is a judge who simply has to go. And there was a plea that went out via our unofficial stake email list, from someone who works in his office and will be out of work if he is defeated. [Of course, if the unlikely happens and a Democrat is elected in this very conservative county come November, that will happen anyway.] It was enlightening to me, to learn that a judge's staff are not necessarily city or county employees. I do not know this employee, but I sincerely wish him/her well. And employed.

While we are discussing mixed feelings, I received an invitation to a home party. Having done our share of multilevel marketing when married to the children’s father, and having run a quietly successful business of my own a few years ago selling product while side-stepping the marketing aspects, I know that there are good products out there, and that not all of them are priced three times what you would spend for a comparable product at the grocery store or cosmetics counter.

I declined the invitation for several reasons: (1) no matter how little it costs, I can't afford it if I want to be out of debt on the timetable I have chosen; (2) I have an equivalent product that I am rarely using now; (3) I am trying to use up or get rid of things chez Ravelled in a provident manner, not add to them; (4) my current level of health, which is improving but not as fast as I would like.

I am feeling exceptionally blessed this morning. Head is nearly clear, only one spectacular bout of coughing (so far), time spent reading a good book last night, and leftovers to take for lunch today.

Tonight we have another presidency meeting, and tomorrow the fun and games begin (singles’ conference. Maybe we will get everybody assigned for the visiting teaching tonight, and Elijah will come for me in that golden chariot right after I’ve said my evening prayers, and I won’t have to go?

[On the other hand, and even more unlikely, wouldn’t it be funny if Brother Right is there? But that’s not why I’m going. I am going strictly out of duty, and to be obedient, and to set a good example, and also to thank Brother Farrell for his book.]

What we studied on Sunday.

The fourth Sunday of every month, we do not study a lesson from our manuals. Instead, we study one or more of the addresses from the most recent General Conference, as published in the Ensign, which is the magazine for adult members of the Church. In countries where English is not the native language, the contents are translated and are published as the Liahona.

One of the responsibilities of the stake president (like your bishop, for my friends who are Catholic) and his counselors, is to plan out a theme for each month, and to choose which lessons will support that theme, and to come up with teaching points which the teachers in each ward Relief Society and priesthood quorum should emphasize.

The theme for the fourth Sunday in February was Agency; the conference addresses which were chosen, were these: Stewardship ~ A Sacred Trust and Moral Discipline. And the points to be emphasized were as follows:

1. We must have the truth to exercise our agency wisely.
2. We must teach our children the truth rather than allowing the world to teach our children.
3. Moral discipline is the consistent exercise of agency to choose the right because it is right, even when it is hard.

I missed the lesson in class, because I am still struggling (a little) with my lungs. I spent Sunday School in the clerk’s office, tidying up Round I of the revisions to our visiting teaching. I spent a very small part of Relief Society in the library, getting the printouts copied for Bishop, the elders quorum president, the high priest group leader, my counselors, my compassionate service leader, and my visiting teaching coordinator. And then I went home, coughing; ate a little, had a lovely if sleep-wrecking nap, got up and tidied my inbox, pre-published Monday’s post, and started this one.

Did I read the lesson? Umm, that would be a no, until now. [Although I had attended Conference in October and read the addresses when they were printed in November, and I referenced “Moral Discipline” earlier this year in one of my posts, as well as an article I found in the footnotes, “Subversive Virginity”.] The late Elder Maxwell would call this being caught up “in the thick of thin things”.

One of the blessings of my current church calling is that it continually focuses my mind and heart on the need to serve others. And for me, as for the rest of you, it is a continual juggling act, and I drop my share of plates and balls and the occasional flaming torch.

This morning, I miss my kids. [This is not a whine, this is an observation.] I do not see any of them as often as I would like. They have turned out to be chosen to be remarkable women, whether because of parental example or in spite of it, and I love them dearly.

In the have-to-laugh-at-myself department, choir practice on Sunday went well. I am there for multiple reasons, some of them selfish. I love to sing. I love the Gospel. I love to perform. I do not have a solo voice. Singing opens up my heart, and not coincidentally, my pipes. My pipes are in need of opening. We started practicing “Beautiful Savior”, an arrangement which has a lovely descant during the third verse. And I brightly chirped, “Oh, I can play this on the recorder!”

So I came home with the sheet music, and last night I sat down to puzzle it out, because this arrangement has three flats, and I am a by-ear, seat-of-the-pants musician. I read music well enough to find my part when I sing, but I’m happier when I know what note I’m supposed to sing because I’ve heard it in context.

It’s been 25 years since I taught myself to play the recorder; I couldn’t remember how to do flats! And the descant just sat there on the page, thumbing its notes at me. So I put the recorder and the sheet music in the pile with BestFriend’s book that I borrowed, in the hope that I could noodle on her piano for a few minutes when I return the book.

But this morning, one of my first conscious thoughts was, “I wonder if I can find a fingering chart for the soprano recorder online?” Lo! and behold, I could. And did. And printed it off. I still want to noodle on a piano, to hear what the descant is supposed to sound like and to count out the timing (easier for me on the piano than on the recorder; no idea why). But now there is light at the end of the musical tunnel.

My friend Tan, who is Musical with a capital “M”, is probably grinning as she reads this. Ditto my friend Wanda, who is Musical and also a Friend [tee-hee].

OK, I’ll behave. Go make some beauty. Or some music. Or a joyful noise. Or a plate of brownies. And find somebody to share it with.

A Tale of Two Earthquakes

I just finished reading this article on Yahoo! news. Our brothers and sisters in Haiti have suffered, and are suffering, because of a rampant lack of integrity: some of it personal, though I suspect that the ones who most deserve to suffer, have not and will not [at least not in this life]. Much of it structural, because according to this article, there are no building codes in Haiti. But primarily because their leadership has been corrupt for a very long time, and the sins of the fathers, and the grandfathers, and the great-grandfathers, have been visited upon those who live there now.

We are free to choose our actions; we are not free to dictate the consequences of those actions, many of which follow natural laws established by our Creator.

Our brothers and sisters in Chile (which has had its own struggles with political corruption in the past; I have no idea who is in charge there now, but Chile has seismic engineers and building codes) have fared somewhat better. Their initial reported deaths are one tenth of one percent of what has been reported in Haiti. [Update: 700 deaths, as opposed to the 200 which were reported yesterday.]

Why? they were prepared. This quake was 500 times as strong as the one in Haiti, but because the people were prepared, they were shaken but not [as] devastated.

The Lord warns us through His prophets to prepare ourselves. These earthquakes and other natural calamities are signs of the times, indications that He is preparing us for the final battle against the Adversary, and He also reminds us that if we are prepared, there is no reason for us to fear.

Want to ramp up your own preparations? Provident Living. There you will find links to humanitarian services, emergency preparedness and response, employment, home storage, gardening, education and literacy, social and emotional strength, physical health, and Deseret Industries, which is the LDS Church’s counterpart to thrift stores operated by organizations like Goodwill, the Leukemia Society, or the Salvation Army.

We cannot prepare for every eventuality. And we are not meant to be living in bunkers, guarding our year’s supply with semiautomatic weapons. But gather together a first-aid kit, and then a 72-hour kit, and then a month’s supply of the foods your family will eat as you accumulate a year’s supply of commodities that will sustain life, and then a three-months’ supply [of things that they will actually want to eat]. All this, of course, dependent upon whether your local laws allow you to do so. Because we all need to follow the rules; I refer you to the Twelfth Article of Faith.

Polish up your resume, even if you are lucky enough to have a job. Pay off your credit cards. Put something into savings. Get out of debt as fast as you reasonably can. Learn to say NO to your wants as you take care of your needs. Say NO to your kids, or your grandkids, when they ask you for the latest gadget. Let them have the blessing of working for what they want.

If your company has a matching program for its 401K, take advantage of that. Ditto if it has a medical reimbursement program, which effectively reduces your total medical expense costs by your tax rate. Consider a Roth 401K, where your contributions are taxed with your gross income, but your withdrawals, way down the road, will not be. I am gradually putting less into my regular 401K, which is matched, and more into my Roth 401K, which is not.

I should have put this first: pay your tithing. If you don't know what tithing is, I know some nice young men with name tags who will be happy to explain it to you.

And then? Don’t worry; be happy.

Fiction was not the only thing I read yesterday.

Not only did I finish the Sharon Kay Penman novel, but I also read a whole raft of articles on Yahoo. How our brains work. Why we learn nouns first. And why things get stuck on the tip of my tongue.

I polished off the cookies, too.

Had the best conversation with a gentleman while Lorelai’s safety inspection was underway. I asked where he was from “because I know it’s not East Texas.” He was from Syria! He commented on my knitting; his sisters knit, not socks but sweaters. He asked the English word for what I was doing, then confessed that he didn’t know the Arabic word for knitting, and I chided him for not bringing a sister with him.

And then we talked about food: samosas, baklava, baba ganoush (which neither of us particularly likes), our respective mishaps with curry powder, hummus. Because everybody eats, and if we are truly blessed, we get to eat more than just a small handful of rice every day; we get to try the comfort foods of many other cultures. Since the Tower of Babel, we speak so many different languages, and language is how we transmit culture (or so I was taught when I studied ASL and learned a little bit about deaf culture). But food? Food builds bridges, one bite at a time.

There was a modicum of knitting, maybe two or three rounds on the sock, but that’s all.

I bought cork grease for the recorder ~ which I think needs a name; if BB King can name his guitar Lucille, and a local bass player I know can name his Fiona, then I can certainly come up with something for this lovely, simple woodwind ~ and I had another lively conversation with the young woman behind the counter at the music store.

It was a good day. The baptism was wonderful, as most baptisms are, and Bishop had approved our changes to the visiting teaching lists, so I stayed after and entered the changes into the system, to be effective tomorrow.

Hrmm, I should probably notify my VT coordinator that what she finds in the system when she logs in to report the visits, is not what she will be expecting, because we have changed a lot of things up, and we are not done.

(I am here to comfort the afflicted, and afflict the comfortable; sadly, my VT coordinator will get caught in the crosshairs...)

The most interesting news to report [at least for me] is that my lungs seem to have stopped grumbling. I will have a better sense of that when I see how many of my meetings I can get through today, and if I am able to stay through Relief Society. I very much want to.

The thought that floated up as I realized I had probably gotten all the sleep I am going to get for now, is that my lungs are where I process not only air, but trouble. There is a strong connection between asthma and one’s emotional state. My parents smoked for 40+ years, and I grew up wreathed in second-hand smoke. And so, when I get sick, it is likely to be my pipes, which means that I have to deal with it. Not simply with the physically-getting-better, but also the emotional aspect.

And behold, it came to pass that we have my meetinghouse flooding because of a burst pipe, plus my exquisite sensitivity to mold, plus a major red flag going up in the romance department, plus an ongoing foot condition (which may or may not be metaphorical as well), all arriving at the same four-way stop simultaneously.

And the hidden blessing to this, is that unlike gastrointestinal responses, which are acute and frequently messy, respiratory responses force me to slow down and ponder and synthesize. When I am living from cough to cough, and from breath to breath, I only have the energy to deal with things which are truly important. This cannot be a bad thing.

I managed to avoid asthma [just barely]. I managed to avoid bronchitis [ditto]. I managed to avoid depression [amen!] And something seems to have happened yesterday, some indefinable key that was turned, and I cannot say how or when, but I feel that I am finally getting well again.

My friend Kristen posted this.

It seems only appropriate to share, after my muttering and musing yesterday.

I spent a quiet evening at home, reading on the couch while the fireplace cycled on and off. I must say, a good book is far easier on the nerves than a preoccupied man.

One of the exceedingly minor characters, a young harlot who is wise as well as worldly, remarks to one of the major characters that the young man who has been her protector and is leaving to fulfill his destiny, is a man who truly likes women. The man to whom she is speaking remarks that he thought all men liked women. She tells him that all men like to lay with women (that may have been the case in the twelfth century; it is less certain now, even for men who are not attracted to other men), but that precious few of them, at least in her experience, truly like women.

Which led me to think about various men of my acquaintance. Some of them seem happiest in the company of their female friends. Others are wary of entanglement, profess themselves unable to understand us, and nevertheless treat us with impeccable and unvarying respect [and if they encounter women who inspire not respect, but fear and loathing, simply avoid those women as much as decently possible]. Still others are attracted to us but, I suspect, rather wish they were not.

When I woke this morning, I tried to put my guys into various buckets and gave it up as a lost cause, because I think there are at least three continuums (continua?) playing into it: desire and its absence, like and dislike, self-discipline and license. It’s not like Mendel and the beans and the four-space grid. It’s more like a logic puzzle that occupies three dimensions and is quite possibly printed on the face of a Rubik’s Cube.

A coworker asked, “Are you still dating Santa?”
“No, we’re just friends.”
“Are you sad?”
“Not anymore.”

And it’s cool, because I’m not. The time may come when I can sit down to dinner with him and wish neither to kiss him, nor to pinch his head off. I pray for him and his tribe, not in an “oh please, may I have him when I grow up” way, but because he is my friend, and I want him to be happy.

But I think that GreyhoundWoman was right, when she said he makes a better friend than a husband. I have heard her side of things for the much of the last 15 years, and it is both good and enlightening to hear his side of things. And at the moment, I want to pinch both their heads off, for entirely different reasons. [You can love people, and (mostly) like them, and still want to pinch their heads off; anyone who does not understand this, has never been a teenager. Or the parent of one.]

Today’s agenda? Restock the fridge and pantry, get Lorelai safety inspected, attend the convert baptism this afternoon, start the ribbing on sock #2, pay a few bills, finish the book I borrowed from BestFriend, enter changes into the computer at church for VT routes, putter a little around the house, practice on the recorder, and nap as much as possible.

This resonates so deeply and sweetly with me.

I read it in a quiet moment at work, and it moved me to tears. I have been struggling with my health, in small ways, for several years. The ankle that mysteriously waxes and wanes. The ache in my right knee and up my thigh when I drive too many miles in one day, a souvenir of that last trip to see Dad before he died (five thousand miles in five weeks with five kids in a Toyota hatchback). The persistent fungus which has been a thorn in my foot for much of the past two years. The current breathing issues. The leg broken while line dancing, the long rehabilitation afterward, and the discovery that a middle-aged woman with a cane is perceived as a crone, or else invisible to all but the saintliest of men (and to her friends and family, who already love her and/or are pretty well stuck with her).

It is crazy-making to be a Relief Society president who is allergic to her meetinghouse and cannot sit through the (extra) leadership meetings before church and the regular allotment of meetings that every Molly Mormon sits through, or preside over a Relief Society meeting. It is frustrating to feel frail, and weary, and sometimes nearly useless.

It is also frustrating to keep striking out in the romance department. I miss the excitement of dating NintendoMan. I miss simple human touch. I am a high-touch individual in low-touch circumstances, and I am (momentarily, at least) sick and tired of it. Which, I suspect, may be part of what is making me both sick, and tired.

And yet I know all these things, the little niggling irritations in my life as well as the greater disappointments, are all serving to purify and refine me, and are meant for my good. It is just difficult, much of the time, to immediately recognize the blessings which are present in the absence.

Here is some good news. Look at the sidebar on the Yarn Harlot’s blog. Specifically, look at the total donations that knitters have made to Doctors without Borders! What a way to represent!

Got a weird text message yesterday, from an unfamiliar number, “What are you doing?”
“Who is this?”
“Why are you telling Maria that I shoot up?”
“You have the wrong number.”
“Sorry.”

I went to the temple after work and brought that heavenly peace home with me. Picked up a hot chocolate on the way home. Sent a clarifying email to a certain man, who had sent me some [squeaky-clean] e-fluff via Facebook, declaring myself a fluff-free zone. Call me cranky, but I don’t want e-hugs if I’m not getting real ones. Substantive discussions, yes, or how-was-your-day emails, the kinds of things that friends do, or at least that I do with other friends. But none of this fluffy-stuff; he does not get to have it both ways. I’m respecting his boundaries, and I need for him to respect mine.

My name is Mammy Yokum, and I has spoken!

Making a virtue of necessity.

Overslept. Too busy coughing last night to remember to set the alarm, so I woke at 6:24. World’s fastest shower (but hey, I smell good, and that’s what counts!) Lunch is packed. Skirt and stockings and dressiest clogs are packed. Driving in. Going to the temple tonight after work. Anybody want to join me at the quietest place in town? Will probably hang out in what I lovingly call the court of the women and then come home to eat, as I do not want to dip into savings, nor do I want somebody else to spring for dinner.

Great day at work yesterday: plowed through all the dictation (both lawyers), though three items are sitting as drafts in my pending folder to review before putting them in Attorney A’s sign this folder.

[I have not visited those hoarding sites, myself. I do not have the time, the energy, or the health to deal with anything they might dredge up. I’m just focusing on getting my foot well and my lungs back to full power.]

A good, productive presidency meeting last night.

Nearly done with the heel decreases on sock #2.

OK, y’all, I’m out the door. Be good, and remember who you are...

Hoarding

A difficult topic. I’ve had these links pasted into the draft for this post for six months now, waiting for the right time, or a good time, to share them.

I subscribe to Unclutterer through Bloglines. Several times a month, I get a tip or a flash of inspiration to help me manage the minutiae of my life. I have many interests, and I rotate through them, and I come back to old ones (witness: I am now noodling around on the recorder, after a lapse of 25 years, and the purchase of a new-to-me one on eBay two or three years ago; it was during LittleBit’s senior year). So for me, it makes no sense to get rid of things related to old hobbies, because I am quite likely to live to be 100, and there will be another quilting jag, another scrapbooking season, etc.)

The trick, for me, is to keep it organized and to keep it under control. So that when I do graduate to the Great Yarn Shop in the Sky, my kids can go: OK, all the quilting stuff to the local quilters’ guild; all the knitting stuff to her Knit Night friends; let’s divide up all the cookbooks; doll stuff goes to the younger sibs; and it will be easy for them to sort and bestow.

Because when their father went into the nursing home, it was an ordeal for them to clean out his apartment. To say more, would be disrespectful.

There is, apparently, a show about hoarders and hoarding. I don’t have cable, so I’ve never seen it, and I probably couldn’t watch it if I did. There was a link to it last August on Unclutterer. The comments are particularly interesting.

And there were links to organizations which educate about hoarding. The OC Foundation. Squalor Survivors. Children of Hoarders. I don’t know if those links are still good, but they might aim you in the right direction if you, or somebody you love, is a hoarder.

And now, if you will all kindly excuse me, I am going to wash some dishes and pitch out the latest batch of junk mail.

[Knitting postscript: I finished the gusset increases on the second sock at Knit Night last night and have begun the decreases. And there was a young man sitting next to us who wants to learn how to knit. One of my friends handed him a spare ball of yarn and told him where to go to buy needles. I quipped that it’s like the bad stuff: the first one is free...]