What's a gal to do?

I've been busy.

Olympic knitting? Nah...never much of a joiner and knitting is supposed to decrease my blood pressure. If I wanted to be in the Olympics, I'd pick curling. I'd be a mean sweeper!

Olympic watching? Not so much, but the hockey is starting to attract me....which brings me to the point of this.

What's a gal to do.....

Root for Team USA? Well, here we have Bugsey Malone (former Penguin), and Brooks Orpick (current Penguin and Stanley Cup Champion) and there's that nationalistic thing happening.

But how can you not root for Sid, the beloved boy captain of the Pens, and Marc Andre and Canada? (Sid was the hero last night against the Swiss). I just knew he would be.

Then there's Russia with Geno Malkin and Gonchar.....sheesh.

The Canada-USA dust up is set for Sunday. What's a girl to do?

Just Shut Up! Thursday

Oh good grief.........please stop now.....you all are beginning to embarrass me.

Watch the video....seriously. These people should not even be allowed out without a "keeper and a shake rag". (This quote is from a very funny "coming of age" book, called Red Sky at Morning. If you can find it in your library, read it. I found a copy at a used book sale. But I digress.)

http://hotair.com/archives/2010/02/10/new-feminist-spin-on-tebow-ad-we-were-joking-but-not-really/

Famous Last Words.

My words were that we weren't expecting much snow. And while we didn't get what my sister and bro, to the east, got, 24+ inches, we did get 15. We were so certain that this "storm" wasn't going to live up to the billing we, and 4,500 other crazy people went to the wrestling meet on Friday night. We went to have a little toddy, and left for home about 10:30 pm. We could see that it was still snowing, however, it didn't look that "serious"....until you got on the roads.

Now, we have an interesting snow removal system around here. Meaning, it's hard to see that there is any. I often say that the town has one truck, two guys, and one shovel. It really looked that way on Friday. The roads were so bad, we couldn't see where our driveway was, and passed it up. This is not true of the smaller neighboring municipalities, so it is odd.

Saturday morning, when I looked for the paper, I only saw snow (and this was after DH shoveled the patio at 11:00pm when we got home).

I couldn't find the paper. When I called the delivery person he said that he started to deliver papers, but there was so much snow that he couldn't even get to the doors/driveways to deliver them. So he stopped. He also had the horrors of tossing a paper, having it get obscured by snow, and sucked into a snow blower.

Don't blame him a bit. So we got Saturday's and Sunday's papers together.....











This was the view out the front door. Yup, a 15 inch wall of
snow. I quickly shut the door.















That brings us to today, we have the second major snow fall in a week, and this one did not live up to the hype. We're going to end up with about 5 [more] inches, but the roads are horrible. To add insult to injury, our campus and the campus in Erie, are the ONLY TWO who are open in the whole state and everyone is ticked off. Really, ticked off. I was so looking forward to catching up on the laundry. Even a two hour delay would have helped. I lead such an exciting life.

Anyway, here are some pre and post felting photos of another pair of French Press Slippers. I think the pattern is pretty amazing. It felts down exactly right.














This pair was a mix of black and gray wool held together. The buttons are ceramic and I don't know how well they'll hold up, but we'll see.

Just because I can't let it go.....

I was embarrassed by the bru ha ha that the Women's Media Center, NOW, and other groups made about the Tebow ad. The fact that they were apoplectic about an ad that they HADN'T seen was the first hint. Then Monday when the president of NOW declared that CBS was endorsing violence against women (paraphrase), because the ad NEVER directly mentioned abortion, or even pregnancy, I realized how inconsequential these groups have REALLY become. They are now meaningless groups of fools. It worries me in a way, because there may yet come a time that they really do need to stand up for something important, and they have diminished themselves completely. On the other hand, it's gratifying to see them "outed" and for others to see what some of us have known or suspected for years. (I had this vision of a "war room" at NOW or WMC and them wringing their hands over the fact that there was nothing for them to criticize. "What can we say that won't sound stupid?" Ummm...bad choice.)

Rest in peace John Murtha. I think you had honorable intentions in the beginning. I also think you got too big for your britches. (Yeah, it's me the "racist".) Now Altoona/Johnstown need to step up and do what's right for the state and the country.

A little bit of this....

It's weird, I know. When I don't feel well, I get all kinds of creative. I mean my brain works overtime. Maybe it's because I get much needed rest. Maybe it has to do with bad daytime TV, but it never fails. Once I'm well enough to manage it, I start doing all kinds of things. Several years ago, I was home sick for several days, and I beaded enough flower broaches for a garden. I was just bangin' them out one right after another.

The first week of this year, when I wasn't hiding under my comforter, I did some knitting. Here are the results:


On the left French Press Slippers. I saw them on the Yarn Harlot blog, and they were just too cute for words. OK, not that cute, but I liked them, and I have a weird fondness for anything that's felted. (Which is why, I'll never buy a front loader machine no matter how much better they are.)

When I saw them I had the brilliant notion that I could use "waste yarn" to knit them. Goodness knows I've got loads of wool ends. Well, the best laid plans and all that. You'll notice that the "straps" are rather bumpy, that's because I used two different yarns. A planned deviation. My problem occurred when I didn't have enough of the same yarn to FINISH half of ONE toe!! So you may be able to tell that the inside of the right toe is also bumpy. That's because I had to go snag a skein of Lamb's Pride from my LYS. Sigh....best laid plans and all that. Nonetheless, they came out really well, and they're warm....really.

You knit them in "strips" and frankly when you have all these loopy loo pieces to stitch together, you're sure that these will NEVER look remotely like slippers. I shouldn't have worried. It's a great project to work on when one has a few moments. The yarn is held double (triple for the sole) and you use a #15 needle. So next Christmas....slippers for everybody!! I already have another pair (for me) ready to be felted. Probably tomorrow morning. I do my best felting in the mornings....




Number 2 on the hit parade is the Brooklyn Tweed Scarf . I used two colors of Noro Kureyon. I was an easy peasy fun knit, even when I REALLY didn't feel well. I soaked it with hair conditioner, now it smells like Pantene, spun the water out of it, then just let it dry. (I use Pantene because my hair didn't like it and I don't know what else to do with an almost full bottle.)

It's fun looking and warm and I'll be wearing it this weekend in our Nor'easter snow storm.

Looks like we're going to miss the worst of the weather again here in Central PA - only 4 - 8 inches through tomorrow. Trust me, I'm not complaining. Hope those of you to the south and east manage to make it through.....

Voice of reason....

....... and an honest assessment - thank goodness!!

Sally Jenkins - WaPo