Reminds me of "Mike Mulligan and his Steamshovel"

This will only interest 1.6 of you - these are pics for Dad to look at of the basement walls they're putting in for him.

Have fun Dad!
:-)





Wasn't that an awesome book?

An Orgy of Wool

May I have your attention please!
Ahem...

Baby camels are very soft.* Please make a note of it.

Now on to your regularly scheduled blog.

Rhinebeck was FAN-DAMN-TABULOUS!!! A few million other people seemed to think so too, as the place was wicked crowded. Wool and yarn and roving and fair food was a flyin' everywhere. And there was much rejoicing.

Walking towards the main gate, I had an irrational urge to throw my arms in the air and run around screaming, but no one else seemed to be doing that, so I abstained. I also failed to find anyone jumping with abandon into big piles of yarn. Too bad. I think I behaved myself fairly well. I put back a lot of what I didn't really want to put back, I picked up the stuff I was looking for, and made two really excellent finds. (And a Christmas present.)

In the "Wendy, you suck" category, I ended up parking almost right next to Cara from January One, walked right past her in the parking lot, then saw her TWO MORE TIMES (both times in the seven mile long line for The Fold, hmmmm....) and those of you who know me won't be surprised to know I didn't say a word. Damnit. Then I also chickened out at the blogger meet up. There were hundreds of them, all happy and stuff, and I couldn't do it. I'm a big freaking chicken! In my defense, I did talk to a lot of strangers in various lines. It was awesome - you'd be standing in line, and someone would walk by wearing a fabulous hand knitted item, and some other woman would literally grab her arm and yell, what pattern is that? It's gorgeous! What yarn did you use? And a lot of chatting would ensue, and the fabulous item wearing woman would continue on. And I had a lovely conversation in the Greek gyro line about how, "OH GOD, what if they run out just as we get to the front?!" and "When we get up there, we should buy like 10 of them and scalp them to the people in the back of the line."

Three hineys all in a row.

I saw my first Shetland sheep and am madly, desperately in love. It is now my life's dream to raise Shetlands and hug and kiss them all day long. They're so little! They're about 2 or 3 inches shorter than Zeke, but stockier and fluffy. And their wool is so soft and colorful! The little stinkers are also impossible to photograph! They just won't hold still.

Excuse me, could you just--

--now look this way...

Don't stick your head through the bars! That's naughty!

Oh, for the love of---


OK, more tomorrow. It's late and a girl's got knitting to do!
_____
*No, I didn't actually touch a baby camel. I stuck my hand in a bag of fluff labeled "baby camel." I was tempted to crawl inside the bag, but it was too small...

Guess What?

See it?

How about now?

Now? !

It's our first snow of the season!! Yay! And....that's about all we got. It's already gone. But I ain't complaining - I don't need any crimps in my Rhinebeck plans.

Zeke doesn't know what all the fuss is about and just wants to go back inside.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to have my ceremonial chocolate chips and cheddar chex mix and a glass of wine and go to bed. RHINEBECK!!!

RHINEBECK RHINEBECK RHINEBECK!!

Yup, I owe you guys a lot of stuff. Pictures of deadly socks, pictures of fall foliage, pictures of Castor canadensis that may or may not have come out. (Sorry, I'm not being snooty, I just feel weird talking about "beavers" all the time. And I know certain individuals will giggle every time I say "I saw a giant beaver the other day." Yeah. You know who you are.)

So anyway, due to a tear in the space time continuum, I seem to have lost an entire week. I thought I had pleeeenty of time to make two quilt squares, clean the house, visit my grandmother, get my stuff together for RHINEBECK, etc., etc. And I don't. One more day!! Bloggers all over the internets are starting to get ready and some of them are already traveling. I'm so excited!! I'm going to the blogger meet-up - at least I hope I am. I hope I don't completely wimp out. And I forgot to wash my tiger socks so I can wear them!!! I think it's already too late - it takes several days for clothes to dry around here. Damn. Maybe I'll try anyway and just wear them soggy.

Have a great weekend everybody!!

Missssscellaneous

To answer comments from "yesterday", I agree - I want to hear all these favorite songs too! The Fantasticks?

And speaking of having vivid memories of music one's parents used to play all the time - for me it would be "Jesus Christ Superstar" played on an old reel-to-reel tape. I was VERY young and impressionable - I used to sing along and try to act it out. So embarrassing. And of course there was the Beatles on reel-to-reel as well - "I am the walrus. goo goo ka chuub." WTF? Frickin hippies. (I mean that in the nicest way possible.)


I finished my first week at the new job and so far so good. I could tell you all about my job responsibilities and the people I'll be working with, but I'd rather tell you about my office and two windows that actually open and the big tree right outside the window!!! And every Friday is "wear whatever you want as long as it's not a halter top and short shorts" day!! They tell me they also had to ban tank tops for men because of a very hairy former employee who would wear a tank top on Fridays. Evidently all the hair was distracting to the women. I'll say - reflexive dry heaving does make it hard to get through a business phone call.

I finally finished my deadly socks of doom and fired them at Calgary this morning. I hope she likes them, but just in case I put some goodies in the box with them. I did take pictures but the camera is all the way across the room and I'd have to stand up and stuff. I'll post pics eventually.

There's a fungus among us:


This was orange-er (more orange?) in real life and about the size of a basketball. About 6 feet up on a tree near the beaver ponds. I went back a week later and now it's all shriveled up and white.

RHINEBECK IN ONE WEEK!!!!! All sock yarn will fear me.

10 Songs

OK, so I've been away from home all week, back in Baltimore, training someone else to do my job. And guys, I am SO homesick for New York!! WAAAAHHH!! If there were ever any doubts (which there weren't on my end) about me staying in New York, there certainly can't be any now. I miss my new house and my ruffed grouse and phoebes and weird stuff in the woods so bad I feel sick. BUT, that being said, I have had a great time visiting with friends and well, frankly, eating everything in sight. Cafe Hon cheesesteak subs tomorrow!!!

Now on to your regularly scheduled blog post:
This little "meme" has been going around some blogs lately and I wanted to join in. So, 10 songs. I decided to just force myself to pick the first 10 that came to mind and if wrote this tomorrow even, most of the songs would probably change. When people ask me for my favorite something, I usually freeze and can't think of anything - until days later at 3 in the morning. So:

1. "Fade to Black" by Metallica. This song, in addition to being my favorite ever, also very literally saved my life. And according to the band members themselves, who get this said to them by thousands of fans, it's had that effect on many, many other people.

2. "Hemorrhage (In My Hands)" by Fuel. This is my second favorite song ever. Fantastic song. "You don't remember, but I do."

3. The entire soundtrack to the movie "Amelie". My cousin gave me a copy of this and I'll be grateful to him forever. It's a style of music totally unlike what I normally listen to, but I was instantly in love with it. Who knew accordion music could be so hauntingly beautiful?

4. The soundtrack to "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou," particularly "Man of Constant Sorrow." Awesome music!

5. "The Vulture Song" from Disney's The Jungle Book. Having had the pleasure (I really mean that) of working with real vultures during my time as a zoo keeper, I really think this is great theme song for vultures. They get a bad rap, but vultures (particularly the North and South American ones) can be really sweet, wonderful creatures. They can't help being how God made them (or evolution, or whatever). They are what they are and without them, the world would be a very nasty, stinky place. So hug a vulture today! (Or just blow kisses in their general direction.)

--why so many soundtracks? who knows?

6. "Toccata and Fugue in D minor" by Bach - played on a REAL pipe organ.

7. "Here It Goes Again" by OK GO. This is my "song of the moment". I can't get enough of watching those guys dancing on the treadmills! Even on my grumpiest of days, that video never fails to make me laugh and clap my hands. (What a dork I am.) But now the song has really grown on me too.

8. "The Devil Went Down to Georgia" by the Charlie Daniels Band. Stop laughing! I love that song. And just as good is a local Baltimore radio station's version, "The Devil Went Down to Dundalk" where Johnny races his Chevy against the devil's Mustang. Oh come on, LISTEN you know you want to.

9. "With You" by Linkin Park. I love this band so very much. I know almost all the words to every song. But I promise not to sing them in public.

10. See? Now this one's the hardest. Out of all the songs in the world, I can only pick one more? Too much pressure! OK, so randomly, "Cheap Seats" by Alabama. SUCH a feel-good, summertime song. And it makes me think of the year I spent in South Dakota, where it was the law that you listen to country music at least 6 hours a day.