Car Trouble?

 

For the past couple of weeks my wonderful, beloved car has been troubling me in one way or another.  You know when you hit that unfortunate teenage period where pimples start breaking out on your face like dandelion weeds?  Well, this is where my Dorcas is at right now.

–Before I go on, take a moment and digest it.  Yes, I name my cars and yes my Malibu is a girl-child named Dorcas.  Those of you that adore “Seven Brides for Seven Brothers” like I do understand and feel there is no need for further explanation on the subject.  The rest of you sorry sorts truly need to inject some culture into your lives.  Do yourselves a favor and sit down to the beautiful musical score of this classic movie and then come back to us, we’ll wait.

   —-Are you done?  Good, let’s move on shall we?—-

As I was saying, Dorcas has been having some blemishes appear here and there, her wheels were shaking, the widow wipers were deteriorating rapidly, she received her first ding last week, she needed an oil change and winter tire trade out, and the rear break light wouldn’t work.  I think the last one was the last straw for her as every time I put on the turn right signal she would click it on and off at the rapid, fluttery pace of a marathon runner. 

So over he past couple weeks I’ve been trying to heal her little wounds.  I took her in and had the balance righted and tires changed.  The fact that the mechanics very obviously went through my things I had stored in there ticked me off, but that is another story. And I tried, in vain, to fix the blinker problem on my own.  I changed out the lights not  once but twice and even yanked out the fuse (like I know what a good one looks like):-/ .  Finally I took her over to the local Quick Lube today, and she came back all shiny and sparkly.  I want everyone to know that these guys treated me and my baby like we were queens. They fixed all her little hiccups/pimples (including the chip!!!) and now we are back to looking sexy as we drive down 5th Ave.

 

Yesterday my good friends, Nancy, Jeri, Courtney and Elise and I went to Spamalot at our local theatre and had a smashing time. Well, I did at least but then I kind of like a little low humor with my chocolate once in awhile.  It was great fun and we kept running into lots of good friends from Anchorage Concert Choir (They are singing Brahms next week with the Anchorage Symphony!!) and many others.  It was lovely.

From left to right: Me (Emily), Jeri, Nancy, Elise, Courtney and some random guy exiting the mens bathroom. 😉

ON MY NEEDLES

 

I seem to have start-itus.  I can’t stop myself lately from starting new projects.  I always give myself an excuse like, “I realy want to learn that techinque” or “I need something more portable” or “Isn’t the Dahli Lama’s Birthday coming up?”  This time it was a combination.  I have wanted to try out Nero Yarn for awhile and since they just came out with a sock weight line I thought “why not?” Also I just received new harmony needles from Knit Picks and needed to test their resilience and adaptability and finally I have been burning to try one of the many awesome patterns in the Knitalong book I finally was able to purchase.  So you see it’s not so much a disease as a need.

So I am knitting up the “Barn Raising Quilt” and I love it!  

my first square, 48 more to go. Along with the Nero sock yarn

The yarn however. Not so much. 😦  I have always heard wonderful things abut Nero and everyone has a Nero Sweater on their dream list of knit-ups, but the sock yarn needs work.  There are a lot of slubs, the spin is inconstant (rather like art yarn, you know how the thickness thins out or expands)  and the elastic support spun through the skein is all bunched up and awkward like.  Oh!  and it has torn apart in my hands not once but twice and I am  not a tight knitter!  

 

However, the colorway is gorgeous, and the skein set me back a pretty penny, the feel isn’t bad and I think I can get about 1/3 of my quilt out of this bad boy, so I am preserving and plowing forward.

Please note** This is Nero first foray into sock yarn, and this is there first batch** I have heard other knitters having the same problem and that Nero is aware of the inconsistencies and are working to fix it for the second batch.  Now if this is so, I think I will be  Nero fan, but don’t count your chicks till they hatch, as the saying goes…

GREAT FINDS:

So a couple websites that I am loving right now are:

http://www.yarnstandards.com/  This place is overflowing with info that you need and want to know.  This is what every knit designer follows when designing and now that I have this vital source at my fingertips, I understand where designers are coming from!

http://knitalong.net/  As I said earlier, I am knitting up the Barn Raising Quilt as well as devouring the book and the website is a gorgeous gallery of projects, ideas and news. **note, you do need to purchase the book to get at the actual patterns shown here**

http://www.folkalley.com/  Folkalley is my fav. web based radio stream, and a sure bet for a great podcaste.  I love all the new folk singers and songwriters they showcase here.  And as it is Spring it is their annual drive for funds and I am a definite supporter!

Speaking of Folk music try out the Smithsonian Folk Project at http://www.folkways.si.edu/  and their podcaste “tapestry of the times” on itunes.  Never before have I been so richly blessed with astounding little known folk songs that have shaped our world and society.  The project was started by a man back in the 1930’s of collecting and publishing as many folk singers and songwriters as he could, one year publishing 52 records (that is 1 record per week!) . He was never looking for material gain, he was just doing this for the love of the art.  When he died he left his collection of over 30,000 songs and records to the Smithsonian Museum and they have continued his work here.  Bliss!