The rumours of my death have been greatly exaggerated.

The rumours of my death have been greatly exaggerated. Mostly. It has been a hell of a couple weeks around here. I might have to write this entry as a bullet point list for the sake of clarity. I'm hoping your regularly scheduled blogging will resume shortly. Anyhow, here is what I've been up to:

• Collective Bargaining - I sit on the bargaining committee for my union, and we have finally started negotiating a collective agreement with the university's administration. Things have gone quickly so far, but we still have the big stuff--compensation and workload--to get through. It will be very interesting to see how this goes--the Ontario government has asked for a two year wage freeze for all public servants/groups that receive transfer funds; it is likely that we will be offered 0-0 for the next two years.
• New school year. You'd think, since this is my fourth year in this job, I'd remember how hard that first week of classes is: a million names to remember, new schedule and locations to memorize, no more napping in the afternoons...but I didn't remember, and last week just knackered me. I'm so lucky to have Mat in my life--if I were left to my own devices, I would probably eat pizza for the entire first month of school because I am just exhausted when I get home from work right now.
• Test knitting. I'm almost done my second test knit. The first was a stranded pattern done in sport weight yarns, so it was a slow(er) project. I've only knit one other stranded project in my entire life, so don't ask me why I came up with a fairly involved stranded design...but I did. My second knit is in a worsted weight yarn, and I'm so happy that I saved it for last because it's working up like a dream. I'm going to mail them out tomorrow, and then I just have finish writing the patterns.
• Bachelorette party. This was a very good night. The theme was "Wear It Again" (as in, wear a dress that you've only worn once) with a side of "underwear" (everyone brought me a pair of gotchies and I had to guess who brought me which). There are lots of photos here, although I will warn you that there are pictures of a) crocheted thongs, b) phallic pastries, and c) firemen having hoses pinned on them.
• Various and sundry wedding planning. I finally have all the fascinator things, but haven't quite figured out what I'm doing. I do not have all the jewelry things, which is irritating. At times like this I feel like the persecution complex that I have in relation to Canada Post is actually quite justified.
• My cat hates me again.
• I AM GETTING MARRIED IN TEN DAYS FRAK

With a bang and a whimper

There are two sayings that I like to pretend were said by my grandmother, although I think I probably picked them up from all that nineteenth century literature I read when I was a kid. They both essentially mean the same thing, I think. The first is, "it never rains but it pours" and the second is "if it's not chickens, it's feathers." So I'll leave it to you to guess what kind of week I had.


Collective bargaining began this week, and occupied six hours of my time on Thursday, plus countless hours of my thoughts since then. I also had dinner with my mother and one of her friends from nursing college. On Friday, I attended a Deans' Breakfast for the frosh, followed by an information session for the English majors, and met with the union's Scholarship Committee. On Saturday, I volunteered for the local AIDS Committee's annual AIDS Walk, and somehow got suckered into doing work with Excel spreadsheets.¹

Saturday night made it all worth it, though. Friends of mine put together a record label for artists in North Bay Rock City², recorded an e.p., and held a record release party at one of my favourite bars. After the week I'd had, I had more or less talked myself out of going until one of the performers emailed me to tell me that he thought I should go--so I got out of my comfy pants and into some other clothes.³

This was the best decision I'd made all week. The martinis were $5, I was only minorly socially awkward, and the music was amazing. Generally, when you've got a multi-artist e.p., you're going to wind up with something that you don't really care for, but this was not the case on Saturday. Everyone who took to the stage was awesome: there was a great mix of originals and covers. (My favourites were Matt Murphy belting out Janis Joplin's "Mercedes Benz," Tyler MacIver's version of Tommy James & the Shondelles' "I Think We're Alone Now"⁴ and Kyle Fowle's Sonic Youth cover.⁵)

Headliner Craig Cardiff played a set mid-show, which felt very intimate as he invited people to sit down on the floor and on the stage. I didn't because I didn't want to abandon my totally sweet bar stool, which was still less than ten feet from the stage. His set was excellent even without my favourite song, "Albion Hotel," and he played a lovely cover of "What A Wonderful World" as his last song.

I'm always a bit worried when I go to friends' creative endeavours, because there's always that slightly possibility that your friends are going to suck, and then there's some awkward lying involved about how much you enjoyed stuff.⁶ Fortunately, no lying would've been required for this show: I had a great time, as evidenced by the fact that I stayed out til 2 a.m.

Overall, I couldn't have asked for a better night out, with one exception--I forgot to grab myself a copy of the e.p.
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¹ There really aren't words to describe how much I hate Excel/how stupid Excel makes me feel. Also, it was Excel for Windows Vista, which is even worse. I really hate the MS Office suite for Vista. Obviously, no one at Windows has ever heard the phrase, "If it's not broke, don't fix it."
² Despite the nickname, North Bay is very seldom a Rock City.
³ I tweeted about this at the time, but I still want to know: What does one wear to indie concerts when one is a grown up? This was so much easier when I was 16 and could wear a pair of Converse One-Stars and a t shirt I'd painted a slogan on myself. I ended up in a (machine) knit dress and a pair of jeans.
⁴Yes, it is the same song that Tiffany covers; it just sounds more impressive if you know the original artist.
⁵ Though, as I tweeted at the time, every time I hear Sonic Youth now, it reminds me of the part in Juno when Juno is angry at Mark and she tells him that she bought a Sonic Youth album and "it was just noise!"
⁶ This is undoubtedly a residual effect from one of my exes, who--while he was a talented guitar player--definitely thought he was a lot better than he actually was, and would get upset if he wasn't given what he thought was his due after shows.

Les Invasions Barbares

I've written approximately four half posts here in the last few days, but I just can't seem to settle on anything. I have only a few days left before the semester starts, and the time seems to be filling up quickly: I have meetings with my chair, with the scholarship committee, with the collective bargaining committee, and a breakfast with the first year students, as well as a visit from my mother. (One of her best friends from nursing school is teaching in town for a few days, so she's driving up to visit Middle Sister and I, and have dinner with her friend.)

I've also got knitting to do. I sold two patterns to Three Irish Girls a few months ago, and the yarn arrived last week for me to work up my samples. I need to finish them quickly so that I can mail them away to Minnesota. (I'm very glad that I started with the fingering weight project first; the worsted weight one will take less time to knit up.) I'm still plugging away on my mum's Rogue (the goal is to finish last year's present for this year's Christmas). I've also got the idea in my head that I want to make a Little Sister Dress for a colleague whose wife just had a baby girl.

The competition list for the Elmvale Fall Fair are up now, and I am bound and determined to enter some of my hand knits this year. There are several different knitting categories, which generally have fewer than five entries in them. I also have this crazy idea that I could throw together a few sewing projects for that too...plus the sewing and knitting projects I want to have done for the holidays this year.


Speaking of holiday knits, I finished these yesterday, and I foresee a fair few pairs in my future. The embellishments are done by needle felting, and I added a few of the beads leftover from when I made Larisa.

From The Office Of...

I am at work, in my office.¹ I've been asked to present at the New Faculty Orientation today on the union's contract negotiations with the university², so I am dressed and professional and wearing heels, and await the presentation. I am also basking in the air conditioning. It was 29 degrees in the house when I left, and I don't imagine that's much improved.

Thus, I am taking advantage of the opportunity to organize my fall knits list, and to think about what holiday knitting (if any) that I want to pursue this year. I've been plugging away, slowly but surely, on my mom's Rogue sweater (which I'd love to have done for Christmas this year). There are a couple of things that I'd like to knit, but I've got some yarn coming to knit samples of two of my designs. Once the yarn finally gets here I will have a fairly tight turnaround with those, so I'm trying to stick to simple and in progress projects in the meantime.

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¹ The comma there is quite important. Without it, the sentence would've read, "I'm at work in my office," which is not, strictly speaking, exactly true.
² Or lack thereof.

Drinking the Haterade

With four weeks to go, I think I might be finally losing it. The last couple of days have been pretty stressful, between trying to track down RSVPs, another shower, and a friend's sudden announcement of her plans to marry a few weeks after us.

Unfortunately, my attempts to track down some of our non-RSVPers has resulted in the realization that a friend of a friend from the Historic Site Which Shall Not Be Named is getting married the same day we are. There is some overlap in our guestlists, and so far I've had three people tell me that they can't come because they're attending his wedding.

I am taking this far more personally than I'm really comfortable admitting. There are quite a few people not attending our wedding for various reasons: work, school, family obligations, and that doesn't bother me...but for some reason, this does. I'm really hurt that these people are choosing not to come to our wedding. Why not us? Don't we matter?

Thus, my goals for this week are to finish my placecards, start my seating chart, and to try my best to accept that if people choose not to come to my wedding, the only people who will miss out are the people who aren't there. I am going to think nice thoughts. I will not dwell on things that I have no control over. I will not, as Middle Sister puts it, drink the Haterade.

Oh, and I'll knit these.

happiness is a warm nerd

My beloved's first language is not English. You'd probably never guess, to speak to him:¹ He has virtually no accent and does not speak his first language often.² He speaks it most when around members of his family, although the odd time when we're talking, he won't be able to find the right English word and will say it to me in French. He often jokes that he spells like a drunken sailor in English. The only time I really notice, though, is with his use of idioms, as he has no grasp whatsoever of English idioms.

This is mostly funny, as he will mix metaphors in ways that make no sense, or get an expression ever-so-slightly-wrong. Every once in a while, though, he'll use an expression so completely incorrectly that I'm completely flabbergasted by it. This actually happened yesterday, when he came home from work. He'd picked up a bathroom scale³ and wanted to buy something else, but, as he put it, one of the other workers had "snafu-ed" it from him.

"Pardon?" said I.

"She snafu-ed it from me," he replied.

"I don't understand what you mean," I said. "AT ALL."

"She snagged it before I got it," he said. "Snafu-ed."

"That's not what snafu-ed means," I said. "Not even close. It's an acronym for Situation Normal, All F---ed Up."

"No it isn't," he said. So I made him google it.

In other news, his place of employment is gearing up for Hallowe'en, which is the biggest event of the year for the store. The managers are expected to be in costume for the whole month of October, so Mat gets to wear several different Hallowe'en costumes. Last year, Capt. Mal was his default costume. Last night, he decided that this year, he's going to add Doctor Who to his repetoire.⁴ Awesome.

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¹ Though his name, Mathieu, might give you a clue.
² This is likely because of me, since it is my second language and the older I get, the more I struggle with it.
³ Which does not work, unsurprisingly.
⁴ David Tennant's Doctor, to be precise.

spinning and food

While I was home on the weekend, Mat's mum gave me a giant basket of tomatoes from her garden. When I got to my parents, my mum said, "Oh, you got tomatoes already. I was hoping to pawn some off on you." It has been, apparently, a ridiculously good growing year in the region where I grew up: the corn came in early, the tomatoes plants have nearly exploded, and the cucumbers are also quite plentiful. So I have a basket of tomatoes to turn into a tomato sauce at some point today, and I bought a basket of Ontario peaches yesterday that I'd like to turn into a peach crisp.

Even though Girl Tuesday brought over her spinning wheel almost two weeks ago, I haven't had a chance, really, to do anything with it until yesterday. I picked up some of Fleece Artist's Merino Sliver¹ at the store downtown, and I've got the first braid half spun and half pre-drafted.






The cat thinks the spinning wheel is just about the coolest thing ever.

It's shaping up to be a beautiful day here, so I'm going to get outside and enjoy it.

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¹ I love this fleece. It's merino, handles really well, has all of Fleece Artist/Handmaiden's signature great colours, and it's generally about $7 CAD for a 50g braid.

doing the grown up things

One of my most popular posts here at academia nuts is the one where I wrote about not knitting a Cowichan style sweater for the Ravelympics during the Vancouver Games. (My other most popular post is the one with the chart for the Hearthstone from World of Warcraft.) It's a topic that I'd like to revisit some time: I think that the sweaters represent a very interesting and very vexed space in Canadian culture, and I've hardly done them justice. I only bring it up today because I've just discovered that Briggs and Little have released the HBC Cowichan-style sweater pattern as a free download on their website. It is a beautiful sweater, and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't tempted to knit it. Unfortunately, it's written for their Country Roving, which is not one of my favourite yarns (picture pre-drafted pencil roving that feels like Lopi). If it were the Heritage yarn, that would be another story.

I'm in the process of sorting through the kitchen, a process which is probably long overdue. We've lived here for just over two years now, and I suspect that since that time we've just been putting things in the cupboards without really paying attention to what they are. Now that I have so many nice new kitchen things, I'm trying to sort through what we can keep, what we can give away, and what we can toss. Now that I have my standmixer, I don't need my handmixer anymore, but it will work quite well for someone else. I also have about three different half sets of dry measuring cups and spoons, which I'll be pleased to get rid of and replace with lovely stainless steel ones. I have also found our large colander (hurray!) which had fallen in behind the pots.

I also cleaned out the fridge today. Not a "let's toss the gross stuff" clean, but a real, remove-and-wipe-down-the-shelves type of clean. I also--I think/hope/pray--found the source of the rather unpleasant odour emanating from the fridge these last few days. Remember that time I made pavlova? When I separated the eggs for the meringue, I saved the yolks intending to make lemon curd...and then forgot them until this morning. Gross.

an embarrassment of riches

I am chez les parents for one last night, though I will be up and on the road quite early tomorrow morning. One of my aunts in Toronto hosted a bridal shower for me today, and it was a really nice afternoon. There was sushi, cupcakes, fifteen different kinds of cheese¹, wine, tea, champagne, sandwiches...so much delicious food.

When my friend Jess got married last summer, she told me that one of the biggest surprises about getting married is how generous people are to you. And even though I knew that was true, I didn't realize exactly what that would mean for me until today: It truly is an embarrassment of riches to be loved by your family and friends. The shower was a recipe shower--my sister sent out recipe cards with the invitations, and everyone brought recipes and kitchen supplies to the shower. The best recipes are the family ones, copied out by my grandmother from her cookbook, where her mother originally wrote it, or from the Women's Institute cookbook my grandfather's mother helped publish up in Timmins in the early twentieth century, or my cousin's recipe for cream filled Easter eggs.

I am so very lucky. Even if they did make me wear the bra.

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¹ Maple cheddar! Guinness cheddar! Caramelized onion cheddar! Cheesegasm!

Wedding Bell Blues

This is a wedding rant, so if you are uninterested in my wedding, you may make your exit now.

Gentle reader, if there is anything that I have learned in the last year that I feel is necessary to pass on to you, it is this one piece of advice: Just elope. ¹

Things have been relatively calm up until this point. There have been a few hiccups along the way, of course, but in the span of about five days, everything got stupid. For example:

• Wedding rings: Did you know that the price of gold is at an all-time high? It is. Which means that my plain, simple band cost almost $250 more than the price we were originally quoted.² It actually would've been cheaper to buy the pre-fab band encrusted with diamonds that we initially vetoed as being too expensive.
• The back up venue for the ceremony, which my father-in-law had assured us that we would be able to get (for free) is in fact booked. Most of the other possible venues? Also booked. Most of them in the last two or three days. Except for the one restaurant, which told my father-in-law that he normally charges about $200 to rent the space, but since it was a wedding he'd have to charge $500.
• Two of the three people that we'd intended to ask to do readings at the wedding are...not coming.
• The RSVP deadline was on Sunday and only 55% of the invitees have responded so far.
• My aunts on Facebook are talking about the black bra of doom.³
• None of the fascinator or jewelry supplies that I've ordered online have arrived yet.

The end result of all this is that I have taken to obsessing about things I cannot change. For example, I have just noticed that one of our floors is a bit slopy. The house is eighty years old, and I've lived here for just over two. I am sure that the floor has been a bit slopy the entire time, and that I've just never noticed before now. But now I cannot not see it or feel it every time I walk on it. There is not a damned thing I can do about it either.⁴

So in the meantime, I am going to breathe deeply, exhale slowly, and tell myself to accept that things are what they are, and that I need to conserve my energy. And then I'm going to go home and have a really kick ass weekend there.

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¹ My wedding has, in fact, driven me crazy. Mad. Loopy. Barking. 'Round the twist. I am losing it. I can't believe that there are still five weeks to go because I can't imagine living like this for five weeks without resorting to the consumption of copious amounts of alcohol.
² Not really the jeweler's fault--we got a quotation for price back in February, and gold has done nothing but go up since then.
³ It is an absolutely enormous bra that women in our family get to wear at their bridal showers. You are supposed to stuff pieces of wrapping paper from your gifts into it. The last person to wear it was my tiny, tiny cousin. I, unfortunately, pretty much fill out the bra to begin with.
⁴ Which is to say, not a damned thing that doesn't involved ripping up the floors and replacing them, which is not really a feasible solution at this juncture.

Dreaming of Expeditions

To summit or not to summit, that is the question. One of my Rav groups is the midst of organizing a major expedition to Sock Summit 2011, which will take place next summer in Portland, Oregon. They're coordinating hotel rooms etc., and I've been offered a spot if I want one. So I need to decide soonish if this is something I want to do. I want to go so bad.¹ I think that it would be so much fun to take the classes, visit the marketplace, do the Rav-type stuff, and meet some of the people that I've spent just over two years talking to online.

As best I can figure, it would cost me somewhere between $1000-$1500, with the variable being how much money I want to take to the marketplace. And theoretically that might not be too bad--I could sock away² about $100 a month between now and then and that would get me enough money...but can I justify spending that kind of money on what is essentially a frivolity? There are so many other things that I could do with the money.³ To say nothing of the fact that I don't know what my employment situation will be like...

Chipmunks McGee is recovering slowly. He doesn't feel very good day, I don't think, so we'll continue the resting and the Firefly re-watch. Any tips on good, protein rich soft foods?

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¹ Which is kind of funny when you consider that I don't even really like knitting socks that much.
² Pun intended.
¹ Mostly very boring, house-related things, like furnaces and RRSPs.

Chipmunks McGee

Poor Mat had his wisdom teeth out yesterday, and he is now all kinds of puffy and jowly about the cheeks. He had all four out, although only two were impacted. (Hurray for dental insurance from work, I must say; it's rather an expensive operation.) The poor guy--the day before, we had gone grocery shopping to lay in some provisions for his recovery. He had looked up a couple of recipes for vegetable soups on the internet, and bought the stuff to make them. When we got home, I asked if he wanted me to help chop stuff up and get things ready for the soup. "No need," said he. "I'll just make it tomorrow."

I decided that this was one of those moments in our relationship when I could either tell him the truth or just keep quiet. I opted for staying quiet, as sometimes telling the truth causes the other party to accuse you of being a know-it-all or a bossy bessy. Needless to say, he was not up to soup making yesterday, poor guy. He seems to be in much better spirits today, although he hasn't actually made it out of the bed yet so I suppose time will tell.

I am currently working on a little cap sleeve top made from Fleece Artist's Peter Rabbit, which is an 80-10-10 angora/wool/nylon blend. The fabric is pretty much the softest, floatiest dream. I've converted the pattern to be knit in the round, though, so now I am stuck in the endless stockingette circle. I just have to keep in mind that the finished product is so awesome as to be worth it. Besides, today is Day Two of the Great Firefly re-watch, so it will be good to have something relatively mindless to work on while we watch.

I'll be headed to my parents' this weekend, and then down to Toronto for a bridal shower on Sunday. It'll be good to have some time with them and Youngest Sister. It will also be good to get my first paycheque of the year, although that does mean I will have to resist all temptation to visit any of the yarn stores on the way home...

weekend

Another hot and humid day. We're waiting on a thunderstorm, and my head is just aching. I've taken two extra strength ibuprofen, which has taken the edge off, but I can still feel the ghost of the headache. Brutal.

It's been a good cooking week here: I made a delicious thin crust pizza. (Okay, not "made" so much as "assembled"--I used a Presidents Choice crust.) I topped it with a plain tomato sauce, proscuitto, sliced boccocinni, shaved parmesan, and fresh basil leaves. It was fantastic. This morning I also tried my hand at salted caramels. (Perhaps not the wisest choice on such a hot day.) The caramels came out pretty well, I think, though I still have to finish cutting and wrapping them. I think I may have cooked the sugar a little too long, as they have a slightly burnt/crème brulée taste to them, but it's not a bad thing. I used a grey sea salt, and I think I would put in more next time. Also: silicone baking pans for the win! I literally just popped my caramel out of it by flipping it inside out. Awesome.

I'm almost done Larisa (like two more pattern repeats and then the last beading section almost done) which is great. I want to keep it for myself, but one of my aunts is hosting a bridal shower for me, and I'm a bit stuck on a gift for her. I need to pick out my next project carefully. Mat is having his wisdom teeth removed on Tuesday, and I am his primary caregiver. He has suggested that we get the first season of True Blood to watch while he's all incapacitated, and I want to work on something that I can finish in short order because...

I have simple knitting to do! I sold two mitten patterns to a dyer, and hopefully the yarn will be on its way shortly, because I have a very tight turnaround. Good thing mittens are usually quick knits...

Knitting Round Up

WARNING: This is will be a knitting and fiber heavy post, so if you are uninterested in those things, now is the time to wander away.

A few months ago, Karie mentioned on Twitter that she was looking for test knitters. I volunteered right away, but I didn't have a chance to cast on for her lovely scarf until last night, owing to first the kilt hose, and then the Haruni shawl. The Larisa scarf is knit out of Rowan Kidsilk Haze and bookended by a few rows of beading on each side. It is both my first time using KSH¹ and my first time beading. I was able to pick up the KSH in Barrie at the Knit and Quilt shop, which is the largest yarn store I've ever been in, and well worth the stop if you are in the area. The beads proved more problematic--there are a few beading stores in town, as well as WalMart, but I had absolutely no luck finding 8/0 seedbeads anywhere. Lots of 6/0, lots of 10/0, but no 8/0s. Just as I was about to succumb and just buy some from the internet, I had a flash of inspiration and decided to check my bead stash to see if I had any. I had a single packet of 8/0s (which I do not recollect buying) that were somehow, mysteriously, the exact colour (hematite) that I was going to order from the internet. Obviously it was meant to be. The grey of the beads looks pretty fab against the red of the yarn, if I do say so myself.

I was able to cast on for Larisa because I finished my Haruni this morning! The second chart involves increasing very rapidly and results in approximately 530 stitches before you begin decreasing again. That's a lot of stitches to knit back and forth, so the last chart really felt like a long slog. The leaves are just gorgeous, though. For some unknown reason, I own approximately 4 crochet hooks in a 6.0/6.5mm size, but none smaller. The crochet bind-off required a small crochet hook, so I had to run out to Wal-Mart last night at 9 p.m.² I wasn't sure if they'd have my size (a 3.75mm) because I wasn't sure if they'd do quarter millimetre measurements in crochet hooks. That shows you how little I know; they actually had over twenty different sizes of crochet hooks, and apparently on the smaller end of the spectrum they actually make them in 1mm increments. Crazy. The Haruni is made from Fleece Artist's Woolie Silk 2-ply, which they have since discontinued (sniff sniff). It's lovely stuff, but I already have a shawl made in this colour, so I'm considering overdyeing it.

The other thing I got accomplished in the last week was the washing and setting of my second skein of handspun yarn. I spun this ages ago on Girl Tuesday's wheel, which is a Louet S17 and then left it to languish. Girl has been pushing me to borrow the wheel again for a few weeks³, so I decided that if I wanted to do that, I need to actually make something from what I made last time. It's an alpaca-merino-silk blend from my favourite alpaca farm, Misty Haven Alpacas and it is destined to be Kink from the latest Knitty.

It is Mat's birthday today. I will not tell you how old he is, because he is embarassingly young. This year, I have been trying to write blog posts on people's birthdays about all of the reasons why I love those people, and what I think are the neatest things about them. I am not going to write about Mat now, though; I'm going to save it for a pre-wedding post. We are going out to a new pub tonight, which has both of our favourites on tap, and that is a good thing.

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¹ And I can definitely see why some call it Crack Silk Haze.
² I do generally try to avoid shopping at Wal-Mart, but when it's 9 p.m. and you need a crochet hook, there are relatively few other options.
³ I suspect, though I can't confirm, that she hopes that if I have the wheel and she can't spin, that she will stop buying roving on Etsy. ;)

Licensed to Wed

Great news today--Girl Tuesday, who manages the A/V department at the local library, has brought a new project to fruition: she's worked out a deal with the Ontario Library Service's OverDrive program that allows library card holders access to a sizable database of audiobooks (which can then be downloaded to a computer, or uploaded to a listening device). I'm just browsing through the selection right now, and it's quite impressive--Atwood's Year of the Flood, any one? (I will pass on Android Karenina, though.) It even has an iPod app, so that you can download directly to your iPod. You can borrow up to five books for up to seven days. I foresee tremendous awesomeness.

Mat and I went down to city hall today to apply for our marriage license this morning. It was a very ineresting experience: you have to declare your religious affiliations on the form, so I foolishly wrote "none" instead of "Protestant" and had to change it to "no religion" when we got there. I know this is going to be a bit pedantic, but having no religious affiliation is not the same as having no religion. We also had to take an oath that we are not affinated nor consanguinated, and swear to that oath by placing our hands on the Bible. It's interesting to me that even though I have "no religion," an oath on the Bible is still considered binding for me. I wonder if that would be different if I had declared myself to be Jewish or Muslim or Buddhist. (Somehow I doubt it.)

I had a very strange dream the other night where someone (possibly one of my co-workers) wanted to pay me to read the Anita Blake Vampire Hunter series. I'm pretty sure that even in the dream, I refused.

Of Pretzels and Pavlova

When I decided a few months back that I wanted to post more regularly here, I read a couple of articles online about blogging. The best piece of advice that I got was that I should blog in the morning, and that I would be better able to keep myself posting consistently if I did so. I didn't put much stock in it at the time, since I tend to think about posting more in the evening, but I'm starting to think that it might be the better way to go.¹

I've been putting the stand mixer through its paces, and have made both soft pretzels and pavlova this week. The pretzels were okay--it was a very humid day, which made for very dense pretzels. The recipe claimed to make 8 pretzels, but if I made it again I would make 16 smaller pretzels. I would also salt them more. The dough hook is awesome though--it kneaded my dough for me in about 3 minutes. I only used the meringue recipe from the pavlova, and it came out different than I'd anticipated. The recipe uses cornstarch and vinegar instead of cream of tartar, and it made a meringue that was crisp on the outside and marshmallowy on the inside. It was good, but very, very different from what I'd anticipated. (I served it with a raspberry coulis and homemade whipped cream, in case you're wondering.)

Yesterday, I washed and set a skein of alpaca-merino-silk yarn that I spun several months ago. It's drying now. It's so pretty I can hardly believe that I made it myself. I am going to make this pattern from Knitty with it, I think, which will be the first time that I've knit anything with yarn I've spun myself.

I am off to somewhere this evening for round two of Not My Family Reunion, because Mat managed to get tomorrow off, so we're going just for tonight. I was saying to him this morning that I thought I would be better able to deal with it if the two reunions weren't back to back; if we were fully able to attend both we'd have only three days between the two because of the long weekend. "That's too much time with too many people for an introvert," I said. "Dude," he replied. "You were an interpreter on a historic site and gave tours in two languages to huge groups. You've lectured to nearly 200 students. How are you possibly an introvert?"

Being an introvert, I explained, is not about being shy, although I was painfully shy for the first 18 years of my life. Being an introvert is more about finding it difficult to engage in social interaction for extended periods of time, and about valuing your own company as much as (if not, in some circumstances, more) than the company of others. One of the things that I like about Mat's job (aside from the sweet spousal discounts on used books and clothing) is that his schedule does not overlap with mine, which means that I get to spend a reasonable amount of time by myself every week. He is definitely an extrovert, though, so that's part of why he doesn't understand.

I need approximately three more hours in the day. If you could arrange that I'd be eternally grateful.

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¹ I.e., thinking about posting is not the same as actually posting.

Another Long Weekend

August is a busy month for Mat's family. The Simcoe Day weekend (known to other Canadians as the Civic Holiday) is a family reunion for his dad's side of the family, which is always hosted at my in-laws' house. The following weekend is the reunion for his mom's side of the family, with a different location every year.¹ The week after that is Mat's birthday.²

So this weekend was the paternal family reunion, featuring a grand total of 31 people. I should probably preface all of this by saying that I love my inlaws very much: they've always been very accepting of me, despite our cultural and religious differences, and they've never made me feel anything but loved when I am at their house. That said, there are very real cultural differences, and a long weekend of that can be very overwhelming, especially for an introvert.

It was especially bad this year because of the wedding. There were guests at the reunion who are not invited to the wedding. (Mat's great aunts and uncles and some of his second and third cousins; we've had to draw the line at our first cousins because it would've added approximately 50 people to his half of the guest list. I am meeting almost of all these people for the first time this summer.) Most people, I think, would be fairly sensitive to the delicacy of these situations, but we got asked more than once where these relatives' invitations were. Awkward. I also got to attend a Passion Party put on by my future sister-in-law, along with her cousins and aunts. More awkward but eventually hilarious.

I got to have dinner with my parents and spend a few hours with my mom, which was really nice. My grandfather's condition is worsening (mentally at least; not sure about the physical) and he's been hospitalized for the time being. He will probably move from the hospital into an old age home. This has been a long time coming; it has been very hard for my grandmother and some of my aunts to admit that my grandfather's needs to go beyond her ability to care for him. I'm hoping that the transition goes well for both of them. Growing old is scary.

I skipped out on a good chunk of the 50 Days of Tea since I wasn't at home, but I did have a peach-mango white tea today. Very nice taste; lots of scent; not convinced that Lipton's much vaunted pyramid-style tea bag really makes all that much difference.
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¹ Yes, this does mean that every five or so years, they will host back-to-back reunions for about sixty people total.
² I have bought him an iced tea set, and I will be buying him a sgian dubh for his kilt.

Early in the morning

I had to drive Mat to work for 5 a.m. today, which is one of my least favourite things to do. I have discovered, through the course of our two years living common-law, that I don't necessarily sleep well when we sleep together. It's not so bad during the school year when my job does a fair job of exhausting my mind, but I've been a little understimulated this summer¹ and have often found myself quite awake when Mat wants to go to bed. This is especially problematic when he has these 5 a.m. shifts, as they usually necessitate him going to bed between 9:30 and 10 o'clock at night.

Now, I love the man dearly, but he is a very restless sleeper. He talks; he kicks; he chatters his teeth. He also, on occasion, snores. If I go to bed at the same time as him, it usually isn't too bad: once I am asleep, I stay asleep, but if I don't...he'll keep me up.²

All of this is to say that I am quite tired, and that I am skipping out on today's portion of the 50 Days of Tea because I want a cup of tarry black orange pekoe, and by George, I am going to have it. It is also a perfectly balmy 8 degrees here in NBRC, so a hot cup will be marvelous.

We looked after Abigail, the six-month old daughter of one of my old roommates, for a few hours last night. It went well until she started to get a bit fussy, which quickly turned into very fussy and then into full-on screaming. I was trying to make dinner while Mat watched her, and we quickly realized that it was our faces that were upsetting her: every time I came into the room, she'd look for her mom, and realize that I wasn't her, and get even more upset. So we strapped her into her chair, turned her away from us, and were careful to enter and exit the room out of her line of sight. She stopped screaming within five minutes of not being able to see us, and fell asleep within ten.

I'm headed to the in-laws' for a family reunion this weekend. 31 people will be there, which will be quite chaotic; hopefully I'll be able to slip out for a bit to visit my own parents and touch base with a couple of friends. My future mother-in-law has requested that I make some soft pretzels for the occasion. I haven't actually made them in years (as in at least three or four) so it will be interesting to see how that goes. I'm considering making a practice batch before we leave today from an Alton Brown recipe. If I do, I get to try out the dough hook on my stand mixer, which sounds like it could be fun.

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¹ You are shocked, I'm sure, to discover that wedding planning is not rocket silence.
² I also have issues with knowing that an alarm clock will be going off in the future, since I'm paranoid about sleeping in. If I know an alarm has been set, I will wake up periodically throughout the night to make sure that I haven't slept through it.

Of Mousse and Men

Today I really did clean all the things. Or at least most of them. It was quite gratifying. I also went to the mall and picked up my brand new KITCHEN AID STAND MIXER, which is quite gorgeous and also weighs quite a bit. It is a thing of rare and singular beauty. I made the Salted Caramel Chocolate Mousse I mentioned a few days ago, which was a very interesting experience. I've never made any kind of caramel before, so melting the sugar was a bit scary. I was especially scared by the crust of sugar left in the pan, but it actually completely dissolved after I let it sit in some hot water for about twenty minutes. I also managed to spill a single drop of boiling sugar on my thumb, which resulted in a LOT of pain, and a very nice blister. I haven't tried to knit since I did that, so I'm not sure if it will affect my knitting. The mousse is quite delicious, though.

One of the neat things about working in a university is that it's a research climate, which means that there's a lot of opportunity to participate in different studies. Today I got to sit in on a focus group discussion of Millenial students in post-secondary education, and how teaching practices at the post-secondary level have changed because of them. Very interesting stuff.

Today's tea was TAZO's Zen, which is my favourite green tea and my favourite of the Starbucks teas. It's green tea blended with spearmint and lemongrass, and it makes a beautiful cup of tea, particularly when my throat is a bit sore or when I don't want the kick of black tea.

Of Tea and Books

As I was sitting down here at the computer desk, I somehow managed to glance my elbow off the sharp corner of the tower section, and gouged a chunk out of my skin. It's been about ten minutes, and it still smarts.

I went to the public library's monthly book club this afternoon. Girl Tuesday runs it as part of her job, and she's been asking me to come for ages. Naturally, this meant that it was always scheduled to happen at the same time as one of my courses, so this is the first time I've been able to go. The book was Yann Martel's Life of Pi, which I've read several times and have also taught for a few years, and it was nice to have a chance to revisit it. It's an interesting exploration of philosophy, religion, science, and storytelling. The other book club members are all women in their late 60s/early 70s, and they felt that it was a book better suited for younger women. Next month is Margaret Laurence's The Diviners, which is one of my favourites, and hopefully I will be able to go back then.

The Haruni shawl is working up nicely. The pattern calls for fingering weight yarn and 3.5mm needles, and after working the first chart, I wasn't sure about how it looked, so I washed and blocked it.

It isn't quite as lacy as other lace projects, so it seemed quite dense, but now that I've seen it blocked, I'm okay with it. I'm using a 3 ply fingering weight yarn in 80% mohair/20% wool from Wellington Fibres, a semi-local yarn. It is a bit strange to knit with, and it has a fair amount of vegetable matter in it.¹ It softens up beautifully on washing, and I think the final product will have a gorgeous drap to it.

Today's tea was a Masala Chai from Teaopia. I made a latte from it. It was delicious, and I am unfortunately almost out. Ooh! On the website, they have an iced tea brewing set...that would make the perfect gift for Mat for his birthday. I like how this is shaping up.

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¹ Which is totally worth it for a local-ish, environmentally friendly yarn