Politics and Tatting

I'm starting this post on Friday, March 25th. The NC legislature and the NC governor had a special session (costing the state taxpayers a few thousand dollars) to pass this bill. These are some of the tweets responding. I don't usually talk about politics on my blog. But this, out of all the things the politicians have done this really gobsmacks me. I am not directly affected (I'm a moderately femme, ciswoman), but this bill is so rampantly discriminatory and they took special effort to pass it. This is a group who can't pass the frickin' budget on time. And it's also badly written. If Jane (name made up) doesn't want her 9-year-old son to go to the mall bathroom by himself, well, too bad. It's illegal for him to go with her. If they're cleaning the women's room at the gas station and I'm desperate to go, it's illegal for me to use the empty men's room. I definitely know some people who are definitely not getting my vote in November. I'm ordering an "I'll go with you" button, as soon as I have some spare change.

I went to the first work sponsored yoga class on Thursday. It's a work week, wind-down thing. We were in the Arboretum and it was lovely. I wish I'd gotten more than one picture. Note for next time; when it's time to lie down for the final relax phase, head uphill, not downhill. Just FYI.

Two bits of gaming news this week. They've started the beta playtest of Shadow of the Century Fate game. And I'm on the list. I'm reading through the book, sending in errata, and planning a game for the 3rd.

The other news is also Fate related. I submitted a pitch to write a building block for Fate Codex, and they accepted. I need to get my outline written by Friday, April 1st.

Tri-Tatters went to demonstrate for a few hours Saturday at Carolina Fiber Fest. I started a new bracelet and finished the hairstick dangle.

Frost Advisory, really? (and some gaming news)

Yes, we had frost last night. After last week's gorgeous weather, pulling out the heavy coat and scarf was not nearly as fun as you'd think it would be.

Saturday was a picnic to celebrate a friend's birthday. He held it at a park near his house, with a shelter and a grill. It was not a warm and sunny day, but at least it didn't rain. And we still have fun talking and socializing. And no one fell into the creek this time (one of the kids has a tendency).

Sunday was the Pathfinder, Wardens of the Reborn Forge game. Due to some intelligent choices, we skipped a few major combats. CD thinks we might be done with one more session, maybe two. There's less than a half-dozen fights left.

I haven't really been doing much tatting. I did a dangle to hang from a hairstick.

bad picture of the dangle

dangle materials

My news (burying the lead) is I'm on the list to playtest Shadow of the Century. I'm reading through the book. Luckily, I know something about Fate system so I'm not starting from a dead stop. I knew that when I signed up to be a playtester.

Oh, and I've submitted a pitch to have something published in Fate Codex. They put out a submission call for pieces, and I submitted a building block. It's an idea I've had for ages, but never developed. I thought about it as a Pathfinder adventure; just couldn't make it fit.

And there's finally a version (modded) of Grand Theft Auto I like. You follow a deer around the fictional county; up a mountain, through a neighborhood, under water, in a mine, through an airport, etc. There's no player, it's just roaming around. Every so often it teleports somewhere else.

Out to supper last night (with update)

So I didn't get my blog written. I spent this past weekend with Mom (and I did find 6 garments to cull from my wardrobe).

The presentation went pretty well. I skipped a few things but I think I retained enough interest. And the director wants information from it to be in the quarterly department newsletter. I gave the 3-page presentation, including the parts I didn't cover, to the communication director.

I also went to an extended lunch and learn, sponsored by the Women's Center. The topic was navigating gender bias in the workplace. It was part II. I haven't taken part I but I'm informed enough it didn't matter (thankfully).

But here's the game I'm playing via Google Hangouts on Sunday evenings (link goes to description). It's not published yet, so I guess I'm part of the play test. I'm playing a master weaver, and grandmother. Most of her family was killed but she has one granddaughter, from another village, who has come to live with her. Sulveig, my character, is very focused on the future of her family and the secrets of weaving she has to share. I missed this past Sunday's game, for reasons.

Coming home from visiting mom was, I was going to say interesting, but that's wrong. It was boring. Boring. Boring. Which is better than being interesting. My hour plus drive took three hours because of multiple accidents. Last I heard, there were 130+ cars involved, at least 9 separate accidents, 21 people taken for medical treatment, and about 6 miles of highway closed to incoming traffic. At one point, I rolled down the shoulder-side windows, turned off my car, and read a book. Some bad storms moved through but I never got hit, while I was in the car.

See the rainbow? We were still moving occasionally at this point

We had stopped moving by this point

I think it was soon after this, I turned off my car

There were also two guys who ran past me on the shoulder; no idea where they went or what they were doing. I only saw one non-emergency vehicle on the shoulder, and that car was backing up to get to the exit ramp.

And if anyone has an empty bead tube like this, I'd like them. My mom wants them. I'll be emptying these beds into another container so I can give her this tube. I went and bought this tube at JoAnne's after doing early voting on Friday.

Employee Forum meeting was yesterday. I took these pictures on the way back.

Last night I drove to Raleigh to meet friends for supper. A friend who moved out of the area and I've only seen her a couple times since came back for a week. This is what I saw in the drive.

Note the line of cars

A 40 minute drive in rush hour took over an hour. It was more slow and go than full stops though.

And this picture I took today. This is one of the pollen culprits.

Tri-Tatters meeting etc

Due to scheduling conflicts, Tri-tatters couldn't get our usual meeting room on a weekend. March is apparently really busy. First Saturday is Living History day at Mordecai House. We were one of the demonstrators, along with hearth cooking. I missed the hearth cooking, it was in a different location. Anitra talked to our contact and he let us have our meeting along with our demo, this once.

One of our younger members surprised us by joining us. She's in college in another town and rarely gets a chance to see us. She didn't have her tatting with her so she did some knitting. I completed a bracelet and just as I pulled out materials for my next project, it was time to wrap up. I completely missed eating lunch. I just grazed on strawberries and Katie's delicious baked breadsticks.

My dentist appointment went well. It was my 6-month cleaning. I really hope they come up with an alternative to that metal pick someday. It just grates on my nerves. I showed off my tatting some more and made my next dental appointment.

I worked on my presentation some more. I'm giving it Thursday but it's hard condensing 8 hours of material into 10, interesting, minutes.

A few more letters have arrived in the mail and I need to answer them. I'll admit I haven't been as urgent in my replies since Lettermo ended.

I'm going to see Mom this weekend. I have to pull together 6 wardrobe discards for her.

Breaking Silence

I got distracted and didn't post the last two weeks. I went to Mom's two weeks ago, and I often start my blog post over the weekend. Last weekend was Triangle Tatters meeting and other stuff, just kept busy.

I've kept up quite well with Lettermo, and only 1 day to go. I already know what I'm sending, I just need to write the note and go to the post office to get packaging and postage.

Wednesday was interesting. We had tornado warnings. We sometimes get watches but warnings are rare (except during hurricanes, when we've already have enough on our plate). My office is in the basement, so I didn't bother moving. However, the rest of the building came to camp in my office and nearby. Again, because basement. After work, the sky looked like a Brothers Hidlebrandt painting.

I literally pulled over and parked to take this picture

And a few minutes later

I finished another bracelet, then started one in the same pattern but completely different beads.

HDT thread, coppery beads

HDT, dyed howlite and seed beads

I got the 1st one loaded during the meeting and started loading the 2nd one. However, I did not get very far for a very good reason; I was helping someone learn to tat. She had heard of the group and showed up for the meeting, hoping someone could help her. She'd looked at the video tutorial on YouTube but it never quite worked for her. She had all the motions right, just missed the key flip of thread tension. She was doing quite well by the end of the meeting. And we had 21 people show up, all told. At least three of them were learning to tat.

I'm sticking to my budget, but it was hard this month. I had an unexpected purchase to make, plus I couldn't find all my stamps and had to buy more.

I've started using Evernote for tracking my letters. I'm not sure it's a good idea; as I'm having a learning curve trying to figure out how to separate the scans into the separate letters. And so far, searching has not been as successful as I'd thought it would be.

 I took a 8-hour training on sustainability through work. A good part was what had been done, what is being done, and what's in progress at work. Then there was what we can do and get our offices to do; things like purchases, water conservation, energy, composting, and recycling. I'll be giving a report to the managers at the staff meeting in March.

And the moonstone bracelet, plus 2 others

HDT thread: Snowy Day & moonstone cubes