Progress on Too Many Projects

I have started the test swatch, aka gauge test, for a baby blanket block. It's my 1st ever block so I'm a little anxious about it. I'm going to make a plain block, to hopefully provide some contrast to other, fancier, blocks. I've never really done this before, the test I mean. It's supposed to be a 7" block, so I'm guessing and trying to do a 1" thick strip. We'll see if I'm right.

Next up: continuing progress on Anitra's test patterns. I've blocked one snowflake but I have more to done that need to be blocked.

Nina Libin asked if I'd be her assistant in her split ring beanile class at Palmetto Tat Days. She sent me the tips/instructions and the patterns. I did the test of technique project. And promptly left my shuttles at mom's house. Luckily, I have other shuttles.

Oh wait, I also have 3 scenarios to prep for the con this weekend. If I can't find my pre-printed pregens (pregenerated characters), I'll need to hit a print shop and get them (up to 30) printed. In color. That's not going to be cheap.

I took some flower pictures and since a friend asked about chard, also a picture of that plant, from the edible plant beds by work.

cone flower

chard

I'm still playing Neko Atsume. And I finally got a full house.

I went to see Mom this weekend. Mostly, I tried to get her tv to work, but her DVD suddenly stopped working. We went to the grocery store and she stocked up on easy prep food. We need to decide what to do about her car, though.

What a Storm!

Last Wednesday was my last Employee Forum meeting. It was the retreat so I joined them for lunch and then the committee annual reports. I found two potential successors. They are going to give me an answer before the next Carolina Campus Community Garden meeting. I gave them a rundown on what I've been doing and some ideas for the coming year.

Friday I went to see mom. We went to lunch, at ice cream at Ozzie, hit a thrift shop, and then in the afternoon we toured a couple assisted living facilities. Mom is healthy as a horse but she's having some driving problems. The nearest bus stop is a mile away and she's reluctant to call a taxi. That left her stranded in her apartment, except when friends came to take her lunch, etc. Mom and long-term idleness are not friends. No matter how much you enjoy it, there's only so much tv, reading, and crocheting one person can do without going a little stir crazy.
Persimmon tree outside Ozzie's

Both were smaller establishments. Those are better for forming personal relationships and so the staff are more familiar with the residents and more likely to notice changes. Mom is going to have lunch at one of them on Monday, to see what they're dining is like.

After the second tour, a storm front was moving through so I stayed a little longer to let it pass. I headed home and got caught in the traffic from a nasty (I counted 13 vehicles; cars and at least 1 semi) accident. It looked like an extended fender bender without serious injuries. At least, I certainly hope there weren't any.

Saturday, I ran another session of Tears at Bitter Manor. I tried a new route to get to RW's house. Didn't work. I ended up retracing my steps to take the route I took last time. I was half an hour late. One of the other players, MC, was 'later'. By later, I mean he never got the scheduling emails and had other plans on Saturday. I had printed out a copy of his character, just in case.

RG brought her new puppy. Desi is not old enough to be left alone that long. We ended up getting supper from Tangerine Cafe. RW went to pick it up, as his character was cowering and couldn't act.

We played a little longer than we had planned as a storm bad enough for a weather warning came through. The 1st warning ended at 9:15 so we headed home. Not a good plan. I got thoroughly soaked getting my gaming stuff into my car. It took 3 trips and may I say again how glad my laptop backpack came with a rain cover.

The storm was a frog-strangler, flash-flood kind of storm. I drove far below the speed limit (with my hazard lights flashing) for much of the trip home. Luckily, there was a car or two ahead of me for most of the drive. If they made it through, I figured the road wasn't flooded out and I was safe. There was one short stretch when I didn't have someone to follow. And one short stretch without power, and that included two stoplights, but no cross traffic; which is good because I couldn't see the stoplights until I was passing through the intersection. There was only once a passing car's splash obscured my windshield. And only once when the water was deep enough for me to be concerned.

Not sure how visible it is, but my hair is very wet

I finally got home and promptly hung up my clothes to dry out. Sunday, I took my time getting up and about. Ion channel marathons Leverage on Sundays and they played the last episode and the 1st episode back to back.

CD and I went to City Barbecue again for lunch and then to Barnes and Noble to pick up the book they had on hold for me. Not surprising, I bought a couple other books, too. Since I was there and all.

I finished a cross from Anitra's book and that's it. I am pinning out the snowflakes I've gotten done so I can photograph them and send the pictures to her.

Mom said she enjoyed lunch at one of the facilities on Sunday. They invited her to come try the food. I really want to talk to mom's doctor.

Oh, and through tomorrow, there's a contest to win supplies for a bullet journal. If you enter, I get another entry. Here's the link: https://prpage.co/EKN/%2B39261/ .

Where Did My Weekend Go?

Okay, Saturday was 'put load of clothes in dryer' and then cough. I did nothing else productive, at least in part because my body has been telling me to rest and a serious cough is an indication I take seriously.

Sunday was errands and meeting my friend's new puppy. I'm not sure how to spell the puppy's name, but her nickname is Dezi, which I'm not sure how to spell either. She's just over 4 pounds of black and white Alaskan Klee Kai and very cute.

I'm on the 3rd snowflake of Anitra's book. As a change, I did this one in a variegated green (Christmas green mix) and Lizbeth fruit fizz. It makes a very floral snowflake. Sorry for the size of the linked images. You'd get a better look by going to Handy Hands website and look up the thread colors in the Lizbeth thread.

I'm still working on Mom's living arrangements. I have high hopes of fast progress that will make her happy and be better for her.

If anyone says drugs and songs are a new thing, at best they're mistaken. At worst, they LIE. This particular song was sung by Cab Calloway.

storm clouds

crepe myrtle in bloom

1st page of birthday coloring book

 Saturday is another session of Tears at Bitter Manor. I'm only prepping part of it. Hopefully they won't get farther than that.

Schedule...or Not?

It's only been a few days since my last post, but I'm trying to get into the groove of posting on a schedule.

I hope (for my US readers, all 2 of you) you had an enjoyable holiday weekend. For my other reader, I hope you had a good weekend and good start to the week. I lazed around and just did a few things around the house.

We now know the problem with the washing machine is not the hose and not the filter. We've changed one and cleaned the other; but the cold water still dribbles into the machine instead of pouring. It may be something wrong with the machine itself.

CD made chocolate chocolate chip cookies on Sunday. The first batch was a little overdone but the second batch came out perfect. I also have some Milano cookies I bought left from a potluck. Thank goodness I have (almond) milk to drink.

I still haven't picked up the yarn for the baby afghan project. Maybe I'll get a chance to do that tonight. Tonight is my date with CC so I'd have to pop into Michael's on the way.

I am so glad I had noted down the phone number for my voice mail in my old phone's contact list. I entered it in my new phone's contacts finally. I called it and I had 17 messages. None of them had dates or times (unlike my work voice mails) but the subjects mentioned let me know I could delete them; i.e. references to my mom being in the hospital. If there is some symbol or something to alert me about messages I haven't found it. There's something to let me know I missed a call or have a text message waiting, but that's it.

NASA got the Juno satellite in place. Yes, it is rocket science. The links go to YouTube videos; one is the trailer and one is a documentary on the project.

From futuristic, to ancient past; here's a short video of a young woman using kulning to summon cows back to pasture. There's a difference between kulning and hollering.

I wonder if my local comic store could get this series, Saltire; it's an import so it might be difficult.

I did get some good news. Another friend called to let me know he and his wife are expecting a baby. They're not spreading the news yet, so I won't even mention initials. 

WARNING: Politics Ahead
And then there's the news from Istanbul; 41 people dead and how many more injured? During Ramadan, one of the holiest holidays in the Muslim calendar (or such is my impression). As usual, Daesh kills more Muslims than any other religion. Despite what they call themselves, Daesh is barely more Islamic than I am. But they could call themselves cars easier than I could, with just the same amount of truthfulness (they are closer to a major source of gasoline than I am). I refuse to call them their preferred name as they are neither Islamic nor a State. They are a terrorist political organization.

And two major US presidential candidates are in my state today, as well as the US President. At least none of them are in the towns where I live or work. No offense, but I'm pretty sick of all them by now. Okay, one of them more than the others. Can you guess which one?

What's a Schedule?

I had started working on my blog and then Wednesday afternoon I got a phone call. My mom was going to the emergency room. It turned out not to be any of the really scary things but she was still in the hospital for a couple days while they ran tests to eliminate those things. They're still not certain what caused her problems, but they're working on fixing them. In the meantime, I'm calling her every day to check on her.

Thank goodness my boss was understanding about my absence. I left Wednesday after he was gone for the day so all he had from me was some emails and a couple voice mails. I finally talked to him Friday afternoon, and he was 'family comes first. Everything here will still be here when you get back. Um, but while I have you on the phone, there's an issue on Monday.' I let him know we didn't need to panic until Tuesday and I was working on stopgap to take care of it if I wasn't back before then. 

I found out I'm a stress faster. Although that's not quite accurate. I was hungry sometimes, but my stomach was so upset that food just didn't look attractive. I drank ginger ale and grabbed a few bites here and there but only had 2.5 meals from Wednesday through Friday. I'm not counting the dinner roll and other bits as part of that count. 

Her sister is back home; after mom got out of the hospital on Friday, I drove my aunt to meet her son. He drove her the rest of the way home. That reminds me, I need to call and tell him when the family reunion is.

Saturday I went ahead and started running Tears at Bitter Manor. I hadn't had a chance to finish prep but I had enough done to get us through the 1st day of gaming. It's a good module with a good storyline. There's a haunt in it, but unlike so many of them, there is a way to find out how the cause and find out how to stop it permanently.

Saturday night was the biggest meal I'd had since Tuesday night. It was a bit more than my system was able to handle. Erp.

Sunday the only thing I did was finish the laundry I started on Wednesday. I'm gradually relaxing a bit. I'm working on one of my birthday coloring books and testing some patterns for Anitra's book of tatting patterns.

Then Wednesday night a transformer blew and we lost power. This is the (I think) the 2nd time in a month. It lasted much longer this time. Power wasn't restored until after 8 am on Thursday.

Deadlands game was Thursday. I'm still playing Alys Reeves. She let herself get arrested (she was framed) and let someone else break her out of jail. Hannah caused a stampede to create a distraction and got us (Doc and Jason were in the jail, too) out. Jason added some oomph to the stampede and we went after the sheriff. The sheriff was actually one of the people we were sent to capture or kill.

One of my on-line friends is having a baby so a number of us are planning a blanket. I need to pick up some yarn to do my square.

I have a new phone. It's an older Android and it's not intuitive for me. It has 3 places to save contact info (phone, USIM, and google). And I can't move someone from one to another. As a result, most of my contacts are still in my old phone. Plus, it's a pre-paid and I'm having the devil of a time finding the number of minutes left.

CD and I have been watching Miss Fisher's Mysteries. It's interesting. Some of the screenplays are from the books, but the murderer is not necessarily the same. It means even though I read the books, I have to watch to figure out whodunit.

I'm reading about 3 series right now. There's the Dark Heavens series, and its sequel Journey to Wudang, written by Kyle Chan. I just ordered the 2nd book of Journey. I've also started a series, The Others, that started with Written in Red, by Anne Bishop. I have the next 2 on order but they're grouped with a pre-ordered book so I won't see them for some time. Both are sort of urban fantasy but very different settings.

The 3rd series is historical romance. It's the Dressmakers by Loretta Chase. Funny thing, I read book 4 and then went back to read books 1 and 2. I have book 3 on order. The same order as the Others, so I won't see it either for some time.

almost full house in Necko Atsume game

For Pulse, in Orlando

possibly edible

roof plants, outside mom's hospital room