happy home

I love stepping into my apartment these days. For one thing, it's warm. It doesn't even need to actually be very warm in the apartment for it to feel warm coming from outside -- it's been FrEeZiNg recently, so as long as the temp in the apartment is over 20F, it's warm!

For another thing, it now smells like lilies. I don't often remember that a scent can really make or break a place. The gentle aroma of lilies is a truly wonderful experience. Why does my place smell like lilies? My new pal Trader Joe gave me some flowers. Literally - I did not buy them. I went there for the first time last Thursday, and after kind of bumbling around near what seemed to be the checkout mob, a kind cashier said he could ring up my (organic -- one was even mostly local!) items if I'd step over away from the wad of people. I said thanks and admitted that I was a bit disoriented since this was my first time there. He expediently bounded over to the floral section and came back with a huge bouquet of roses, Gerbera daisies, carnations, and...lilies! "Since it's your first time here, here's a gift - I hope it brings you back." ...I'll take it!(Yes, I am that person who still has not put away the Christmas decorations so I still have a Christmasy table runner...)

And, of course, there's my Joelle always waiting to greet me. The poor dear has been very patiently dealing with my harassment of late - she's developed some major mats, and that requires a lot of yucky maintenance work like the evil Combing and Brushing and Mat-Raking and, of course, Trimming. She mostly hates it because it requires the two things she despises the most: being held and being put belly-up.

We've also been facing a sort of hay crisis. I like to buy my hay from one place, and every time I've gone there for the past month or two, they haven't had any hay! That was okay the first couple times, but then...the stock at home kept getting lower and lower and lower, and pretty soon I was quite truly "scraping the bottom of the barrel" (er...box, it's not really a barrel) to get out the last bits of hay. The fact that by now the hay was indeed in BITS was also bad, because it meant that the small hay pieces fell to the bottom of the hay-holder in Joelle's house. So maybe I'm just babying her, but when I saw Joelle putting both paws up on the rim of the holder and sticking her head in as far as she could reach to get at the hay, I declared, "That's it! I'm buying you a new thing for the hay!"

That meant a bowl. But it couldn't be just any bowl, because Joelle does not like to eat out of bowls; she likes to dump out the contents of bowls and then eat. That's okay now and then, but when it's the daily hay that means it gets REALLY hay-y all over the floor, and I am not too into that...and it just contributes to MORE matting and then the resultant Combing, Brushing, Raking, Trimming, and being held belly-up! That is why her food pellet bowl is bolted to the side of her kennel and is therefore un-dumpable. I wasn't too keen on another bolted bowl. So, the new hay-bowl had to be a heavy bowl, one that could not be flipped over with normal bunny strength.

Luckily, I found the perfect dish.I think she likes it as much as I do.

are you sure...?

I know I ought not to worry so much.

I know that worrying doesn't help and that usually when I start flipping out about something, it rights itself rather quickly and then I am just left feeling frustrated that I had wasted so much energy being concerned that nothing would ever work out.

But...every time that something worrying occurs, I find it very difficult to not worry about it.

The latest frustration to my life comes less than 24 hours after having accepted a postdoctoral job. So - hey, good news: I have a job lined up for after I graduate, which tentatively means by April 1! And just when I thought the saga of my future was coming to a peaceful close, just when I thought I had covered all my bases, just when I thought I had clearly grasped what I'm supposed to be "doing" with my life (at least for the time being) -- frustration!

The frustration: a particular member of the committee that decides whether I really get to graduate or not suddenly sends me an email to the effect of, "Huh, you're going to graduate soon? When did this happen? What have you actually accomplished that gives you any capacity to graduate?" (This person was not at the meeting where the other members of the committee told me to write up all my results and get the heck out of grad school...but I did indeed inform the individual of my results and the rest of the committee's instructions to me to finish up and graduate...almost 3 months ago...!) So...I send the person the summary of the last meeting and a bazillion tons of my results. And then I get a, "These results are weird - they don't look like other peoples' results. Do you know how to analyze your data? You really should ask someone who has done this before (a.k.a. my employee). You should have another meeting; everyone probably thinks your stuff stinks."

Ow.

There are some times in my life where I wish I had the capacity to selectively erase peoples' memories. If I had that ability, I would shake this person, say, "You really hurt my feelings. Do you actually think I am completely incompetent and don't know how to analyze my data??! And for your information, I have asked no less than 4 experts in this area - including the pioneer - who have a total of more than 50 years of experience, and they told me I was doing it correctly. Now you're going to make me sit down with the person in your lab who you're so convinced knows more than all of those people?? And by the way - you obviously don't know any of the literature on this stuff, because the "weird" results you think I'm seeing is because nobody has ever reported anything about these cells, so of course it's not going to look like anyone else's! The other 80% of the committee has not indicated that my stuff stinks. If they thought so, they should really tell me instead of being jerks and waiting until I'm obliviously accepting a new job to suddenly trick me and say 'You gotta do more work here, nah nah nah nah!' Speaking of that, why in the heck did you not say anything about this anytime during the past 10 weeks that you have had the data I just resent to you?????"

And then I would erase the person's memory of that conversation so the person wouldn't be angry at me.

Sometimes I just want to be understood.

Of course, I cannot say any of that stuff, and it is best if I come up with more kind, convincing (and non-violent) ways to support my scientific work. But right now I am worried...that I won't get to graduate this semester...that people think my work (and...thus, by association and production, ME!) is worthless and stupid...that my future bosses will be upset that I told them I'd be available in April when I won't be...that some hideous, embarrassing disaster is waiting to befall me and will involve people saying, "You should have done this, this, this, and known that, that, that."

As I think about it, those are not things that are truly very REAL. Well, at least not the last one. Reality tells me that more than a majority of the graduate-or-not committee have written letters of recommendation to the very person who just hired me -- obviously those people think that I will/should graduate. And...the new boss told me repeatedly that April 1 is flexible. ...Breathe...okay...it'll be okay...

So! Yes, that is the update on me and what's up in my life! I got a job. It's lovely. I am really, really, really, really, really looking forward to it at this precise moment because it has NOTHING to do with my current area of research - HIV - which I am very much disliking currently because it involves so much competition and requires so much detailed, outrageous information to be provided to convince people of anything, when, in my humble opinion, I think that really nobody has any actual concept of the depth of complexity of what's really going on and why (see, for example, here. I got into this field because I wanted to help people, not because I wanted to duke it out with people who are too self-centered and stuck in their own ways to consider that there could possibly be a different way of looking at an answer to their favorite question.

where it all comes from

I am afraid I am rapidly turning into a "tree-hugger!" I am attempting to make 2008 a banner year in which I transition into an organic/local food-consumer. Thus far I have managed to buy nearly all organic groceries (and rabbit greens) -- there was that emergency jug of non-organic orange juice I picked up when I got the flu, but at least it was made from American-grown oranges according to the package. Last week I was trying to figure out how I could possibly find locally-grown chocolate when I realized that maybe this is why some people substitute carob for chocolate (although I haven't actually been able to find anyone who grows carob in non-perpetually-warm climates). ...I hope it doesn't come down to that...I think I'm able to convince myself that organic, fair-traded chocolate is "good enough," because I really dislike carob.

What I think is important about organic food is not that it's necessarily any healthier to eat - although I don't dismiss those arguments - but that the way organic food is grown and produced is done in a sustainable way, so it's not going to destroy the farming land or put "bad" stuff into the environment which will then take forever to get out. So, it's much, much more about how food comes to be on my plate. Which, in the end, causes one to consider a LOT of aspects. Who is growing this food? Are they getting paid a reasonable price? How is the food being cultivated? Is an exorbitant amount of energy (a.k.a. carbon) being put into the food's processing and delivery? And how about the packaging: is it produced in an eco-friendly manner, is it reusable (or re-used) - heck, is it even necessary?!

As I'm sure most people have noticed, the price of "natural" foods is higher than your run-of-the-mill favorite mega-store brand. This is an obvious limitation for a lot of people (although...truth be told, probably most of us don't really need to be eating quite as much food as we do...which means that if we were eating the actual amount of food we should eat, we would be spending a lot less on food. Why not buy less food (gain less weight) but make it organic and spend the same amount of money we'd have spent on the three-times more food than we need anyhow??). BUT...when we get down to the cost of something, the value inherently must be considered. How much do I value keeping farmland available for generations to come? How much do I value supporting local farmers who are being pressured to be paid less, treat their soil worse, and be controlled by huge companies with a major bottom line? How much do I value acquiescing to the way the earth was naturally designed to function instead of insisting upon having what-I-want-when-I-want-it?

Another part of food I often forget to value is the life involved with it. Not just human life, but animal life. I am not talking about vegetarianism. I came across an interesting article about chefs who are taking responsibility for the meat they prepare. Responsibility, to them, involves treating meat-producing animals as organisms with value, and that alters the way in which they make their meat choices. I invite you to read the article from the New York Times. In the end, it deals with the cost. The following is a blurb from the article for all to ponder:

"A chicken is a living thing, an animal with a life cycle, and we shouldn’t expect it will cost less than a pint of beer in a pub," (chef Jamie Oliver) said Monday in an interview. ...The most shocking of all may be his revelation that price wars have squeezed the profit margin of the modern poultry farmer to about 6 cents a bird. Mr. Oliver’s message to supermarket shoppers is clear: the only reason for the miserable lives lived by most chickens is your insistence on cheap food."

just like that

It's been said time and again that despite the phrase "It's not what you know, it's who you know," the more accurate phrase is, "It's not who you know, but who knows you." In the scientific community in which I've been reared, this has always come across to me as meaning stuff like, "Your boss will tell his other boss friends that you need a job, and then you'll get a job with one of them" or "Someone you went to school with will be working at a place you're interested in, and that will be your 'in' to that company." I believe that those takes on it have their merit.

However, in light of the fact that marketing and sales in the business world often seems to really be selling one's own self (e.g. kind, classy, humorous Businesslady takes her client to a 5-star dinner, and poof - the big deal is sealed! It's not necessarily the deal on the table or the food on the table that do the convincing, but rather the kindness, classiness, and humourous-ness of the person orchestrating the convincing. I mean...would you prefer to buy something from a Rude Nasty person or a Friendly Happy one?) -- in light of that, it seems that an additional interpretation might be considered for that old saying.

What happens if a person doesn't try to figure out who else might be able to make the right connections with the company/person she's interested in? What if instead she just goes ahead and makes that company/person know who she is? Call it an introduction, if you'd like. Sometimes at a social gathering a friend/co-worker will introduce me to a new person, other times I just introduce myself. Why shouldn't it be like that in the world of finding an employer? Maybe the key to getting "known" is to make one's self known.

You never know what will happen. Even if you weren't trying to do it. Such was the case with me this past week. I have been sending out my curriculum vitae and a lovely blurb about what I plan to do with the rest of my life to researchers far and wide, and where appropriate I have been following up with telephone calls. I figured this was just what reasonable people do, but rumor has it that I'm incorrect. Thus far the following have resulted from these calls:

• A busy researcher who had put filling-that-position on the bottom of the list of things to do moved considering me for the position to the top of the list
• The crazy, disjointed background I have that I think seems like I have no idea where I'm headed has repeatedly been praised by forward-thinking researchers
• I discovered that a position that was not yet advertised but which is even more in line with my training is available with one researcher
• In short order, I am being whisked away for an interview the end of this week

Not quite sure where any of this will end, but the moral of the story is obvious: like it or not, "marketing" one's self does wonders -- and not just for getting an interview or job, but also for making one realize how marketable one might actually be!

she's five!

Fish may have brief lives, but the good news is that rabbits don't. Joelle and I celebrated her fifth birthday on Wednesday. She chewed some holes in one of my throw pillows......and I cut off the hair on the top of her head so she could see better and then served her a magic birthday basket salad with kale, parsley, and hidden apples and carrots.

r.i.p.

Been too busy/preoccupied/sick to blog. Today's been a kind of cruddy day, I'll admit, so I suppose it's apropos to report the following:

Sheamus, my beautiful betta fish, has died. He passed away while I was visiting my family in Michigan for Christmas (I do not believe it was because of my absence that he died), so I am not sure of the date. But in commemoration of Benazir Bhutto, I'll say he and she shared their last day on earth December 27, 2007. Sheamus was buried in Swissvale, Pennsylvania, on December 31, 2007.

a recipe

It's potluck time for my Bible study group tonight at our annual Christmas party/white elephant gift exchange. Last year the highlights were an amazing pomegranate guacamole and a mannequin leg. We shall see what this year brings. The maker of the guac and the giver of the leg will not be there this year, so perhaps there will not be such exciting stories to tell.

I was inspired to make some gnocchi to bring to the potluck tonight. So yesterday (at 9:30p.m. for some odd reason) I tried my hand. Gnocchi is a delightful potato-based pasta which I had not eaten or even heard of until just a few years ago, but it is one of my favorites. I believe it's also a suitable "buy local-and-in-season" option for this time of year -- the ingredients are potatoes (which should be abundant in much of the US now), flour (assuming you've done your threshing and grinding already, that should be somewhere in your kitchen), and eggs (hens function throughout the year). If I can make it, you definitely can make it!! Just follow these easy steps...

1. Fill a large saucepan or pot with water, put on the cover, and heat it to boiling.

2. While waiting for the pot to boil, peel potatoes. You can use regular potatoes or sweet potatoes/yams. I used fingerling potatoes. You'll want to use enough to end up with 1 cup mashed. I used about 6 fingerlings. Cut the potatoes up into chunks to help them cook in the next step, if you'd like.

3. Boil the potatoes. Some people say this takes 15 minutes. I don't know because I didn't cook mine long enough. They should be done (fully smushable) but not dry.

4. While boiling the potatoes, measure out 2 cups of flour and set aside. Also get out one egg. Think about if you'd like some flavoring. Basil? Salt? Butter? If you're working with sweet potatoes, maybe some nutmeg and cinnamon? Olive oil? Pepper? Garlic? If you want flavor, get that out, too. Suggested amounts for butter and olive oil: 2T butter, 1T oil.

5. When potatoes are done, scoop out from pot and remove pot from heat. Keep the water, because you'll use it later and it's such a waste to dump it. An authentic Italian just told me that you should let the potatoes cool completely to ensure success. Mash the potatoes really, really, really well in a big bowl. Use a ricer, use a hand mixer to whip them, whatever it takes to get them good and smushy.

6. Add egg and mix. At this point I started using my hands to mix, because I figured it would help mush the potatoes even more.

7. Stir in any flavoring you desire at this point.

8. Gradually add flour to the potato-egg mixture, kneading it in with your hands. You might not need all 2 cups of flour or you might need a bit more depending on the potato-egg consistency. Continue adding flour and kneading until you get a dough that sticks more to itself than to your hands. It shouldn't be too dry, but it certainly should hold its own and not get gook on you when you touch it.

9. Once the dough is formed, turn on the heat to heat the water to a boil again.

10. Make a little rope of dough (about 1/2 inch in diameter) either by rubbing between your hands or rolling on a floured or plastic surface.

11. If you are using a plastic surface (like a cutting board, which I recommend) on which to form your ropes, ensure that it is far enough from the heating element so as not to melt. Otherwise, the following may occur...If you smell something that is sort of yucky and reminds you of wax candles burning, that is bad.Oops.

12. Cut the ropes into about 1-1/2 inch pieces, and roll them in half. I guess the traditional thing is to have the impression of fork tines on the dough, so use a fork if you want to. Or a spoon. I used my fingers.

13. Put the rolled up gnocchi pieces into the boiling water. They'll sink to the bottom. Put the cover back on the pot and boil for about 3 to 5 minutes.14. If you haven't roped and rolled all of the dough, continue doing this while the gnocchi cook.

15. When the gnocchi are done cooking...they will float to the top!That means they're done, and you can drain them and eat them alone or with butter or with tomato sauce or anything else you want! Yum!

for health, for the earth...or for the steelers?

A short skit recounting an actual conversation:

(A green compact car pulls into the parking lot of a grocery store in a semi-shady part of town. The driver, a single young woman, has been duped in this area before by a pan-handler...and she has grown to dislike the lewd comments thrown at her by many a straggler on the street. Thus, as she parks the car and exits she is cautious as a man smoking a cigarette approaches.)

Man: Are you going to The Store?

Woman, continuing to walk to the entrance to the store: Yes, I am going to The Store.

Man: Do you work there?

Woman, wondering what makes this man think that he should be allowed to pry into a vulnerable young woman's personal business, especially in this neighborhood: No.

Man: Are you going shopping there?

Woman, becoming more wary of the guy as he is obviously not going to leave her alone and thinking caustically, "No, I'm just going to take a tour of the meat counter and then flirt with the cute baggers. Why else would I be going into The Store?!": Yes.

Man: Okay, I'm just checking because we're ticketing and towing today.

Woman whirls around and looks at the sign above the parking spot where her car is located. It clearly reads "For customers of The Store only while shopping." And that is what she is doing. She says: What, can't I park here for The Store today?

Man: I just wondered why you parked so far away.

(Truth be told, the woman had parked approximately fifty paces away from the entrance to the store. Not "far away" by a terribly large portion of the population, but obviously the man had a different frame of reference.)

Woman, with more than a little irritation in her voice: Well, I use less gas, create fewer emissions, and get some exercise if I park there.

(This is 100% true. It was actually what the woman had been thinking as she entered the parking lot and selected her parking space.)

Man: Okay! There's a Steelers game today, and we don't want anyone trying to use our parking lot while they go to the game.

(Well, that explains it - I guess. The store is within walking distance to the stadium where the Steelers play football. Not that the woman really appears to be going to a Steelers game...she is dressed in her Sunday best, having just left from church a few minutes before, and that is not typically the attire individuals wear to football games, particularly ones that are occurring on drizzly days. The woman walks away, enters the store, is disappointed to find that the store does not carry any organic yogurt - the single item on her list, which she was hoping to find at this store since it was on her way and would therefore be a more environmentally-friendly choice for shopping than driving to another store on the other side of town where she knows they sell yogurt that has been produced using sustainable practices. Feeling afraid that the man in the parking lot is going to see her return to her car empty-handed and assume she was lying all along about not trying to stealthily usurp the parking space for her own ulterior football-viewing purposes, the woman grudgingly grabs a package of (non-organic) cookies off of the shelf, buys them, and returns to the car to proceed home where she can allow the comfort of buttery shortbread to console her in her misunderstood state. Bleh!)

END SCENE

the sounds of the holidays

Last week I completed the last "experiment" I need to do for my dissertation (unless some thesis committee members unexpectedly bust out some new demands, but I'm going to assume the chances of that are slim). I need to do some data analysis and potentially run a few more samples if I can possibly get that particular assay to start working again in our lab...but other than that life needs to stop being about doing experiments and start being about writing a dissertation and finding a new job. Just simple tasks, really...

Anyhow, that is why I have been absent for a while. Since I last posted, Thanksgiving has come and gone. For Thanksgiving I went to a cabin in Lake Hope State Park in Ohio, where my mom, dad, and brother gathered for a lovely time of turkey and all the fixings (and 4 pies). I try very hard to not "start" Christmas until after Thanksgiving, but let me tell you...as soon as I was "out of the woods" on my drive back to Pittsburgh on Black Friday...I opened up the newly released Relient K Christmas album and put it into the CD player!

If you like Christmas; if you hate Christmas and feel especially lonely and sad during this time; if you get sick of the snowy, cold weather of winter; if you have ever wondered what a partridge is and what it's doing in a pear tree...then you should run - not walk, run! - to the store (or website) and buy Let It Snow Baby...Let It Reindeer. This newest release from my favorite rockin' guys has several songs that were on their previous Christmas album (which...I do not have), one from an older release, and a few new ones - both originals and traditional Christmas songs. I'm rather sorry that I never picked up the old Christmas album, because it (and the new one) contains what is my current favorite song: "I Celebrate the Day". And...I hate to admit it, but my second favorite is the kind of farcical rendition of a traditional carol that is the "hidden track."

That's what I've been listening to as I've been driving to and fro in the snow and sitting for long, long hours in the lab! If I could just figure out what I did with my camera, I'll share some sights of the holidays in the next couple of days...

Have a cuppa cheer!

not quite there yet

I'm trying to be more "environmentally friendly," which really means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. I won't go into what it means to me at the moment, except to say that I want to try to be more responsible with my purchases of food. That brought me to Pittsburgh's East End Food Co-Op a couple weeks ago. I have shopped there on and off over the past year, but I had never gone on a Sunday. It seems that everyone and their mother shops there on Sundays, because I had never seen so many people.

I also guess that Sundays bring out the die-hards, because as I strolled around the store picking up my granola from the bulk food section and the organic greens for Joelle and selecting a locally grown eggplant (they are sooooooo good! I can't believe I have lived for so long without appreciating the wonder that is eggplant...!) I found myself feeling quite inept, and in fact not at all environmentally friendly.

Not that people are judging, but if they were, it would have been obvious that I wasn't a real tree-hugger, because real tree-huggers brought their own glass jars, prelabeled with the jar's empty weight, in which to put their bulk food items. None of those yucky plastic bags like I picked up. And real tree-huggers wouldn't look at the organic ice cream and say, "Oh, that's all the selection there is? And only in pints? And no store-brand? Nevermind." Real tree-huggers would embrace the fact that there are no less than five different brands of organic ice cream, in a variety of flavors, not to mention the soy-based ice creamy stuff; they would support the companies who are producing sustainably-grown products when the store brands are just going for cheapness -- and they would be happy that portion-control was built in to the size, because who in the world needs to eat a half-gallon of ice cream by herself anyhow? Real tree-huggers wouldn't groan internally and say, "Man, I can buy this same cereal at Target for about half the price...!" instead of choosing to support a locally owned and operated business. They would proudly flash their Co-Op membership cards...and they'd probably then hop on their bicycles and ride home, unlike me who mumbles, "No, I'm not a member..." and gets into the car and drives the three-ish miles back home.

But hey - at least my gets 40 miles per gallon and is certified to be an ultra-low emissions vehicle!!

I guess there are levels of environmentally-friendliness, and there is probably always more any given person can do to stop depleting the earth's resources (...to be quite technical, I guess the best a person could do is DIE, because not only is the person no longer using the bounty of nature, he's now giving back to the earth as his body decomposes...but I'm not suggesting that's what we do to save the earth!). And I guess that my small steps are better than no steps at all.

hodgepodge

Last Thursday Relient K made their closest stop to Pittsburgh on their Appetite for Construction tour with Switchfoot and an opening band ironically called ruth (I assure you - it's not me, and you don't want me to be on a stage singing...not pretty). Unfortunately, the venue was still 2.5 hours away; fortunately, it was in one of my most favorite towns and I know a few people there. Unfortunately, the weather was sort of ucky - rain and a little hail/sleet/iceball stuff - on the drive there; fortunately, there was little traffic congestion, even on the roads that are often jammed (that's what happens when one leaves much earlier than rush hour!). Unfortunately, the lack of traffic meant I arrived a lot earlier than I needed to (not actually a bad thing...); fortunately, someone in town called me and invited me over for a wonderful home-cooked dinner in the meantime, and there was still ample time to arrive at the concert and meet up with the group I was sitting with. Unfortunately, the lead singer of Relient K was not feeling well and sounded a little pained to be singing; fortunately, despite his illness, they did not cancel the show as they had been contemplating. I would have been really, really, REALLY bummed if they had canceled. I have been waiting for this concert for months.

Despite the not-feeling-well-ness, the performance was very enjoyable, and I was just happy to see the band in real life. They played some of my favorite songs and one off of their new Christmas album, which I just purchased and can't wait to start playing once Thanksgiving is over. I just think it's appropriate to wait until one major holiday has concluded before really ramping up for another one. Although I did put up my Christmas tree, lights, and nativity scene yesterday...but that was more of a logistical decision, because I won't have time for that again for another two weeks, and then it's too close to Christmas!

Friday and Saturday I attended a branch meeting of the American Society for Microbiology (I know, aren't I the most way-cool clubs???), which was at a small college on the other side of Pittsburgh. It was informative and interesting, and I enjoyed talking with many of the other attendees. However, for some reason it's left me in a work-related-emotional slump. I guess I had sort of been hoping to make some good connections for post-doctoral positions at the meeting, but that didn't happen the way I had envisioned. It wasn't all bad, and I did glean some information about a couple places I have been thinking about applying, but it wasn't what I had hoped for. It brings into question whether it's just utterly ridiculous to ever want something, because it seems that it's entirely too heartbreaking to deal with when what we want does not come to fruition. But maybe that's just real, true humanity -- wanting something, even though we know that it may never come into being, seems to be at the core of being a genuine human being. I guess that in many ways I would prefer to be disappointed than to become so callously apathetic that I don't care whether anything at all ever occurs. Doesn't make it any easier, though.

i can write

The day has finally arrived...!

Last week Thursday I had my sixth thesis committee meeting. These meetings occur approximately every six months and involve me meeting with the five professors who oversee my research, telling them about what I've been doing, and hearing what they think I ought to do next. For this meeting I pulled together all the data I've accrued from the past five years, sorted through it to put it in the most honest and yet favorable light, and presented my case. And lo and behold, the response I've been longing for arrived:

Stop doing more lab work and write that thesis.

Woo hoo! Know what that means? I get to graduate!! (Soon. Well, in a relative sense. Probably March-ish of next year, which is only a few months away.)

Thus, as I embark on the fun last stage of this journey with the companionship of my trusty computer, I think I'm going to need one major item that I currently lack: a workstation that does not contribute to the massive pain in my shoulders that I am currently feeling. If anyone has some thoughts, please do let me know.

Yay, thesis! ...Oh yeah - this also means I'm supposed to find a new job...! Starbucks a few miles from my apartment is hiring.... ;-)

the little things and the big things

For some reason my thoughts of late have led me to appreciate "things" more than normal. But the "things" aren't always all that related to one another.

The novel Alas, Babylon by Pat Frank has been on my mental reading list since 1994. I'm finally reading it. Oops. The book is set back in the 1950s and revolves around the reality of nuclear war in the United States. It's made me think a lot about not so much what I'd do if my country were to be obliterated by a nuclear weapon but what I'd do if I were forced to "regress" in technology - if, for example, electricity no longer existed. What if transportation was not as simple as turning the starter of an engine and I couldn't just run to the grocery store when I got a craving for ice cream, and water was something I prized as a necessary drink and not as a means of washing, a medium for recreational swimming, or the makings of a relaxing, artistic fountain? And all of this reading and pondering has led me to appreciate two things more than I ever have.

First is the passengers who were aboard United Airlines Flight 93 on September 11, 2001. I think of how confused and troubled the country was when the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were devastated that day, and I can only shudder at the thought of what else would have occurred had Flight 93 reached its destination, presumably the Capitol or the White House. It makes me wonder to myself...if I had the opportunity to stop the destruction of the building and/or persons that represent my country, would I do it? I believe it's a worthy cause. But would I really be brave enough to do something if it were really, truly my life that was going to be what made the difference? In light of Alas, Babylon, I have a deeper appreciation for what "symbols" of a country are worth, and I entirely have a new perspective of and respect for the passengers aboard Flight 93 who did not just accept the inevitable. That's a big thing.

The second is really not worth mentioning in light of the deep, serious paragraph just typed, but it points out that even though "big things" count, so do little things. Like coffee. On the morning of my ponderings about Flight 93, I had made myself a particularly good, smooth mug of coffee. It was a big deal by any stretch of the imagination, but...man, oh man, was it enjoyable! As I go through my mundane, normal life, as I dream about the "big things" that might be done someday, am I taking the time to appreciate all of the little, amazing things that are gracing my life every day? Or am I too focused on waiting for a big thing to happen? I think that if I keep my sights fixed on the big things, I will be altogether insensitive to the little things, and that would be an extreme misfortune.

Speaking of coffee...in some senses, this guy does not even deserve my recognition, but in case you haven't heard yet about DaVido, he's a New York nightclub singer whose self-proclaimed goal in life ("big thing") is to have an album of his sold at Starbucks. He wrote a song called "The Java Jitter," inspired by a trip to Sbux and a conversation with a hot barista, and tried to solicit it to Starbucks but they rejected it. I suppose we all must have dreams, but this guy cannot take "no" for an answer, so instead he is attempting to win his way in by busting into Starbucks stores, attempting to shoot a video, and sequentially getting tossed out because it's against Starbucks policy to allow recording within its stores. He has now posted a 7-minute "music video" of this experience Perhaps I'm slightly biased because I find DaVido's song and dancers quite distasteful, but I find his methods to be entirely disrespectful, which certainly is not the way to sell one's self to a corporation. If he can't adhere to Starbucks' rules, why in the world would they want to give him a chance to represent them? Call me a Starbucks softie, but I think they're entirely in the right. Establishments are still entitled to the right to ensure a reasonable atmosphere! And recording labels are still entitled to the right to select the music they wish to market! And besides that, I think people should be nice to each other.

So love your country and enjoy your coffee, but don't get disillusioned by either.

outside

It's unfortunate to be cooped up inside doing work in a lab or at a computer when it's the most beautiful season of the year out of doors! The lab where I do most of my lab work has no windows, and the window in the room I do my computer work gives me a great view of a brick wall and more windows. And I suppose that is why when I have "free time" (or...when loyal friends forcibly drag me away from work) I go outside.

The latest adventure came a week ago when I and a couple friends and a bunch of friends-of-friends drove down to West Virginia to stay in a cozy modern cabin and experience Bridge Day 2007. This event allows BASE jumpers (BASE = Building, Antenna, Span, Earth -- i.e. things that are tall) to jump from an 876 foot bridge and (assuming all goes as planned) free fall for several seconds before parachuting down to the bottom of the New River Gorge. It was exciting to watch these men and women jump, flip, and otherwise fall and then pull their chutes and end up safely on land (or...sometimes in the river).

The best part, however, was the trees. It's the middle of autumn, and that means the West Virginia trees are gold, orange, red, and green. I appreciate the green that remains, mostly contributed by conifers. The tree-covered hills turn out looking like an incredibly comfortable quilt to me.It was very refreshing to get out and roam the West Virginia "country roads," although it wasn't quite the same without some John Denver coming out of the speakers.We took the roads to get to a hiking area, where we ended at a beautiful overlook with a view of the bridge the day after Bridge Day.We also took the roads to get to the site where we went rappelling down a 100 foot cliff, that was around the mountain from these cliffs:(Sorry, I was incapable of taking a picture of myself rappelling, and I haven't gotten the pics from my fellow rappellers.)

And then...back inside to work...

it's my...

Not to toot my own horn, but it's my birthday!

And it's also Columbus Day.

For all who are burning to know, I am planning to celebrate by...

• Accomplishing some immunology and microbiology work at the lab
• Attending a conference about science down the street
• Visiting the chiropractor
• Attempting to go home and sleep as soon as possible

The past several weeks have left me exhausted (and with big back, shoulder, and leg pains...), thanks to massive amounts of lab work, and even though I have a yummy supply of coffee to hold me over, I'm really quite tired. It's gotten to the point where I am really quite incapable of even writing an email that makes any sense. So, all I want for my birthday is...my bed.

This also means that if you happen to call me to wish me happy birthday, please don't do so too late. :-) I will certainly be turning off my phone's ringer as soon as I'm ready to hit the sack.

The large amount of work-related tasks I've been up to explains (or rather...is my excuse for...) the lack of writing I've done here. Sorry about that. Here's the summary of the last month: work...sleep...work...visit to my favorite city ever...work...sleep...work...decide to go on a trip in May...work...sleep...work...convinced myself that all of my hard work had earned me a Starbucks pumpkin latte, but it was the grossest thing I've ever had...work...sleep...work...car got hit by a golf ball as I was sitting in it at a parking lot...work...sleep...work...haven't gotten time to swing by the body shop to get an estimate for the car...work...sleep...work...work...no sleep...work...meetings with fun and interesting engineers...work...sleep...work...

You're all caught up.

Seriously, it hasn't been that awful - I've also had some really good times with various friends, and I accomplished a bit more of a sock. Woo hoo.

There is a bit more news to share, but I'm too tired to write about it in an engaging manner today. So...I'm going to go finish my coffee and head over to the conference where they will be serving me MORE coffee...hooray!!

sweater weather

Labor Day came and went. I spent it, as I mentioned earlier, camping......and hiking.That was the first indication that fall was on its way. It was also, I think, the first time in many, many months that I pulled on a sweatshirt at night. Mostly because I was outside, but still.

The next indication came when the temperatures started to drop. Yesterday boasted a brilliantly blue sky, sun sparkling down on the still-green leaves...and a high of 62 in Pittsburgh. Now that is what I like to hear. Because it can only mean one thing...The Starry Night sweater has made an appearance! It is almost autumn!! The autumnal equinox is Sunday...are you ready? It's...sweater weather!

To celebrate (? er...actually, just because I am), I've begun work on two sweaters. In a sudden convergence of yarn and magazine, I picked out two sweaters from the Spring 2007 Interweave Knits. For some reason, they are both raglans. The first is the Green Tea Raglan, which I'm making with Frog Tree Merino.The snake-like thing is the "belt" that goes around the waist. Technically, I made this in Frog Tree Alpaca, because it just so happened that I had half a ball of some of exactly the same color of that, and it managed to get thrown in with the merino, and I realized it but decided I might as well use it up to make the belt. I also decided to call this the Coral Tea Sweater since mine's not green.

The other sweater is the Cable Down Raglan, which I am making in Lion Brand Fisherman's Wool. Ages ago I began making an Aran sweater in this. That went through various iterations of disaster (gauge change...messed up parts...) until I finally decided that even if I ever did manage to make the crazy cabled thing, I'd never want to wear it because I don't like the way it is made to fit (and I have no inclination to alter it to fit the way I want). So now the wool is becoming a different cabled beast. I am sort of thinking this yarn is cursed in my hands, because no sooner had I gotten through the first repeat of the cable pattern, complete with very lovely shaping, when...I realized that there was an error in the pattern (because the next instructions made NO SENSE at all). Okay, so not a big deal, I just had to set down this until I had time to find the correction online (because of course Interweave decided in that issue that they'd no longer print the corrections in the magazines - and I do have the issue that said there needed to be a change in the pattern - and they are only available online). I set it aside and went to work on some socks I'm making with yarn I got in Vienna last year.I used the Round Toe from Charlene Schurch's More Sensational Knitted Socks and am doing a ribbing-ish pattern I made up.

I'm also making progress (slowly) on the Brioche Bodice from another Interweave. I have about 5ish more rows of unshaped knitting to do before I can start tackling double decreases, but at least it's brioche stitch and not ultra-boring stockinette. Although...brioche isn't that much more exciting.And finally I found the corrections for the Cable sweater. And that was when I really decided that there's something up with me+this-yarn. Not only were the original instructions for the next step I need to take with the thing incorrect...but so were the instructions for all I'd done up to this point. ! Gasp! Sigh! Grrrr...! It's a minor change, but I know it will make the garment look much better. ...But it also means I have to rip it all out and start over. Bleh...

I guess I won't be wearing that one anytime soon. Thankfully I have many other sweaters in stock in preparation for sweater weather!

musings on age

Labor Day weekend had me thinking about "me" as a 26-year old. I spent the majority of the weekend tent camping with some other women around my age who are residents at a hospital. In many senses, we are so young! It's sort of amazing for me to think that they're doctors, I almost have my doctorate, and we're not 30 yet! We (assuming we survive) have a long, long life ahead of us! Wow! We've come so far in such a short amount of time. A camping neighbor visited us and exclaimed about how neat it is to see young people like us spending time in the great outdoors.

After the camping trip, I spent a little over 24 hours in a nearby college town. As I meandered around the campus, I was struck by how young everyone seemed. And when I thought about it, the freshmen starting their university studies really are likely 7 to 9 years younger than I, and that's a significant age difference. No wonder they looked young!

I volunteer as a librarian at my church on Sundays, and it turns out that I'm in the children's library. The most profound thing that I have learned in that position is that while children are children, they are still people. Sometimes I (and others I have observed) tend to treat children like pets. As if they can't understand language or facial expressions (which, incidentally, I believe pets actually do have some capacity for). As if they can't comprehend complex emotions and ideas -- and as if they don't have their own complex emotions and ideas. Working with the kids in the library has taught me that this is entirely untrue, and that really...children are just small adults. The major difference between most children and most adults appears to be that children don't know better than to suppress their inner selves; adults have learned that to be "polite" or "socially acceptable" they must act according to specific rules, even if that is not how they really are inside. Not that this is totally a bad thing, but the point is that children are much more genuine than adults.

Seeing children as people instead of children (or pets...) reminds me that the college freshmen I saw this weekend are also people and not college freshmen. And that the teenagers at the next-door campsite who found it desirable to eat dinner away from their parents by sitting in the middle of the paved street are also people and not teenagers. Plunking these individuals into categories diminishes who they really are and limits who and what others will allow them to be. There is value and worth in the thoughts and feelings that all of these people have, even if they're not as "advanced" as matured adult-thoughts and adult-feelings.

And...to come full circle and apply this to myself... During my visit to the college town, I attended a conference centered around bioenergy (yes, like my beloved microbial fuel cell). In a conversation with two professors I met, I expressed the framework of my increasingly-more-lucid future dreams (which, yes, you may have noticed have not actually been spelled out on this blog; it's sort of like "if I write it...it won't come true"...). The two professors, who have many years of experience and expertise in the fields of which I spoke, both met me with "uh...do you have any idea what you're talking about?" looks. At least that's how I felt. I am increasingly aware that I try very hard to say the things that make people happy with me, but sometimes the ways they respond that make me think I have not impressed them do not in fact necessarily mean I have failed at presenting myself to them in a favorable light; I still feel that way, but I don't think it's always how they feel about me. Not that it should matter so much what others think of me.

Anyway - I felt like my thoughts and feelings were obviously not very "mature adult-thoughts and adult-feelings." Immediately the scale that weights the "goodness" or "badness" of a day began tipping far towards the BAD side. Then another professor, the one in charge of a program I'm interested in (and thus the one I'm most interested in impressing...), spoke with me and further discouraged my idea and encouraged me to try a different approach. To be fair, the approach this professor suggested is the more traditional one and in some senses would be easier. But just because it's easier and is the way everyone else does it doesn't mean it's better. Right? But then you throw into the mix-of-thoughts the fact that this professor and the other two have all been working successfully in their respective fields for a long time and know what they're talking about...and maybe I should listen to them. How do I know if my way won't work, though? But if it doesn't, all those folks who gave me the "you're crazy" looks will just shake their heads and say "I told you so" and remind me of my silliness to even try.

...Once my brain hits this point, the scale tips to the COMPLETELY AWFUL, WASTE OF TIME DAY mark, and I'm sorry I ever came to this conference and want to just move to Switzerland and pursue research on something totally unrelated so I can get away from all possible thoughts and associations with these people who must think I'm a complete idiot for even envisioning the future that I spoke of...

It reminds me of when I wanted to be the place kicker on the high school football team but after practicing and training through the summer, right before the season started the football coach basically told me I couldn't. But that's another story.

So, I suppose what I should learn and do from all of this is take these peoples' suggestions for what they're worth, give myself some credit (after all, I'm 26 and nearly have my PhD in microbiology and molecular virology - I must have some idea of what is going on, right!), and remember that I'm a person, too, regardless of my age and experience, and my thoughts and feelings do have value. I am a person and not a 26-year-old microbiologist. That is far, far too limiting of a definition.

what i want

I kind of think I should not write this here; it's more like a journal entry. But what the heck...maybe it will be of assistance to someone else.

I haven't reached any final conclusions yet, but many things are ordering themselves neatly in My Crazy Brain regarding where I'm headed in "the future." Specifically this means "my career." Over the past several weeks I've been getting (I hope!) a much better vision of (again, career-wise) what I enjoy, what I'm good at, what that means, and what I should do about it. If I had to give a word to the result of all this thinking, it is CLARITY. Not utter and complete clarity, but clarity nonetheless.

But something else has happened as I've been attempting to muddle through myself and all that is me. Not only can I now look through job ads and say, "Nope...nope...not quite...hey that one's good...nope...no" (instead of my previous method: "Hm...well...I could do that...but I'm not sure if I'd really like it...but it's a job...and it's at a pretty good institution...and maybe if I work on that virus for a while I'll learn to like it...") but I also feel a bit more capable of viewing people this way. I can't believe I just wrote that - it sounds excruciatingly cruel, judgmental, and mean. But I don't quite mean, "Hey, let me go down a line of people and give them a plus or a minus and decide whether I will give them the time of day or not." I'm still all about being kind and respectful and friendly to all people. However, I think I can also tell with more clarity who is a good "mesh" for me and who isn't. (Please, if you do insist on thinking I'm being cruel, judgmental, and mean, please please please tell me -- I'm still open to being wrong, even in my own self-evaluation!!!)

The concepts of "compatibility" and "chemistry" in the study of social interactions have long been rather repulsive to me simply because they seem to be so...categorical. "Ruth, you'd do well with someone who is intelligent, conservative, driven, and family-oriented." What, so I need to just reject all people who are not highly-educated, liberal, working hard at a dead-end job, and prefer dogs and cats to children and babies? Of course, that's not precisely what it means, but you get the picture. Where's the "give people a chance" and "sometimes people change" in all of that? And isn't that saying, "I'm too good to associate with that sort of person"?

But as I understand more about who I am and what I am all about...it makes me realize that those categories, however limited, do indeed mean something. If I can say "I like this, I don't like that, I'm good at this, I'm bad at that" about myself...why in the world can I not say, "I like this type of person, I don't like that type of person, I'm good at relating with this type of person, I'm bad at properly dealing with that type of person"? I sort of think that I can...and should! It seems rather foolish to get into a relationship - friends, dating, anything - saying, "Well, no matter how utterly difficult it is to get along with this person and no matter what we do to hurt each other, I am determined to make this thing work!" That's called Control Freak and oversimplifies things.

I am believing more and more that sometimes...some people are not good for each other. May be because of one person, may be because of both people. But sometimes, there are, in fact, irreconcilable differences. ...Much better to recognize this before getting emotionally attached or - worse - making a lifelong commitment to the person, right?

politics and economics

There are many things I know something about, but two that I am quite incompetent about are politics and economics. To my credit, I have in fact taken a university course in economics, and I did in fact get a good grade in it. I have never studied anything at all about politics.

However, despite this lack of understanding of these two subjects, I still feel like I have something worthwhile to say about a plan one of the Republican presidential candidates for 2008. I heard Mike Huckabee on NPR this morning, and he discussed an interesting concept: get rid of income tax. Again, I'm not economist, but I have this very huge gut feeling that making income tax a thing of the past is not going to do all that Huckabee says, and the immediate repercussions of doing so seem to be quite drastic and not at all helpful. I'm happy to hear others' comments - again, I really have no idea about economics, and this is all based on my perhaps naive common sense and the very small amount of microeconomics I remember, most of which is focused around tacos and burritos (for some reason those were the commodities my econ professor ALWAYS used for examples and exam questions...):

• Huckabee boldly and rather giddily presents his listeners with the notion that when income tax is over, the IRS will be no more. As if the IRS is some Evil Monster That Sucks The Life Out of All Living Organisms. As if our main enemy is the IRS. As if the IRS is what everyone gets mad about when they have to pay taxes. Personally, I don't blame the IRS for the taxes I have to pay; obviously they are not making the laws about taxes...it's people like senators and congressional members and presidents who are creating and approving the tax laws. But that's not my point. The point is that if the IRS goes away...that means over 100,000 people suddenly don't have a job. Great start - a 1% increase in unemployment, if I am calculating unemployment rates properly. From what I can gather, Huckabee doesn't have new jobs for these IRS workers in his plan.
• Too bad for the IRS, but that's not all who will be out of work. Ever needed a CPA? Won't need one anymore! Not for personal income tax returns, and also not for corporate taxes. Which means the people at your company who do all the tax stuff...yeah, they won't have a job either. And probably a few of the people who do payroll will be out of luck, also, because without payroll tax, there will be less work for payrollers to do, so some of them will get the boot.
• Let's pretend that all the people who lose their jobs at the IRS and accounting firms and company payroll offices are all able to find nice jobs at McDonald's. (I'd love to go on a tangent here, because Huckabee - and I admit I admire this about him - is big on encouraging health to prevent the need for treatment later on. The tangent would go something like this: nice job at McDonald's = eat lots of BigMacs = get more health problems = need to participate in those weight-loss programs Huckabee wants to make low/no cost = more money needs to be spent by the government on the weight-loss programs, but that's a problem, because there's no income tax and all the people who are eating all the Big Macs are at poverty level and so, due to Huckabee's plan, they're not really contributing any money to the funding of the government spending budget because all the tax they "spend" gets refunded back to them.) Let's pretend all those people find jobs, even if they're not at McDonald's (hm, maybe it's the new Wal-Mart that gets put in down the road... Those Wal-Mart people are so good at creating new jobs in places that need jobs! And they also seem to be pretty good at causing landslides). But I think it's fairly safe to say that the people are probably going to be making a bit less than what they used to. That means they're going to have less money to spend. And that means either they will use credit more or that less of their money will be spent on items that would put consumption tax money into the "government money pool." Credit isn't so cool, but that's another whole Hairy Beast. The larger issue is the fact that these (and, of course, all other) non-wealthy people will effectively not be paying any taxes. And the people who didn't work for the IRS, accounting firms, etc. -- who have high-paying jobs and are "wealthy" -- WILL. Does this seem any different from the way it is now?
• No corporate taxes. Let's get back to that issue. If you're a company and there's now tax on U.S. goods, why in the world would you want to buy U.S. goods? You're a big company with huge buying power and a big bottom line that reads MONEY. You simply buy more stuff from other countries who don't have all that tax on them. That, by the way, also means fewer U.S. jobs. This is because A)if corporations are buying less from the U.S., the U.S. has smaller need to employ people to make stuff for corporations to buy and B) smaller corporations or businesses won't be able to compete with the big corporations who can buy the cheaper non-U.S. goods...so the smaller guys will get shut down (okay, so maybe that one is a little anti-Wal-Mart biased...but still!).

Ugh, I'm getting tired of this!! My weariness definitely proves that I am not politically-minded... I acknowledge that there are some good points in Huckabee's plan and argument for his FairTax plan. That's great except that they're interspersed with such diabolically ungood points. I think I can muster a bit more strength to comment on a few other statements on Huckabee's website page about this issue. If nothing else, I at least want whoever reads this to be encouraged to not, not, NOT be swayed by the lovely, persuasive words Huckabee or others use to try to sway you emotionally into buying into a particular view. For example: Huckabee says that when his plan is implemented, "it will be like waving a magic wand releasing us from pain and unfairness." Um. Excuse me? ...I don't know about you, but I sort of feel uneasy about trusting someone who is going to just wave a magic wand and solve all the problems of the country. Which, truly, if you read it, is what he's saying! Yow! Perhaps if you were really desperate and were looking for someone to save you from your miserable existence this would be a welcome invitation. But I'd say that for the majority of Americans (in particular, the majority of those who would be reading Huckabee's website), they don't want magic. (Can you imagine... President Huckabee signs the FairTax bill into law...and POOF!!!! The Dow Jones Industrial Average soars to 20,000...everyone who's been laid off gets a call to come back to work IMMEDIATELY!...backruptcy is reversed...the people who foreclosed the houses and farms track down the displaced and bring them back home...the lame walk, the blind see, all pain is erased, there is racial and religious and ethnic and gender fairness as far as the eye can see...!)

One final rant - I've gotta go catch the last bus to my house!! - on this paragraph: "I believe that globalization, done right, done fairly, can be a blessing for our society. As the Industrial Revolution raised living standards by allowing ordinary people to buy mass-produced goods that previously only the rich could afford, so globalization gives all of us the equivalent of a big pay raise by letting us buy all kinds of things from clothing to computers to TVs much more inexpensively." Whom, precisely, do you mean by "us," Mr. Huckabee? I realize that you are interested in not just free trade, but also fair trade, but I think you forget that when goods are mass-produced...from the very beginning of its inception, somebody, somewhere is certainly not enjoying the "blessing" on society. I'm no history expert, but I do recall things like child-labor and deterioration of family life being quite rapid results of the Industrial Revolution. It sounds like Huckabee is convinced that the primary way to be happy is to have luxury items easily at one's disposal. Ugh...I could go on, but...I'll stop.

Tell me, what do you think of no IRS?

socks galore!

FINALLY...socks are done.

Not just my sockapalooza socks, but also the Retro Rib Socks I've been working on for over a year... Ugh. That is not cool. AND I even got my own pair of sockapalooza socks in the mail yesterday. Woo hoo! If I could, I would take a picture to indicate that I have socks coming out of my ears!

Here are some photos and the tales to go along with them:

• Sockapalooza Socks knit for my pal Anne.

These are made with "Peach Sherbert" Flock Sock yarn from Van Calcar Farm. It is wonderful yarn...I love it. I went with the Shimmer pattern from MagKnits. I loved that the yarn did not pool and that the colors all blend and stand out individually at the same time. I just hope they fit...! I had stupidly not started these socks until the beginning of July, knowing full well that the deadline was the start of August (and based on my skill with the Retro Ribs...yeah...knitting socks in a month...?!?!) - but I figured that with some weekly goals, I'd be good to go. That as true until the last week, when a) I had to start working ALL THE FREAKING TIME and b) I ran into some dropped stitch issues which had to be fixed...then a realization that I had messed up the pattern (probably because I was knitting after working for so long...)...then the whole binding off issue. I don't know what my problem was, but I could not for the life of me get the top cuff bound off loosely enough for someone to actually stick her foot through the hole and get the sock on. I had to redo it three times. I really hate undoing bind-offs...but at least now I'm pretty good at it!

• Retro Rib Socks for me.

I love this pattern. I think I could even use a crazy-colored yarn and it would be very lovely; generally I wouldn't be a fan of texture with multi-colored yarn. But, like most everything else, I had a few issues with these socks, too. The largest of which you probably have already noticed: I have two dye lots of yarn. If you look at the sock on the left, you'll notice that just past the gusset (that's the part that connects the heel to the foot) the color changes. Yuck. I kind of coulda gone back and made this color change a bit less visible, but...I didn't want to. Recall...I have been working on these FOR A YEAR. No way was I going to undo any of my knitting just to fix a part of a sock that usually will be covered with shoes anyhow. So...if you see me wearing these socks, please don't say anything about the two-tone... I also could have made them a bit less long in the foot. But not a big deal. The worst thing I did with these socks was put them on the day after I finished them and then did a bunch of cooking. Somehow I managed to effectively "clean" the floor with the socks...the poor wool is now a filthy mess. Bleh. Gotta bust out out the hand-wash-wool soap... I also learned with these socks that I quite dislike having to recalculate everything when I choose a yarn for a project that has a different gauge than the yarn specified in the pattern. Not only did I have to do that for these socks, but I had to do it twice because in between sock 1 and sock 2 I lost the copy of the pattern on which I had written all my calculations. Grrrrrr....

• Socks Made For Me! by my sockpal, Cathy.

When I took out these socks, the very first thing I said was, "These are WONDERFUL!" It's always amazing to me how people who don't even know me can pick out yarn and a pattern and make socks for me that I absolutely adore. The color: perfect. (I actually think I have a shirt my sister gave me that matches it precisely!) The pattern: awesome. I'm rather tempted to make some myself with this Uptown Boot Sock pattern from Favorite Socks - enough of a texture (and knitting challenge!) without being crazy and making my head hurt. I put on my new socks right away, but immediately put on slippers (you can see one in the picture) lest I decided to go venture into the kitchen to do some more "cleaning"...

And that is the story of the socks. The sockapalooza socks are getting into the mail today (okay...so I'm a bit late for the August 2-7 deadline...well...oops...life took a few unexpected turns, we'll leave it at that), and that means all of my knitting-for-others is done! Woo! Perhaps that means I can make something for myself (that won't be socks that take a year...).

Or...perhaps not, because my friend Jen had her baby on Thursday...and perhaps he needs a cute little crocheted bunny...and a sweater...and some booties...?