Something Different...

Today, I have just 7 more points to do on the Princess Shawl Border.

I am a little bit behind because of the samples I made for JoAnn's, but I'm catching back up. I should have those seven done today, but I must allow my eyes to rest for a bit--as I've just finished working three of them, and my eyes are--well--crossed.

I got some news the other day from my husband. He tells me that my ex-boyfriend is teaching his Physics class.

This was NOT happy news, and I got teased rather hard about it. Grief and loss don't resolve for me, so the news brought all sorts of good and some REALLY BAD memories right to my temporal lobe and sent me in a tailspin...for a while. Then I got to chatting with a girlfriend, and after a while, I felt a lot better, and was able to finish working out the day. But I was certainly exhausted at the end of the day--so much so, that I was unable to get to sleep. So I took a sleeping pill at 2 AM, and slept until 10 the next morning.

It just wasn't the best way to begin my weekend, but there you go.

Hubby, his son and I drove into town and had breakfast together. Then, because hubby was driving me pretty nuts over his computer (he's not real savvy about computers, but he's getting better with practice), I decided to head to town and pick up some things. One was a video camera/webcam to use for internet conferencing with my son and my mother--this is a cute little contraption. I got business cards, paper and some folders for hubby to use. Then I drove to JoAnn's and worked on a couple more points on the border.

You wouldn't believe the number of compliments I received about my lace. It's very pretty, I know that--and I thanked everyone. It's a difficult piece, but not impossible. I've made mistakes, but I've learned a LOT, too. Laminating and enlarging the border pattern were two things I learned early on. The rest has been learning to tink lace and counting, counting, counting. Now that I'm nearly done, I can work two rows before highlighting the pattern with the dry-erase marker, and that saves lots of time. I can now get a point done in about an hour or so--if I don't end up tinking--which of course, slows me down a little. And I learned how to tink an SSK (slip, slip, knit), and an SK2P (slip one, knit two together, pass the slipped stitch over the knit two together), and a K2tog (knit two together).

I ran into a young man at JoAnn's who knows how to bead, which is another craft I like doing, and he also likes to work in glass--something I've always wanted to do...so at some point, I'll be taking his bead class. I want to learn how to make the spiral necklaces--ah, another lifetime, right?

In the meanwhile, I knit on the border, and chatter with my son. I have a webcam now, so we can talk and see each other talking. I'ts a little memory intensive, but otherwise works well. I've never been photogenic, so having people see me while I'm doing "stuff" is not necessarily my cup of tea.

I really hope that hubby learns the computer a whole lot faster than he has so far. I'm having to teach him all of my little keyboard hotkeys--such as CTRL+P to print stuff. These are all things that will make his use of his computer more efficient and lots faster. We'll see. At some point, he'll fly off on his own and learn stuff that *I* don't know. That's when I'll be able to let him soar on his own.

My guru had me download a piece of software, and now he and I can communicate and he can fix my computer remotely. This is a piece of software that I can use for my friends, as well, and help them fix their computers--the software is called "TeamViewer". It's a lot like Log Me In, but you don't have to use the web, at least not directly. You find your IP address, send it to your buddy, and then he can log into your computer and fix whatever might be not quite working right (or as expected). He had fun showing me different things, and built me a ping program so that I could make sure that I was connecting to the internet, to my husband's computer and to the printer. Windows XP is starting to get "confused".

Well, I'm thinking about taking off and heading over to my mother's to help my son learn to knit. He's having a bit of trouble.