Erring On The Side of Caution...

So very sorry for the lapse in posting (or should I say "lapses"). I do have a valid excuse.

My mother fell a week ago, and broke her hip. Now, we are just waiting to see what happens. The orthopedic doctor/surgeon, whatever the heck he is, has taken x-rays after a two week hiatus, and the prognosis is not the best.

He explained that my mother's hip is not healing on its own, in fact, the fracture now has "space" between it, which means it's getting worse (likely due to the fact that the woman just will not lie still!), and if she doesn't lie still for a while, it will ultimately require a hip replacement.

Not a really good idea for a lady of, um, how do I say this delicately? her age.

So we have her on calcium and Vitamin D, plus a multivitamin, plus her high blood pressure medication. She's grousing about the idea that she's never taken this many BIG PILLS in her entire life. I know what she's talking about. I take the same stuff (except for blood pressure).

So, there's a wait now for another couple of weeks to see if things get "resolved". In her case, this means that things start working the way they should and the bones knit themselves together. I'm a good knitter, but I ain't that good. So I bought her cross stitch instead.

So two weeks from now, I find out if my mother is going into surgery. I'm on pins and needles.

But I did complete a couple of hair scrunchies for one of my co-workers. She's going to present them to a niece for her birthday.

In the meanwhile, I doubt if I'll get a lot of knitting done until these two weeks are over. I'm simply a nervous wreck. It's probably best that I just stay home.

In Which I Become Computer Savvy..

Yesterday, I found out that I am a guru (computer-wise) according to one of my friends. I have been working with her on and about her computer. She was having trouble with IE8 and her comcast account. She couldn't read her email.

Well, I fixed that, and then I installed a different browser and a couple of other programs so that I can work on her computer from home. Then we watched "Thor" via Netflix on her computer screen. The computer screen didn't have a fast enough refresh rate, and so she copied the name of the movie down to download it to her television.

That guy that plays Thor is a cute little biscuit....

Once the movie was over, I went home. I was a tired little puppy, but I ate something, took my pills and went to bed and watched a little television. I was falling asleep before I finally realized that I needed to get some sleep or I would be worth a big, fat zero at the office in the morning.

So now, it's work time, and I'm feeling like a big, fat zero. I always have trouble keeping focus on projects that bore me--that goes for knitting, too. And I LOVE knitting. So you know it's got to be the job.

And I'm looking again for something else to keep me activated mentally and psychologically.

A friend of mine is ignoring me, or else he lost his phone. I'm somewhat concerned about that. I'll send him an email today. Perhaps he'll answer, perhaps not. We shall see.

I'm going to take care of it right now, while I'm still thinking about it. So, I'll likely see you later. Have a nice day!

And Away She Goes

Just a quick post about a process shawl. Don't need another one, but the pattern was so pretty. Just one row to memorize.

It's Sunday....

That's right, it's Sunday. I have just one day left of my weekend. I'm not sure how I want to spend it. Hubby is still in bed. We had a moderately busy day at his mom's yesterday, and today just seems like it should be a day of rest. But in a few hours, I'll be at JoAnn's helping out a person having trouble with an afghan--I think crochet. That will take about an hour, I expect. After that, I think my day is quite open, and I've been thinking about staying home and relaxing.

I had wanted to run up to Clare and Farwell to check out a store called "Elm Creek", but because it isn't Saturday anymore, I think that it's probably too late to try. Reason being that most of the "up north" towns roll up the sidewalks on Sunday to go to church, sit down and read the paper.

Speaking of the paper, and digressing totally from that, yesterday, there was a horrible accident on the freeway, and we had to take a byway to avoid it. The police still had it closed off hours later...so I'm heading over to the Lansing State Journal to see if it made front page or not.

Ya'll have a good Sunday.

I Can't Believe It!

I am typing this on my old laptop.

You're looking at me like I'm an idiot. Why would I want to work on a much slower machine to do my blog, when a much faster machine is just two steps away?

Well, let me tell you what. The big machine is great, and all that, but sometimes, I like to watch television while I fiddle on the internet. So at this moment, I'm sweating--literally dripping in the living room, watching the old-tyme music from the 50's on channel 23 (PBS) doing a pledge drive.

I just love public tv. My husband isn't fond of the pledge drives at all, but I think they're great.

So for now, I'm going to run and find my glasses, while I listen to the rhythm of the falling rain....lalala.

All Day Long

And I do mean, L-O-N-G. But it was, all in all, a really fun day for a Friday.

Did I say it was a Friday?

Anyway, one boss needed an adjustment to a spreadsheet he was doing. I just told him to send it to me, and I'd fix it. Ten minutes later, it was done and on his desktop, and he was in LOVE.

Not with me--the spreadsheet.

Then, another boss comes to me asking for advice on the template for some circular labels she wanted made for her daughter's wedding. I spent about 20 minutes on that, and got it ready for printing. She's going to bring in the rest of them for printing on Monday. She's simply amazed, because her husband spent quite a bit of time on it, and wasn't quite able to figure it out. To be honest, it took me some time, too, because the template doesn't match up with the printing somehow, and I had to do some adjustments to the template. Otherwise things worked out GREAT.

Later in the day, I queried google about an issue that I came across trying to send an embedded picture in an email, and it was just plain giving me fits. I knew it had to be in settings, but I wasn't sure WHERE. So I searched "emailing pictures embedded in gmail", and it came back with the "how to's" I needed to complete the job. Sure wish I'd thought of it two days ago before I sent the email out to 50 people. But there you go. The next newsletter will have pictures in it. YAY TEAM!

We had 4 new people coming into the office, and one leaving for a new job in a different area, and I created a banner and some name plaques for all. Afterwards, I took my lunch and dropped into JoAnn's to get a friend to assist me with a cute border. Then, with all the scraps from the paper, I made flowers to put on the name plaques. Then others brought in cupcakes and muffins and cookies (chocolate chip, my personal favorite), and we had a little party.

It was sort of weird about the banner. The person who was leaving our office, the banner said "CYA", which is shorthand/texting for See Ya! Almost NO ONE got that. Most thought it was some sort of code. The head boss thought it meant "Cover Your A$$". Well, everyone who knows me, knows I'm not like that--I spent more time explaining what it meant. I guess this means I've been chatting on the internet for far too long.

Later on, I finally did get in some real office work, but after all the successes today, it was REALLY hard to focus on boring things. I was happy for the occasional interruption from the telephone! Something I almost dread most times.

Today was surely different.

Hail in Denver, Colorado

I'm not much for watching the weather around HERE, let alone in a city I haven't seen for darn near 40 years, but this just simply takes the cake. Big storm in Denver, Colorado leaves the city blanketed with hail up to the roofs of the cars.

Now that's a lot of hail overnight. They were saying most of the hail was golfball sized and that it was so deep it was still around on THURSDAY morning!

The storm spawned several tornados, and a good amount of rain, too.

So you know that when I was driving home, I was watching those rain clouds. Oh, yes indeedy!

Beyond that, not much going on.

I did get my book, Jean Greenhowe's MacScarecrow Clan. Don't worry, I'm just stretching my knitting muscles. There's a pic on Ravelry of Uncle Angus--who plays the bagpipe, you know. He's quite the hairy fellow. He's got wild haggis on the ground all around him. I can barely wait to get started on the whole family!

I'm still working on the last round of the first ruffle. Oh, I must tell you. I am about done with this throw! It takes all day to get around it! I really don't have that much more to finish on it, but it just takes so dingable long to get around it that I lose interest (long time ago), set it down and pick up something else, equally boring. A Chevron Scarf. As if I don't have enough scarves...there are only 2 rows. The wrong side is purled, with 5 garter sts fore and aft. The right side has a little interest with some decreases and an increase to make the hills and valleys, but after about the first two rows, you've just really done it. Maybe I'll work on the picot on the ruffle tonight?

It would be nice to put a progress pic on here at some point, don't you think?

I Was Thinking About Doing Something...

Posting another blog entry, and then I remembered. Oh. I have to make a new hyperlink to get you to the Scrunchie pattern (always free), and that took a little time, because I had trouble remembering how to finagle it.

Well, trust the web to remind, and it's now safely ensconced in the sidebar...over there ---->

If you click on the word "scrunchie", it will link you to the post ONLY about the scrunchie, which was why you were here in the first place, huh? :)

It's been a very eventful day. I got lots done at the office. I made somebody happy and I introduced a friend to a guy who sings and sounds just like Freddie Mercury. Yes, he's on YouTube. You can search on your own. He's very well known, I guess.

Then I purchased Gorilla Glue, a wooden clock face, some flowers, and then I came home. So now it's time to blog, and I can't think of anything to write about, other than the governor in Wisconsin trying to bust the unions. If he succeeds, the fire will spread, and we're all worried about it.

I'm worried because most people don't like me much--it's not that I don't have friends. I do have friends, but they aren't DEEP relationships whatever. If it came to whether to keep me or the gal who doesn't do the job quite as well, but is friendly all the time and smiley here and there, I'd probably lose. I'm something of a rebel. I don't believe in spending more money than I have, and I don't believe the government should spend more than it has. But it should give me my just due, and what it promised me many years ago.

And right now, it smells like doggie doo in my bedroom. Maybe it's the cat?

HA! Classic dog joke.

Anyway, it's supposed to rain tonight. I need to get those flowers in the ground. I've got to shower, and I've got to make something to eat. Let's face it. I have no time tonight to do much more of anything, since it's nearly 7 o'clock already! So you guys all have a good time. I'll just run and take care of those plants...tomorrow.

Scrunchie!!!!

I did some scrunchies. One I left at JoAnn's for a trend class, and here's how to make it!

Need:

Red Heart "Kids" yarn, Bikini colorway
Size H crochet hook
One (or more, because they are really addictive!) fabric covered rubber band. You can get these by the dozen at stores like Meijer's, K-Mart or Wal-Mart.
Big eye tapestry needle

Attach yarn to rubber band by slipping the hook into the ring, grab the yarn, pull through, then work a chain, pulling the short end of the yarn through the chain to tie it off. Then work enough single crochet (sc) in the loop to fill the rubberband. My rubberband took about 23 scs. Join with a slip stitch (slst) in the front loop only (flo) to the first sc.

(FLO) *Ch 10, slst in same sc, slst in next sc, repeat from * around. Join with slst to the back loop only (blo) of the first sc.

(BLO) *Ch 10, slst in same sc, slst in next sc, repeat from * around. Joing with a slst to the back of the work, and finish off.

Hide ends with a tapestry needle under the legs of the sc going around the rubberband.

Wrap around your ponytail and enjoy!

Latest on the Woman in the Parade...

Strange Dreams..

I took a nap yesterday after work. Hubby let me sleep until 8pm. I didn't go back to bed until almost 3am. I'm up at 8, and HUNGRY. He's still sleeping, and gave me a "huh" when I poked him asking for breakfast. It's date morning.

Date morning is sort of like date NIGHT, except it includes breakfast instead of the movie/dinner/dancing or whatever other people do on date night. It would seem that we're usually too petered out after a long week to do much more than eat breakfast so that we can go on to more important things, like cleaning house, doing laundry and just general "get ready for Monday" type stuff--most of which involves watching lots of videos, but I digress.

Sorry that I haven't been blogging much lately, but I've been so busy. Actually, that would be a lie. I have 3 computers, and one of them is ALWAYS with me, and working or playing. I'm never alone. I can always blog, even if I have to submit it via email. It's not that I've been busy so much as it's been so boring since Alma--which was a really cool blog, with lots of excitement and what not. But this week has been something of a downer.

The highlight of the week was Friday got here. That should tell you a world of information. There's been nearly no knitting or crocheting, no spinning, no "read any good book (notice the non-plural) lately". In fact, a friend at the office sort of begged me for a little help, and sent me the information, and I got it done in less than a minute. I am kind of proud of that, actually. This guy needs a secretary with skills, and that would be me. But I digress. I haven't been doing much that crafty at all, all week.

I did find a website that allows you to play Tri-Peaks non stop, and continues to run up the score, which is what my husband has on his computer. His score is something like 15, 000 or so. Mine? No, really, you don't want to know...okay...you broke me down--it's a little over 800. Hubby just laughs at me about that. Of course, he's been playing his game for several years, and has only gotten better with it since he retired and feels he has nothing else to do except play Tri-Peaks. I also found tri-peaks for my IPad, but it doesn't let you go on and on--if you can't clear the board, you end up losing all your points, and have to start a new game. It's a big bummer after you've played with the non-stop game, and I wrote to the developer about that. He says he's going to add an option for it in the next update. That will make my IPad quite useful (not).

My IPad is becoming a little more game oriented. This in and of itself isn't bad, except that I can't play at home with it. I use it a lot at the office--I take minutes with it, and then email them to myself. For this purpose it's almost insanely valuable! My brain tends to halt a little these days, and for whatever reason, my penmanship is terrible, and sometimes I can't read what I wrote 5 seconds ago. With my IPad, I can take my notes and email them directly to the boss immediately after the meeting--a task that takes me only 5 minutes. The difference was a totally unreal sensation. Almost like euphoria--because I love 5 minute jobs. The problem is that there are games on it. Games I like to play. Which can be dicey at times. I do try to keep myself focused, and I get my work done everyday--

Okay, okay, another lie.

But it won't be anything to get those caught up.

I'm not sweating over here. Not even a little. Like I said, the week was pretty boring.

And hubby is still snoring--it's almost 9am! He won't wake up! He's still breathing, don't worry, although there was a few minutes there last night when I had to poke him to remind him to BREATHE! Yes, he's Apnea-with a capital A. We both are. His has gotten worse over the years. He could be the poster child for sleep apnea. I'm imagining this 50 year old man with a round belly, eyes closed, mouth open, half bald with more hair on his lip than on his head (another lie to make good copy) on a poster, stapled to a telephone pole or on a milk carton. No one would find this missing person, I don't think. He has almost no computer footprint, refuses to buy a cell phone and isn't very patient with technology. He wants that website, and he wants it now kind of person. Type A all the way. I'm the same, and we get into some pretty heated arguments sometimes--although not so many since he retired. Maybe I should get him in a corner and duke it out, just for excitement.

Not that I fancy Peg Bundy (Married with Children), but it sounds fun.

And he would respond with the typical Al Bundy. Yup. I can see him now.

Anyway, that's been it. I have a class today in the evening (hence the date morning) probably for making flowers, and then I believe I have a class on Sunday as well at JoAnn's. I might hitch on out to the garden to see how it's coming. I haven't looked at it all week. I also need to check on my lavender to see if it's bigger, or at least see if it's hanging in there. Beyond that, there is quite literally nothing to do, unless I want to pull out my blanket to work on. Not a bad idea, since it's been so cold and rainy. I'll think about it,

First, BREAKFAST!