Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Debt Free!

I did something amazing tonight. I went online and made the last payment on my student loans.

I've been paying in big chunks so I could get it over and done with, and tonight I realized that I could finish the whole thing off. So I did it. Clicked "submit," and all done.

I feel like this enormous weight has just lifted off of me. There were certainly months when I wished I hadn't set my payments so high, when I scrounged in my change jars for milk money and counted the days until payday. I paid other bills late because I didn't want to get behind on the loan.

And now it's done.

I'm having a celebratory glass of The Macallan Scotch and feeling rather contemplative. I'd like to say Thank You to my friends and family for all the help and support I got while I paid this monster off.

Have a glass on me.

Tuesday, January 22, 2008

7:35 am

Seen on my way to work this morning.

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Wednesday, January 16, 2008

Mindless Knitting is Important...

It's such a good thing that I started that mindless sock the other day. I'd been feeling a little blah for a few days. Nothing that I could really put my finger on and say, "I'm sick, I need to stay home." I was just a little run-down and kind of achy in my shoulders and neck. I thought it was just left-over from a moderately insane holiday season.

Then Monday it happened. I was all right when I woke up. I did my workout, showered, had breakfast, I even went to work. But by 10 am I knew I was in trouble. My shoulders and neck were so stiff I couldn't turn my head, I had to turn my whole upper body. And I was getting that spaced-out disconnected feeling that always means I have a fever. I gave up and went home.

After I took a nice long nap, I looked around for something to keep my mind off how crummy I felt, and there was my project bag, with the Mindless Sock sticking out of it. Perfect! So I stuck my iPod in my ears, picked up the sock & started knitting.

And knitting.

And knitting.

This is how much I got done Monday afternoon:
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Ribbing and leg

Tuesday I still wasn't feeling all that well, so I stayed home again.

I knit the heel flap:

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40 rows!

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On the inside

And then I turned the heel:

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I always feel so clever when I do this!

I picked up the gusset and started the decreases last night, and finished them at lunch this afternoon. Soon, I'll have a whole sock done.

I'm so glad I had this project started before I got ill. I wouldn't have been able to manage it on Monday, I was just too out of it. But, since those first few fiddly rounds were on the needles already, I had something to do with all those hours when I was too sick to do anything, but not well enough to go to work.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go find my Mom and tell her that I've been sick before she reads this. Certainly don't want to get another one of these e-mails!

Monday, January 14, 2008

Mindless Knittitng

I'm kind of between projects just now. I've got swatches drying which need to be measured, and I wanted to have something on the needles that I don't have to think about too much.

So I cast on for a pair of plain socks. A mindless pair of socks. Just 1.75 inches of ribbing, and then round after round of stockinette.

So I'm using this yarn:

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It's full of subtle color shifts, and the main color is a lovely purple. I love it.

It got me thinking, though. This is a fairly fine 3-ply yarn. I'm working it on 5 size 0 (2.00 mm) needles, at a gauge of about 9.5 sts/inch. To a non-knitter, heck even to a non-sock-knitter, this probably doesn't look like mindless knitting. It probably looks incredibly difficult, even dangerous, considering how pointy the DPN's are.

I think it says quite a bit about how far I've come as a knitter that I consider this the perfect mindless knitting project...