Knitting in the Big City

Hello 2009!

Hi everyone - long time no post. Didn't have time to blog, barely had time to knit. Why not?

Went to every Yankees game at the "old" Yankee Stadium (yep, 81 games takes up time), was accepted into a nine month long leadership program (more time again) and, in general, took stock of what I liked about my life and what I didn't like (more about those things later).

I did make breakthrough with my knitting. Every project started in 2008 was finished - no UFOs! Joy of completion is so much better than the angst of UFO. One major milestone - I made my first top down sweater (The Patsy Swing Jacket, a house pattern from The Point).

So I'm back, with my NY baseball rants, my streaky leisure reading, and my tv critic commentaries. Among the things that do not change: I'm a fast stasher and a slow knitter. I'm pretty sure the stash I have is going to see me into and through retirement.

Time won't allow for posting everyday but once a week sounds doable. Thanks for reading!

Sheepish return

Hi all -

Like so many blog posts I've read in the last year - "I can't believe its been this long since I've blogged", more specifically since Sept 11.

Life gets in the way of blogging. And unlike other bloggers, my blog is not my life, it's a part of my life that gets low priority when I have other "real life" situations that need attention.

Since September, I've developed and expanded my group's responsibilites at work, gotton more diligent about taking care of a chronic health issue, and managed to spend more in-person time with my knitting group.

However the biggest change that's happened is that my long time kitty, Boo, the Persian Diva, past away in January. She was seventeen and a half. Even though she loved being our only cat for the past 18 months, her health started to decline. And my knitting stopped. Why? Well at first I thought I was losing interest in the craft (God Forbid!). But once my kitty past away I realized that every moment at home was spent petting and giving her rubs under her chin. Since I never mastered one handed knitting nor did I grow a third arm and hand I elected to spend time with her and not my knitting.

So now I'm back and this is the first time I'm able to write about my girl without breaking out in tears.

I started knitting again in February. Simple little projects but each one got started and got finished. More about those next time.

Have a good weekend folks!

Dog or Cat

I'm up to the toe on the first of my sockapaloooza socks. I ran into a problem while knitting the gusset - I'm about half way done and counted 22 stitches on the left and 15 stitiches on the right! Since I'm using a lace pattern I ended up frogging stitch by stitch until I was back to a couple of row after you pick up stitches.

And work's been mucho busy - that's what happens when half you staff takes a vacation and the remaining folks (me and the other half of the staff) only have 4 days to do 5 days worth of work. But I did find time to see if I'm a dog or cat:

You Are: 60% Dog, 40% Cat

You are a nice blend of cat and dog. You're playful but not too needy. And you're friendly but careful. And while you have your moody moments, you're too happy to stay upset for long.

Are You More Cat or Dog?

Hmmm, this isn't going to make me kitty very happy.....

Apparently I'm way too young.

My New York age is 27

This New York age puts you-generally speaking-into the young category. That's what you were hoping for, right? Run and tell your friends. Then get drunk (as usual). Then sleep it off. Then pop an Adderall. Then come back and consider experimenting with a more mature type of New York life (just once in a while). Have you ever been to the Village Vanguard or the Living Theatre? Eaten at Elaine's? Taken a date to Michael Feinstein? Before you laugh, check 'em out and see what old-school NYC experiences you can add to the new.

Does your age reflect how you're living? Let us know.

What's your New York age? Take the Time Out New York quiz and find out!

Well my feeling is the survey’s questions were way too confining so you compromise your answer. For instance I go a lot of Yankee games so I've been up to the South Bronx recently. The question had two viable answers: Was it to boo A-Rod? No. But it wasn't to go look at real estate. So I guess only 20 year olds go to Yankee games. And only 30 and 40 year olds would buy real estate in "SoBro". D-U-H.

But apparently knowing places to go in all five boroughs, being tech-literate in this day and age, and staying up to 4am on a Friday or Saturday night (sometimes knitting!) puts me in the dreaded hipster category. That’s so funny especially since:

- I don’t drink.
- I don’t take over-the-counter medication much less anything else.
- I do like to sleep (doesn’t everyone?).
- The last few times I saw live music involved Roger Waters (Pink Floyd), Darlene Love and Frankie Valli concerts. Sorry no clubbing involved.
- Oh wait – check that- I had dinner at Via Brasil over the weekend and the musicians played live music intermittently during the evening.

Annoyed alright

Hmm let’s see, my new hire just informed me that she’s wants to go back to her old department. Never mind that she was a former colleague of mine and I jumped through hoops to get her placed here. Yes, I understand that she needs to do what works for her and yes I understand this move involved a career change since I did the same move.

However now I know first hand why her old department is not granting her a promotion even though she produces quality work. In the past they attempted to place her into several positions that called for her skills and each time she found a reason not to stick with it. They stopped doing that and she landed in the crappy staff group. No, it seems that my old VP and I have something to talk about over coffee.

I’m truly annoyed – I officially have the duties of my old boss and now I have to again hire some else to replace me at my old position, train him or her and all the while shaping our area’s vision, policies and procedures while going to executive meetings and dealing with new management at the parent agency. I have yet to leave work without putting in a 9-10 hour day and I only eat lunch because I bring in my lunch.

And I just noticed that I’ve been so busy with work that I never uploaded my Valentine’s Day post! Argh!

..and how was your Thanksgiving weekend?

Thursday was spent with a small gathering of family and friends. My brother is disabled but he wanted to host dinner. We ordered a pre-cooked meal and I got up bright and early to finished roasting the turkey and the veggies of choice: string beans and Brussels sprouts. Two kinds of pie finished off the meal – pumpkin pie and sweet potato pie (topped with toasted coconut).

Friday was spent getting together with my former boss for a delicious Scandinavian meal and a viewing of the Bodies exhibit at the South Street Seaport. *** This exhibit is not for the squeamish! **** I had to take a deep breather several times as I viewed the exhibits. Two in particular hit home since they were the items that resulted in serious health issues for various family members – the aneurysm that burst an aortic artery and the various organs that had cancer tumors. I think what helped was there were always several medical professionals around you and they managed to be detached yet possess a child-like enthusiasm for all the displays.

Later in the evening I hooked up with hubby, our nephew and nephew's girlfriend for a maniacal tour of the new Apple store, FAO Schwartz, Lord and Taylor’s holiday windows and a walk through Times Square. We encounter the temporary Charmin restrooms which may have been the highlight of the day! Cha, Cha, Cha.

What do you do when you are perpetually invited to other people’s home for Thanksgiving but you love to have turkey leftovers? You wait a couple of days and make your own turkey!

This lovely bird was made Saturday afternoon - and was served with mashed potatoes and the carrots and celery that were added to the turkey for flavor. Oh and rfried mushrooms (with crispy burnt edges). While I was cooking this year I missed the presence of the Wembley kitty - she would remind me every 15 minutes that there was a turkey cooking and that she wanted the first bite! Gawd that cat loved people food.... plus she never got fat!

And Sunday? Well after bumming around and doing a bit of cleaning we went to the Redeye Grill for dinner and then we went to see Frankie Valli at the Rose Hall at Lincoln Center. We grew up listening to his later hits like his song from the movie “Grease” but who doesn’t know songs like “Sherrie”, “Walk Like a Man“ and “ My Eyes Adored You”. Except for the four singers that served as his “Four Seasons” hubby and I were the youngest people there! We got amazing seats at the last minute (box seats at the side of stage) and it was a treat to watch the audience reliving their teenage and young adult years. There was even had a pair of green panties thrown onto the stage at one point! The experience was a far cry from the rock concerts we usually go to but nonetheless very enjoyable.

On the knitting front I started and completed another Christmas gift - it’s for the Persian cat, the Queen of the house. More on that later.

Long overdue

Let’s see what’s been going on….hmmm…

- My boss resigned and leaves the company after 25 years… her duties have been split between myself and another staffer. If this work division is permanent then it looks like we both have a well deserved opportunity to move up. In the year I worked for my boss all that was required of me was to come in, do my work, and leave. I enjoyed being a non-managerial employee but that’s all about to change in the next few months.

- We celebrated my eleventh anniversary a couple of weeks ago. We had dinner at Nick and Stef’s and then we went to see Martin Short’s show “Fame Becomes Me” We didn’t know this prior to attending the show but Short tries to have a celebrity guest as part of the show and ours was Chris Matthews . Matthews was a good sport and rolled with the punched. Dinner was fine but I my preference is for Keen’s Steakhouse which is in the same neighborhood.

- We buried Pucci kitty with my mother-in-law this weekend. Pucci was happy, spoiled, and displayed her personality at its wildest when she lived with her late owner. As has been tradition the last decade or so, whatever the weather during our annual visit to the cemetery the sun will comes out – seems my father-in-law’s magic touch didn’t go away after his death. Sunday was a cloudy cold day and BAM, as we walk to the gravesite the clouds move and the sun is shining.

- I’ve been knitting and watching Law and Order: Criminal Intent on USA. I remember watching the show during its first season and I disliked the fact that Kathryn Erbe’s character never seemed to do the hard thinking. Now Goren (Vincent D’Onofrio) and Eames are definitely more of a partnership which each partner contributes their strong skills in an investigation. USA is running 3 shows a night! Last season I watched some of the first-run shows on Sunday nights on NBC but I was turned off by the famous guest stars appearing every week.

- Speaking of TV – is anyone else hooked on Heroes ? There seems to be something every night for my DVR to record: Heroes, House, Law and Order: Criminal Intent, CSI (original) and Doctor Who. I’m still taping Lost but the story is getting to be too much for me. Or maybe too little is more accurate – I really couldn’t care what happens to the characters this season. And I got hook on 24 last season – I can’t wait for it to start again in 2007.

Word is that Chris Eccleston (Doctor Who #9) is will appear on Heroes after the holidays. Yippee! Good or Evil which side will he be on?

- You might think with this much TV there’s no time for anything else. Incorrect. I’ve been reading up a storm. I’ve gotten hooked on Jean Plaidy’s historical novels about the wives of King Henry VIII, JD Robb’s futuristic cop Eve Dallas, and Leslie Glass’s modern day cop, April Woo.

- And yes, I’ve been knitting holiday gifts – 3 down and 4 to go! Those entries are on their way.

I met Jay from Project Runway!

I was at the Point Saturday afternoon and I had ended up meeting the first season winner from Project Runway, Jay Mccarroll . He wasn’t recognized until he and his friend left the store. So what do a bunch of New York knitters do? We yell for them to come back to us! And they did!

What did we chat about? His collection is coming out in 3 weeks. He already knows who this season’s finalists are (but he didn’t share!). He’s not a knitter “Hmm. Let’s see…Knit one…. Purl one…. Zzzzzzzz” but he really loves to sew. His friend wanted to learn how to knit. And he graciously posed with someone for a camera phone photo.

The folks at my table weren’t sure it was him until he spoke, he asked me to pick up some Fixation ball that fell near me. And then it took a minute or two few people to decide they wanted to meet him. Me? I’ve only watched this season of the show on a regular basis. I only watched one or two episode of season 1. Jay was nice and friendly and his friend was a doll for putting up with us.

And while I was at the Point I finished the Mistake Rib scarf! Yeah!

It’s hot-

There it is - the tag line for the last week or so…

At work our building reduced elevator service by 25%, lowered the air conditioning to a non-freezing level and turned off building lights which account for about 40% of total flooring lighting (we control the remaining 60% of floor lighting). However no one was notified about the light reduction so for about 5 minutes we all wondered if there was a brownout. And amazingly, everyone elected to go out into the hot weather at lunchtime!

We went to last night’s Yankee game to welcome Bobby Abreu to the team. The heat didn’t keep fans away, the place was packed! We were one block away from our place when the street lights went out and we heard the air conditioners come to a halt. “Uh, oh, a blackout?” Apparently not, the juice was reduced and more power was released as the night went on. Once we got home last night we discovered that power must have gone out during the evening – we spent some time resetting all our clocks and timers.

However my neighbors did not have a pleasant wake-up call. Some talking burglar alarm went off in a brownstone around the corner this morning. It sounded like a car alarm until you get closer to the building.

The message - “This is a burglary. You are trespassing. Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah.” - repeated itself over and over again!

Talk about obnoxious! A police car showed up and left quickly. And the alarm kept going! Another neighbor told me that fire trucks should up at the building the night before - something about a strange odor. Doesn't sound too good...

Laugh of the day

poor Rufus!