Dresser

Oops. So my sister Barbara was coming in to the city, so I thought I should dress up at least a little bit. And you know what? I looked pretty good. At least as far as I was concerned. Well, rather later in the evening, when planning to put on my PJ's, I noticed a seam, raw, running down the inside of my leg. Huh. Yes, I was wearing my pants inside out. Oh, and by the way, my sister, trying to comfort me or at least assuage my horror, said "No one would have noticed. Unless they noticed the tags hanging out of the back of your pants." Thanks, Barb. So then, when removing additional levels of clothing, I found it was rather difficult to remove my bra. That's because it was INSIDE OUT. Maybe not my best day, style wise. Ya think?

Well, I hope when you have a backwards day, at least you can announce it BEFORE it happens

Not a good housekeeper

My big plan, hang around on the roof, read some books, get a bit of housekeeping done. But Horrors, the small bug hospitality suite has turned into a massive party suite, and I served as the house dick. I bought 2 packs of Combat, a container of diatomaceous earth, and of course boric acid. Turns out that attempting to evict bugs with Raid pretty much works the same way as a police raid, the strongest and the smartest run and hide, and only the young and stupid pay the price. I did scream a few times, once when I discovered that bugs were living in MY MOP! I swear, I was changing out the sponge on the mop and...EWWW and much shrieking, but quietly lest I upset the neighbors. Then I started on what I thought was a benign counter top and there was more shrieking. apparently I missed that particular counter when I was dousing my kitchen in Raid. So I started cooking, cream cheese, sugar, and boric acid, roll into balls and tuck into bottle caps and leave around the house, so some bugs will say Yum and then errch. Maybe Combat will work better, but I wanted to be a part of the eviction process. Now I have to spend at least 2 weeks waiting for bugs to die.

Meanwhile, much scrubbing ensued, behind things and under things, pulled the washer out, looked at the stove, evaluated my strengths and decided No way. Worst part is that in the beginning of the day my plan was to make my house look clean and tidy, now it is a bit of a mess as I could not bear to go back in and reclaim my space, especially since I know I will have to wash everything again before I can tidy.

I finally bought a big bottle of wine and sat up on the roof with a lovely glass, trying to catch my breath and pretend I was not grossed out. Then I played with some paint, painted a wide strip down one side of the hallway, just to try taking my house back. Not sure that was the best idea, but hey, at least it was a positive move. Next I am going to paint my front door and then I bought some spray paint that turns things into a chalkboard, and I am going to make the middle of my door a chalkboard for a while. Why night, it will a bit of entertainment and changeable art. My door is not beautiful right now, after all the work the building has done replacing bits paint is missing, and there are dings, so what the heck.

Name change

This blog used to be called Not a good knitter.  That is so limiting.  There are so many things that I am not good at that I did not want to stop at knitting.  I have execrable taste in colors, turns out I may, read MAY be slightly color blind.  I crochet things that perhaps should have remained on the hook.  I will occasionally draw something, having neither the talent to go for it, nor the training to fake it. My photography can best be described as fuzzy snapshots.  Oh, did I mention the astigmatism, and the lack of glasses?  Mostly I just approximate where a picture might be, and push the button. Fortunately since I rarely wear my glasses, the pictures look pretty good to me.  Oh, and what about Not a Good Employee?  Well, if my boss suggested that I would have had to smack him upside the head, hence the original suggestion.
But I am very good at opinions and ideas.  Today I was watching an episode of The Next Design Star on color, and I noticed that no one talked about how to choose a color, so here is MY tip.  Is there something in your room that you love, that will remain in your room no matter what else you do in the design of your room?  Could be a painting, (or three) or you love your drapes, or a particular chair.  Not the TV, do not choose your colors based on your TV since you will only change the channel, and then where will you be?  But especially think about the things on your wall.  Now think about the colors you like, and get a bunch of paint chips in those colors.  Now put the paint chips behind and around the things you love on your wall.  If the color sucks the life out of your picture, makes that photograph look like it came out of the Night of the Living Dead, then that is not a good wall color.  Using the colors you can imagine living with, find the colors that make your art look the best, and now buy some sample pots of those colors.  Paint squares on your wall to see what the paint does in different light, during different times of the day.  The ONE color that looks good with your art, good in afternoon light, and good at night with your electric lights on, that is the paint to choose. (oh, you are a fan of gas light, go 3 shades darker, gas light can handle the heavier deeper colors far better than florescent light.  Me, I go old school with incandescent light bulbs. (fancy name for bought at the grocery store)
So that is my tip for the day.  But since I have many opinions, it is only the first of many!

Bullies

No knitting content.

I am watching "The Mentalist" and it is really bugging me. The main character is working against a team whose job it is to solve murders, because he wants HIS team to work on these murders. He manipulates the people in the team to create dissension and pain, to get what he wants. Here is what I think. He is a bully. Just because he uses his brain and his knowledge of psychology to manipulate people to feel uncertain and to create problems, rather than using physical strenghth to beat people up, he is still a bully.

TV has become very mean-spirited, and it makes me tired.

Fiber content

Do not buy cheap yarn. Yes, it may be difficult to allow yourself to make mistakes with expensive yarn, but if you do not make mistakes, you are stuck with a sweater that will last, and would maybe have been excellent, if you had not used random yarn that you got free on freecycle, which had no labels, and looks terrible, but is wicked soft and the cats like it, so you cannot get rid of it either.

I can knit, no, I swear I can

I even make up patterns, but I have never written one down. This may change, as I suspect that I really will write down my pattern for little people, and maybe for a knitted shopping bag. Of course, I have to make those things first, and that means putting aside my gorgeous shrug slash bolero, which I have finished. Not that I know what I did, since I increased randomly, and knit until I ran out of yarn, not a good way to create a pattern. Well, maybe a good way to destash, but my half a sweater may be even less valuable to someone in cold weather.
Here is the good news, crochet, I am brave enough to frog items. Yes, that means that i get to re-crochet the same stuff, only better. Well, hopefully better. but think of the yarn I am saving.

My imaginary life

I have imagined making many things. Many many things. But the reality is that I take forever just to finish a shawl or a pair of socks. I am not complaining, this is all part of my gift. My gift is that I am an appreciator, I truly appreciate the patterns that people have created, the lovely knitted and crocheted yarny goodness. I actually read those patterns, not just the description of the pattern. I like the structure and the vision of the designers.
Now, I do have vision for myself, but not for others really. I imagine the things that might look good on me, for my imaginary body, sadly, as my actual body is not exactly as I imagine. Hey, I call it anorexia in reverse, I look in the mirror and see a thin person. Thus I make hats, lots of hats, and weird things for my own entertainment.
So it is all good.

I am way cool!

I am watching "White Collar" and the scene is shot right around the corner from my house. Oh, and there is no parking in the neighborhood again, since they are shooting another random show. They were shooting "Bored in New York" down the street in the beginning of the summer, and recently, another show called "In Production". Obviously, I have become jaded, since instead of trying to find out who is on the shoot, all I can think about is the missing parking spaces, (No, really, Parking in my neighborhood is very difficult, and I feel for my neighbors. {A car in my neighborhood?!! are you out of your mind?!!! I totally do not have 20 minutes to an hour to spare driving around the block looking for parking, and now that they are filming...})
What does this have to do with knitting? Not a thing, except that I knit, and I am obviously cool, hence, knitting is cool.