Projects! Updates! Y’know… things

What’s up, Apocaknits Nation? (Are we a nation yet? When are people allowed to claim they have a nation?)

I wanted to tell you what’s going up with my wacky sidebar since I’ve been moving stuff around and cleaning stuff up. When I say sidebar, I generally mean what’s going on over there.                     ————->>>>>>>>>>>>>>

First off, I’m now a Woot! affiliate. That means: if you click the little thing that says shirt.woot! over there, I get half a penny or something. Now, if you go to shirt.woot! from my link and actually buy something, then I might be able to buy a knitting needle.

So, click that ^ and check it out. I might not have even hooked up all the tubes properly. I made sure to put a link in here in case you’re reading in your reader and not on my website. Which- good for you. I had a reader once and once it did that [[you have 1,000+ unread items]] thing I just sort of abandoned it.

Speaking of reading, I need some books to read. I’m almost done with:

It’s pretty funny. If I liked/watched The Office I’m sure it would be a lot funnier.

So let me know if you’ve read anything really good lately! Preferably fluffy or thrillingly intellectual books (is that a genre?) I’m not ready to tackle anything over say, 300 pages. George R.R. Martin did that to me.

Another thing on the sidebar, is Double Jump Spirit! Sparkles! Glitter!

It’s a podcast that you should be listening to. This whole thing was born in the super feisty head of Jared. Someone asked me to describe it to them and I was kind of at a loss. But I’ll try to describe it to you right now.

Jared talks about adult things. Like power lines and overcoming illnesses. I spin around in John’s office chair and talk about Titanic and Breaking Dawn. Every so often he’s successful in reigning me in so we can move forward and talk about what you, the concerned listener has come to hear about: folding sheets and optometrists offices. BUT IT’S A LOT BETTER THAN ANY OF THAT.

Seriously. Check it out. You’ll be glad you did. Or you’ll absolutely hate it. If that’s the case- call in and tell us what assholes we are!

Okay, I’m almost done boring you. But another project I’ve been working on is another Project365. Hopefully to be better than the first Project365 I did before. Because it’s all pictures of our cat Schmoo.

Last night, I was tired and about to go to bed and I realized I hadn’t taken a picture of Schmoo for the day. So I bent down and was like “Hey. Schmoo. Do something cool really quick so I can go to bed.” She then stuck out her tongue just a little.

Sometimes she does that kind of thing and I think “holy shit, this cat is the smartest cat ever.” Then she poops on the floor or runs into a wall and I’m like, hmmmm.

[This post was written to get the excessive amount of exclamation points out of my system. I'm sorry if it has offended your good sense of writing or eyesight.]

[[P.S. I also got rid of a bunch of links to blogs that were inactive. If  you would like me to link your blog/website in my "Cool Links" section, post a comment letting me know. I'm not trying to snub anyone, I probably just missed you.]]

One seriously rad book signing

One day I was whining on the internet about how no books were holding my attention this summer. (I know, you can’t imagine me whining, right? But it’s true sweet blog, it’s true.) Luckily, instead of telling me to stfu, judahthor came to the rescue. He sent me a whole slew of book ideas.

The one that has really caught my attention so far is Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. For some reason I got super caught up in it. Even though I don’t share the same obsessions as Cline, I still got wound up in thinking about obsessions. I wrote about his book on my goodreads if you’re interested. But! What’s more interesting is that thanks to judahthor’s quick recommendation, I was able to see Ernest Cline here in Columbus doing a book signing. Eeeee!

He answered questions and got very animated with the hand gestures. He definitely struck me as the type of guy who would get really excited about finding some lost episode of an 80′s cartoon.

At one point he said that when he was describing the evil corporate headquarters that are in the middle of Columbus (in his book) he was totally thinking about Nationwide. I found this even more funny since I was sitting in a ‘dudes who work at Nationwide’ sandwich at the time. Mostly because I think they’d agree- giant buildings that dominate downtown and they sell insurance? I’ll bet they have a department that’s completely just guys with mustaches tying ladies to train tracks.

But yeah, I’m recommending this book to everyone and their mother. Because even though I didn’t really care about some of the main 80′s things he focused on (I want to stress this- I really don’t give two shits about Rush), I still loved the book.

Plus…

Ernest Cline also collects 80′s memorabilia, which he is taking with him on his book tour and he totally lets people play with it. There was even a proton pack from the Ghostbusters just chilling in his passenger seat. The passenger seat of what else–

But a ghostbusting knight riding back to the future DeLorean.

Which I totally sat in but man, that thing is low to the ground and small. I didn’t want to sit all the way in it for two reasons. One- I might never get out of the thing, it’s like a pit. Two- he left it on and playing Huey Lewis and the News and I thought… if I really sit in this I’d definitely feel the need to look at John and say “Roads? Where we’re going we don’t need roads.” Then you’d all see me on the evening news being pulled over in what would seriously be the most stupid car heist in history. Because it’s not a Honda Civic, stealing a DeLorean means the police are actually obligated to throw your ass in jail.

 

Follow the Garter Stitch Road…

Somehow I’ve made progress on something…

Okay, so you know things are bad when you get tired of hearing that you’re sick. So I can only imagine how other people feel when they hear that I’m sick. AGAIN… (forever). The first time, I kicked some strong antibiotics back and while I thought it went away and I’d dodged a bullet, turns out I just angered whatever sickness was inside of me to hide for a week, then come out with a vengeance. Leaving me with some sort of awful head congestion cold thing for a week of no knitting, no progress of any sort in any aspect of my life… well except for the being a lazy bum aspect, I’m tops there.

Remember that contest I entered a while back? Well Crazy Aunt Purl sent me a “you don’t suck and I love you even though you didn’t win” prize (aka pity prize if you want to be succinct. psht.) Which included a signed copy of her book, two mixed tapes and a cute thank you card which I definitely hung up on my fridge.

Speaking of fridges, mine is kind of a monster, what about yours?

I have to feed it new magnets monthly or it gets mad and eats my bacon. I can’t have that. I’d post a picture of it but I’m kind of embarrassed at how freaky it is, so post a picture of yours first so I won’t feel so bad.

Also, speaking of books, since I’ve been sick that’s all I’ve been doing. You know, burning them. (Wait, can I get thrown in library prison for saying that?)

(All pictures taken from Goodreads and belong to their respective owners.)

So yeah, if you care about all that, check out my Goodreads profile or leave a message if you have any good book suggestions because I’m always looking.

What else? Oh yeah, someone recommended me as an off beat knitting blog on a livejournal community and described this blog as having “a high cat content and general life content.” (here.) At first it made me antsy, oh no, I’m a high cat content person. (Because I work with a woman who talks to herself a lot and she’s considered a high cat content person. Is that me? Do I talk to myself a lot? Do I have conversations with my cats and not even realize it anymore?) Then I realized I need to stop thinking about it and just embrace my freaky cat crazed blog for what it is. (freaky. cat crazed. rambling and long.)

Sax was almost worried I would get through a post without her.

Hey, since you’ve read this far, do you want my extra copy of Drunk, Divorced and Covered in Cat Hair? If so, leave a message and let me know, if more than one person wants it, I’ll put names in a hat and have the cats pick. If one person wants it, lucky them!

Somebody needs to stop me.

I don’t know if you’ve noticed but my personal links are growing a little bit out of control. Plus, thanks to a buddy I’ve just found a new site to be creepy about.

But what I’m really saying is that if you like to read, you should join and add me as a friend so I can look at the books you like and we can talk about books and how much we like them.

It’s kind of scary though. I wasn’t like this before. It seemed like the only thing ever on TV were stories about people, especially kids getting abducted or murdered because of posting too much crap on the internet. They had me freaked out man. I would watch shows on how to evade kidnappers. How if you flipped the lights off and on really fast it was a sign to neighbors that you were kidnapped and if someone grabs you that pulling away only makes them grab you harder- you’ve got to pinwheel that arm to get them to let go.

Yeah.

Then the past year or so I’ve signed up for all kinds of stuff, giving everyone who asks more than enough information than they’ve ever wanted to know about a stranger. Suck it proper decorum.

Boy and kitty together in harmony.

No, but really, if you join goodreads, let me know and we’ll have chats about books and things. Or we could just talk about books without a website-

What are you reading anyways?

Today I had to broach the subject of where my money was with my boss. (Since my direct deposit isn’t set up yet.) He showed me the magical money cabinet that I would never have known about had I not asked. No really, I had to go through the wardrobe into Narnia and success! money time. What can I say except:

Thanks for saying it for me Married to the Sea.

Stuff that makes me sad

Let’s start with the obvious:

Now that I work at a library it’s like “oh hey, I can check out any book I want to!” Plus since I’m there all the time, I can return them on time… although I don’t think it matters since (supposedly) I don’t get fined. Yeah right.

My copy of Little Women is so badly abused. The spine broke, pages are all shifted from where they’re falling out. Yet somehow the libraries copy has withstood the test of time? Jesus, I need to check myself. (Before I wreck myself. Word.)

What else makes me sad? Contests.

I entered two knitting contests this year. The first was earlier in the year, it was the knitty calendar contest.

(There was another photo I submitted, it’s around here somewhere…)

Yep, that’s Victoria from knitty. Those are from our wedding, in Hawaii. So, maybe they felt like I’d already won.

Cat hate.

This one also didn’t win! It was for the Crazy Aunt Purl sweater contest. However, it is chillin in the photo gallery for the contest, which if you haven’t checked out yet, you should. Although, it’ll take a while to go through. At least a loooot of people get to see it thanks to her gallery, which it hardly sees the light of day in my flickr.

Anyways, I don’t want to get myself down thinking about how I’m a total loser. Lame.

Oh great! Another downer. Garter stitch is getting me down man, it’s like… the man, man. Especially when you have to go out of your way to make it garter stitch. It’s one thing when it just happens naturally, you’re like alright, fine. Then when it’s time to actually knit one row, purl another to get the illusion of garter stitch it’s kind of like let’s smack this pony on the ass and giddyup. (To take a phrase from my dad.)

Also, I’m on dessert duty for Thanksgiving. Which is great because I love to bake (and never get to since someone doesn’t eat sweets. Or read this blog so my guilt trip will go unnoticed.) but at the same time… everyone wants pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving right? Nobody wants Thanksgiving muffins. So, I’m resigned, pumpkin pie. Maybe I could slip another dessert in without anyone noticing? Eh?

You know what doesn’t make me sad though? You. Leave me some love. <3