Just another popularity contest...

So. I know that I've been whining a lot lately about being busy, and my show, and being chained to my sewing machine like a child laborer in a Nike sweat shop, and that's got to be getting repetative so I will stop now. Instead I will whine about Art Shows, and application deadlines and how it's really unfair that I have to spend so much time fucking around with slides and cameras and how even though it should be about the quality of your artwork, it really isn't. It's about how good of a photographer you can hire to shoot your photos for you (in my case, I can't even afford to hire myself...) and who you know and and...okay sorry.

But really. I just spent a week, more or less, running hither and thither borrowing cameras and equipment that I have no idea how to use so that I can take photos that are going to be projected up on a wall for about 5 seconds in front of a jury of people who don't know me, and who don't care about me, but never the less are going to decide my fate. And all the other photos that get projected up onto that wall will have been taken by professionals that the other artists hired to make there shit look better than mine. It'll be like going to the prom in a dress made by my crazy blind aunt instead of one that was bought off the rack at the department store that I can't even afford to go in, let alone shop at. It'll be like highschool all over again, and they won't see that I'm a good person, they're just going to judge me by my appearance and they're all going to hate me. And, and, and, adding insult to injury, I have to pay application fees for every show I want to try for. It's like the lottery.

Uhm. Sorry again. Maybe I'm a little tense. Maybe I should take a pill.

It's really much nicer in person. This photo is a little gritty, although much nicer than it would have been had I been on my own. Thanks much to Hippy-Jen who came down to the gallery yesterday and spent 3 hours helping me figure out how to photograph things that are under glass so that you don't have weird reflections on them....and then, after I tortured her for three hours, she bought me dinner. Gosh it's nice to have friends who don't back away from you saying things like "Just calm down Ragnar, you survived High School, you'll get through this. Why don't you sit down here for a second while I get the nice men in the white coats to put you in that nice padded room."

Ragnar...30 year old high school reject

Just when I think I'm getting tired of piracy...

I find out that I can coast in the wake of my neighbors wireless connection.

Arrgh!

That's right, when the wind is southernly, the sun is shining and the sails are at half mast I can just eek out enough signal to post a blog entry from the lazy boy in my livingroom. So far this has happened twice.

Just so you all know, I'm going to be shop sitting at Woven Art while Nancy is out of town, and I'd love to have company if anyone wants to come by and knit with me. I'm working Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Tuesday and the following Wednesday, so if anyone is in the neighborhood it would be nice to have knitting buddies.

And...the show is up. I spent last week sleeping until noon and doing all the domesticy bullshit that I didn't get to do while I was chained to the sewing machine. I baked bread. I made many tasty dinners. It was a lovely vacation, but I think I'm ready to face the studio once again.

I have no idea how long the wind will be blowing in the right direction for me to maintain signal strength so I'm signing off now, more experimentation is needed to find the exact angle for piracy....perhaps I'll become a more regular blogger!

Ragnar...signal pirate.

Stress Monkey....

I'm not sure why it is that no matter how much time I have to accomplish a given task, it is impossible for me to get anything done until the last 15 minutes. I scheduled this show about 8 months ago, and here it is, a two weeks before d-day and I am officially a stress monkey. You would think that I could create enough artwork in 8 months to fill a moderately sized gallery...and I half made a lot of stuff...but half made stuff doesn't really fly with gallery owners. They sort of like it to be finished, signed, and ready to hang. You'd think that these creative types would be a little more flexible, but no. I feel like I'm working in an art factory, because all of the fun creative stuff is done and all that's left is boring finishing stuff. Hard to get excited about sewing on binding for 8 hours a day.

But those deadlines are powerful strong motivators, and I'm supposed to start hanging quilts on walls during the first week of January, and I know that somehow it will all work out. The work is supposed to be hung by the first Sunday in January, but the "opening" or "reception" or whatever you want to call it (you know the day where I sit in the corner and drink wine and growl at people who want to ask me questions about "my work," why is it that all of the vocabulary words that are related to art are so damn pretentious?) isn't until February 4th, so you have plenty of time to come down and check it out.

And if you aren't interested in art, you could just come down and visit, since the "gallery" is also a "yarn shop," and isn't that a perfectly matched business pairing? I have a new "sort of job" if you can call hanging out in a yarn shop a "job," since isn't that what I would be doing anyway? Anyway, the owner is being nice enough to let me babysit her yarn once a week, so even if you could give a shit less about my "aahhhart" you could come by and keep me company on wednesdays and I will show you where all the most snuggleable yarn is. So clickety clickety, and the address is at the bottom of the page. Also, you'll notice that Fiona Ellis of "Inspired Cable Knits" is going to be coming....my heart is all aflutter.

Really I will post more often when stress monkey season is over....promise.

Ragnar...aaahhrtist daaaahhhling.

The ship's cat...

So you can't have a pirate ship without a cat, and apparently you can't have a blog without posting tons of pictures of your cat...hopefully doing cute things like playing with yarn or sleeping in strange poses. Therefore I am cementing my "blogger" persona by admitting that I actually own a cat. Her name is Splash...you know, like the sound a cat makes when you throw it overboard....nevermind.

The only problem is that she doesn't really do cute things. She sort of menaces in a feline sort of way. She has this vulture like posture, hunched up as if she's about to strike...and she has a strange affinity for anything that's made out of yarn. She doesn't play with yarn, barring the few times that she's turned the living room into a spiderweb by knocking balls of yarn off the table while we sleep our innocent slumber.


See? Here she is gaurding a pair of mittens.

Notice the look in her eye? The "these mittens? Maybe if you wanna trade me for that thumb you're not using..." look. If any knitted item lays in a horizontal position for more than about 30 seconds it has to be reclaimed from the beast.

Here's a little photo essay about the last sweater I knitted...those of you who want to see the sweater will have to visit it at the local yarn shop, as it's a sample for the class that I'm teaching there. (shameless plug, I wanted to call it "pimp your sweater but the proprietor thought that might give some of the white haired old ladies heart palpitaitions, so it's called "Increase your bling" or something like that, basically it's adding cables to things. You should all take it because cables are fun. end of shameless plug.)
Ooo...on that last one you can sort of see the skull and crossbones that I knit into the back so that everyone would know that the sweater was knit by a pirate. In retrospect it was amazing that I actually finished the sweater since I had to knit a row, move the cat, knit a row...and when the feline doesn't sit on my project she sits on my tools...

Okay, well, the last photo was of my cat laying on my needlecase, but blogger is a BOOGER and it won't upload. Grr. Is it any wonder that I never update my blog?

Ragnar, cat wrangler, blogger hater...

Knitting Evangelism

I have a deep and incurable character flaw. I think that not only is it possible for everyone to knit, but that they would be happier if they did, and I do everything in my power to bring the power of knitting to every man, woman, child and genetically modified animal with opposable thumbs that I encounter. I have considered making up "learn to knit" kits with cheap needles and little balls of yarn so that when people come up to me and say "I wish I could do that," I can whip them out and say "Well now you can!" In fact the only thing that has prevented me from going through with it is that I can't stand the idea of someone learning how to knit on crappy needles and I can't afford better. Maybe I should write to Scacel and tell them that I could supply them with an endless supply of new knitters if they would supply me with several dozen pairs of 16" #8 needles...no better not, they might take me up on it.

Anyway, I have a friend...let's call her the terminal non-knitter, who blurted out within 10 minutes of meeting me (in a bar...where I was knitting a baby sweater for the viking nephew) that she was "not a fiber arts kind of person." She then went on to describe all of her fiber arts mishaps, how she's only used a sewing machine twice but has managed to sew through her finger, and break a needle which hit her in the cheek an inch below her eye. And about the repeated attempts that her mother has made to bring her over into the ranks of the knit-enabled, and how she finally gave up saying "maybe you're just not cut out for this..." So I of course thought to myself..."we'll see, we'll see...I give you 2 months before you're begging for it."

She held out though 5 months into our friendship she still hadn't so much as picked up a ball of yarn. It wasn't until I got her really drunk and let her wear the dreadlock hat that she finally broke down and said: "so how hard is it to make one of these things." Before she could sober up/change her mind I whisked her over to the LYS and loaded her up with yarn and needles and started her on her first swatch.

It's been three weeks now, and she has three inches of ribbing on a circular needle that is going to start sprouting little i-cords at any moment. I don't have to tell you how proud I am, I'm sure you can see the sparkle in my eye. There is only one problem.

She's having so much knitting related stress that I'm worried about her health. I think she suffers from the notion that if she doesn't hold on to her needles as hard as possible that the whole thing will unravel into a tangled mess of yarn that looks like something the cat chucked-up, and so she gets hand cramps. She's having dreams about being chased by giant knitting needles that "keep doing the wrong thing." I told her to take her ribbing off the needles and try it on the other day and she nearly had a heart attack...two heart attacks really, one after I made a throw away comment about how I thought the work she'd done so far "looked a little big," and one as she was slipping the needles out seeing all the loose stitches hanging out looking oh-so-frightening and unravelable. I'm torn basically. It makes me all gooey to see someone working on their first project, but at the same time I'm questioning a basically held belief...that being that everyone's life would be improved with the addition of some wool and a pair of needles.

I'm giving her another month and if she doesn't relax, I'm taking the needles away.

Ragnar...knitting cult recruiter

Snakes on a hat...actual knitting, with pictures!!

So, I think I may have mentioned these hats that I've been making for a couple of years now...the neigh upon unwearable dreadlock hats? I think my obsession with dreadlocks stems from the fact that I could never actually commit to such a lifestyle changing hairdo..but they look so damn cool! So instead I wear strange hats. Like this..see? Oooo...Ragnar what long eyelashes you have....are you wearing mascara? The better to look in the photoshoot my dear. What photoshoot is that Ragnar? Well you see, I get so many comments (some of them even positive) when I wear the medusa/ravergrrl/dreadtastic hats that I decided I would write up the damn pattern and submit it for publication in an online knitting magazine...which will not be named here. It will not be named because in spite of the fact that I even wore make-up for the photoshoot (thanks very much to hippy-Jen for the fabulous photos) I received a very gracious "thanks but no-thanks" from the editor yesterday, and this is not a slam on knitty (oops!) post, 'cause they can pubish what they like, right? But the fact remains that I have now written a pattern for this neigh upon unwearable hat, and have to decide what to do with it.

This first thing that I realized is that since I don't follow patterns I have no idea how to write patterns, so I have no idea if this hat is actually knitable, or if I just have made so many of them at this point that I could make them in my sleep. So....anybody want to be a pattern tester? I've taught several people how to knit with this as their first project, so I don't think it's that hard, basically I just want to know if my instructions make sense, and if all the decreases line up in the right spot, etc.
And if you have any plane trips coming up soon you can knit it on the plane, and then you'll have snakes on a hat on a plane.....ooooooooo.

Ragnar...as yet unpublished.

Obligatory TLPD Post...

Regardless of how we here at Domestic Piracy (oh wait, that would be "me here at Domestic...yada yada.") feel about International Talk Like a Pirate Day (can we say crass commercialism? we can but it wouldn't really be appropriate) it seems like a shame to let it slide by without running my mouth about it.

First of all, if you live under a rock, September 19th is International (I think they're one lonely guy in Sweden wearing an eyepatch and swilling grog) Talk Like a Pirate Day. Which means that you're supposed to say "arrr" a lot, and "shiver me timbers" and "avast ye scurvy lubber, give way or I'll tie ya to the mizzen mast with yer grannies garters..." etc. etc. But really, it's like that "everyday is earthday" bull pucky that I've been subjected to lately since I am visiting Boulder Colorado, mecca of the granola crunching universe:

If ye be a pirate, then every day be talk like a pirate day matey, 'cause everything you say IS SAID BY A PIRATE, right? Damn skippy. Or rather, "ye bet yer black piratical soul it be, or ye can call me nancy and keel haul me like the lubber I arrrr."

And pirates don't say "arr." They say "Outta my way you useless waste of space..." oh sorry, I'm looking forward to this afternoon when I will be rushing from one end of the Dallas/Fort Worth International airport in an attempt to catch my plane back to Lansing with only 50 minutes of layover to spare....yes I will be talking like a pirate in three different states today.

And like Andi said in the comments: Check out the Harlot, who as always, has her finger on the pulse of the knitting nation. Can I just say that I had the idea for making skull and cross bones argyle last year sometime? I'm just happy to see that someone isn't a lazy grog swilling excuse for a piratical knitter (point finger at self Ragnar) and gets off their ass to make these dreams a reality.

Ragnar....I be in Colorado now matey, but I be in Texas in 4 hours and then I be home lateish tonight...I'm not sure if I'm thankful that I get to spread the pirate love around today, or pissed that because of the time changes my Talk Like a Pirate Day is going to be 2 hours shorter than everyone elses....

Ice...Cream? Fruit?

So I invented a new food product.

Okay, maybe "invented" is sort of misleading, come to think of it, I'm sure that it's not really new either...but it is definitely food. So anyway...here's the story.

A friend gave me her old food processor (yay!) and Manimal...who has an unnatural aversion to "counter" based appliances pronounced a jihad against it. Actually I think he walked into the kitchen and saw it sitting on the counter in it's cute little "cuisenart" cozy, and said something like "what the hell is that doing on our counter?" while making some sort of complicated hand gesture meant to ward off evil. Of course by this time I had a full blown crush and would not be separated from my new true love, and I started making bizarre promises that I had no intention of keeping...namely that if I could keep the Cuisenart I would get rid of the blender (I know, what the fuck was I thinking?) and before I could hide the blender in the basement he had thrown it in the garbage! (I know...I know...)

So anyway, I was in the "look I can make hummus in 5 minutes" honeymoon phase, and I must confess that I wasn't missing the blender that much until Rat Girl asked me to make her a smoothy. Huh...a smoothy you say? Sure, why not.

So I threw the frozen fruit into the food processor and hit the "on" button. (none of this prissy "frappe" bullshit for my new baby, oh no, it's "on" or nothing bitches!) and I was getting ready to pour in the soy milk...because the blender required lots of extra liquid in order to reduce the frozen fruit to that sippable texture...but instead the miracle machine reduced that fruit to littly itty bitty pieces of...well frozen fruit...and I added a teeny tiny bit of lemon juice and a ittle bittle bit of honey....and hit that "on" button again and those itty bitty pieces of frozen fruit turned into this thick...creamy ...ice cream looking stuff. It was amazing. So I told rat girl that she had to eat her smoothy with a spoon.

Then I pulled all the frozen fruit that I had out of the freezer and made quarts and quarts of this amazing stuff. I swear it's just like ice cream except that the only thing in it is fruit! (and a teeny little bit of honey, which is natural and therefore good for you) So it's healthy.

So in summary:
Take frozen fruit, and put it in the food processor.
Hit "on"
Add lemon juice and honey (or agave necter if yer one o' them vegans I dun heard tell about) to taste
Hit "on"
Eat it out of the bowl of the food processor, or pack it into old yogurt containers and pack it in the freezer to eat whenever you want ice cream. 'Cause it's fruit! Which is good for you!

Mango and cantaloupe makes a really good combo.
Actually, melon makes a very good base for other flavors since it's not as sweet and has a flavor that combines well with other fruit.

Enjoy! And let me know if you come up with any amazing flavor combinations.

Ragnar...don't come between me and my Cuisenart.

Techno-wiz...

Oh yeah baby, I have defeated the bloody minded cellular device, thus proving once again that I am more stubborn and pigheaded than a piece of plastic...and just to prove it...here's an image to haunt your dreams at night...



See! I can make the phone cough up the pictures.

I was going to celebrate by publishing that project that I alluded to last week, or you know whenever I blogged last (I think it was chiseled on a stone tablet...), but it involves about 20 pictures and blogger (booger...) is being it's irritating self, and I've just spent about an hour trying to wrestle in into submission. It resists! Oh how it resists. I can master the cellphonic device but blogger, oh no, that would be too easy.

Oh sure, now it works! Damn the man. Anyway, that's the tote bag that I was going to show you all how to make, but it's bloggers fault that I'm not publishing it today. It's my fault that it's a crappy out of focus picture though.

Ragnar....passive aggressive

Apologies, lame excuses etc.

Believe it or not I think about updating the old bloggerino all the time. Something interesting will happen and I'll think to myself: "the bleaders would love this." But then for whatever reason I don't make it to the computer in time and then something else happens and I figure I'll just add it together and then by the time I actually sit down to type, I've got this list of things and the post turns out like those "and then I, and then we, and whatabout the time..." things that I dispise, so I delete the whole thing. So...sorry about that.

But but look! I've been being a productive member of society! Really. And they even spelled my name wrong so it won't wreck my ungoogleability...check it out. So in spite of the (admittedly rather snide) comments I made about artists being unmanagable etc, the Art Party went off fairly smoothly. Smoothly enough that we will be doing another one. Anyone who finds themselve in Lansing on the first weekend of November is welcome to attend or participate.

Other minor developement. I am the owner of a spanky new cell phone that takes pictures and plays MP3's and I think it washes dishes and feeds the cat too but I haven't figured out those functions yet.

So I had a "project" sort of post, a "how to make a nifty totebag," post, a bribe to the blog gods. However I am unable to use the library computer for this since it requires an admin password in order to install new software and so I can't actually get the pictures on to the blog...but never fear! I will find a USB port and I will upload by god.

And since this is already shaping up to one of those "random" entries: my ten words or less review of "dead man's chest" (subtitle, "Johnny Depp, the manliest pirate ever to swish across the quarter deck wearing more eyeliner than I did in my sullen teen years.")

Best movie ever. Period. Absolutely fabulous, couldn't have been better.

Uh...yeah, I was sort of drinking rum, so that may be a slightly biased review.

But I do have to say something, and this may sound like a critizism, but it's not really since as I've already said: best movie ever made. But if you haven't alreay seen it (and if you haven't then what the hell are you doing reading a pirate blog?) then stop reading now because I'm about to give away a minor plot detail.

I couldn't help but notice that when the crew of the black pearl (purl?) was hanging over the bottomless ravine, in two cages made from the bones of their former crewmates, that all the "international" pirate were in one cage and all the "angloish" pirates were in the other. And when there are two cages hanging in a ravine it is inevitable that one of those cages will fall, sending the pirates within to a messy, squishy death on the bottom of the bottomless ravine. And of course this was the cage with the swarthy internationals...leaving the crew of the Black Pearl, with a lot less blacks, not to mention asians. And I know this is a Disney flick (and don't think that doesn't make my heart ache) and I know that I should expect these things...but if I hadn't had a mouthful of rum at the time I would have lept to my feet and shouted "that is so lame! you should be ashamed of yourselves!"

But don't let that spoil it for you...like I said, best movie ever!

And as soon as I can find a USB port that doesn't require administrator clearance, I will post a cool project for you all, deal?

Ragnar...technophobe, and pirate propagandist.

and PS, I can't run spell check on the library computer either...so you'll just have to take me as I am...niegh upon illiterate.

Daughter creature

I think I've outed myself as a "bad parent," and it's probably been noted that I eschew (actually...I just really wanted to use that word) the normal affectionate knicknames (sweetie, honeybun, little brat) and favor ones that have a little bit more color, i.e. rat girl, punk rock squirrel, fink, etc. If you don't have children let me assure you that this is normal and justified behavior. However, I find myself wondering more and more often if I don't have this parent/child thing a little reversed.

I haven't seen the daughter creature in a month or so (I didn't misplace her or antyhing, we have split custody and she's been at her "real" mother's house), and the first thing that we did when she got back was go to weed my garden. "Do you ever weed the garden when I'm not here to remind you?" was daughter creature's first comment.

"It's not a garden, it's an oxygen farm." I muttered.

"I think that if we weed a little bit everyday then we can get this done by the time I go to Canada with Grandma, I'm thinking maybe half an hour everyday," she says in such a reasonable tone of voice that I can't find anything to argue with.

"Grumble grumble, okay, I guess." says me.

"In fact, I think I'm going to write you up a schedule for when I am in Canada. You can check off every day after you do your garden chores, and then when I get back I'll be able to check and make sure you did it."

"Seems like that would take all the fun out of it, grumble grumble."

She just had her ninth birthday, and she seems determined to skip the whole "tween," "teen," phase and go straight to middle age.

"So what do you want to do today." I asked after she woke me up this morning.

Giving me an evil look she said, "You know what we have to do today, you can't get out of it that easily, we have to weed the garden."

Little tyrant. She also makes me go for walks. She's a short, bossy, nine year old life coach, and after she's done turning me around we can rent her out by the hour.

Ragnar...no longer captain of this here pirate ship.

Like herding cats...

I am taking this working artist thing fairly seriously...okay, maybe not that seriously, but I am trying to take it seriously, is that good enough? I mean I have to have the occasional week where I sleep in until noon and realize at 4:00 that I'm still wearing my pajamas, if I don't act unemployed they might take away my benifits! But the rest of the time I'm really really trying to be an "artiste." Really. That's why I have a studio.

There is a couple that has their studio in the same building as I do, and we are organizing an open studio/art party/grand opening celebration for the 15th of July (consider yourself invited, I'll send you a map), and we are trying to get as many other artists involved as possible, because it is a sad fact of life in this town that people don't give a shit. The only people who will attend are our friends, and our friends don't have money to buy art...because otherwise the already would have right? But if we get other artists involved then their friends will come too, and we still won't sell any art, but at least we won't be sitting around twiddling our thumbs and getting skunked off of the obligatory boxed wine that must be served at an art opening.

Part of being a professional artist is being a big poopy head pessimist. Sorry about that, fact of life.

So anyway, I've been trying to round up some artists. If there is one thing we have a surplus of in this town, it's artists. You would think that the word "show" would be the magic bullet. Isn't that what all artists want? Some where to show? I mean, you're definately not selling any art when it's in a box under your bed, are you?

But here's another sad fact about artists. They don't want to do your show, they want to do their own show. I suppose that's what makes us artists isn't it? After all, if we worked well with others we would still have our crappy office jobs. Sigh.

Ragnar...art wrangler.

Mark of the beast, dude.

So how oblivious am I? When a friend asked if I had seen any of the undead walking the earth today I said "Huh?" And (with a note of incredulity in her voice) she said "Uh, yeah, it's the sixth day of the sixth month of the sixth year...666, mark of the beast?"

So, yeah, that slipped under my radar...I am a recovering goth girl remember? Although this is a serious enough lapse that perhaps I should say that I am fully recovered goth girl and go out and buy myself something pink and frilly....shudder.

How am I spending this holiest of evil-dead holidays? Well, I took the van to the alignment shop and dealt with a mechanic, surely one of Satan's minions made flesh...although this one seemed very nice. Then I tried to get approved for a car loan, since the SAAB is bleeding me dry, and the demons of the banking world didn't quite laugh in my face...but I did detect some off stage snickering, can you blame them really? I mean, I am unemployed, and my checking account is currently overdrawn, I couldn't exactly tell them I was good for it. And now I am at the library returning overdue books (probably not the what the demon of the black pit would do), and of course my least favorite librarian is working...but I don't think I can accuse her of being from the devil....which probably means I can't exorcise her, unfortunately.

What is the difference between exorcise and exercise anyway? From now on when I tell people that I am going to the gym to exercise, in my head I will be thinking exorcise.

However, I did decide which knitting project would be most suitable to work on while sitting on the porch and waiting for the sky to turn black and the rain of hellfire to begin. Yes! The lace socks! There is nothing in my knitting bag that even approaches the evil potential of the undead-lace socks. I tried to smother them in my knitting basket. I even started working on a blanket, a blanket! with which to suffocate the bastards...or rather, bastard, since I'm only half way through the first one...but they refuse to die! Or even dye...did I mention that they are pink, purple and green?

Is there some alternative yarn demension where everything you frog lives on? A dimension filled with miscounted lace, dropped stitches, and ill fitting sweaters? If there is, then there is a pink, purple and green lace sock there which would make a resonable leg warmer for an elephant, no doubt it will be even larger by the end of 06-06-06.

Ragnar...knit evil.

Mishmash

Got lots of stuff to blog about so hold onto your boxer shorts.

First of all, I had a birthday, it was yesterday, it was my third annual 30th (shut it Adrien-Alice, some secrets are best kept secret). I'm going to keep on turning 30 until I get good at it and then I'll probably start working on 50.

Second of all Adrien-Alice (who has known me since I was a wee leetle grass hopper, and thus knows far too much about me) came to visit and help with the pirate party. She held up well considering that the visit probably felt something like this: "Look! this is my daughter/garden/studio/fucked up ghetto house/favorite coffee shop/etc." It is good to have friends with patience and wit.

Third of all: Pirate Party. Make note for next year, all guests should be searched for edged weapons before being allowed to consume alcohol, even Machetes that are "too dull to cut butter." The evening ended with Yammer throwing sticks of butter into the air and attempting to slice them mid-drop...but as we mentioned the weapon in question was rather dullish, so there was more smearing than slicing...yikes. Also, the party was rather glam thanks to a care package from a friend who works at a Costume company, and included about 15 pairs of false eyelashes (mine were black with red beads on them...so chic!). I noticed many cameras being passed around and have let it be known that I expect copies so perhaps we will have a special "illustrated" version of the blog sometime.

Forth of all I have resolved to reduce my consumption of alcohol. This is sort of like a new years resolution, but since I am a self centered sort of pirate, my new years start on my birthday. I would appreciate any support you'd like to offer...especially since there is a lot of rum in my pantry just begging to be made into Mojitos.

Fifth of all that knitting content I promised you last week:

As you may recall I am attempting the "Celtic Icon" sweater from "Inspired Cable Knits." I swapped a cable pattern from Elspeth Lavold's "Viking" book so I am calling it the "Vicon" sweater, which could be described as "Inspired by Inspired Cable Knits." This is the biggest and most important thing I've ever knitted. This sweater has to be my favorite sweater and I have to wear it every single day until it falls apart, so I am getting a little whacky about it. How whacky? Well, I knit a front, a sleeve and one side so that I could baste the whole thing together and try it on to insure the perfect fit, then I reknit half of the front and had to recalculate the entire back panel because I put extra cabling on the back thus reducing the gauge even further...madness! The completely bizarre thing is that I am loving it! I get out my little scraps of paper with crossed out measurements and random numbers (is that my bust measurement or the number of stitches in a side panel? Hmm...) and figure stuff out and knit and frog and knit again, and I'm in heaven. In fact I have run out of yarn and have been drop spindling like mad (and who ever thought I would do that again, after the wheel moved into the house, not I!) so that I can knit the left side, sleeve and hood.

I think I'm a sweater person. I'm not sure how I feel about this.

And last but not least (and I'm sorry this is so mishmashy) I'm leaving you with a recipe for the best cocktail in the world...which I will be drinking a lot less of now that I am a (relatively) sober adult.

Mojitos....simply the best thing to drink, ever.

Put 1/4 of a lime (sliced into several pieces) and 10-20 mint leaves (about three stalks worth) in the bottom of a tall glass (pint sized rather than hi-ball) and "muddle" them (that is to say "crush") until the limes have been juiced and the mint leaves are bruised. If you don't have a muddler you can use a wooden spoon. Then add approximately a jigger (3 ounces, or two shot glasses) each of simple syrup (equal parts water and sugar, heated until all the sugar is dissolved and then chilled) and rum and a shot (1.5 ounces) of lime juice, fill the rest of the glass with club soda and stir. Serve iced. You can of course adjust any of those amounts based on your personal taste, and if you're turning over a new leaf, like I, and are going to try life on the wagon (shudder) you can drink them without the rum.

Ragnar...older than I've ever been.

Certified!!

What? It's not enough to have a blog, now I have to update it as well?

I'm at Jiggy's house, I'm supposed to be kegging beer for the pirate party (5 days, panic panic), but the lure of a computer with internet is impossible to resist...so here I am.

So you can probably tell by the fact that I have a blog, and the fact that I am obsessed with skulls and wear black all the time, that I am a total nerd. I come by it naturally though, I've been a nerd for most of my life. When I was in Jr. High, a friend and I convinced the school administrators that rather than going outside for recess, that we should be "allowed" to hang out in the Library and reshelf books...does it get more geektastic than that? I think not. There is a point to this though.

Point: as the certified nerdling that I was/am I devoured the Hitchhiker's Guide books when I was younger, my parents even bought me the set of tapes of the BBC broadcast version. And since, as a nerdling, I considered myself an outsider and a loner, my favorite character was...Marvin! The paranoid android. For those of you who are not nerds (and what are you doing reading blogs if you aren't?) Marvin is like the Eeyore of the Sci-fi genre, one of his big lines was "I'll just sit in the corner and rust." But wait there's a point to this.

Point: as one of the great unwashed it's my responsibilty to "certify" my continued unemployment every other week by calling the Michigan Automated Voice Response Interactive Network...and if you follow the capital letters you'll see that it's my old buddy! I call, Marvin answers and says "welcome to the Michigan Automated Voice Response Interactive Network, you can call me Marvin." And if that guy had a British Accent I would have sworn they hired the actor who played Marvin for the BBC. Then I have to certify...basically tell them that I'm still unemployed, by pushing "1" for yes and "9" for no. It's the most surreal thing I've ever done in my life...but two days later I get a check!! Freaky...but my love of the Paranoid Android has been repayed after all these years.

And "certify" cracks me up as well. It makes me think of those evangelical church services where everyone is supposed to testify about their faith in the lord.

Oh Marvin! I certify Marvin! I certify! I am able to work, I am willing to work! Marvin! Ain't no body offered me work, and I ain't refused no work. Send me that check!

Of course there's always certified, as in certifiable, as in insane.

Ragnar...certified knitting content next week I promise, the saga of the Vicon sweater, in all it's sordid glory.

Confessions of a bad parent

First a little house keeping and then I'm going to tell an excruciatingly cute story about the daughter creature (fair warning).

I want to thank Kendra (sorry Kendra, I've got no bookmarks anymore and I can't find your blog!), Inky, Imbrium and Beverly for the mail! I have responses written and have been carrying them around in my purse waiting for the postage fairy to come and put stamps on them, but I hear that the postage fairy makes the same rounds as the unemployment check fairy, so I expect to see her little winged self sometime around next Wednesday.

Thanks especially Inky for the pirate bandages (I'm hoping for a paper cut, but if I haven't got one before the pirate party (in 10 days! panic) I will wear one anyway), Beverly for the fabric featuring Kiwi birds (only from New Zealand, who knew there was such a thing?) and Imbrium for saying that I was wickedly funny (I feel warm and fuzzy!).

Now...for those of you who feel the vomit rising at the mere mention of cute stories about children, consider this your final warning.

I suffer from Bad Parent syndrome, or perhaps Naughty Parent Syndrome would be more accurate. I get an unholy amount of fun out of tormenting poor daughter creature with false or misleading information. For instance: count day. This is a manditory attendance day because it's when the school district notes the number of students in a school and sends out those big checks. Much noise is made about count day, and there are posters and announcements for months reminding you not to get deathly ill, or end up in the hospital or anything. I told her, with a perfectly straight face, that count day had been rescheduled because they lost count and had to start over again.

This pales in comparison to some friends of mine who told their daughter that "Santa Claus bites," so don't look at me like that. They have a picture of their daughter sitting as far away from Santa as possible while still technically being on his knee.

But why am I writing about this? Because I feel like I might have gone too far, specifically in the matter of the "swirly."

You probably already know what a Swirly is, but just in case there are some people who were home schooled or something I will define it. A swirly is when you hold someone upside down, dunk their head in a toilet and flush...thus causing their hair to swirl around their heads. Voila, a swirly. It's right up there with wedgie in the lexicon of modern American English.
Daughter Creature heard me tell someone that I was going to give them a Swirly, and she said "I want a swirly!" "No, you can't have a swirly, maybe after you clean your room." "Okay!" and off she ran to clean her room.

I didn't give her one of course, being dunked in our toilet probably qualifies as some sort of biological torture, but neither did I tell her what it was. How could I ruin the fun (for me) by explaining it? Is there anything funnier than an eight year old who stamps her foot and shouts "I won't clean my room unless you give me a swirly," or begs "Please please please can I have a swirly? I've got all my homework done."

But here's my fear. Someday she's going to run into someone that really will give her a swirly...so how far do I let this go before I break down and tell her...and how do I tell her? After more than a year of holding out the swirly as a possible treat (I think she envisions it as some sort of extra special smoothie) how do I tell her that it's really all about beind dunked in a toilet?

Ragnar...the worst, just the worst.

Scientific Discovery

Yeah yeah, long time no bloggy, thirty lashes with some hand-spun linen rope, and on to more important things: namely being the discovery of a new kind of human. Well not new, just new to me. I had read about them, but I never suspected that they actually existed. This new type of human? This deserves Caps lock, but I hate Caps lock, so just read it in a Vince Price type doom and gloom sort of voice: The Used Car Salesman.

Yes, it never rains but it pours, lose your job? The exhaust system is certain to fall off of your rediculously expensive to repair import car the very next day...or you know, a week later. So after hooking up the SAAB's monetary IV directly to my bank account and allowing it to suck a few hundred dollars out into a temporary exhaust system repair, Manimal and I decided that although the SAAB is cute, and has my pirate stickers on it, and is an irreplaceable shade of pea green, it's day has passed. It is time for me to get a new "old" car in which to haul my shite around the town.

We found our selves pulled, as if by some magnetic force, into the Used Car Lot. This is what you do if you want to encounter your very own Used Car Salesman: park the rather rusty, distinctly disreputable Green Swedish Piratemobile next to the largest and shinest SUV on the lot and wait 22.4 seconds for the "Used Car Salesman" to scent his prey. I would describe him but the only impression I have is of a very pink oxford cloth shirt and big white teeth that seemed to take up his whole face.

What are us folks looking for today? That's a good question. My fantasy car is a late 70's vintage diesel Benz station wagon, perferably in a ridiculous color. I'm also partial to the old mail jeeps with the steering wheel on the right side (or the wrong side as it were), and the old International "Scout." How does one express that to a pink shirt with lots of shiney teeth? One stands back and allows the Manimal to list things that make the Used Car Salesman's brow furrow furiously as he attempts to figure out just who the hell these people are. What are you driving now? he wonders, thinking this might give him an idea of what sort of freaks he's dealing with. Ah...freaks that would drive a pea green SAAB...with pirate stickers on it. Somehow he works into the conversation that he once saw the Ramones in concert....apparently people who drive pea green SAAB's have been known to like the Ramones (okay...so I do, shut up!). I am inclined to disbelieve him, even though his teeth seemed sincere, since if this man had ever been in the same zip code as the Ramones there would have been a matter-meets-antimatter type anihilation and the crater would still be a tourist attraction to this very day.

When he found out we didn't own a television he said "I love it, I love it, you guys are like...whatchamacallit...throw backs." Used Car Salesmen never say "What are you, fuckin nuts?" They always say "I love it, I love it." I have a sticker on the back window of my two door, hatchback, that says "Swedish Sport Utility Vehical." This is obviously a joke, but the Used Car Salesman? He "loves it."

On another lot with a different Used Car Salesman (I know, two in one day, it should be on one of those nature programs that I don't watch because I'm a throw back with no TV Set) I actually test drove something. This UCS had less teeth, but a rather disturbing habit of laughing at his own jokes, Ha ha, ha ha, heh heh, hmm....and then looking at us with sort of a "get it?" glint in his eye. No, we didn't get it....I guess I just don't understand jokes about Subwoofers. Anyway, the test drive...after asking me if I used to be Goth because of the expression on my face in my driver's license photo (No, I just didn't look enough like a serial killer in the first one, so I asked them to retake it) he encouraged me to "have fun." Having fun apparently means driving fast, since he kept telling me to squeal the tires, and when we pulled out next to a sporty red Corvette he leaned across me and yelled at the driver "You got beat by a KIA! Take that Corvette!"

So here's my "way to have fun" while not spending any money since the unemployment checks haven't started rolling in yet. Go and find yourself a Used Car Salesman, and see just how long they will put up with your shit. Answer...forever. As long as you keep looking at cars and acting like you have a down payment burning a hole in your pocket they will keep trying to figure you out. Plus you get to test drive things, take that Corvette!

Ragnar...yeah, I've become a once a week blogger.

On knitting while walking

I own this little piece of plastic that will magically allow me access to "the gym." The Gym is a mystical place full of rather frightening looking machinery that's supposed to turn me into a super model...er...super pirate...uhm, yeah. So far though it hasn't worked. The problem seems to be that you can't just own the card, you actually have to go and use the magical, mystical, frightening equipment.

Instead of using my special piece of plastic I "walk." I walk anywhere that's less than three miles away, and in this town that's most places. Walking provides me with transportation, an excuse for not going to The Gym, and also fills up that void that some people fill up with television and other people fill up with meditation...the staring off into nothing void. Basically walking is a good thing.

Actually the only problem with walking is that it takes time, sometimes lots of time, valuable time that could be taken up with knitting...you see the problem? So I decided to start knitting while I walk. Yup. I'm the freak that you see walking around with a ball of yarn in the pocket of her hoody squinting at whatever's on the needles, bumping into things and basically causing traffic problems where ever she goes.

These are the things that I've noticed about walking and knitting. First of all, I walk a lot slower when I'm knitting. A former 40 minute walk now takes about an hour. Second of all, traffic is a good thing. Waiting at a stop light for the traffic to clear gives you a chance to look back and see if you've dropped some stitches or miscrossed your cables etc. And Thirdly...parking lots are really scary places full of people who are almost as oblivious as I am.

If you are going to attempt walking and knitting do it someplace that you've walked many times before, someplace where you know all the bumps in the sidewalks and which driveways contain crazy teenagers who are likely to zoom out without looking at what's behind them. And don't try to fool yourself into thinking that knit-walking is exercise because you walk so slowly that your metabolism probably slows down...if you want to be a super pirate you still have to go to The Gym...or I could try running and knitting? Knitting marathons? Miles per inch?

Ragnar...see I didn't talk about unemployment at all, even though I'm at the library printing out my resume.

Not what I should be doing

First of all I am not supposed to be blogging right now, I am actually supposed to be writing my resume, but shush. I just had a realization that I wanted to share.

Realization:

I have not yet missed a “normal” blogging day. Monday thru Thursday bloggety with a long weekend. See! I’m not so bad.

Second of all, I am totally stressed out for no reason. I think it’s because I don’t believe that this is really happening yet, the whole not having to go to work but instead fumbling around with a new bureaucracy that I have yet to fathom thing. I got a call from “work” a few minutes ago and when I recognized the number my first reaction was “Shit, what did I do?” Answer being nothing, because I don’t “do” anything there anymore. They wanted me to return my key (which I was planning on doing on Wednesday when I go to pick up my last paycheck anyway, so nyah). That doesn’t seem natural does it? To have heart palpitations when someplace you don’t work anymore calls you?

The other possible reason for stressed outness is that I have a writing assignment. You’ve probably noticed that I don’t have a problem with “writing” per se (you do tend to go on and on don’t you Ragnar?) but it’s all that propaganda that I had drilled into my by the career councilors at University. All that “your resume is you” and “the average employer only looks at a resume for 10 seconds” stuff. I’m not very good at condensing…or completing assignments in a timely fashion come to think of it. Also the two crutches of my writing style are frowned on in resume writing, those being superfluous ellipses (…) and random (misplaced) parentheses…

On the other hand, I mentioned to FWI that I would be hogging his computer today and when I got here I found that he had made me my own personal playlist with Slayer and Rasputina and all sorts of other “resume writing” music…isn’t that sweet? Although the only thing in the house to drink is pink wine in a box, but I suppose one isn’t really supposed to get soused while working on one’s resume is one?

Are you all thoroughly sick and tired of the Ragnar as Unemployed topics yet? I am. No more unemployed shit for the rest of the week. I was going to write about the Andy Goldsworthy show that I went to this weekend, but somehow my train of thought was hijacked by that “work” phone call.

Andy Goldsworthy…I have such a crush on that guy. If I lived in Scotland and he wasn’t married (and I wasn’t madly in love with my Manimal) I would totally stalk him, or place personal ads like “Nature lover seeks rugged middle aged artist for long walks on the beach, building things out of moss and piling of rocks into interesting shapes.”

Ragnar…I am more than my (unwritten) resume.

Forget all the nasty things I've said about Blogger

Because evidentally they employ wizards who can find "disappeared" posts in the ether of the blogosphere.

Finally have all unemployment things filed...somehow the State Of Michigan has figured out a way to print 4 extra pages for every page that they required me to print off their website so now I own several blank pieces of paper that either have Michigan letterhead, or the Unemployment Agencies web address on them...at 10 cents a page no less. I'm unemployed! I can't afford that! Oh well, whatever.

My parents will be here in an hour and a half...I must go home and freak out at the dust maggots.

What are you doing here you dust maggots? Didn't I tell you to get out of here? You're not welcome around here. I swept you like 6 months ago, don't you know how to take a hint?

Ragnar...paying for internet.