7 things

OK, so I was sort-of tagged by sassenach for this meme, so here goes:

List/talk about 7 facts about yourself. Anything you find interesting that may come to mind. Tag 7 people and they have to blog about 7 things about themselves. Those tagged continue the chain by tagging 7 other people. Leave a comment on the tagged people’s blog so they know they are tagged and to read your blog.

1. I have a great fear of zombies, yet I own at least one such movie and make it a point to see movies featuring them. I know they are not real. But they scare the bejesus out of me way more than other horror movies. I was scared out of my mind at "28 Days" (yet I bought it on a super-sale at FYE), so why, oh why, did I go to "28 Weeks Later"?!
2. Speaking of fears ... here's a real one. I harbor a big fear of getting skin cancer. Relatives on both side of my family have had it. I try to wear sunscreen all the time, but I'm very bad at remembering unless I'm at the pool or beach.
3. I love LOLcats and lately LOLpresidents. Their ridiculous captions crack me up and I hope that in my caption-writing job I don't accidentally write one that says "President sez I can has handshake."
4. I know my yarn habit is getting bad when I thought about lying to my boyfriend as to the reason I had to get moving at a decent hour Monday morning. "I mean, I want to go running before it gets too hot out!" The guilt was too much, and I spilled the beans.
5. I went to a pre-school for the deaf, even though I could hear. I was one of only a few who could hear in my class, and I learned a lot of sign language, forgot it all, and learned a bunch more in college for an elective.
6. I am a weather fanatic - I check the weather weather.com at least three times a day - for dog-walking wardrobe consultation, work-wardrobe consultation and can-I-go-for-a-run-tomorrow-and-not-melt consultation.
7. I think I curse too much so I've started saying "dag nabbit" on a regular basis as a substitute. But I'm looking for other satisfying alternatives ... anyone??

I won't tag anyone in particular (except for Judy) ... but consider yourself tagged if you read this!

Let it be stated for the record

1. I hate traffic. Sitting in bumper to bumper traffic so people can peek at a fender bender irks me to no end.
2. I hate traffic on Interstate 264, the direct route to the Virginia Beach Oceanfront. There's a lot of heavy traffic at the junction with Interstate 64 ...
3. ... especially during tourist season. Which starts this weekend.


So why am I hopping onto I-264 on Memorial Day?
Ewe Knit Kits is having a huge yarn sale. I'm in no need of any yarn, but I'm arming myself with my list of knitting needle sizes and handy guides in case the urge strikes me. Which I'm sure it will. Come on now.

whew

I'm feeling inspired. I started training for a new duty at work tonight, and it was intimidating but very fun. I thrive on responsibilities, and this is a big one, but I am up for the challenge.

Aaaaaand my Yarn Pirate sock yarn in Daisy arrived a few days ago:

It is so gorgeous. I covet the Pretty Pirate yarn at her special-order sale going on right now, but I really can't be spending $26 a skein on any more yarn. I'm saving Daisy for once I get better at socks ... I found a relatively easy crocheted sock pattern online, so I'm hoping to take that up on my "weekend," which starts Thursday, with my green and blue Sockotta.

And I discovered this Flickr group - it is absolutely gorgeous. It looked oddly familiar, though. That's because I picked up that magazine (Spring 2006 issue of Interweave Crochet) last September when I was at Knitting Addiction in the Outer Banks. Score! So the Babette blanket is on my to-do list, for sure.

As for life outside of work and crochet? Eh. I'll keep busy with yarn, racquetball, Wii (I'm inching toward becoming a tennis pro) and long dog walks and hope the other facets of my life shape up soon.

Oh yeah ...
Exercise Hourlong walk with Gracie. We have had a string of gorgeous days lately - mid-70s, sunny. I love it.

rum raisin

Today has been really lovely, mostly because I started a new knitting project. Behold, the rum raisin scarf!


I'm loving the variegated yarn. I switched gears to a new project because I love the acid green scarf I'm working on, but I'm sick of not seeing much progress. This is nice chunky yarn and it works up really quickly. 16 stitch cast-on, then garter stitch on 10mm needles. Lauren will most likely be the recipient. I might even be able to eke two scarves out of the yarn, considering how little yarn knitting uses. I've got five skeins of it, I think.

I made garlic chicken and pierogies for dinner. It was divine.

Now it's time to return to my spot on the couch for more work on rum raisin. I'm partway through this week's episode of Lost ... will Charlie die? I hope not. He's my favorite Mancunian on TV!

the best one of the best ones

Man but the past few days have been great. On Friday, Josh took me to dinner at my new favorite restaurant and I had my second meal ever there - the Louisiana cajun pasta (in a lunch-sized portion, which was still huge - we were there at early-bird time, I guess). We weren't super hungry for cheesecake, though. We were in the mood for gore (!!!), so we saw "28 Weeks Later" and it scared the bejesus out of me, as I knew it would. Despite my poor sleep that night, it was a good movie.

And Sunday was fun ... we went to D'Egg for breakfast and while we waited for our food, we read the Sunday Times. Then at my place, he read some more while I took a few hours to edit some pages from our redesign guide. I love that kind of editing - little odds and ends here and there. It was so relaxing. I came home from work to find him playing Wii golf (oddly his Wii has lived at our house since he bought it last week), and we played more Wii for a few hours before sleep. It was really an unremarkable weekend, but it lovely and perfect to me.

P.S. Today I ran for the first time in a while. Granted, it was on a treadmill and it was a laughably short time, but I just felt like I needed to get something out of my system, and running was the only solution. On my way out of the gym, I stopped at the registration window and on a whim grabbed a class schedule. So tomorrow I'm signing up for a belly-dancing class. It will be good for me and build character, like Calvin's dad always says. I'm wondering whether I can convince any friends to sign up, but I think I might prefer to keep my flubbiness to myself and a bunch of strange women in a hourlong class each week.

P.P.S. The title of the post is from my new favorite song, thanks to the episode of "Scrubs" from May 3. It's cheesy but I love it. I'm surprised "Grey's Anatomy" hasn't picked it up yet.

Exercise: 15 minutes on the treadmill (run/walk), 20 minutes cycling

accountability

There's an easy solution to getting in shape/losing weight: eating less, exercising more. Yet why can't I just do that? I know there are no magic tricks. My friends and I have been going around about this for month: How can we accomplish this? I think my friends and I might be on the right track, though. Nick and I went to Cogan's last night, and over pizza (you don't have to say anything, I know it's bad), we talked about how when we were younger, we'd just go play frisbee outside. Or go roll down hills and ride bikes with friends. There didn't have to be some end goal, we'd just goof off. So maybe we need to make it a point to do that kind of thing now. I know, planning spontaneous exercise is kind of ridiculous. But maybe we should make an effort to go for a long walk around Ghent. Or play tennis at Fergus Reid. That kind of exercise is great, because it's fun, you're with friends, and you're accountable to other people. It's easy to skip the gym when you're not supposed to meet a friend there.

With that in mind, I'm going to try to put a little kicker at the bottom of each post with what I did that day to get moving. It'll keep me accountable to someone out there, even it's just typing it on the screen.

I haven't forgotten about my trip to South Carolina. I want to post about my trip-within-a-trip to Asheville, too.

Exercise: 2.3 mile walk with Gracie, 40-45 minutes (17:24-19:36 pace - it was pretty hot out)