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Warming

That’s the post number. I totally missed post 666. Damn.

This week is supposed to be all about how old I’m getting and how you all should suffer for it. Or how you have avoided the cruelty and suffering because I took the week off from work and have holed up in front of my computer for the week or indulged my rare urge to spend like a Rockefeller and generally not thought about work. Or both. Sometimes I read too.

Then my employee resigned and I gave up two days of vacation in the middle of the week to nag him to document his work and to spend several frustrating hours with our job requisition software (that only an HR rep could love), losing what I typed every twenty minutes because the third-party software could not remember that I actually was logged in.

And J’s employer eliminated his job on Wednesday. Sort of. He still has work with his clients, but not with that employer (but w/o benefits). It’s complicated and too dramatic.

From χmas onward, I look forward to this one week a year when I have no real plans and what nebulous plans I do have are very flexible or forgettable. There is no planned travel. There are minimal appointments to meet. I only have to get up to feed the cat. I can stay up late (provided I still get up to feed the cat) or not. I can do chores or not. I can go somewhere or not. It is usually a week about nothing important. But not this year and I am not relaxed.

Next vacation: September.

At least the weather will be nice for biking this weekend.

Just what the hell is on the ceiling that the cat finds so fascinating?

Sunny, in the mid-sixties, with a cool breeze

This is the route of today’s bike ride—probably the last one of my 52^nd year, given the forecast for the next two days. The weather was near perfect, though I do like it when the wind is calm. While averaging 10.7 mph, it seems to me that I spent an inordinate amount of time waiting on stoplights.

My employee gave his two-weeks notice on Wednesday, leaving for a better opportunity. While I wish him luck, I’m a bit pissed about the timing. I’ve had to cut two or three days out of my week-long birthday vacation in order to catch up on all the tasks I’ve assigned to him over the past few years. It will be the first time in over twenty years I have worked any one day this week.

I used to take this week off to goof off and party in a very understated way, that is, with no one else. It was a good week to get a tattoo or piercing before summer. In some years I also took the week off to avoid biting anyone’s head off at work, particularly for the 39^th, 40^th, 45^th, 49^th and 50^th birthdays. Getting older makes me crabby. This year I just wanted to goof off alone and with J for a week. And with the loud and annoying Little Monster.

For some reason, the weather almost always seems to suck this week.

I’ve got an eye appointment on Monday and J is going with me to get new frames on Tuesday. I’m assuming that looking at frames on Monday with my eyes dilated will be less than optimal. I’m seriously considering changing frames for the first time in fifteen years or so. I’ve had three pair sequentially with the same frames. I’m not buying anything that makes me look older, though.

I’m probably picking up an iPad this weekend too. Or I might wait until next weekend and get the 3G model. But everyone says that 3G in NYC is a waste of money; you can never connect, so I might be getting WiFi sooner.

I’m working on a baby blanket for said soon-to-be-ex-employee. I thought I had a month or so to work on it, but now I have only a week. Wunderbar. I have also been swatching for J’s sweater. I’ve settled on a design, but I still need measurements.

One of the great tragedies of this life—that the men in the most need of a beating up are enormous. —The Palm Beach Story

ETA: It’s a screwball comedy, btw. Hilarious.

Cloudy, breezy and cool.

I got in 19¼ miles anyway.

Sunny, but cool. Not windy though, so it will be fine for biking.

You should have Queen stuck in your head now: “I want to ride my bicycle. I want to ride my bike.”

This thing is light and fast. I can lift it with one hand and biking into the wind requires nowhere near the effort needed on the old Raleigh street bike. I’m taking it out as soon as I finish this post.

I’m waiting for the yarn for J’s sweater, so I have only my office knitting on the needles now: a baby blanket knit in the round using Elizabeth Zimmerman’s formula of 7 paired yarn-overs every four rounds. The yarn is Fiesta Yarns Boomerang in Safari. In the picture I am switching from a 32″ circ to a 60″ circ; hence the two needles. The center was bit pointy and I too it out and reknit it. It still sticks up a bit and imay have to re-reknit it if it doesn’t flatten with blocking. [Ravelry ⇒]

Cool, supposed to rain soon.

I got two more yarns to swatch for J’s sweater, Debbie Bliss Fez and Tahki Yarns Tinka. The Tinka is unworkable. It is remarkably scratchy for merino and is a single ply that lost most of its twist as I knit it.

The Fez looks like a good candidate. It knit up well and looks good in both stockinette and double moss and J liked the fabric. The online reviews are generally favorable. If only Webs had shipped the brown skein I had ordered. I do need to see what it looks like.

I do not, I think, knit loosely, but every ball of worsted/aran weight yarn I’ve knitted lately has called for 8mm-10mm needles and has produced a loose, formless, snaggable fabric. I have gone down two or three needle sizes to get what looks to me to be sweater fabric. Have I turned into a loose knitter or did the gansey warp my perception or are these yarns expected to be loose?

Clear and cool

Well, at least that is done. Every year I wait until the penultimate day to do my taxes and, at least since I got this mortgage, I’ve gotten a refund. Still I procrastinate.

Jury duty was a wash. I did not get called and the Brooklyn Central Jury Room provides free wifi access. Only one other person was knitting. Everyone else was wasting his/her opportunity.

The three yarns I have tried out for J’s sweater so far have panned out. The Queensland Collection Kathmandu DK and the Lana Grossa Royal Tweed both were too rustic for what we both want in a sweater, but might make a nice winter cap.The Lana Grossa Cashtweed only produced an acceptable fabric on 4mm needles, instead of the recommended 6mm, and would have been prohibitively expensive, particularly relative to the gansey that I just finished. I’m waiting for a couple of yarns from WEBS that he might like the look of and I might tolerate knitting. If those don’t work then he gets to visit some more LYS’s.

And I’m waiting for a new bike to come in. I will be able to lift it with one hand. All drag contributed to my ride will be contributed solely by my excess avoirdupois.