One thing about blogging – it allows us to document and share all sorts of ephemera that would otherwise slip away unnoticed by anyone else. Sometimes that might be for the best, but usually, it’s those fleeting glimpses into your lives that really help me feel close to all of you. Hopefully that isn’t just me! 
Allow me to present the Stumbling Over Chaos “But since I wasn’t blogging then…” contest. Think of something that happened before you started blogging, something that, had you been blogging, you would have shared with us. Describe that event in a comment to this post before 5 pm CDT (ack!), Monday, March 19. (If you don’t blog, this contest will be particularly easy!)
What? You want me to start? Ok. Back when the Chaos Kitty was a wee kitten (only about 8 pounds or so, instead of the strapping 16 pounds he is now), he started to climb my long summer weight bathrobe (made from a nice textured t-shirt material), which was hanging on the back of my bedroom door. It was winter or early spring, so I wasn’t wearing that bathrobe and didn’t pay any attention to it. After the weather started to warm up, I pulled the bathrobe from its hook to discover that it was now a swiss cheese style bathrobe! Apparently, when an 8-pound kitten repeatedly climbs stretchy, lightweight fabric, there are dire consequences for said fabric. My poor bathrobe suddenly wasn’t good for covering much of anything and I had to throw it away. Now, if I had been blogging back then, I would’ve thoroughly documented this (although I would’ve been dressed underneath the robe, sheesh), as I have documented other tales of Chaotic naughtiness, but since I wasn’t blogging then…
And since I wasn’t blogging back during the memorable summer that I went on over 30 coffee dates (oh, the magic of internet dating… heh), you’ll all just have to wonder what the blow by blow on that would’ve been like. A hint – I went on maybe two second dates and no third dates. The tagline for my blog? Not joking!
Anyway. Winners will be selected by random number and there will be an assortment of prizes. No non-knitters will be forced to take yarn, unless, of course, they’re interested in learning to knit.
A bag of Briggs & Little Atlantic in mulberry (10 skeins, 1350 yards total):
“The tags make excellent snacks!” -M
“But what I really want is to get into that bag!” -M
A skein of Sunshine Yarns sock yarn in Denim:
“This looks like a fun toy, too…” -M
A skein of Trekking XXL, color 144:
“…or this…” -M
A skein of Dicentra Designs superwash sock yarn in Kingsfoil:
“You are so mean, not letting me play with these, Mom!” -M
A copy of Knitting Rules!, autographed by the Yarn Harlot herself to “Friend of Chaos”:
“Stay away from this one, May, because it’s all about me.” -C
Since my blogging life is just approaching the 1 year mark, there is much of my life that has not been fodder for my blog. One thing that I would have blogged about was my learning to knit. Last September was my 2 year knitiversary, from the first wobbly steps to discovering good yarn – thereby starting stash – these are things that were not included in bloglife.
Yay! Contest!
Hmmm… Probably the time Atticus ate 3 pieces of fruit cake that had been left on the window sill to defrost (I actually LOVE fruit cake…can’t eat it any longer, *sniff*). He managed to get the Saran Wrap off of it, and smelled of nutmeg for DAYS. Oh, that and when my sister eloped!
Oye, this might be rough as I generally use my blog in place of the memory I lost long ago!
Did you find a swapper for that book?
What a fun idea! I wasn’t blogging when my kitty, Maxwell, was hit by a car. I could have definitely used some bloggy love back then.
Let’s see…before I blogged…
how about the time I ran over my own foot? Yeah…with my car. Heh, I’ll have to post about that just for the laugh.
I would have told you about my shotgun wedding! Seven months pregnant and no one knew about it. No guests or honeymoon:-(
Fun contest! I would have blogged about the year most of us went out for a movie on Christmas afternoon, and Gracie (the not-wonder dog) got into a box of See’s Candy that my mother had received as a gift. DH had to take her to the emergency vet. When we all returned, DH teased my mother about trying to kill our dog. She promptly burst into tears and locked herself in the guest bedroom until dinner. Fortunately, by the next Christmas, she’d recovered enough to laugh heartily when she opened a package with See’s Candy–from Gracie. Oh, the blogging fun I could have had with both of those Christmases.
Y’all probably would have had to hear all about my pregnancy woes, which–on second thought–are probably better kept to myself. Be GLAD I wasn’t blogging then!!
Well how far back could we go? If I been blogging in 1982 when I came to Finland for 6 months I would have blogged about that (and written about how I’m still here.)
Or I probably would have blogged about bringing up my son bilingual. How nice it would be to look back at how his vocabulary developed and laugh at what he said.
I would have blogged a lot of stories about the kid, of course. Or perhaps about my own total cluelessness as a mother…
The shortest of which is that when the Kid was about 6 months old (and was still the only grandchild on both sides of the family) we attended a family birthday party. I had the baby on my lap while we sat at the table between his grandmother and great-grandmother. While I was regretfully explaining to his complaining grandmother that the baby’s severe hypoglycemia meant that she wasn’t allowed to offer him any of her delicious cake, HE was busily grabbing up fistfuls of thickly frosted goodness from his great-grandmother’s plate and gleefully stuffing them in his face…
In early 1979, I was an extra in the Blues Brothers movie (with Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi). The scenes are at the end of the movie, the “concert” show. Those were shot at the Hollywood Palladium and I went just one day, was paid $80 and got a box lunch. Most of all, John and Dan came out and entertained the crowd several times during the 10 hours we were there. And the coolest thing was seeing Cab Calloway perform. It was a blast, and I can pick myself out of the crowd scene on the DVD.
That’s my first 15 minutes of fame
If I had been blogging years ago, everyone would have heard about my parent’s dog, Taffy. I was taking care of her while my parents were on vacation and while I was over at Josh’s house one day she managed to get into a bag of chocolate covered expresso beans. I was horrified to discover this later that evening becuase chocolate is very bad for dogs. It was too late to call the vet, so I stayed up with Taffy in case she got sick. Well, she wasn’t sick, but she spent all night running around, jumping in the air, and bringing me toys. Apparently the expresso beans just made her hyper!
I would have documented my progress on the Ballet Wrap from Interweave Knits Spring (maybe 2005 since I made it shortly before blogging; I’m really too lazy to go find the right mag right now as usual, but it’s on the cover in pink and by Norah Gaughan.) Anyway, I had finished the front and nearly the back and had realized that my purling rows were a bit looser than my knitting rows. Didn’t matter so much for lace, but this was my first sweater and it had to be perfect and it really showed, so I started over, just knitting straight from the old pieces and I got my purling rows to be the same gauge. It looked much better and I’m happy I did it though it was a pain at the time. There was a bit of swearing involved and it would have made for fun documentation because I could actually laugh over it.
The time when I was in my eighth month in a heat wave in August and the power went out for three days! As soon as power was restored, of course. Did I mention that we could constantly hear the generator the guy across the street was running?
What an excellent contest!
When I was in college I took care of a German Shepherd– Buddy — in my dorm for a few days — long story, and hoo yes it was against the rules! On the first night he spent with me he laid at the end of my (extra-long, super-narrow) bed. He was in the way of my feet so I nudged him a bit until he stood up, walked to the top of the bed, curled around my head and whimpered until I pet his leg, which made him fall asleep.
OOOOH he was snuggly. Here he is giving me a smooch on the nose: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v186/melosond/DSC01647.jpg
I’m a very new newby in this blog thing, 3 months new, and to my utter horror, my life is so very un-blog worthy, so I would make up stuff like the time I was abducted by aliens and forced to mother a whole new race of human hybreds to repopulate the moon…..yeah, something along those lines I think….
I would have blogged about the time Julia was 9 months old and rolled over on to an antique auto harp that was my grandmother’s, full of family history, that was propped up on the wall of our living room, and how it fell over on to her head and gave her a small puncture wound, and how the blood literally squirted out of her head and ran down her neck and shoulders. I would have blogged about how I totally freaked out, went into hysterics and called 911, and how although she was FINE, because the head is very vascular and head wounds bleed a lot without it being very serious, I stayed up almost all night sitting beside her crib making sure she didn’t fall into an auto harp puncture wound induced coma. And how the next day I was so tired I didn’t know whether to wind my butt or scratch my watch and I had her on the couch with me and she rolled off of it and landed face-first on the hardwood floor and I sat in the middle of the kitchen floor and cried because I realized then I had no idea what I’d gotten myself into.
I would have blogged about that.
My cat Gracie never got on my kitchen counters….for some reason this just did not interest her. BUT…….every since my Grandmother was no longer able to bake I have made her special pumpkin pies for our Thanksgiving family dinner, generally make 6-8 pies every year. WELL……THIS particular year Gracie decided to check out the whole pie making thing. Over the course of the evening I had 6 pies that year sitting on my counter cooling until time for bed. Imagine my surprise when I went to put the pies in the fridge to discover one PERFECT paw pring in the center of EACH pie!! These pies are our tradition….no time to bake more…..so, I put one perfect little dollop of whipped cream in the center of each pie and no one was the wiser!!! LOL!!!
I would have blogged about taking home Sally and Willowpede when they were very tiny and also about when their sister Happy came to be babysitted for a week. I would have blogged about learning to knit at the art store I worked at – and the crazy things people used to ask me about there every day ;o)
I probably would have blogged about planning my wedding and how proud I was to keep it on the cheap. Especially compared to a girlfriend who was getting married a month or so before me. I got married at home – she got married at a minor league baseball stadium. I had 35 guests, she had 250. My dress was beautiful – hers was ill-fitting and completely unflattering. (Heh.)
Of course, now I can blog about how great my husband is. (Hers is a total and complete ass.)
Chris- I just found out a few things in these comments- Marina!
What would I have blogged about? How about meeting my now DH at work, thinking he was an A-hole, marrying him, and still thinking he was an A-hole?
Just kidding, he’s a great guy
hmmm… I think my first car’s (a Mercury Lynx) tire woes would have made good blog fodder. by the end, each tire had it’s own problem (though one tire didn’t provide nearly as much entertainment as the other three)
tire problem #1 (front right): I notice a wobbly sound, particularly as I’m slowing down and turning. somehow I figured out that the lugnuts were loose and that’s why it was wobbling so bad. problem #2: very bald front tires (to the point you can see the little metal bits poking out of the rubber). problem #3 (back right): driving around a curve on my way into work (in a small city and thankfully not on a main road), the back of my car thuds to the ground – I look into my rearview mirror and see my tire rolling across the road behind me. (I blame this incident on the ex who was going to be learning to be an auto mechanic. I think he forgot something important while replacing my brakes.) problem #4, the final tire fiasco (back left): say that this is what tire support looks like: !-! (with the dots being the wheels and the dash the axel that connects them and the two uprights that support it all). the upright rusted out and so the tire was leaning against it. all the while rubber is scraping against the metal as I drive. by the time we were finally taking it in to trade-in on my new car, my dh following me and watching little bits of rubber fly off as I drive, the rubber had worn a white ring on the inside of the tire.
ah, the memories. sadly, there are no photos. (though the video in my mind of the tire rolling across the road behind me is quite funny. too bad I can’t extract it for all to view.)
Hmm, I would have to say my blog post, if I had been blogging in May of 2000, would have been our wonderful trip to Italy. Hubster went over for business and I got to tag along. We saw Venice-hated it, Monfalcone-loved it (even drooled over a yarn shop but didn’t know how to knit then), and Rome-the favorite!!!
Or meeting my Hubster at a speed boat race. He was very drunk and very funny.
Or the time I downed 7 Tequilas and ended up being carried out of the bar, slung over a friend’s shoulder, with my skirt around my waist. Thank goodness for slips. Then I walked into my house with my purse around my ankle.
But let’s not talk about that. Definitely Italy.
Hmm, how about the first knit project that I tackled, the baby blanket from Stich and Bitch. It got frogged 8 times, the ends were woven in horribly, the blanket is NOT machine washable, and when I blocked it, I just stretched it out to the area I thought it should be. It ended up looking like a really wonky rectangle/trapezoid… I didn’t know any better! I haven’t heard from that blankie since it was gifted, I’m guessing their dogs ate it.
What great yarn! I’ve been dying to get some Dicentra yarn and even saw some in Oakland, but not their sock yarn and not a gorgeous color like you got – great haul!
You know, I totally didn’t read the post clearly, and didn’t realize this was your contest! So in the interest of being forced to take yarn, I’ll give this story:
When I was pregnant the first time I got a huge blood clot and was hospitalized for 5 weeks. The kicker – I couldn’t do much of anything except watch TV because I had to lay down with my leg elevated. I couldn’t read even because that would mean holding my arms up to hold the book. I might have been able to knit, though, as long as I didn’t have to look at my hands too much. Now I’d love to have 5 weeks of unadulterated sleeping time, or stockinette knitting time. I definitely got caught up on my Law and Order and L.A. Law.
Ok…definitely NOT blogging 30 years ago, when, driving back home to prepare for my wedding day, I was stopped for speeding on a lonely stretch of road. (I swear I was going downhill in a car without speed control and it only picked up 3 mph over the limit!) It was a HOT August day and I didn’t have A/C in the car. The windows were rolled almost completely UP. The cop (a nice guy actually) said, “roll down your window please, m’am” and I said, “I can’t, the cat will jump out.” He leaned down and peered inside to find a long-haired black cat sitting on the headrest behind my head. A blonde short-haired cat peeked from inside my shoulder bag. “Open the window to sign this and I’ll make sure he doesn’t jump out.” As I signed the speed warning (no I didn’t get a ticket – I was a good-looking, 21-year old blonde, but I’m convinced it was the cat on the headrest that saved me!) he stroked ears and gently dissuaded black kitty (who’s name was Samurai) from jumping out.
>^..^
I’m going on 5 years blogging now…whoa. I need to look back and see what I missed
I would have blogged about being so much in denial about my first son’s allergies. Hmm … ate a spoonful of yogurt, then vomited and got hives. Oh well, he’ll grow out of it, let’s try again in a month. (Same result — and I stupidly kept on trying every month for several months.) Threw up cashews? Well, he can’t have an allergy, he must have had some bad rice. Got tiny red skin prickles when daddy was eating pistachios — that’s not a REAL reaction, I just need to get my eyes checked.
Denial is a strong force — glad that I’m out of it now. He’s 3 and a half years old now, and still alive. And I’m not in denial any more.
In the kitty dept, I would have blogged about one of my previous (now gone, but still much loved) cats, Bert, who used at least a few of his nine lives when he rode 18 miles to work with me, which I didn’t even know about until I was almost there, sitting at a light, and heard my car meowing!!!! Pulled over, looked everywhere. Finally opened the hood, and there he was sitting on top of the engine, where he had been sitting the whole time squished between the top of the engine and the hood!! He didn’t even meow until his paws got hot. Not a scratch on him, either. But the folks at work looked at me a little funny when I carried him in the door so I could call my boyfriend to come pick him up! By the way, Bert never got to go outside again after THAT escapade!
Since I haven’t blogged for a few months, (not sure why!!) I would have blogged about caring for 5 grandkids for 10 days straight!!! Getting them up, breakfast,to school,to soccer, kindergym, kindermusic…yikes, does it ever end?? and trying to finish various socks and other projects admist the insaanity..it kept me sane believe me!!
I would have blogged the mess I made with 1500 yards of red laceweight cashmere, trying to wind it off my knees since I was swift-less! Of course, I may get a chance to reprise that as I got a very tangly skein of silk at Stitches, and I’m afraid it’s going to be everywhere, swift or no swift.
Or cat stories–gotcha cat stories right here. Bailey arrived in a box, covered in grease, direct from under the hood of a friend’s car. Fleas, eye infection, he was a mess. My daughter took him to the vet where they gave her pink medicine for the infection, so she faithfully dropped it into his eyes twice a day. Of course, it was meant to go in his mouth…he survived.
I would have blogged about the time I was cutting my hair and I got my middle finger stuck in the loop of the sissors. I didn’t get it off before right away – only to have discovered that the sissors were now stuck on my hand. Soap and water didn’t work. I had cut off the section passed the loop hoping to make it easier to pull off (the little hook at the top of the loop stayed – by the way… did you know that metal heats up when being cut with a hacksaw?). That didn’t help. I slept with it on, I took my morning walk without mittens – hoping it would make my fingers smaller and it would slide off. Nope. Went to work with it still attached (but the hook on the inside of my palm, not facing the outside)and brought a hack saw with me. I tried to cut it off. Nope, just a lot of scraping the back of my hand and knuckles. Eventually I had my husband go to my dad and borrow his bolt cutters. (I made him not to let dad ask any questions.) We were able to cut it off and keep the finger:-) I am such a dork.
I think, definitely the time I’d put on a tank top but was about to put on underpants. I opened the drawer for underpants, the whole drawer came out and landed corner-first onto my second toe on the right foot. This was an art deco solid wood dovetailed drawer. In other words,? HEAVY. POINTY. PAINFUL.
Ye g-ds the pain. It was like a sylvester kitty moment with all the floating yellow birdies around my head, and I was on the floor with no underpants on in a yoga position clutching my foot, breathing very very very very very very very carefully.
My roommate was definitely perplexed when she walked in and saw that.
The toe? Broken. The blog fodder it could have generated? Priceless.
Oh my,there are just so many things I’d have blogged about. I don’t know how we survived before blogs; we now have so many friends to turn to when we want to share a funny story or need a hug. Here is just one story I’ll share now, that I definitely would have shared when it happened.
My husband used to work nights for the first 6 or 7 years of Samm’s life, so I would let her sleep with me (more for me than her). One night when she was about 18 months old, she had pineapples for desert and in the middle of the night she reached right over and put her face right in my face and shared those pineapples with me! Yep, puked pineapple all over my face. It was all I could do not to puke right back at her! DISGUSTING I know, but I definitely would have shared it with you
I just discovered your blog and really enjoy it.
I was lucky to jump into blogging right when I first started knitting, so a lot of my knitting learning experience is documented.
But I probably would have blogged about being pregnant with my son and carrying around a stuffed teddy bear and pushing it into the stroller because I wanted to prepare our dog for bringing home a new baby.
I think the dog thought I was insane. (She’s been absolutely wonderful with the kid.)
There’s pictures of me doing this somewhere…
Hmmm, probably about the time that my cell phone company sent me a 250 page bill in a FedEx box, claiming I owed them $2500 for using 40,000 text messages in one month. That was a good laugh, after waiting for hours on the phone to get it all sorted out…
I was not blogging during my pregnancy and I really wish I had. I was weirdly superstitious during my pregnancy and refused to knit ANYTHING for the baby until she was born. So, instead of knitting, I bought knitting books and looked at patterns to plan what I’d make.
I guess I would have blogged about getting my pup, Dylan Thomas. He was a yard dog at my work and my boss was afraid he would get run over by a truck so he said he had to go. I was standing at his desk and said, “I’ll take him.” I had no idea why I said it, but to this day (9 years later), I am so grateful I got to have this litte boy in my life. He had to be dipped 3 times for sarcophigal mange. $350 for a free dog.
Woohooo! A contest! As my 46th birthday approaches (rapidly), I am remembering the spring I turned 40. I managed to give myself a concussion. By sneezing. I hit my temple on the grab bar while I was waiting for the water to get hot to take a shower. The doc had me come RIGHT NOW (I waited until I had showered and dressed) to get a cat scan…there was a huge blizzard, but that meant no waiting lines. I remembered to tell folks at tae kwon do not to hit me in the head, until about 2 weeks later, when 6’3″ and 240 lbs (I’m 5’8″ and 150) clocked me in the head, hard. I literally dropped to my knees and saw stars. Can you say reconcuss? I was a little loopy for a bit after that (don’t listen to anybody who says, what is different about that). Let’s see… That same spring I was getting a dish out of the closet (no cabinets, just a dish closet) and noticed it was warm in there. I was thinking, why is it warm in here, the woodstove usually downdrafts near the other door, why here, in the corner, near my hand. So I looked… and… my shirt was on fire! Luckily it was a cotton shirt, and by reflex I just smacked it with my hand and it went out. I had been cooking and because of the boobage, the shirt hung away from my body and caught the element without my noticing right away, and, well, just glad it wasn’t polyester. I’m more careful now. And… dh forgot my birthday. MY FORTIETH! But I got my first (that’s right, there is another that is just mine…we have more kayaks than people in the family!) kayak as a make up gift on mother’s day that year.
OH man, I’m gonna have to think about this one and post back, it’s funny all the little mundane things we put into our blog that other wise would go uncelebrated, unremarked.
Given the tales of Chaos, Mine would have to be rosie and the catflap. When i lived back in colchester, i rescued 2 dogs, sophie a Jack russell and Rosie, an Alsation. Now the house i lived in already had a cat flap and after 3 months sophie had found she could let herself in and out at will, on this one paticular day, i had invited round a friend who the dogs had never met, so Sophie dashed out the back (we always used the back gate) Screaming her head off, my friend lept backover the 7ft fench in one go, and for the first time, Rosie decided to follow, Alsation – Cat flap, cat flap – alsation, well with a leg and a head out of the cat flap she got stuck, then it became obvious she couldn’t get out again, she hadn’t just got the top bit of her leg stuck she had managed to get the WHOLE leg up to the shoulder through. And couldn’t get back out, so i had to climb out of my kitchen window and then back again with sophie, to let my friend in, and then after trying to help her out and it not working, we had to dismantle the cat flap. Nope still stuck, by this time she is getting very stressed, and is being fed treats to keep her quite which meant sophie is howling cos she want some too. Then had to get a hacksaw blade and enlarge the hole slightly to get her out and the bottom of the inside of the cat flap cut out the get her paw out. 35 minutes later, i have a dog that seems none the worse for her ordeal but a jack russel that is going hyper because she has had too many treats and a large hole in my door that had to be boarded up and the cat flap re-fitted. Oh the fun and games that was. Oh how i miss rosie and sophie.
Obviously I have no ‘before I blogged’ kind of stories (and I’ll have to come back later and read the ones others have shared), but I will say since I’ve become friends with knitbloggers, my opportunities to look goofy on the internet have expanded in ways I could never have imagined…
I am blogless so super easy. I would share the trials and tribulations of a knitting abg being stolen, making socks for the first time, and the crazy adventures fo my two black cats that require child safety locks on all cabinets with food or bandaids in them…
Right after Hubby and I moved in together, Hubby announced that he was going to give the cat, Bucky, a bath. Now, let it be said that Hubby had never had a cat before, his was a dog family, and dogs would get bathed once a month, whether they needed it or not. I explained that (generally) cats do not like or need to be bathed, then I went off to work.
Not to long after getting to work a received a phone call from Hubby, “The damn cat peed on the bed!” he yelled into the phone. After attempting to calm him down I asked him why Bucky would do that. After much hemming and hawing he confessed that he had taken the cat into the shower, “since they don’t like baths.”
He had put on his swim trunks and a t-shirt and attempted to give the cat a SHOWER (‘cuz gee if they don’t like baths they should love showers). The cat proceeded to claw his way up his chest and down his back, ran out of the bathroom directly to the bedroom and peed on his side of the bed.
It was hard not to laugh, okay, I think I did laugh, a lot. Really, what did he expect.
Let’s see, well, before I left on maternity leave with my son, my 5th period junior religion class threw me a party during class time. In the midst of the festivities, I went to sit down on my rolling chair, just got the edge of it and fell down with the chair on top of me. My 16 year old students had to save me. Luckily, I had a couple of football players in the class, as they had to help me off the ground. Not a pretty sight.
Back in the day before PC’s when I was single and living Uptown (behind the Dudly Riggs Theater), I had a cat named Mugs (short for Mogwai – she was a goofy looking Torti). I would come home from work, open the door and I would call out (ala Desi Arnez): “Muggies, I’m home!” The cat would come barrelling down the hardwood floored hallway and leap up to my shoulders where she would perch, purring, wrapped around my neck like a fur stole until I’d make her get down.
If I were blogging say, 7 years ago, I would have written about how my best friend since jr. high became engaged within weeks of each other, how she asked me to be her maid of honor and I was about to ask her to be mine when a letter from her came in the mail. She basically told me, among a myriad of excuses, that she wouldn’t come to my wedding unless it was closer to home. I was tentatively planning a small wedding in Puerto Rico, 2 years at the earliest, but hadn’t finalized on anything yet. It really tore my heart to pieces because the letter was clearly a preemptive strike. Tell her now before it’s too late! And so how are you supposed to react when your oldest friend tells you she refuses to pay X amount of dollars to come to your wedding, before you’ve even planned it? She was living at home at the time, with a full time job, no problem, so it was clear that money wasn’t an issue but the fact that she just didn’t want to spend it. On me. No one else gave me this reaction, because well, they were doing what real friends do – coming to my wedding because they love us, and respectively declined *at the appropriate time* when they couldn’t make it. I could not understand why she was trying so hard not to get out of it, and to this day I still can’t. As if I could be HER maid of honor after that letter. I chocked on the words. So I never was, she never was, and though she has many years later apologized (in a roundabout way by saying she now wishes she could have been at my wedding), our relationship ended the day she sent that letter. And I don’t miss her.
I love these!
I would’ve loved seeing that bathrobe & hearing about the internet dates at the time too.
I would have blogged about my trip to Norway to study abroad during college, and my knitting there.
I learned to knit when I was a kid but I didn’t really knit anything until I went to Norway and brought my partial scarf in Homespun – I figured I could finish it and wear it there – it would be cold enough.
Then I found out that my newfound Norwegian friends knit and got a knitting book written in Norwegian, some blue wool yarn, and my first circular needles – wonder where those went… and I puzzled out how to knit a hat and knit in the round for the first time while reading a pattern in Norwegian. Fun stuff! Then in the end I didn’t really like my hat so I gave it to a friend.
Yeah, I would have loved to have blogged ad nauseum to you all about the Adventures of Baby Puppy Katy and the sequel, Adventures of Baby Puppy Chappy. And, oh, the puppy-p*rn I could have posted with those two adorable faces. There was the time Chappy ate a hole in the kitchen wall (for no reason we were ever able to discern), when he emptied all the waiting newspaper out of the fireplace. The lovely fun when Katy swallowed a dryer sheet (did you know those are toxic?). And then when she swallowed the sock. And then the second dryer sheet… Chappy’s adventures at puppy-school where his best friend was also a student and they had to sit at faaaaar ends from each other so everyone else could concentrate. And . . . well, you get the idea. I would really have loved having a puppy blog!
OH so many stories, so little time!! I probably would have blogged abt my experiences while working at JoAnn Fabrics. One in particular was when a couple came up and wanted some black silk because the girl wanted to tie up her boyfriend. I showed them some very nice satins and he was thoroughly happy with the choice (they wanted a breathable fabric to eliminate chaffing) Ah the memories…..
If I had been blogging then…I think the best would have been to describe the situation when I moved to washington state.
I moved here all by myself, with an absolutely full Jeep, and pulling an overfilled u-haul trailer behind for 1500 miles. When I finally found where my house was (I had to rent it site unseen!!) it was on a very steep hill with lots of dead end lanes and NO WHERE to turn around.
I pulled up on the wrong side of the street in front of my place, saw it and almost burst into tears (it was that bad!)…within about a minute, the next door neighbor came out of his house (looked even scarier than mine!) and started yelling at me “Get out of MY parking place” (on the city street), and “your landlord is a slumlord!” etc…
The five months I lived there would have supplied endless blog material!
Great idea for a contest. Since I waited well past the 12 week mark to announce bring prego – I may have blogged about when hubby and I were in the ultrasound room and they informed us we were having triplets.
So one lovely afternoon when I had just adopted Viva and lived near the beach, I had all my windows open to let the sea-smelling air brush through my apartment. I had a baseball game on the radio, a beer in my hand, and a huge stack of magazines to get caught up on I(this was pre-knitting days). Next thing I know, Viva comes flying through the window from the outside, with a huge pigeon sans one wing in her mouth. She dropped it, and the poor bird tried to fly away but managed to drop little bits of blood and feathers EVERYWHERE. I finally got it back outside, but imagine trying to explain to your landlord why the curtains suddenly had blood spray on them.
This is such a great contest idea.
Let’s see…
Once I got “pulled over” while I was stopped at a red light at night in a very bad neighborhood. The officer had been shining a flashlight into my car and I didn’t look over at him because I was scared. So when the light turned green, I took off and he pulled me over. I had been returning from dinner with a friend and had had two glasses of wine. Not drunk, or even driving under the influence but the cop was bent on being a jerk and made me take TWO breath tests, both of which I passed, then he proceded to lecture me on the dangers of drinking and driving even though I was well below the legal limit and he had pulled me over for no reason late at night in a bad neighborhood. I’m not sure what the cop was trying to prove, but it was a really scary experience.
I would have blogged about my ex, with the multiple personality disorder. One of his personalities didn’t like me to sew or have hobbies. I talked his OTHER personality into buying me a really NICE sewing machine. I’m not sure, but I think the third personality enjoyed the whole thing. (And don’t even ask about the dinner party when all THREE of them were there. PSYCHO!)
I would have blogged about the time someone tried to turn my Mom’s flower shop into a drive through flower shop. Nothing like getting a call from the police with that news.
Oops… I should mention the driver was just fine – not a scratch and it was at night when the store was closed – oh, but you should have seen the damage the car did.
One of the joys of having lived a long time is having an endless supply of stories with which to bore one’s younger acquaintances.
I would have blogged about the time on the way back from Florida when I left my husband in a McDonald’s and didn’t realize he wasn’t in the car until a highway patrolman pulled me over, smirked, and asked, “Missing something?” This was 90 miles away from said McDonald’s and in another state. And it was 20 years ago and we are still married.
Then there was the time on a business trip when I parked the rental car in the motel parking lot, locked it, and slammed the door… having forgotten to put it into park or to set the e-brake. It rolled slowly across the aisle — with 6-month pregnant me running alongside trying to jam the key into the door lock — and slipped perfectly into a parking space, coming gently to rest when its rear bumper encountered another car. The space it had rolled into was so tight that neither I nor any motel personnel could open the door to get into it. Seriously, I couldn’t have DRIVEN into that space. I had to take a cab to the client’s office the next morning, so everyone in my office ended up knowing about it — my expense report had both rental car AND cab.
Or the time I reported my car stolen when I couldn’t find it in the parking ramp. Turned out it was parked on a level lower than skyway, where I never, ever parked. In my defense, it was 2 a.m.when I left work (tax season, you know) and couldn’t find the blasted thing.
I would definitely have blogged about my older son being stranded in Washington, DC, where he had stopped to visit his girlfriend on his way to his semester abroad in South Africa, when South Africa Airlines went on strike a day before he was to fly out. The e-mail were flying thick and fast between Washington, Minneapolis, and Pietermarititzburg for about 5 days.
Pet stories: Lucy, encountering a porcupine. Bear, mothering kittens. Pius, depositing a nightcrawler on my pillow in the middle of the night. Tabby, disappearing into the woods for a month every summer when we fostered kittens for the Humane Society.
I could go on, but I take pity on you all so won’t. Great idea for a contest, btw — best one in a long time!
Let’s see. When I first moved here, I had a cat named Nell. Apparently the apartment had fleas, because Nell suddenly got fleas. When I asked the vet about the best way to get rid of them, he told me to bring her in for a bath while I sprayed the apartment. So I dropped her off one morning on my way to work. About an hour and a half later, I get a call from the vet tech. “Nell doesn’t want a bath today.” They ended up having to give her some kitty downers to finish the bath.
Oh yeah, then there was the time I was changing a flat tire and ended up closing the trunk on my hand. I was too far away from the lock to unlock it myself. I had to wait for someone to come along and get me out. Luckily that wasn’t too long.
When I first graduated from university, I was really chuffed to get a job interview for a disability charity in London. Unfortunately I had terrible sunburn and was red on one side of my body from hanging out with my friends too long in the period between the end of exams and graduation so I was feeling more than a bit nervous.
I arrived at the job interview really early and went to the cafe next door for a cup of coffee whilst I was waiting for the interview time to come round. Naturally, I needed to use the bathroom just before I left so off I went. It had been really hot that summer (hence the sunburn) and the door to the toilet was quite hard to push shut. My mind wasn’t really on the consequences of pushing the door shut so when it came time to leave the cubicle, I couldn’t. I assessed my options : there was a tiny window which I could try and climb through but I was just about to go for an interview and I could bang on the door and hope someone would be along to rescue me.
I went for option 2 because I was afraid of ruining my suit, hair etc so I hammered away and shouted to no avail – no one could hear me.
It was getting closer and closer to the interview time and I was getting more and more hot and distressed. Suddenly, I remembered that I had brought my mobile phone with me (these were the days when mobile phones were big and not very common) so I dithered a bit because I had no idea what the cafe was called and eventually settled on calling the reception of the company who were interviewing me and asked them to send someone to the cafe next door so that they could let me out.
It was very difficult to conduct a sensible interview after that experience and with extreme sunburn and heat exhaustion! It has reminded me that even though they are annoying, mobile phones can be so useful!
Eight years ago Nephew #1 was three. We were sitting around the dinner table talking and he burped out loud, and looked around sort of surprised, amused and horrified: what was going to happen? would he get away with it? My sister said, “Now ________, what do you say?” in her most lecturing tone. And he sat up straight in his chair and looked as proud as he could be because he KNEW the answer:
“PLEAAAAASE!”
And then realized he’d answered the wrong “what do you say” question, and everybody cracked up, including him.
I probably would have blogged about the birth of my second child. My first was a breeze, I always had such bad periods- it was like that. My second was permanent birth control! Everyone says the second is easier- uh no!
If I had been blogging at the time I would have told the story of popping out to the shops for a tin of anchovies only to follow a fire engine all the way home – to my house!
I had left the chip pan on and it caught fire – thankfully only the kitchen was damaged and everyone was unhurt. OR I might have blogged about the first time my house caught on fire – no it wasn’t my fault, faulty appliance. That time the dog came and got me BEFORE the smoke alarm went off, I got him, me and the cats out the house and called the fire brigade – who got lost and finished up in the next street across. I had to go back into the burning building to phone the station and tell them they were in the wrong place. OR the time the ambulance couldn’t find us? Never dull around our place
Well, if this counts… I don’t currently have a blog. I will once I buy my own computer. So if I had my own blog now… I would be theorizing about divorcing, getting a new job and moving across the country. Of course I am only considering apartments near yarn shops in the new city. Maybe I’ll teach beginning knitting classes there. I would be blogging about change. Definitely.
I’d probably have blogged about the time I stabbed myself in the hand with an illegal stiletto knife. I’d always seen switchblades in movies flip open from the side, and I wanted to see what the blade looked like, so I held it carefully at both ends and pressed the release. Pop! The blade shot out the top of the handle and right into the palm of my hand.
I had to go to the ER when it wouldn’t stop bleeding, had to lie about what happened since the knife is illegal, needed to get a tetanus shot and I’m absolutely terrified for that knife now.
It would’nt let me leave one yesterday. I think I started blogging as my memory was failing me. I probably would have posted about my return to knitting after been away from it for years. My first pair of socks I tried to do with 3 dpn’s instead of 4 or 5. (Did’nt read the instructions too well) I could’nt figure out why it was so hard and I had ladders down each side.
You know, this question it too easy to answer! I would have blogged about the awful summer that my dog Toby was hit by a car–almost two years ago. …and how the millionaire who did it not only didn’t offer a dime- but had the nerve to say, “Next time get a bigger dog!”
He ended up having two surgeries, and completely depleted my house repair stash… a stash I still haven’t been able to replenish.
you can see one of his scars here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cashmeredreams/300461455/in/set-72157594381737265/
No blog so my choices are infinite. A few years ago an emu walked down our road–we live in the upper midwest USA. No idea where it came from or where it went. Our dog (the older polarbear) is now and forever a “certified emu herder”. Not bad for a clumber spaniel. Gives new meaning to the term “bird dog”. I have pictures to prove it.
I might have blogged about the time I fell out of bed, and injured my knee so badly, I was on crutches for six weeks. I am very graceful. And I certainly would have blogged about my beloved Shadow, a beautiful grey mutt of a cat, who weighed an impressive 20lbs. He wasn’t just fat, either — he could stand on his back legs and put his front paws on my hips, and I’m 5’8″. He lived with us for about 13 years.
OK, here is my unblogged moment that would have definitely been blogged complete with pictures.
My daughter made me a poster when she was 5. She was very busy all morning with her construction paper and crayons and glue stick. She was cutting out animals from a National Geographic to paste on the picture. She is an animal nut you see. Finally, she finished and proudly handed me the poster. There were several animals pasted all over, but right in the middle was a large crab and written underneath him, in her 5 year old chicken scratch, was the words, “Mom, Sometimes you are a crab.” I think the cutest part was the fact that she spelled crab “crad”. Her statement was so simple and yet…so true! I still have it and have since cropped it down so I could frame it.
Blogless here, so my entire past would be rich fodder for blog stories. Snore…..oh, sorry, I drifted off there from the sheer excitement.
I am sure, though, I would have blogged about the time I came home, after a terrible, stressful day at work, during which I had learned I had to have a hysterectomy, to find that Gizmo, our new kitten, had escaped from the house in the morning and been outside all day long. My husband and daughter and I went out and called and searched. No Gizmo. I was in tears all evening. I went out one last time, before bed, and heard a little “Mew.” I looked up and there was Gizmo, about ten feet up in a tree, apparently unable to come down. So my husband got a stepladder and this miniature pool table we had and stood on the ladder, holding the table up over his head so that Giz could step down on it.
Thirteen years later, Gizmo’s still with us and still, very occasionally, manages to slip out of the house…though usually now he doesn’t go much further than the front walk.
*reminder to self* DO NOT READ ANY MORE OF THESE COMMENTS AT WORK, SNORTING AT ONES DESK IS FROWNED UPON..especially on a quiet Tuesday when the phone isn’t ringing. Kitty Paw Pies, drunken ankle purses, kitty oral eye drops, too funny!
i wish i had been blogging when i made my first sweater. I started it just after my Mom died and it was therapy to come home every night and immerse myself in knitting.
it was acrylic (eek) and gauge meant nothing to me at the time.
it is a cardigan, more of a house jacket but the thing is so big i can fit 2 of me in it!!
i should post a picture sometime. i still wear it, but it makes me laugh.
I have another story that I love to tell, but it wasn’t P.C. or funny enough, I guess, to tell when I was on a game show. I’m relatively small, which I think figures into this story. When I was at UCLA I was at the cafeteria and decided to have a bagel. Apparently the bagels were extra soft or the knives were extra sharp that day, because I cut my finger on it (and I still have a scar). I was telling a group of friends this story that evening when this, I’m going to guess basketball or football player, came up to our table and asked “What are you talking about?” It seemed slightly menacing to me, but I said “Oh, I was just telling them how I cut my finger on a bagel this morning.” This very tall guy lifts up his also bandaged hand and goes “The same thing happened to me!” I think he thought I was telling people that I had seen him do it to himself. Anyway, I still think it’s funny, since it was such a random occurence.
These are so interesting! Let’s see…my life hasn’t been very bloggable… Perhaps I would’ve blogged about my seven year engagement – and why my fiance wouldn’t tell his parents we were engaged for five of them… and how the wedding was canceled because my grandmother spilled initial plans to his mother before we’d told her…then replanned for a year later (finally!) – and the best man (a friend for fifteen years) informed my husband he MIGHT NOT make it because he had a class field trip that weekend (the wedding was actually on monday)… he made it, didn’t give us even a card (and made us pay for the tux). And to be honest – i’ve never forgiven him for it. the last time i saw him, he had the NERVE to tell us about losing his luggage on the way to a wedding in Paris – his camera (hello, moron, that goes in the carry-on) and the wedding GIFT were in there. Sheesh. He’s clueless. (thanks to Domesticat’s post above for reminding me about this!)
Hmm, I wasn’t blogging when I took my first trip to Lalana wools. I’ve lost the original scarf I made from the Phat Silk Fines I bought there and I have no photos. It was amazing.
I’ve been blogging since 2001 and I don’t know if my brain has kept any bloggable stories from that long ago!!! I think I would have posted a picture (I have it around somewhere) of my old Fiat in the mid-70′s. I had parked it in my parent’s driveway. Vandals tipped it over on it’s side. It cracked the windshield. My insurance company replaced my windshield at least 3 times on that car. I loved my Fiat.
Oh, this is a good one.
The first thing that came to mind was the day I met my husband. He and I didn’t go to the same highschool. I just got out of class and i was looking for a couple of friends to unwind with before going home. I saw this guy in black sun glasses and a black trench coat sitting with a friend of mine. I immediately went over because i really wanted to know who this guy was. It turned out that this guy (Sean- my now husband ) was notorious in Bayridge (brooklyn) and i have heard some really crazy stories about him but i never actually met him. Flirting my ass off, i told him that i was tired of hearing about him. Witty remarks were exchanged and i went home practically floating. Really it was love at first sight. We finally got married last April and 9 years later we are still together.
What would I have blogged about? Well a few years ago I had the idea to take banjo lessons. Actually my car broke down outside of a music shop and thought -what the heck, I’ll buy a banjo instead of fixing my crappy car. In hindsight not such a good idea. Anyways, I got a recommendation from a guitar store for lessons. The lesson were at this banjo man’s house. It was a dump, piled to the ceiling with newspapers. He was also drunk during the lessons and his cat would sit on my lap while I practiced. I only went to three lessons, at first I was into it. I mean perfect banjo teacher right? Well, I got kind of nervious about the drinking aspect of it and had to call it off. I have not picked up the banjo since.
Oh you have such clever ideas!
Hmm, a story B.B. That would have to be how I met my husband 13 years ago. I was standing in line at Disneyland when this guy with a gorgeous smile caught my eye. At first his small friend wanted to ask me out but luckily, I convinced my little friend to hang with gorgeous smile’s little friend so that I could get my hands on the tall one. It worked. A year later we got married, and because he’s German, I’ve been living with him in Germany ever since. The silly thing is that I have a degree in Spanish. Oh well, things happen for a reason.
Thanks for a fun contest!!
Hmmm. There was the time Chris and I woke up in the middle of the night to a plastic-y burning smell, called the fire dept. to investigate, had something like 4-6 fire engines lined up and down the street with firemen all over the house, and they think it was actually a skunk that sprayed under the front porch.
There was the time Tim went to the vet one afternoon for his annual checkup, came home, and right after the vet closed at 5pm, managed to find a piece of curly ribbon, eat it, and off we went to the animal emergency room, where the vet there gave me a hard time as if it were my fault. Cat X-rays are infinitely adorable, though.
We took an amazing trip to the south of France in 2004 that would have provided beautiful photos.
Ooooh, so much happened before I began blogging this past October… The biggest event would be the VERY early arrival of my son, The Absent Minded Professor. He was 15 weeks premature. eek! Weighing in at ONE pound, 12 ounces, we were told to not expect him to make it, and certainly not to expect him to live without handicap. 10.5 years later (and seven surgeries), he’s a BIG healthy kid in 5th grade, with no learning difficulties and a love for life. Really, he’s almost 5 feet tall now, smart, sensitive, funny, loving… and very, very typical. Makes me crazy!
I used to be a trip leader for a local tour company. The high school ‘ski trips’ to Montreal would have been great blog fodder. Even better were the annual Training and Blow Out weekends that all us trip leaders would take together. Like the time we had the two rival deck bars at Sugarloaf chanting “Tastes great!” “Less filling!” at each other. Or the time the bus caught fire on the way home and we made friends with the firemen and posed for pictures with them afterwards (no one was hurt, but the bus was destroyed). Or the time we rented a house down the Cape with the money we made working at Woodstock and had a big toga party. Actually, it’s probably a good thing I didn’t have a blog back then. Then I REALLY wouldn’t be able to run for public office.
I would have told you about taking my mother out to see The Hollow Crown for mother’s day – it starred Diana Rigg, Derek Jacobi and the late lamented Ian Richardson. It was great! We then went to a nearby hotel for coffee after the show, and while we were there the Dalai Lama walked through with his entourage. Then we went for dinner and all three stars of the show picked that restaurant to eat in as well. So we got autographs! There is no way I will ever top that mother’s day outing!
Before blogging? Well, I probably would have posted about a) happy things–my pets, cute stuff my kids said (like four-year old Jack’s question after watching a show about Joan of Arc, “Mom, was Joan of Arc burned into steak or burned by mistake?” I know that’s gruesome, but it always cracks me up) and b) sad stuff–my marriage breaking up, having to move, getting sick from the stress and c) what I learned–that love comes in lots of shapes and sizes and it’s there for the taking.
I would have blogged about getting my dog. I went to the humane society to look at a different dog, who basically wanted nothing to do with me. Instead, this ratty pathetic poodle crawled in my lap. She chose me. She’s older than dirt, has no teeth, she’s deaf and her eyesight isn’t much better. But she’s the love of my life. Who knew I could fall in love with a ratty poodle! I’m really a cat person!
I wish I had been blogging when I was in the Navy. There are so many stories and adventures that I wish I had written down. There were lessons that I learned whose details now elude me. It was the best and worst of times in my life. My experiences of living in Anarctica, the horries of War in the early 90s…the friends I made and lost…the wonderful countries that I visited and the great people that live all over the world…I wish I had had a blog back then…just to be able to document the truth and reality of things that today the media muddles, the government lies about and that the world might be able to benefit from …not that my life could or would change the world but maybe some of my experiences could or would help someone…
One thing immediately comes to mind: How I was hit by a car in front of the UMN Law School. It could have been so much worse, I hobbled away with just bruises and a broken toe.
I would have blogged about try to find kittens to adopt,when I was ready to have another cat. (I have always had black cats) so that was what I was looking for- but at the time there was a kitten shortage- that never happens if you have ever worked in the animal field. final I found a guy that could have stepped out of the sopranos, take had a litter of kittens. it was so funny seeing this big tough “mob guy” talking to little kitten in a baby voice. I dare not laugh- now I have boneless and fat boy. two great cats!
hummm I’d probably have blogged about Sock’s trials with diabetes poor thing!
I would have blogged about the first time the DH spent the night at my apartment when we were dating.
No, really, it’s funny as hell.
My bed was under the large, high bedroom window which had a nice set-in sill that Momoze would always sit on. Of course, being a cat, he couldn’t very well stay in the same spot all night, so usually in the wee hours of the morning he’d get off his sill and patrol the house, making sure Sassy was where she was supposed to be. And since I always occupied just one side of my queen-size bed, he learned to use the other side as his landing strip.
I think you know where this is going.
On the night in question, the DH was fast asleep, and Momoze, doing his usual routine, jumps off the sill, landing squarely on the DH’s “package”.
yeah, I thought it was funny as hell.
Hi Chris! Great contest!! I definitely would have blogged about:
1. Process of getting tile for our kitchen floor (after DH and I finally decide on a tile & grout, load it up, bring it home, decided I really didn’t like it afterall, bring it back, buy a different kind of tile, load up the car bring it home and end up with the same colored grout as I initially picked out).
2. Attending my first-ever knitting class through community ed with my friend after downing two margaritas right before. I’m surprised we weren’t issued a KWI (knitting while intoxicated).
I might have blogged about the most romantic and ironic date I’ve been on.
One Saturday many, many years ago when I lived in SF, I had arrived home late one evening when there was a knock on my door. I wsn’t expecting anyone least of all the person who was there all dressed in black. Mr.Gothboy had come to ask if I was inerested in seeing City of Lost Children at a theater I had never been to before (A new venue? But of course!) so I dressed and he hired a cab to take us there in time. Inside, the threater was filled with all people dark and goth: perfect. The show let out late and we walked to Chinatown, which was almost completely deserted, hoping to find a place to eat. It was a wonderfuly mild and moonlit night. We ended up entering a narrow doorway which led through a kitchen, to a set of rickety stairs that climbed into a tiny noodle shop,all wooden benches and tables. It appeared to cater to extras from Enter the Dragon. You acan imagine what an impression Gothboy and I must have made to these elderly martial arts types.
Afterwards Gothboy walked me home and we said goodnight. The irony? Gothboy was my LTex.***CV
The mysterious nail in your bed reminded me of something that happened long before I started blogging, and that would definitely have made it to cyberspace. I was having my mom, her brother, and his wife over for dinner. Trying to be fancy, we were eating in the dining room, heretofore reserved for special occasions like Christmas and Thanksgiving. My dad had died a few months before, and my mom was enjoying the opportunity to spend a happy day and evening with her brother. Just as we were about to begin eating, there was a loud crack and my uncle looked down to see a rather large screw sitting in the middle of his plate. Our first thought was that it had fallen out of the overhead light, but he examined the fixture closely and there was no way a screw of that size could have come from it. The screw just appeared from nowhere it seems. Of did it?? Cue Twilight Zone music!
I would have blogged about the Christmas when John sliced his finger on a lemon zester, requiring plastic surgery on the day we were due to pick up the 20lb turkey, and we didn’t have a car. Oh, and as if that wasn’t enough, we had invited both sets of parents over for Christmas Day, but the oven thermostat was broken, and no-one had come to fix it by 7pm on Christmas Eve… We ended up moving Christmas over to my parents’ house – it was one of the most relaxed and fun Christmases ever. (Oh, and my mother and I did NOT drop the turkey on the floor when we were basting it – really we didn’t
)
Let’s see before blogging, is there such a time? I guess there is. Okay let’s see what would I have blogged about:
August 17, 1999 – It’s our 3rd year anniversary today and guess what I’m doing. I’m picking up our baby bird. Basil is his name. He is a blue-crowned conure. I’m assuming he’s a he, because without DNA testing or blood testing there is now way to truly know, but we have a strong feeling he is a he.
I picked him out back in early June of this year, a few days after he was hatched. He’s from a clutch of 6, but he is by the far the sweetest of his clutch. I picked him out because when I held him up to my chest he laid his head down and started clicking to the sound of my heart, and it made me love him.
He’s set up in his new cage and he seems to like it. Nick’s parents dogs are here visiting and they aren’t too sure about him, but they won’t be here for long. Spitzel isn’t doing well, we don’t expect he’ll be with us much longer his cancer has proceeded along. He’ll be greatly missed, his brother Jaeger has been gone over 3 years now, it doesn’t seem possible. Those guys have been great dogs, high energy, but sweet, especially Spitzel. He’ll be sorely missed when he’s gone.
Great idea!
Let’s see. I’d have blogged about my first sweater. I was a self taught knitter and the first sweater I made was my third knitted item. I knew no fear. LOL. I knit the entire thing by knitting through the back loop so there was this strange twisted stitch pattern throughout. I knew it was wrong but didn’t realize what I’d done so I donated it to goodwill and started my next project.
Great idea for a contest! I probably would have blogged about the losers I dated before meeting my husband. In particular, “my stalker”, who blamed his stroke (he had a blood disorder) on the fact that I broke up with him and caused him so much stress. Then he started leaving roses on my doorstep and emailing twenty times a day. Poor guy. I hope I never see him again!
I would have put the pictures of Rootbeer, a reddish alpaca, on my blog. (Maybe I will someday.)
Way back in the 70s I had spun some alpaca, then moved on and sold my wheel to concentrate on babies.
Stopping on the side of a country road a few years ago to take pictures at the alpaca farm reminded me how much I wanted to get back to spinning. And now I have.
I know that’s not funny, but neither is my blog. I’ll leave that to others who do it well.
I’m sure enjoying all the great storytelling on this post.
Great contest and I’m thinking of a million things. But, I’ll go with this one:
A few months after we bought our house, I awoke in the middle of the night to yelling and flashing lights. Looked out the front window and saw 6 squad cars and the entire street bolcked off. At the shady house across the street were cops hiding behind the trees, guns drawn and a guy with a megaphone shouting “Rodger, come out with your hands up!”
Rodger never came out. We sat there watching for 20 minutes trying to decide if this was really cool or if maybe we picked t he wrong neighborhood. Finally they stormed the place and came out without Rodger, whoever he is. Thr next week the house was up for sale. A really nice lady lives there now.
Similar to you, I was once crazy enough to agree to date anyone…and I mean anyone brought forth by family or friends for an entire year. It could have been it’s own blog.
I’d have blogged about the time I went grocery shopping and lost my car keys. I had just purchased $150 of groceries.
I parked right in front of the store so when I was finished shopping I unlocked the tailgate on my station wagon and then went around to the side to buckle my 2 daughters in their carseats. Then I pulled the cart back around the car, put the groceries in the car, close the tailgate, put the cart back by the store, got in the car, went to start it …. no keys. Just had them. Unlocked the car. Now they have been sucked into the black hole where laundry socks go.
Get out of the car and look on the ground. Nope. Check the cart. Nope, no keys. Climb over the back seat to the cargo part of the car and look for the keys. Nope. Empty every bag thinking maybe I dropped them in there by accident. Nope. Climb back over the seat and open the doors checking around the floor, car seats, and kids. No keys.
It’s been 10 minutes, I’m almost in tears, my ice cream is melting, and it’s August so everyone is hot and starting to whine about going home.
I get out of the car, look on the ground again. Open the front doors and look on the seat, on the floor, in the map pockets on the doors. Now it’s 15 minutes and I am crying.
And as the ice cream melts I’m sobbing and the girls are sobbing along with me. I look up and OMG my keys, on the top of the dashboard where I must have tossed them while putting my daughters in their car seats.
We drove home and had milkshakes from our melting ice cream.
heehee, I can’t believe I’m entering this contest. ahhh the things you make me do Chris!
ok, I think I would have blogged about the day my husband and I found out I was pregnant with not one but two babies. how we couldn’t stop laughing nervously hours later…
I would have blogged about how my neighbor’s incredibly obese, crabby cat used to come into my house via the cat door. Fattie would scarf down all the cat food, then stand at the door meowling until someone let him out. It turns out that his immense girth broke the cat door each time he came through. In the end we decided that our cats were best off as indoor kitties.
Oh this is easy…..hands down it has to be the day I found out I was pregnant with our surprise baby–our other kids were 10 and 13 at the time. Yeah, I ran the gamut of emotions that day…..well, the entire nine months. Tons of blog fodder was missed by three short years.
I don’t blog, and that’s probably because I’d end up blogging about really boring things like homework and books I’m reading. I might have had some funny stories about things our puppy did last summer.
Wow, the contest really bring people of the woodwork, don’t they?
Back in February of 2003 DH and I drove down to a small town between Fort Collins and Loveland and picked up this adorable and sad looking dog from a rescue. We took her home on a one week trial. Her name was Wilma, but we didn’t much care for it and it didn’t seem a good match for this dog, so we changed it to Emma because we had read same syllable rhyming names were the way to go if you renamed an animal.
Well, little Emma (who was full grown, but always kind of looks like puppy) was picky and not eating her food (hard to believe that now), so twice a day I was grating up carrots and apples and mixing them with yogurt and some of her kibble. I was gradually upping the kibble and reducing the other stuff. She stayed in the kitchen in her kennel unless you pulled out the harness and leash and then she’d sit by the door and wait for you to take her out on her walk. At the end of the week she had wormed her way into our hearts and we decided we’d keep her. So, it was off to the vet where we found out that her incision was infected and that she had worms. Poor thing! So, we fixed her up.
For weeks she never left the kennel unless I was on the kitchen floor ready to brush her or I was going to take her on a walk. I called my mom up probably several times a day crying that I was a bad puppy mom and that she didn’t like me and what I had I gotten myself into, LOL! It was like I was a new mom, but without the hormonal swings, LOL!
We eventually made our way together. I remember finally coaxing her down into the basement where my studio is and where I tend to spend the vast majority of my time during the work week. I took some Kraft singles and broke them up and trailed them down the basement stairs about every third step, LOL!
I probably would’ve blogged about the completely unromantic way DH proposed to me. No bended knee, no romantic location, just an unlit part of a backstreet in front of a couple of rental places complete with metre high unmown grass…
(Heh. I was there that day with Peeve. Except I missed the restaurant. But yes the Dalai Lama did swan into the hotel! He may be humble but he stays in the best hotels and has about as much securityw ith him as the US president.)
You know, at first I couldn’t think of a single thing. But once I thought of one, I thought of several.
Like when my oldest kitty Charlotte died very suddenly at age 18. And how my sweet co-workers took up a collection so I could go to the shelter and get a new kitty (although they got their money back, because Harley found me before I went to the shelter).
Or how it was so amazing when I got Lasik, and could wake up in the middle of the night and see the clock — all the way across the room!
Or about the very best concert I ever saw: Robert Earl Keen at Gruene Hall in July 1999, despite the 100 degree temperature and no A/C.
Gosh, I may have to actually blog about some of these things!
I would have blogged about the transformation of our house. We’ve been here about 5 years and when we bought it there were some serious crimes against humanity going on in here. Pastely textured wallpaper in the kitchen making it look exactly like a gynecologist’s office. Super high shag carpet that was grey, ten years old and matted down AND had cutouts added of purple orchids and a center diamond of black and white. When I ripped it up it came apart in my hands – nasty! My husband had to rebuild every toilet in this place – there are 5! – and we had to replace every switch, outlet, light fixture and railing. Seriously – we bought this house because it had “good bones” and that’s about all we got (once we stripped off all the crap that is). It’s been a long hard road of work on our part – and now we are on the final phase. Contractors are coming in to install the new kitchen and then we work on the bathrooms. We should be done in another year and a half. Sigh.
Ooo! I thought of another one! I would have blogged about the greatest concert I’ve ever been to. I’d only just heard of the band and found out they were playing in Chicago for the first time in 10 years. So I bought a ticket last minute and went the next day. Right before the show started a band rep asked me if I was alone (I was) and moved me up to fill an empty single seat in the front row, where I got to sit with the friends of the band and, during 3 songs, get on stage and dance with them!
You’re lucky I wasn’t blogging when my kid was born! It would have been nothing but baby photos and complaints about smelling like baby puke. LOL
I would have blogged about the time (3 years ago) I was recovering from abdominal surgery. I knew how to knit, but was doing a lot more beading than knitting at the time. My mom visited for 2 weeks to help M take care of me. She brought her knitting with her; she was trying something new: socks! In the afternoon we would sit at the dining room table while I beaded and she knit on her sock. We marveled at how the heel turn worked, how the sock back in the round for a gusset looked like a papoose that Indian women used to carry their babies on their backs, how the toe really shaped to fit a foot. It was all new and really cool. Several months later, when I had more beaded jewelry than I new what to do with, I started my own handknitted sock. And the rest, as they say, is history.
When I was growing up, we had one dog and only one dog – Kramer the Crazy – who was adopted while I was in high school. The entire extent of my cat ownership was a single day when I was around four years old. My dad brought home a little black cat and didn’t check with the landlord first. No pets. The nameless black kitty found a home on my great uncle’s farm and I was told he ran away.
So, when the Mr. and I decided it was time to make our family a little larger, my initial thought was a dog. My one and only cat was mean and therefore, all cats were mean. Now I realize I was just a shitty four-year-old and any cat would have been mean to a shitty four-year-old. Seriously, what cat likes to have its tail pulled? Due to our complete lack of a yard, we logically decided that an indoor cat would be a better fit for our tiny, little condo, even though I was completely unaware of how to raise a kitten.
The first night I was home alone with Kally, she sat at the other end of the room and kept her eye on me incase I did anything that would be of interest to her, completely normal cat behavior. I called the Mr. near tears and said, “I don’t know what to do, she’s just STARING at me.” He had to explain to me that she’s a cat and that’s what cats do, they stare at you. Every now and then, he’ll say “she’s just STARING at you,” in his best impression of my near-tears voice.
Oh man the one story that would have made the Purling Sprite headlines was the “I love you story”.
When I moved to Utah I had a boyfriend from Salt Lake City, he would come and visit me up in Logan (about a 2 hour drive). He was going down in Salt Lake to school and I was attending school in Logan, so it was a long distance relationship. We would see each other every now and then and got all sappy and mooshy around each other.
As time went on, I started hanging out with more guys and one guy in particular–just as friends, nothing serious.
One Saturday the boyfriend from Salt Lake called me and we were on the phone for a good hour or so at the end he said the obligatory “I love you” and I of course promptly said “I love you too Sam”, except his name was Ryan. Oh I felt like crap! I still remember my face turning all red and getting the urge to hang up the phone as quickly as possible.
Needless to say, Ryan and I never made the cut, but today I am happily married to Sam
–almost 6 years.
I spent six months living in Rome in college, and that would have made for great photos and stories had I had a blog at the time.
The one experience I would have wanted to blog, for the catharsis, is the time I witnessed a pedestrian get hit by an SUV on the way to class when I was in college. She got dragged 40 feet, and when the guy finally stopped, I ran into the road to get the traffic to move into the other lane. It was a terrifying experience, but there were amazingly six or seven witnesses who helped out in other ways, and all stuck around to give statements to the police. Sadly, the girl never regained consciousness and died the next day. Over a year later, I had to go through the whole deposition/pre-trial stuff, and was blessed to meet her family and find out more about a stranger who changed my life in more ways than I would have thought possible.
Hmm… I’d have to blog about the summer before I went to College, when I worked on a road crew as a flag-girl holding a stop sign for a paving company. I got an amazing tan, made friends with a biker gang, had random strangers stop to propose marriage to me and all kinds of truckers would bring me drinks and snacks from time to time. I also ended that summer with a mouth like sailor, which went over a bit oddly when I arrived at Art College looking like a beach blonde with a mouth like a merchant marine. I didn’t even have to try to stand out
I wish I would have been blogging the first time I dyes yarn with Koolaid. It was a disaster and I hate the smell of it all. The yarn came out pretty cool but I hate the whole process and it was not what I wanted it to look like. Norma recently knit a hat for Dulan with that yarn!
Love the site. Found it looking for the lyrics to Shaun the sheep for my father-in-law (big Wallace and Grommet fan). I particularly liked the stories of the cats! I will be back.
Keep up the good work
Regards
Paul
Fun contest! OK, here goes…
Had I been blogging before I was actually blogging, I would have posted about the amazingly cute pygmy goats I saw in a little village/town in Austria. You could buy yarn by the kilo there, but I wasn’t knitting yet either.
I would have blogged about the experience of adopting our daughter, Cieara. The whole process took about a year, and was both happy and frustrating. She came to live with us when she was 8, and we just celebrated her 7th “Gottcha Day”! I remember that time as being incredibly stressful as we impatiently waited for the gears of state government to slowly turn. I definitely would have blogged it!
I wish I had been blogging when I first learned how to knit. Cause it would have been funny to see photos of me tossing my yarn and needles across the room in frustration!
I’d say it had to be when I shaved my head a few years back.
I wore it much better than Britney does.
I live in the South, which is home to a fun little delicacy called grits. They are made of corn and go well with lots of butter and sugar, even though some people say salt.
About 10 years ago, I had gotten a big thing of grits and was going to transfer them from the package to another container. Being that I tend to make messes, I made the container swap over the sink.
I was pouring from one holder to another when I noticed that there wasn’t as much as I thought there would have to be, considering the size of the original container.
Well.. there was a hole in the original packaging. This hole caused prob about a half pound of grits to go down my sink.
Grits expand in water, so you can only imagine the issues I had. My sink was so clogged that it was making other sinks in my apartment clog. It was a MESS.
The plumber laughed loudly when I told him what had happened. Totally mortifying. It was eventually fixed, but the pain is still there when I see grits.
This little adventure would definitely have made my blog, along with pics of the grits, the sink and the plumber’s butt lines and his laughing face!
There are such great stories here in your comments!
I think I would have blogged about my fabulous trips to Alaska, it is such a beautiful place and it would have been nice to share some of my photography from there. Too bad none of my photos are digital and I don’t have a scanner, sigh.
Or on a knitting theme, the time my mother taught me to knit. My first project was a cotton dish cloth. I asked my mom how I was doing and all she had to say was “you’ll loosen up”. Little did I know that cotton was an absolute nightmare to knit with no matter if you’re a beginner or not.
What would I have blogged about? Ummm….
My three gorgeous kids (alhough I do that now – but they did lots of stuff pre-blogging too
)
The tramping (hiking) trips I used to take pre-having-kids. New Zealand is such a beautiful place to live.
I’m sure there would have been a post about the time my boyfriend (now hubby) and I went camping out in the middle of nowhere in a little park campground with long-drop toilets etc and he had a stress reaction that brought on shingles and we ended up being nearly stranded by floodwaters – only the Ranger rounded us up just in time. And somewhere in there there was an incident with a slightly scary neighbour and an axe – but that’s a whole other story.
Gosh – I actually did have a life back then, must remember that more often!
No idea if this will get in on time given time differences but only found your site today (enjoyed the visit!)
EnnaVic (in New Zealand)
I do like the idea of this contest, too! It took me awhile to think of what I would post, since most of my life is mundane.
Most likely, everyone would have been privy to my trek through Europe. I was gone with one of my closest friends for a month, and we went to seven countries, but only spoke the language in three! I hated Paris, since we were there during the summer of 2003. It topped 95 degrees Fahrenheit every day we were there. I also learned how to use an Italian washing machine and figured out the transit system everywhere.
great contest! it’s been fun reading all the stories.
i would have blogged about how i was in my last semester of college (after 13 years in and out) working full time, learning to knit, and training for my first triathlon all at the same time. i still don’t know how i did it or where all that motivation went.
i moved in with my bf early in our relationship, some may say a little too… but we had been living together for a good two months when my usual “i want a kitty!” whines started up again.
i love having a cat in the house and i had been missing it since my baby shawn had “run away” the year or so before, and my other baby zachery passed of cancer the year before that.
the space we were sharing was much too small and his parents didn’t really want us to have a pet, so i’d resigned myself to waiting.
until i got this mysterious phone call from a close friend.
“are you home?”
“yes…”
“good. i’m coming over. and i have something for you.”
i thought it was my helmet, or maybe a pair of sneakers i’d left there a few weekends before. needless to say my interest was piqued. what could have been so important?
well… she calls back when she gets in the driveway and i make my way out.
she’s standing at her car door holding something out to me in her hand. “do you want this?”
the smallest, scruffiest, cutest little bundle of gray and white fur ever was hanging there limply, as kittens tend to do.
talk about melted heart.. she thrust him into my arms and he just fell right asleep.
they were pissed that he was so calm with me but had been scratchy scratchy with them.
br was horrified and demanded they take it back but how could i let go of such a little thing? it took a lot of begging and pleading and pouting but…
that’s the story of how we got the temperamental pain in the ass that is napoleon!
Before I was blogging I would probably would have blogged about picking up a copy of Alice Starmore’s knitting book, The Celtic collection. I thought I would give fair isle knitting a try and knit the Lindisfarne Sweater as my first project. For the first time I actually went to a yarn store to buy wool yarn. Hundreds of $ of Shetland wool in 14 different colors. It didn’t seem like a big deal at the time but looking at it now, I can’t think what possessed me to knit anything that complicated for my first fair isle project.
i started blogging a year after i planned my wedding. i definitely would have blogged about how much i hated planning a wedding. how stressful it was to have your future nieces as your bridesmaids when you weren’t sure their mother liked you, why oh why did i need to make my invitations (i’m actually glad that i didn’t read blogs back then either, because i would have stressed that my invitations weren’t good enough), etc.