Category Archives: Reading

*gasp* An FO!

Carol and Margene are asking us to use the two weeks from November 18 – December 2 to Knit Unto Others. This is the second year they’ve coordinated this effort, and this year there will be prizes for those who participate!

Hope everyone had a great weekend! Mine was extremely relaxing, which I really needed after some long days at work last week – and with more long days ahead in the next week or two. Spending so many hours working in front of the computer is cutting way down on my blog reading time and inclination – when I get home, I can’t bear to be in front of the computer anymore. But I’m also frustrated about being behind in what everyone’s up to. *sigh* And then I have this significant birthday coming up in less than two weeks, which has me a bit contemplative about life, the universe, and everything. So, I’ve been distracting myself with reading and knitting (I know, how is that different from any other time?!).

Reading Update
Incubus Dreams by Laurell K. Hamilton. Another Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter novel (book 12, apparently) – um, yeah, I couldn’t help continue rereading this series… Moving right along!
Blood Trail, Blood Lines, and Blood Pact by Tanya Huff. More books from the Vicki Nelson series about Toronto vampire Henry Fitzroy. These are good reads. I’m curious how accurately they depict Toronto (well, beyond the obvious supernatural stuff…) – they seem very descriptive of the city!

Ok, totally not in time for Socktoberfest, but I finally finished the Flatiron socks, knitted from yarn I dyed.

A little color correction actually got them slightly closer to reality – the pink and purple defeats my camera. Strangely, no cats were lured by knitting photography…

However, lurid yarn on the floor (more hand dyed, now wound up for a new pair of socks) drew them right out.

“Stay back, big kitty! Your aged eyes might not be able to deal with this brightness!”

Pin-up calendars

Nicole’s started a new group called Fitter Knitters and is having a contest. Leave a comment with a link to a healthy online recipe by Tuesday, November 7, 5 pm Eastern, and you might win two skeins of Noro Kureyon, color 163!

Reading Update
I know, all the vampire books lately – started out reading one series (the Sookie Stackhouse books), then wondered when the heck the Anita Blake books had gone astray, then people kept recommending stuff… ‘Tis the season, right?!
Undead and Unwed, Undead and Unemployed, Undead and Unappreciated, and Undead and Unreturnable by MaryJanice Davidson. A vampire series that takes place in the Twin Cities! Betsy (Elizabeth) Taylor didn’t want to be the queen of the vampires – she just wanted to own really expensive shoes. We can’t always get what we want… Another fun vampire series – once again, Peeve knows her vampires!

As I mentioned yesterday, Deb of Chappysmom is having a maybe contest – show her pictures of what your November calendar page(s) look(s) like. Here are mine – the first is a knitting calendar that hangs in my kitchen.

The second is the calendar I have at work.

And the third calendar (also in my kitchen) isn’t going to surprise anyone…

Remember this picture? Here’s a new picture of May for size comparison – even I can tell she’s getting bigger!

*glug glug glug*

“See, Mom?! I told you I was getting bigger! Look out, big kitty, I’m going to be big enough to squish you soon!”

Randumb

Hope no one’s got a Halloween sugar hangover this morning! I did wear the black cat ears last night (but not the tail – maybe next year). Interesting reactions included a woman in a crosswalk who looked through my car window and got the giggles, a dog that growled at me while his owner apologized profusely, and my brother’s cats poofing and hissing and creeping carefully back away from me. The block party was sort of a bust, since it was about 30F. Brrrr! Alas, I have not a single picture – we were too busy shivering and hopping around to stay warm.

Reading Update
Obsidian Butterfly, Narcissus in Chains, and Cerulean Dreams (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter) by Laurell K. Hamilton. Ok, I now know where the psychotic break was in this series. Obsidian Butterfly, perhaps because it took place in New Mexico, far from St. Louis and “the boys,” was the last book where, as Beadslut so succinctly put it, Anita spent more time on a case than in bed. After that, we have Micah and the ardeur and a glacially slow storyline and lots and lots and lots of sex.
Running in Heels by Anne Maxted. I couldn’t remember if I’d already read this, although I wondered if I had the entire time I read it. Maxted delivers damn good chick lit, whichever.
The Trouble with Witches by Shirley Damsgaard, an Ophelia and Abby mystery. This is the most recent book in the cozy series about a librarian witch and her grandmother living in Iowa.
Blood Price by Tanya Huff. Vampires in Toronto! Finally enough people recommend this series to me that I simply couldn’t resist anymore. The first book was very good, and the next is already on reserve.
Shakespeare’s Landlord by Charlaine Harris. This is the first Lily Bard mystery and since I enjoyed Harris’ Sookie Stackhouse mysteries so much (and since Peeve recommended this series, too), I figured I’d give ’em a try. The first one is a good basic mystery (no paranormal romance!), set in Shakespeare, Arkansas.

Since I basically have nothing else today, how about some cat pictures from a few weeks ago? (Cat pictures?! Wow, that’s a new one!)

“Oh, come on, May, I just want to wipe a little smudge off your face.”

“Let me return the favor, big kitty – with my teeth! Bwah-ha-ha!!!”

There was snow on my car this morning

One of Michaele the Knitty Professor’s pet peeves is men who wear pants that make them appear as if they have no ass. Submit stories, photos, and haikus about these assless men and the best submission will win a prize.

Trek is having a limerick contest. The rules are great! Highlights incude that you must refer to fiber or homebrewing and you cannot include the word “Nantucket.” Heh! Contest ends 11:26 am, Friday, October 27 – I’m assuming EDT.

Sunday morning, I was lying blissfully asleep in my flannel sheets when the roof repair guys began work. Yikes! I’m on the top floor of condos, and they started right over my place. Remember how stressed Chaos was when the window guys were working outside?? Pretty much a rerun of that, except there were two cats hiding behind the toilet this time. Hopefully the roof repair guys finish very quickly…

Reading Update
Burnt Offerings and Blue Moon by Laurell K. Hamilton, books 7 and 8 of Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter. Ok, these two books were ok, but things were starting to fall apart with the addition of the wereleopards, Asher, and in particular, Raina’s munin.
Charmed to Death by Shirley Damsgaard. This cute book is the second in the Ophelia and Abby mystery series, about a librarian witch and her grandmother, living in small town Iowa.
Derik’s Bane: A Wyndham Werewolf Tale by MaryJanice Davidson. Hee hee – you know how books sometimes have a categorization on the spine? This one is “paranormal romance.” 🙂 It was a light and fun quick read. I’m waiting for the first book (Undead and Unwed) in Davidson’s Twin Cities vampire series, which sounds a wee bit lighter than the Anita Blake books. 😉
The Chocolate Cat Caper: A Chocoholic Mystery by JoAnna Carl. Ok, how could I resist this one? Chocolate! Cat! Yum! Not sure if I’ll read any of the other books in the series, but this was fun.
Something’s Cooking: An Angie Amalfi Mystery by Joanne Pence. Another of those irresistible $0.69 mysteries at the thrift store. I spent a fair amount of time shaking my head that I kept reading this book… but I did. And I was surprised at how things turned out. Um, if I found another in the series for the same price at the thrift store, I would probably read it. But I’m not going to bother looking for them at the library.

I’ve been making steady progress on the Flatiron socks from the yarn I dyed. I’m enjoying the spiraling and pooling – it’s fascinating to see what they’ll do next.

“I’ll pose for this picture, Mom, but you know as soon as you’re done, those Addis are toast!”

“Neener, neener, neener, May – look at my lovely whiskers. Ha! Yours are all bitten off.”

End of vacation…

The Yarn Harlot is having a contest – what’s the best word can you make from the Scrabble letters?

Celtic Kelly is selling some really cute stitchmarkers for sockscheck them out!

Yesterday was my last day of vacation. Alas, I spent it with a migraine. Pooey! Much better today, but I didn’t get any of the things done I was planning for yesterday, so I’m feeling more discombobulated about being back at work than I expected. And very very far behind in bloglines again!

Sometime during the past two weeks, I saw a pattern for a soap bag that hangs in the shower. It was posted on someone’s blog, but I didn’t bookmark it. *slaps forehead* I think it was from Sugar’n’Cream, but I wouldn’t bet on it. Please leave a comment if you know where this pattern was posted. My google-fu hasn’t found it yet…

Reading Update
The Laughing Corpse, Circus of the Damned, The Lunatic Cafe, Bloody Bones, and The Killing Dance by Laurell K. Hamilton, books 2-6 of Anita Black, Vampire Hunter. It’s been ages since I read these and I’m definitely enjoying the re-read. The series hadn’t started to deteriorate yet…
Bit of info for anyone reading the Sookie Stackhouse Southern Vampire series – when I started the sixth book, Definitely Dead, I was very confused. The book referred to some critical incidents that had recently happened, but I certainly didn’t remember anything about them and I had just read the previous five books in about four days. It turns out that the information was revealed in a short story in the book Bite. I highly recommend reading that short story before you read Definitely Dead!

This was worth turning around to get a picture of…

And May wants to show off how big she’s getting:

“I’m almost as big as the big kitty, Mom!!”

Monday, Monday

Thanks to everyone who’s been asking about the Chaos Kitty. Here’s where things stand: Chaos is happy and active and is off antibiotics (for a skin infection – hence the shaved butt). He went back to the vet on Saturday and the consensus is that he’s having autoimmune issues. (Aw, he’s taking after me!) This last bout was triggered by him sneaking some of May’s food. May seems to be grain sensitive. (Aw, she’s taking after me, too!) She has trouble if she eats any of Chaos’ food. He has trouble if he eats any of her food. Ack. Cat feeding time around here is very intricate, let me tell you!

Brigitte is having a contest to name the sweater she’s working on. The contest deadline is 5 pm Eastern, Friday, October 20.

Rabbitch wants to put hats on as many of Vancouver’s 1300 homeless as she can and is offering prizes to those who knit hats. You can send your hats to this address. Deadline is December 1.

There’s still time to enter V’s contest by sending her some yarn for her blanket. She’ll draw for prizes on November 1.

Reading Update
The Crocodile on the Sandbank by Elizabeth Peters. This was the very first Amelia Peabody mystery and interestingly enough, really the only one that I enjoy re-reading.
For Better, For Worse by Carole Matthews. Your basic chick lit – it was good enough that I finished reading it, but not good enough that I’ll recommend it or pass the book along to anyone. Your mileage may vary.
Guilty Pleasures by Laurell K. Hamilton. After reading the Sookie Stackhouse books and thinking how much more I enjoyed them than I have the recent Anita Blake (Vampire Hunter) books, I decided to re-read the very first Anita Blake novel. It’s good. At what point did the series deteriorate? Guess I’ll have to re-read them in order to see if I can figure that out.

I have quite a few bibs to knit, since there’s a baby infestation bearing down upon us. You have been warned.

“Oh oh, I think the big kitty mentioned something about this…”

“What the…?”

“Hmph.”

*fight fight fight*
“Almost free – whew!”

Vacation continues…. ahhh….

Anne is having another contest! She wants to see pictures of a trip to one of your local shops – and it doesn’t have to be just yarn shops. She hasn’t selected an end date, as this involves a little bit of work for people. She’s very curious about local oddities. Hmm. Probably not St Sabrina’s Parlor in Purgatory, the piercing and tattoo parlor a few blocks away…

Ahhh… My vacation continues, albeit much quieter than last week. I’m so relaxed that I didn’t blog yesterday and I don’t want to ever go back to work! 🙂 Strangely, I’m not getting as much knitting or closet organization done as I’d hoped. Oh well.

Reading Update
Witch Way to Murder by Shirley Damsgaard. Have I mentioned that I’m a sucker for books with a black cat on the cover?! So that’s why I picked up this one, about a reluctant witch and her grandmother, living in smalltown Iowa. It was a fun read.
Definitely Dead by Charlaine Harris. The most recent Southern Vampires novel. Move over, Anita Blake. Sookie’s way more fun and the story moves along much less ponderously! I think I’m adding Quinn to my list of sexy fictional males
Concourse by S.J. Rozan (cd). The second book in the series about NYC PIs Bill Smith and Lydia Chin. This series is along the lines of Marcia Muller, Sara Paretsky, etc., and is one that I will definitely continue reading (or listening to).
Grave Sight by Charlaine Harris. Not one of the Southern Vampire series, this book is about Harper, who was struck by lightning when she was 15 and can hear dead people… It was an ok read, but nowhere near as good as the Stookie books. And the hardcover was so poorly edited that it pained me to read at points – things like someone ordering French toast and bacon, and then on the facing page, conversation stopped while he waited for his eggs and toast to be set in front of him. These sort of consistent inconsistencies make it it hard for me to get into a story.

I have an FO!! I’ll wait while you all recover. 😉

This baby sweater was knit from 4.5 skeins of KnitPicks Shine Worsted, color terra cotta. The basic pattern was Knitting Pure & Simple’s neckdown baby cardigan, although I used attached i-cord for the edgings and buttonbands. The buttons are the only purchase I made during Saturday’s yarn crawl.

“Hmm, I wonder if I can bite one of these buttons off?”

Can you see the silver-tipped fur on May’s front legs? She’s developing some more distinct tabby markings – I don’t think she’s going to be as black as Chaos is.

“Maybe best not to while Mom’s watching, so I’ll just pretend that I’m interested in her silly sweater. Fur just seems so much more attractive and efficient.”

*purr purr purr*

Another vacation Monday!

I’m so behind in bloglines! Yikes – over 300 again… If you have or know of a contest you’d like mentioned, please send an email to chris at this domain, since I probably won’t find out about it until it’s over at this rate. Thanks! (On the positive side, I will have new knitting to show you very soon!)

Reading Update
To Catch a Cat by Marian Babson. Just a generic mystery that I read to pass the time while knitting. I wouldn’t recommend it or read it again, although I’ll probably pass it on to Jeanne because the cat on the cover looks like her Greta.
Dead Until Dark, Living Dead in Dallas, Club Dead, Dead to the World, and Dead as a Doornail by Charlaine Harris. I started to read the Southern Vampire series over the weekend and I’m hooked! I love the characters – telepathic barmaid Sookie Stackhouse, the Vampire Bill, the Vampire Bubba, Sam the were-collie… These are set in a small town in northern Louisiana (near Shreveport). Hopefully the library has the next one…

Ok, I promised pictures of the yarn I dyed at Deb’s last Thursday. Behold the skein that contains no black, purple, or pink!

Of course, it looked much better when it was reskeined – this is 800 yards of the KnitPicks Dye Your Own laceweight, using Country Classics dyes (buttercup, pumpkin, butterscotch, and a mixture of greens that I’ve forgotten).

Here’s a skein of Wool2Dye4’s sock yarn, dyed with key lime, kiwi, and raven:

Deb picked up one of Louet’s mini dyeing kits and let me play with it. The kit came with three colors of Gaywool dye (blueberry, cornflower, and silverbirch), along with some GEMS Pearl. We passed this yarn onto Jeanne, since she couldn’t join us on Thursday.

May practices her yarn inspecting technique:

“I think the big kitty is just making me do all the work now.”

And just so you know that you’re still at the right blog, I did dye a skein with some purple and black – this is Wool2Dye4’s sock yarn, dyed with wild iris, charcoal, and raven.

May was apparently exhausted from her yarn inspection.

“There, there, May, a nice bath will revive you.” – Chaos
“Hmph.” – Mayhem

Vacation, Day the nth

Yesterday, it was Deb’s turn to entertain me during my vacation. 😉 We dyed some wonderful yarn, but it’s drying, so you’ll have to wait until Monday to see it all pretty and nice. This will shock you – one of my skeins contained no black, purple, or pink!! I’ll wait while you collect yourselves.

Jeanne and I will be participating in the Yarn Crawl/Treasure Hunt going on at seven Twin Cities’ yarn stores this weekend. Wouldn’t it be great fun to win the $3000 grand prize?!

Reading Update
Sacred and Profane and Milk and Honey by Faye Kellerman. Books two and three in the Peter Decker and Rina Lazarus series. Although I’m enjoying this series, at times, I find I’m gritting my teeth at Peter’s attitude toward women in these books. Does this improve at all in future books?! He’s generally ok regarding his partner, Marge, but towards Rina – argh!
Naked in Death by J.D. Robb (aka Nora Roberts). This is the first Eve Dallas novel and I hugely enjoyed rereading it. If you aren’t familiar with this series, it’s a somewhat graphic mystery series set in the not-too-distant future, featuring NYPD lieutenant Eve Dallas and the ever-so-sexy Roarke, the richest man in the world (and then some). Roarke is way up there on my list of sexiest fictional male persons. *fans self*

Here’s a little photo essay of Chaos, May, and the black shoebox that I’ve been meaning to post for several weeks – from before Chaos’ butt was shaved.

“Nothing to see here, move along, move along.”
*hee hee* “May will never know I’m under here!”
“Hmm…. I wonder where the big kitty is?”
“Ha! I see your butt, big kitty!”
*fight fight fight bite bite bite*
“Run away!”

Vacation, Day #2

MajorKnitter is having a contest to collect supplies for a school knitting project. She has a list of supplies needed to get a K-5 knitting program going – the kids will be knitting for different charities. Mail your donations by October 21.

Reading Update (probably will be quite a few of these during my vacation!)
Burying Ariel by Gail Bowen. Another $0.70 mystery from the thrift store, set in Canada (Saskatchewan this time). Joanne Kilbourn teaches at a university in Regina and one of her colleagues is found stabbed to death in the library. This was a well-written mystery that touched on some tough subjects and I’ll be looking for more in the series.
The Diamond Cat by Marian Babson. Ok, I love the covers of Babson’s books. The contents, not always so much. This was an ok book – I finished it, which I won’t do if I hate a book. And I’ll probably read the other book of hers that I have. But I don’t think I’ll look for any of the others.

Look! I actually took a Saturday Sky picture on a Saturday! (Please ignore the fact that it’s Tuesday right now…) The exuberant ash at the top of the picture has dropped all of its leaves while the other trees are still trying to decide whether to change color.

Really, I couldn’t have asked for a better start to my vacation (well, other than being in my car heading southwest across state lines!). It’s been unseasonably warm and dry here the past few days, and I’ve spent a lot of time walking around my neighborhood, sitting outside at cafes reading and knitting a bit. Today is supposed to be rainy, but hopefully I’ll hook up with Renee for a movie and some knitting – I might even finish my Regia Silk waffle socks!! (I’ll wait for you all to collect yourselves at the rumor of a finished object here at SoC.)

Since I have to be very careful about the angle I take pictures of Chaos from (so his naked butt isn’t revealed – he needs to retain some dignity, bibs notwithstanding), you might see quite a few pictures of Mayhem in the near future.

“Which is as it should be, seeing as I’m so cute and all.”

Hmm, I think I’ve posted at least one or two very similar pictures of Chaos…

“Where do you think you’re going, my pretty?”

“Ha, you’ll not get away from me now!! Off to my lair under the shoebox.”