the darkness has not overcome it

my back continues to cause me less pain for greater amounts of time. i am completely off the heavy drugs. i am mostly off the alleve.
even went to the gym yesterday and did a half-hour on the elliptical, cool down around the track and some short time with the weight machines. mostly i'm just avoiding twisting motions or heavy lifting.
good stuff.

it is a beautiful day today in the twin cities. it is predicted that today will be the first day reaching 80 degrees since last september. i really wanted to ride my bike to work today...but i need to take the time to fill my tires and get a bike lock that can handle the super-thick locking options i have at 3m. also i didn't get up early enough.
also savil needed some serious butt-trimming this morning(yuck). she didn't let me finish, but she is much less matted & stinky than previously. i think i'm going to need someone to hold her for me to finish.

the routine of working the same daily hours has been good for me to get back to. having a schedule stabilizes me a lot. i'm taking the down-time i need, but i've also been making a point of getting at least SOME chores done around the house every day. it is going a long way toward keeping me sane and keeping the house clean. especially since ross isn't around to help much.

he woke me at 4am this morning to tell me he had a great night at work and everything was coming together and he missed me. and bless him, i WANT him to wake me to tell me things like that. but i could NOT get back to sleep afterward, and i wasn't sleeping well BEFORE he woke me, so i'm feeling it today.

i had a long talk with ceci last night and then my parents.
it was good to re-connect with all of them. i have been so run-down by trying to do too much, and i have been neglecting the people i try to keep in contact with by phone. i miss ross, and i miss doing things with him, but i also feel like his being at work so much is giving me a chance to breathe. i think i need to figure out how to stop sacrificing my down-time so much, especially since he really doesn't need me to (he has said so). the distance gives me time to reflect. it just seems funny that i should need so badly to reflect on such basic things.
it isn't that i'm not being social though. returning long distance phone calls counts as social for me.
also i've been seeing lots of susan lately, which is lovely, going to knitting/spinning groups and today i am getting together with victoria, who i'm not sure i've mentioned before here. she's way cool. i met her on the knitting camping trip last fall. she just had her NINTH baby! most of her pregnancies happened while she was on birth control and there was one set of twins, so don't judge her as another octomom. also she's married and stable.
she's also very funny and creative and cool to be with. i quite like her.
tomorrow is getting together with marie for spinning/knitting whatever and saturday i will be hanging out with christa and ross before he has to go to work in the evening.

i am still enjoying gregory frost - i'm on his second shadowbridge book now, lord tophet. i continue to be pleased with this new find. they have some of the feel of neil gaiman's neverwhere - without neil's darkness. we'll see if this one ends better than the last one.

also i still have not seen watchmen and am put out about it. i was going to see it with ross, but he has no time now and every one else has already seen it.
i have been re-watching the 10th kingdom. the logical result of this is that i have THE TROLL version of saturday night fever going around in my head endlessly. i am simultaneously amused and annoyed.

but the dream didn't quite make it to reality. i also dreamed about work. figures.
actually, i kinda slept for shit last night in general.
i will pay for that today, but so far the caffeine is sustaining me nicely.

mostly ross and i had a quiet weekend of bashing heads with diablo ii and some online friends. beat the game and are talking about going back for the nightmare level. it should be interesting.
amy came over for a while saturday, and then we wound up going to hell's kitchen sunday in celebration of her birthday and afterward hitting the macy's flower show. it wasn't anything as spectacular as the philadelphia flower show - this is something put on for free by a corporate headquarters. still it smelled good and there were many hyacinths. we have yet to have anything really blooming here yet (and actually had a dusting of snow sunday morning), so seeing all the color was really nice.
hell's kitchen, as always, is spectacular. how can you go wrong with bloody marys and bison sausage? it was the first time we've been to their new location and i had 2 cups of coffee, not realizing how late it was - hence the sleeping for shit last night.

i finished peony in love by lisa see. it is WAY more fanciful than snow flower and the secret fan, but it had a similar feel. if you liked the one, you will probably like the other.
i am currently working on a book called shadowbridge by gregory frost. i am loving the premise. we'll see if it stays good. if it's all as good as the beginning however, i may have to read everything this guy has written.

it is official that i will be attending the nuptuals one kfringe to the beautiful and brilliant crowyhead. i'm not going to croquet and i'm not going to estes. i'm damned if i'm also missing this! i am terribly excited to finally meet her in person as well as some of the rest of the philly knitting/lj/book-reading crowd that seems to surround her. but it also sounds like there will also be many johnnies attending. also they are getting married in a bar. only kfringe. admittedly it is sounding like a damn good time. hopefully ross will be able to come with me and will not have another musical.

i still have not seen watchmen. this needs to happen.

also cirque du soliel will be in town the weekend of july 3rd - which is AFTER ross's show and means he will be able to go. and might be while my folks are here - they have not confirmed if they are coming this summer or not. i would really like to get a big group of people together to go to this. patchhat?, sidhebear?, wilderheart and eltanin?, oneonajourney? any of you guys interested? any of you people i didn't mention?

this week is my last week of literacy training classes. i am REALLY looking forward to them being over. i want to be working with people, not sitting in a classroom feeling like my time is being wasted.

also my winter twilight mitts are starting to show how awesome they are going to be. i love the bright contrast of the colors. these are a very personal project. the cashmere was a gift from my brother and sister-in-law from the farm where my nephew works, hand-dyed and knit by me. lots of meaning compact into a little thing.

this weekend:

tonight - dinner with scott and heidi and the girls
tomorrow - amy is coming over and i will teach her to knit and hopefully we will cheer her up.
sunday - maybe watchmen? i will admit to blasphemy. i didn't much care for the comic. i am hoping the movie will be better. i liked v for vendetta better than i liked the comic.

hopefully there will also be time to finish my book.
wings of wrath by c.s. freidman rocks. i am really enjoying it so far.

calling all johnnies!

have you heard of this book yet?
a college president(of another liberal arts school) enrolls at sjca as a freshman.
i'm about half-way through and i have mixed feelings about this book.
on one hand, i love it that sjc is getting the press from it. i love it that he sticks up for the program (albeit not as well as he might). i love reading about all the tutors i had when i was there and remembering life on the campus. that part is very good.
on the other hand, he isn't REALLY getting the freshman experience. it BOTHERS me that the only class he seems to be enrolled in is seminar. seminar may be where the bulk of the program is processed, but martin makes a point of how sjc teaches how ideas cross boundaries between disciplines - while it seems like he is avoiding that experience himself. it feels intolerable to me to claim to be pursuing the freshman experience, and then only take one class. that is NOT the freshman experience. even if you are also participating in crew and learning to sing.
additionally, while he admits to being and old guy (not really that old, imho) and makes fun of his lack of success "trying to be cool," his general naivete really bothers me. i have trouble relating to him and wind up feeling...scornful of him. this is very uncomfortable for me and also ties into my previous point about not really experiencing what he claims to be experiencing. if i didn't care deeply about the things he is talking about it probably wouldn't bother me so much.
i remain undecided about this book.

so i went to a stitch n' bitch last night.
at the mall, which i hate unless i have something specific i want to buy.
and no one was there but me.
And they were playing xmas music before thanksgiving.
and it got stuck in my head (briefly).

all in all, that was pretty terrible, although my xmas gift for my brother is progressing VERY nicely. i have completed the pattern repeat twice now. it's almost like a big cable-y snowflake. but not quite.

anyway, in order to get to the coffeeshop at the mall, i parked (you guessed it) outside barnes and noble. in part because i am addicted, but also in part because i have a membership card there, so the prices are more reasonable than they could be, and because it is a good place for me to scope gifts for people and the season is coming.
which meant i had to go BACK through there when i left. (oh the horror!)
which means of course, that i succumed to my weakness and left with 2 books, both of which are way more of a participation in fad than i usually involve myself with.
that being said, sunshine by robin mckinley is shaping up to be one of the best vampire books i've ever read. up there with fevre dream and that book i can't remember the name of that dana loaned me in high school. the jury is still out. i'm only 1/3 of the way through. but this book is awesome so far. i particularly love it that the vampires are terrifying and ugly and smell funny and are compelling but NOT sexy.

chestervhe, have you read this one?

so i found out today that one of my friends at work has been let go. a permanent employee, not contract like me.
and it is his position that i'm going to be filling for at least the next 2 weeks.
and that feels sketchy. i liked this guy. we went and got tea together almost every day for a while. i feel bad that i couldnt' say goodbye.
but i also found out that he was being a real creep to others in NOT OKAY ways.
i don't know how to feel about my good fortune being at his expense.

good fortune being another 2 weeks paychecks, and the immense goodwill of my co-workers/supervisors, etc.
my agency called me and told me they had been told how grateful 3M is for my positive attitude. that feels good and i earned it. it just feels weird to replace a friend.

i took leto in to be fixed last night. the breeder decided she didn't want to use him as a stud, so there was no real reason to keep him whole.  the vet called this morning and said everything went really well this morning, but he kept kicking the anaesthesia needle out of his leg, so he mostly had gas and might be awake enough for me to take home this afternoon instead of tomorrow. that would be very good.

i am re-reading the foundation trilogy by isaac asimov and am enjoying it tremendously. i normally don't care for books that aren't character driven, but this is a notable exception. i don't fall in love with asimov's characters, because it isn't who they are that is important. what is important is what they think. his characters come up with ideas that no one else in the story has and that the forward progress of the story depends on. they are idea-driven rather than character driven or even plot driven and it is very exciting. i love the underlying believe that it is ideas that make people great. i don't believe it is the only thing that can make someone great, but what a wonderful thing when it happens! i have never read anything like asimov's work, although vernor vinge's work is clearly influenced by it.

it snowed all morning here but nothing stuck. we expect more snow tomorrow. it is so beautiful and exciting at the beginning of winter.  i feel energized by it. i have always associated "over the river and through the woods" with thanksgiving, rather than xmas, so it feels right to have snow this time of year to me.
tonight susan is coming over. we haven't seen her in about 2 months because she's been so busy with school.
tomorrow i expect to be canning with corrin, knitting, drinking cider/cocoa and weather permitting - playing vampire tag. it is looking like a good weekend.

last night was the best concert i've been to all year.
including seeing boiled in lead on st. patty's day and including the really awesome GBS concert.
shawn mullins opened for dar, which i wasn't expecting. he's kinda so-so for me as an artist, but i really liked his stories. i also like that he puts his rhymes in the middle of his sentances. you also get to talk to artists after the show at a lot of guthrie concerts. he told me he rhymes that way because he's inspired by chris christopherson.
his performance was good.
but dar? she shown. she glowed up there on stage. i knew i liked her before the concert (although the christians and the pagans makes me mad on a semantic level - i realize that it is a song that the world needs - i feel that it perpetuates some false comparisons). i like her SO much more now. i got a whole different sense of her songs at the concert...but also i got a sense of HER and where her songs come from. and she talks about beauty and the way she sees things in a way that moves me deeply. she also tells great stories and is very funny. i am so glad i went.
also she reminds me of my friend katelyn.

i also picked up a new (large) scratching post, moved the small one we had into the guest room for the kitten (which will help her get used to madeliene's smell).
and i returned that book. i picked up a copy of storm front by jim butcher instead (in paperback, so i got some $$ back as well). all ya'll have been talking him up so much i figuree it's about time i checked him out.

it is raining softly outside and looks to continue for the rest of the day.
it is a good day for hot coffee.
it is a good day for a kitten.

i went solo for most of the weekend as ross was mostly at work prepping for little house. friday was pretty uneventful, but saturday was SERIOUSLY eventful. in a good way mostly.
first i went to detta's spindle and ordered *da da-da-DA!* my spinning wheel. ( details )

then i stopped at a produce stand and picked up fresh locally grown strawberries, local potatoes (cuz we needed them) and fresh(but unfortunately not local because that's impossible here) nectarines - and headed over to shawn and thistle's place. i REALLY enjoyed myself over there. i hadn't seen them in an age due to the birth of their new-ish son, phoenix, my travel this spring and ross and my surgeries. phoenix is a beautiful, easy-going baby and cedar is actually protective of him, which is cute. he is also talking like mad (though half-unintelligably to me - it took a while for me to realize that when he says "eh-er" he's talking about me). thistle and i talked about politics and family and she says she has a friend who has some wool they are looking to get rid of for free. oh-oh-oh pick me! she is going to look into getting it to me rather than to the trash. i WIN!
( game stuff )
in between shawn and i took cedar out to burn off endless energy after his nap and actually got to talk about real life and books and movies. i think he is going to come with us to go see dark knight next week, but i have to run times by him. that should be fun. i like it when i'm the only person visiting them, or one of two, because i actually get real time with both of them. the gaming and more general stuff is fun too, but shawn and thistle are people i genuinely like and want contact with, even if i am not the most communicative friend to them sometimes. they were also kind enough to loan me lois mcmaster bujold's curse of chalion series and watchmen, which i've been wanting to read for ages. i've already finished the first book and really enjoyed it. much more complex and deep and satisfying than the other things i've read by her (sharing knife). i look forward to the others. i have started watchmen...but i'm still at the very beginning and am not sure what to think yet.
the downside of all this is that cedar is a 2 year old. and 2 year olds demand MUCH in the way of talking. i really strained my voice and hurt myself. i had to go sleep upstairs after ross came home because i was tossing and turning, and wound up doing nothing except reading and sleeping sunday - which really sucked because scott gave ross the afternoon off and he was actually home for me to be with...of course, he really slept most of the time too, poor guy. still i felt like a very unattentive wife. i wish i'd known he was going to be around. i would have come home earlier the night before. i DID start doing some laundry for him after he left, but it isn't the same.

my contract got renewed at work.
and we are expecting thunderstorms EVERY DAY for the next week and a half.
i love thunderstorms.
and i biked 7 miles yesterday, which is not a lot, but i booked it the whole way and had jelly-legs after and i was in a better mood (feeling less like killing people) afterward.
and i increased to 60 crunches this morning
and i have managed to stick with doing crunches every work day and that makes me proud.
and i finished imajica. it was weird. i'm glad i read it, but i'm still not sure how i feel about it.
and i'm almost done with knithulhu #4.
and ross made me dinner last night
and we are seeing jory and simona tonight and corrin and susan tomorrow night.
and my seedlings are coming up which means soon i will have HERBS.
and i think i am going to be very happy with my brother amos socks when they are done.

thursday evening ross changed the breakpads on his car (and i helped a little).
somewhere in that process he managed to hurt himself badly or aggrivate a previous hurt.
at first we thought it was just heartburn - at which point i went to bed - but ross wound up going to the ER and they diagnosed him with a pleural effusion. a pleural effusion is a pinch or a bubble in the membrane lining the chest cavity. and apparently it sucks because they put ross on the good drugs and told him he's on restriction re: physical activity. it is supposed to work itself out in a few days. he is doing much better than he was last week.

but it definitely changed our plans for the weekend. we had been talking about getting the boat ready to go out and getting my breakpads changed and he wanted to work on his harley....none of that was realistic.
so we went and saw prince caspian.


ross and i hung out, went for a walk, went to barley john's with susan and patchhat, filled my growler (refillable beer jug), giggled a LOT (it happens when you hang out with patchhat, watched house episodes (again) and had john and darla over sunday evening for dinner. i got to make soap base and go run out and take advantage of borealis's yarn sale to get more yarn for knithulhu's (i'm on #4) and some cherry tree hill to make a gift for my sister in law for xmas. it was a good weekend.
i also got a lot of reading done.

susan is made of awesome. and i have new stuff to read. i also got a bread machine book and breath and bone by carol berg at barnes and noble because they sent me an awesome coupon in addition to my membership discount. i am VERY book happy right now. i have read cryptonomicon and this alien shore before.
imagica is turning out to be pretty awesome though.

 the knitting is going very well.
i finished a knithulhu and have started another. also i am almost done with a cotton sock. i figure it is a good idea to make some socks i can actually not overheat in for the summer. these are VERY simple compared to my other current sock projects, but they self-stripe (sockina) so they will be pretty enough without complicated lacework. we'll just have to see how well they stay up. cotton is not very elastic.