Cold Mountain, and possibly some cold mountains.

I did it, yet again, once more, I can't be stopped. Before finishing any of my other projects (remember the black shirt, the stitches-on-the-bridge project, various dresses, and new bolero project, the crochet bags? Anyone?) I've started on another project. This one has some recent pictures.

It started out looking like this:


But now it looks a lot like this, only a little longer:


It's called the Cold Mountain Stole and I'm liking it muchly (sic) so far. Using bigger needles made me get mom to get me some more yarn. I'll need it.

The other knitting project has no pictures yet, but I've passed the halfway point. Progress slowed down because of the shawl though. This is not a good thing.

In good news, I'm no longer doing corrections at work next week, it's Friday and that's always good, I'm getting my hair done in the morning (9am, not so good) and a certain someone might be coming over soonish. That should be jolly dandy indeed.

In other news, the Slasher Book Club Book, Afraid is very amusing to read. To paraphrase:

"After getting away from the psycho killers, the sheriff found himself trapped in one of his brother's bear traps while trying to save his niece and her son from the mad psycho killers. In a moment of questionable genius, the sheriff cuts off the flesh on his leg, breaks the bone, just like his father did when trapped under a tree, only to find out the leg actually has 2 bones in it."

In the words of the delectable Hugh Grant:

Bugger, Bugger, Bugger, Bugger, Bugger, Bugger, Bugger, Bugger, Bugger, Bugger, (cont'd)



Oh gosh it makes me laugh. People think I'm weird. (Score!)

It's Springtime, for.....

...me at least!

The sun's out, the temp's up, and all is well in the world. Well, not really, but according to what I saw, even (most of) the G20 protesters enjoyed the weather. Sun is good. It really, really is, but you probably agree with that, so I'm not expecting any argument back. So while it's glorious outside, I got to bring some of it back in.



Pic including both BCB, so I can finally start with that. Am still on target for Scriptfrenzy, which is a new thing, since I'm usually behind from day one. As long as I write a little over 3 pages today, I'll be on top form. Weird....
Here's an exerpt (sorry, my first ever Dutch writing project)

INT. Herman's Keuken. Evening

HERMAN staat de vaatwasser in te laden. Deze is pas halfvol. Herman's keuken in een hypermoderne keuken met veel roestvrij staal en dure apparaten. Op de achtergrond het geluid van een tv. Herman sluit de vaatwasser zonder hem aan te zetten en begint een espressoapparaat te vullen. Als deze herrie begint te maken gaat de telefoon.

HERMAN
(zuchtend)

Moeder?

Scene 1. Curious? Me too. You never know what it ends up like from there.


Status of other projects also in pictures today. Here's what's going on with the BMB/Ti bag.



The body of the bag (horrid!) is finished and waiting for liner/fiberfill/vlieseline, so I'm working on some decorative flowers to go on the outside.

Other Projects not moving along very fast, sitting on the back-burner a bit since Scriptfrenzy and the BMBag are taking up some time. This is what they look like now.




Not very impressive, and not being worn tomorrow, obviously. Might do a pin or something to put on a black shirt I've had forever and a day. It'll be replaced, but not right now. Kinda busy, you see?

Anyway, in other news, we're very, very very carefully tip-toeing about possibly being a little bit positive about a meeting DH had yesterday. This means we're still expecting nothing, but two braincells are allowed to think positive. Will inebriate them soon, just in case.

I myself am invited to come to an interview for a job I don't think I should be doing. BA, office setting, SAP experience, Excell proficient is all required, and then they want to speak to me?!? Makes you wonder what's wrong with them, but I guess I'll find out on Monday. Still have 2 others I want to put in for, but didn't have time to do so today. Will send out email to one next, the other must be called soon, but is open until May 6. Some time left on that one. Weird, all this.

Must also call Nell, to see about dinner tomorrow evening, which will be at her house (!) which I haven't seen finished, with Flip, Heidi and the twins. Well, the twins might come late, and I'm not sure if Sjoerd will be there, or will come later. Because.... WE'RE GOING OUT!

That's mildly exciting, as I never seem to do so these days (months, years). It'll include dancing and drinking, and I'll slap some make-up on and earrings, and nail polish and cute jeans and not my new black shirt, as it's still in pieces as you can tell. Guess I'll have to make a decision about shoes though. Comfy, pointy or high? Oh dear. Also, I got to drop a therapy session this week, but I'll have 3 next week. Have I mentioned yet that he thinks there's progress? I can't currently lift up my arm very well with the soreness from training muscles I didn't know I had. The things you find out while in a gym full of old people. Never seems to be anyone my age.

I did realize something very serious about the current situation. I had to bring a lot of winter stuff back with me because it was still winter here. Therefore, I couldn't bring any summer stuff, which is still over there. As I'll probably be here for a while, what am I going to do without my skirts? My shirts? My cute little sandals? What, I ask you! (Oddly enough, my bikini *is* here. I guess I can go to the beach, in bikini, jeans, sweater and boots. Hm.)

Brother has safely arrived in Tokyo, and has slept until 14.00. Guess he's well rested now. Arigato, or whatever!

As promised

An update on how the day was weird, and turned out to be tiresome indeed.

It all started with not being called to wake up. Well, before that, my dad was prevented from waking me up at 5:30 by brother and mom. I'd said my goodbyes to brother yesterday evening before going to sleep, not seeing the point in waking up in the middle of the night, murmuring a 'don't jump the plane unless you have a parachute' comment and go right back to sleep. Or, with my luck, be awake for the rest of the night and having to do all of today on 5 hours of sleep. So, we said goodbye, safe journey and all that good sobby stuff before going to sleep. Dad did not wake me up.

DH on the other hand, can be trusted to call at any time in the early morning before he goes to sleep. Never after 8:00, or he knows I'll get on to him for not going to bed before midnight. He doesn't 'do' clocks and never checks the time during the evening, right until the moment he decides he's getting tired. That didn't happen until 1:30 his time, which is why he called me at 8:30 in the morning, when I was no longer around to answer the phone.

Mom didn't call me from the airport, as I had told her repeatedly that I had set the alarm, and that between it and DH, I would certainly be up before 8:00. Which is why I frantically called her at 8:20 to ask what time I was to have expected the first batch of kids to show up, right after the father of the first batch finally got to leave for work.

At 8:13, I woke up, screamed a little when I checked my watch, jumped into my clothes and down the stairs to open the door to two slightly undercooled kids and their father, holding his phone from when he was calling the house phone, wondering if anyone was there. Well, I was. As it happened, just as I was zipping up, the alarm went off. 7:15 Winter Time. Gods I felt stupid and inadequate. Luckily they were the first batch to be expected, so none of the other fathers needed to know. In between arrivals I managed to brush my teeth and put on socks and shoes. Not a great start of the day.

Of batch #1, 100% has a cold of the running snot type, followed by 100% of batch #2. Batch #3 was snot-free, and assured me she had eaten all of her dinner the night before, and even finished her yoghurt after. Believe me when I say that's quite an accomplishment, as she only ever does that here, and only after much power-struggle has been overcome. At 9:00, one child was removed from the flock to sleep. Which he did, blissfully, for 90 minutes. By 10:30, after Tweenies, Tubbies and King Koos, breakfast and a coffee, the parental unit finally returned from Zaventem, having gotten themselves lost in Antwerp in search of that really cheap gas station. Left the house for a few minutes in search of cheap fabric, and returned to find much snot, unhappiness, and a 2 year old trying to get a feel for where my boundaries lie. Corporal punishment is so last century, but I can sometimes see the point of it. By 14:30, I was ready to leave the house but had an instant soup instead. Colds never help, and I was clearly tired and grumpy, but dear Gods, we can start our own "stop procreating" lifestyle group just with the 4 of them there. Just before soup, the most rational and least demanding one (who sleeps in my room) farted in her sleep, filling my room with sewage-grade stink. Mom transferred my 'wages' which is really kind of her.

Book club book #1 has arrived, so I can go pick it up anytime. I was late responding to the Ravelry position, but they got over 1500 applications, so it wouldn't have been any use anyway. Looking at the NHTV job site made me feel incredibly inadequate again, being in the place of under-over-qualifiedness. Will call about it tomorrow regardless. I would quite like to be a lecturer. I'd be a quite cheap one too, I imagine. They should hire me. Also applied for 3-month in-house translating job to be done in Germany for Gaming company, which will surely come to nothing.

Lovely Laura interrupted this posting, with more and new job openings in the Midland area. Sweetness, found lots more in the DFW range, which is currently slightly more convenient. Still, thanks bunches, sent them all on to DH, who is out, doing important expensive stuff.

Tonight the Screnzy starts. Actually looking forward to it, even though it won't be good, make no money or won't help with the future one bit. Still, it's something to do of an evening, when there's nothing on the telly.

For now, still working on the Blue Mariyam Bag, almost done with the crochet bit, and managed to score some fabric today.

Life isn't all bad, but I'm having that wine anyway. Bottoms up.


PS. Laura's cats are adorable little tigers.

What I'm working...

...on these days. As much of a to-do-list as a reminder for myself. Plus, you, my non-reader, will be able to find out for yourself how I fill my days. Because I'm just *that* interesting, y'know?

#1 Scour the internet for a job.
This seems easy, or maybe not, but searching a number of websites for suitable and not so suitable vacancies. This usually results in a reply similar to the following, or with the same meaning: "We think you're too smart, which means you will go away or get bored or tell us how to do things better, so we'll just hire someone we can tell what to do and they'll just do it." This seems rather irritating, especially when it refers to a very short term job (think weeks rather than months). However, it's all I get to hear, whenever "We have filled the position from within our organisation." Ta, people, for making me put in the effort.

#2 Make Maryiam/Ti her bag, and then another and find some things to start my very own Etsy store.
You never know what might come of it, but so far, the bag seems to be getting the better of me. I will nail (or crochet) it one day, and then we'll see who has the last laugh!

#3 Read the book club books.
As I currently only have book #2 and have not yet finished the book I was reading, I must really remember to do this. Hopefully #1 will arrive soon.

#4 Write a script in 30 days.
As if I don't already have nothing important to do with my time, I'm going to do it again. I'm going to write an absolutely unimaginative script which will never see the light of day, for the sole reason of being able to say that I did it. At least the idea came to me while watching TV (another one of those not important things I happen to do a lot) and the subject was a blind man with a bionical eye. Ah! The Potential! Don't expect to see this in cinemas near you any time soon or ever at all.

#5 Make that black shirt
My way of having a whole new wardrobe for very little indeed. Just need to sit down and do it, apparently. Same goes for #6

#6 Make that jeans skirt
As #5, but with jeans fabric and in the shape of a skirt. Eventually, I will wear all these projects.

So, while I'm doing all these *very* important things, I manage to help out mom, get me some Physio (is it meant to hurt more than before I started treatment?) stay up far too late and sleep a hole into the morning, not spend any money (see the helping of mom) and remaining a very dependent girl. Whatever happened to girlpower?