JenLa

Nope, no meme here. Nope, nuh-uh. I’f you’re looking for a meme, you better just keep on moving, cuz JenLa’s a meme-free zone, dontcha know. Not a single solitary meme. Instead we have shameless pimpage of cuteness. The fact that it just so happens to be Friday is pure coincidence people, that is all. No way, no how should this be considered in the general vicinity of…

Just so we’re clear on that.

Yes. That giant person is none other than my darling granddaughter, Marina, taken around Easter time. I can’t believe she’s almost 18 months!

And then there’s Baby Levi…

nom nom nom nom nom

Daddy pillow…good

Can you believe that his parents have made me partially responsible for this little dude’s spiritual upbringing? Yep, I’m his godmother, can you believe that?

And just so you know, things are starting to progress over at Dizzy Blonde Yarns. Wanna see? Okay, but just a peek…

~and~

My October WOW Sock Club yarn has “arrived”!

Brooks Farm Primero in all it’s lavender & butter, merino & mohair yumminess. I picked up this poor little abandoned “orphan” last year at SAFF. This was my only gratuitous yarn purchase at the entire event. Well…everyone else was going home with some Brooks Farm, I couldn’t very well go home empty-handed now could I have?

Speaking of SAFF, some of you will notice that I’m not there, and it mostly sucks. Most of you know that the main reason for my non-SAFF-attending suckage is due to getting popped for jury duty earlier in the year, and the fact that my cheap-assed boss doesn’t cover days off for jury duty, which forced me to choose to use 2 of my 3 remaining vacation days, if I wanted to still receive a full paycheck. Eh, some creative budgeting (and squealing pennies) could have overcome that obstacle. What can’t be overcome is a serious family obligation.

Not many know that my family suffered a loss last year while I was at SAFF. On that Saturday my mom called (she NEVER calls me when I’m on vacation), to let me know that my brother and his wife lost their baby. I’m so thankful that Jen was beside me when I got the call. Her quiet comfort (and strong, absorbant shoulders) was just what I needed. The SAFFers (mainly our roommates) were all having to put up with my illness (food poisoning), and all the discomfort that entails (for me as well as for them), the last thing I wanted to do was invite my sorrow onto others, so I just kept this news to myself.

When I got home, I found that they had held a very private, very small memorial service while I was gone, and the DH wasn’t able to attend because he had to work. The guilt of not being there for my baby brother Tom, and his wife Donna, compounded by the fact that the DH nor I were able to attend the memorial has weighed heavily on my conscience this past year.

This Sunday is the first anniversary, and we’re getting together in memorial of Baby Coleman. So I decided to stay home this weekend and be there for Thomas & Donna, and to finally get some closure. I just hope the fires allow him to be home for the day. Thomas and I have always been close, closer than any of our other siblings, and it just tore my heart out that I wasn’t here for them when they really needed me.

In the meantime, I can live vicariously through Claudia and Jodi, who have already posted, and anyone else who posts from SAFF over the weekend, and through Grace, whom I’m going to bug in email cuz she has her blackberry and can answer back.

Oh, and ESC? That PWNED button is SO mine! Just set it to the side, and I’ll collect it from you, uh, whenever. (Let me know how much!)

The night blooming jasmine is in bloom again, and gawd does it smell good. I’d spend every waking moment out on our back patio except for 2 things: 1) it’s too dark to knit out there and, 2) uh, well… it’s too dark to knit out there. Istead, all the windows doors in the house are thrown wide to let the fragrance in. Who’d have thought that such a small, unshowy bloom could put out a fragrance strong enough to overpower eau de pooch!

Claudia’s teaching us to schprecken sie Deutsch, one knitting term at a time. She’s even linked to the correct pronunciation of the word so we’re not sounding like Ranier Wolfcastle on the last day of Octoberfest. Now if I was smart I’d keep this all to myself because at the end of the month she’ll have a quiz with prizes. But since my desperate need for popularity overrides my sense of self-preservation, I’m sending you all over there to drive up the competition! Pretty damned cool if you ask me…Claudia’s lessons, not my self-sacrificing generosity.

Oh, and just to prove that I’m knitting…

Have a great weekend, and go schprecken some stricken!

…Things

1. People who point at their wrist while asking for the time… I know where my watch is pal, where the hell is yours? Do I point at my ass when I ask where the toilet is?

2. People who are willing to get off their ass to search the entire room for the T.V. remote because they refuse to walk to the T.V. and change the channel manually.

3. When people say “Oh you just want to have your cake and eat it too”. Damn skippy! What good is cake if you can’t eat it?

4. When people say “it’s always the last place you look”. Of course it is, moron. Why the hell would you keep looking after you’ve found it? Do people do this? Who and where are they? Gonna kick their asses!

5. When people say while watching a film “did you see that?” No asshat, I paid $12 to come to the cinema and stare at the damn floor. (or knit)

6. People who ask “Can I ask you a question?”…. Didn’t really give me a choice there, did ya sunshine? One day I’m gonna answer “No” and watch their heads explode.

7. Fucking yarn store hoars who hand me drama first thing in the fucking morning. Go hang yourself with your own fun fur. Entitle THIS…

8. When people say “life is short”. What the fuck?? Life is the longest damn thing anyone ever does!! What can you do that’s longer?

9. When you are waiting for the bus and someone asks, “Has the bus come yet?”. If the bus came would I be standing here, dumbass?

10. People who say “It goes without saying”…and then they go ahead and say it anyway! Well, if it goes without saying do me a favor, will ya? Don’t say it. Sheesh!

Ok, that’s all I’ve got for today. My recent knitting either makes for some seriously boring-assed reading, or it makes for some seriously boring-assed REDUNDANT, beating-a-dead-horse reading. In either case, I’ll hopefully be turning some WIPs in to UFOs sometime in the not so distant far-flung future, resurrecting an UFO, so I can fall in love with it again. Also, I’m dying to dye. I’ve got a metric buttload of blanks that I’m itching to experiment with, and it’s finally getting cool enough to be able to stand over pots of stinky, steamy colored water and not risk spontaneous combustion. Now if only I could find that extra set of hands…

This one’s just for Jen…
~~~~~~~

Yappy burst-tay two shoes,
Yappy burst-tay two shoes,
Yappy burst-tay, yappy burst-tay,
Yappy burst-tay two shoes!

Happy Birthday Jen! May your food be flavorful and calorie-free; your drink be plentiful and potent and I hope your day is filled with happiness, laughter, and love!

And because I just gotta be me…