a little heresy to start your day…

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Before I begin: I’ve been advised that the people who read me through Bloglines got dumped with 10 or so of my posts in the last several hours.  Just remember – you can’t have too much of a guid thing.  I’m resisting the ever-so-Canajan temptation to apologise, but it’s difficult.  Sorry about that.

Well, it’s Wednesday and thus the middle of my working week – high time to promote a little controversy on the blog, I should think.

So, here’s my statement for today:

Forget lace knitting!! 

(ducking to avoid virtual missives thrown by Clarabelle and Soo, lace goddesses extraordinaire.  Sorry, ladies.  In reality, I’m just upset because I can’t churn out the lovely shawls that you both seem to produce in a couple of days!).

But seriously, why such a heretic and loaded statement?  Because I have a new book of time-honoured crafting techniques in my hot little hands which should provide hours – nay, months! – of excitement: Kitschy Crafts.

(Apologies if I have featured this book before – I really can’t remember but I suspect I must have as I’ve already had it out of the library once before! Oh well, it won’t be the first time I’ve rambled on ad nauseam about any given topic!)

I’m already planning to make a chip bowl out of an old Zorba the Greek LP:

Well, maybe I won’t use it as a chip bowl… after all, the chips come in a perfectly good bag and all – very handy for snacking.   But get this, people are actually selling these!

Clearly I’ve missed my calling. 

I also have to find a rock grinder to deal with my seashore haul from NS and a few dozen amethysts I rescued from a dead candle.  Being an ignoramus, I don’t begin to know where to look – any ideas from anyone in the GTA? (because, being a further ignoramus, I don’t dare buy one on-line in case I end up with the wrong thing).

And then, I intend to make myself a fancy hat like this one:

That would be the hat to the left, in case you were wondering.  This hat was one of surely dozens of similar – ahem – import worn at the first day of racing at Royal Ascot yesterday.  I would just love to wear one in the subway here one day soon.

Well, back to finding more photos of ludicrous hats from the Royal Ascot race meeting the grind, I guess.  Summer socialising has been impeding my progress on the Seascape, but it will get done eventually.

Learning to smell the coffee rather than guzzling it, laughing and then snorting it all out my nose,

Kristina

 

do idle hands make the devil’s work?

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I’m not sure about that, but they do make for some fun reading sometimes!

Yesterday while … oh, never mind… I came across this website with perhaps the perfect title: The Idler.

Who couldn’t love a magazine with the following mission statement?

The Idler is a bi-annual, book-shaped magazine that campaigns against the work ethic….

The intention of the magazine is to return dignity to the art of loafing, to make idling into something to aspire towards rather than reject.

Sign me up!  It seems that I may just finally have found my people.  My true people.  The loafers, layabouts, idlers, etc. etc.

So if you’re in the mood to laze around and surf the net, check it out.  I recommend in particular the mini-essays on crap jobs for a wee chuckle.

And – here’s the poster that’s going up on my office door, with a few modifications:

What’s that?  You insist on keeping me busy?  Well, here’s another craft for you all to take up:

Come on – you know you want a fancy macrame swing coat!!!  Wouldn’t these be ultra-fabulous with the Swarovski crystal yarn? (Thanks to Jay for the photo!)

Well, I must confess I’m feeling rather pedestrian these days, actually.  So, I’ve resorted to starting work on the Seascape pattern from the latest Knitty magazine.

I’m using that fabulous blueberry seasilk I got in Nova Scotia.  So far, so guid.

Happy loafing Tuesday!

 

Wherein the glory that was Hellas?!

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Well, they lost. Again. And after I went and bought t-shirts and ballcaps!!

Just count me in as one of the ones making a left turn. Sigh. I did have to laugh at the tag line in the Daily Telegraph’s reporting of the Greece/Russia match on Saturday:

“Lightning does not strike twice, not even when the bolts are thrown from Olympus.”

Oh, well then. OK. I think the Brits are just showing their sour grapes off since they didn’t even manage to get a team into the Eurocup, anyway. So THERE.

I also loved the Greek team manager’s attitude. Check it out:

A miracle happened in 2004 but these kind of things occur once every 30 years, reflected Otto Rehhagel, the manager of Greece, who in Portugal oversaw a footballing earthquake. “I knew we would not be able to waltz through the group, we are not that good. But other teams will be going home, too – maybe both Italy and France,” he said.

Easy to say after the fact, no? But he had a smarter answer for the tougher questions…

“I know the games and I’m not going to play them with you. I know the question before you ask it,” he added. “I’ve said this before, Greece is a country where democracy was born so you can say what you want. Germany is also democracy which is why I’m free to say whatever I want.”

Germany?!? Hold on just a minute…

“I think the Acropolis has been around for several thousand years, and we won’t be around for that long – that keeps it in perspective,” the German said.

He’s GERMAN?!?!? Should have figured that out with a name like Otto, mind you. Was there some kind of fix, do you think?

(In case you’re wondering what in the name of Zeus the above cartoon means, I don’t know. But it came up inexplicably when I googled “big greek losers”.)

Anyway, at least I won’t miss any more time off work sleep watching thinking about the soccer matches.

Instead, I can spend more quality time drooling over my latest British TV-inspired crush:

I know, I know – I need to get a life. Or at least get back to knitting (and no, I haven’t forgotten that this is a knitting blog). I have a very odd combo of finishitis and startitis at the same time… I’ve put aside my three WIPs, but can’t decide what to start next. Any suggestions for 800m or so of lovely blueberry mist sea silk?

Wishing you all a wonderful week…

moot post?

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Hello all: I’m sure this is probably moot, so bear with me.  I’ve been advised (and I can see) that Bloglines is way behind in my feed.  Maybe they’re upset that I wasn’t posting every day… 🙂  Anyway, just so’s you know – I’m here.

Sitting on my balcony, enjoying the party atmosphere amongst the balcony dwellers, full of fabulous cheap Italian food from Eden on St Clair, and admiring the lack of grey in the above photo produced by my Mac’s PhotoBooth programme (I guess there’s a reason I paid $$$ for the Mac after all!)

Anyway, if you’ve had a delay problem, maybe you could drop me a quick line at BespokeByBrouhaha@gmail.com?  But if you have better things to do, I certainly understand!
Happy weekend,

Kristina

two pirates’ booty from down East

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My fellow Canadian readers are probably well aware that the rest of the country tends to despite Ontario, and more specifically Toronto (because, after all, Toronto is the only city in Ontario… isn’t it?).

I never quite understood why – until I started amassing all the goods that JJ and I had plundered from our recent trip to Nova Scotia.  I have to confess that they were all steals, quite truly.

First up – check out this fabulous handmade cap I bought at a shop along the Cabot Trail called Sew Inclined:

Barbara, the shop owner, makes all sorts of handmade sewn goodies by hand… including this fabulous corset:

(And no, that’s not me in the photo.  I only wish.  I am still coveting it, but did have to show some restraint as it was near the beginning of the trip.  But she does ship…! Check out her website…)

I also must have been in quite the girly phase, as I ended up picking up all sorts of great jewellery in Halifax

I even found an evil eye pendant which all my coworkers tried to rip off my neck want:

And how about this fancy purse?!

I won’t bother showing you the dozen or so CDs I got, mostly in a great used shop on the main drag in Halifax.  I could have spent hours in there.

Now, don’t feel sorry for JJ.  He wasn’t left out either.

From the left: Hotoi, Annapurna we can’t remember but JJ is laughing at me because I came up with Annapurna which is apparently the name of a mountain somewhere other than Japan which is where this lady comes from, and Wee Little Leprechaun (which JJ has renamed Seamus – I tried to baptise him but JJ said that he’s a drunken pagan.  The leprechaun, I hasten to say, not JJ.)

Oh, and speaking of drunken pagans:

This should keep JJ happy for a couple of days or so.

Oh, and just to complete the full circle of shameless acquisitions – when I got back to the office this Monday, guess what was waiting for me there?  A little package from Blue Moon Fiber Arts

2500 approx lovely yards of “Lover’s Leap”…!

Ain’t it purdy?

Oh, and 3700 yards (approx) of the same in the fantastic Blue Moonstone colourway…

I cannot do justice to it with the camera, really, but here’s another attempt:


So – this should all keep me busy and out of the shops for some time, wouldn’t you say?

But hmm… what day is it today?  The 13th?  Meaning Sunday is the 15th? Meaning that today is PayDay… and a special rare Friday the 13th Payday at that…

Augh!!!

Happy Friday and a wonderful weekend to you.  I should note that I’m starting some unofficial summer hours for the blog effective now.  This means that I probably won’t be posting too much at the weekends unless the Moronic Muse moves me… please do try not to be heartbroken.  I’m sure you have better things on the go in the summertime anyway!

Stay tuned for a report on Greece/Russia fun on Monday!

How to feel like you’ve just dropped LSD at 9:45 a.m.*

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*Disclaimer: Not that I’ve ever actually dropped LSD, of course. That would have been an illegal activity, and thus something I most certainly do not condone. Just some poetic licence here, folks. Really. I mean it.

Easy! (and cheap, and not as bad for you as the real thing, either). Just take a look at the Photo Exhibit at the Globe and Mail website on any given day.

I think you’ll get what I mean when you have a look at some of today’s offerings:

What?!?!?!?

(Here’s the caption from the Globe: “Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama’s work, called Dots Obsession: Infinity Mirrored Room is on exhibit at the contemporary art centre Le Spot in Le Havre, France, as part of the Arts Le Havre 2008 contemporary art biennial.”)

This, on the other hand, is a Dutch football supporter at the Eurocup. Nuff said.

And these? Well:

Maybe not too ersatz LSD-head of me, but these make me very, very glad that I was not of age during the 70s. Apologies to anyone who actually had a pair of these at the time.

And finally, this just frightened me, frankly:

Was I wrong?

Really, I should just stick to looking at knitting stuff from now on.

Hmm.

Then again…

Well, I think I’d best tune out, drop out, etc. now. I’m really, really starting to fear for my sanity!

Happy Thursday!

the downfall of my people

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My 10 or so regular fans may have noticed that I’m posting today’s entry rather late in the day.  This is because I was too depressed before now to turn on my computer. 

Why?

Greece got their ass kicked by SWEDEN in yesterday’s match!  Tell me this, how can the cradle of democracy, philosophy, ancient Gods, etc possibly lose to the birthplace of virutally nothing but depressing movies and cheap crap furniture?!?

Shame, shame!

That’s right, cry, you vlakas, cry.  But pick it up by Saturday’s game or I’ll really give you something to cry about!

I mean, really.  It’s completely embarrassing.  A country with 572 (or thereabouts) local soccer teams can’t get together one decent team for the Eurocup?!  Please.

I wonder if it’s because they decided to go with a new style of soccer cleats?

I mean, Takis nearly threw himself off my living room wall, he was so freaked out!

Well, smarten up boys, and fast.  I’m sure you can return to your former state of glory by Saturday, can’t you? 

And just remember – hell hath no fury like a Hellenic woman scorned!

And if you have any doubts about that statement, just call puir wee JJ.  I’m sure he’d be glad to fill you in on the truth…!

Happy Wednesday!

 

 

memories of Cape Breton…

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Now, I warn you in advance: I have decided that I would like to return to live in Cape Breton when I win the lottery manage to find a legal aid job in Nova Scotia which will never, ever happen retire.  So, I took a million photos of the place.  Well, 502 photos to be quite exact.  I’ll only show you a fraction of those, I promise…

Let me first start with telling you about one of the best yarn shops I’ve ever been too, Baadeck Yarns.  It is located in Baddeck (get it?!?).  The owner, Patricia, is from Toronto but decided to move down there and open a yarn shop after a vacation some time back.  And I’m very glad she did, too.

Why?  Well, first off, she carries an exclusive line of colours by the Fleece Artist/Handmaiden… which she helped design herself.  And if I dare say so myself, I managed to exercise significant self-control in the face of this, buying only two skeins of HM Sea Silk in the Blueberry Mist colourway:

She also carries Tilli Tomas products which I had never seen in person before… so of course I had to snap up two skeins of the Moroccan Blue silk prestrung with beads:

Patricia was also kind enough to let me drool over fondle the Tilli Tomas Swarovski crystal studded silk which she had in stock.  At $125/120 yards I couldn’t really see fit to buying any, although I was sorely tempted.  (By the way, for you knitters out there, I am deliberately not including a link as I think it would probable be actionable if you checked it out and lost your house as a result.  Having said that, I did link it somewhere previously on this blog and I think if you search “bling” you’ll find the link.  Heh heh).

All I can say is that it’s just a very guid thing that JJ was along, otherwise the rent cheque for June would have gon bounce bounce bounce into the Atlantic for certain.  Oh – and if you are anywhere near Nova Scotia, do visit Patricia!  It will be worth the trip, I can assure you.

All right, all right… enough yarn pron.  Back to the vacation.  We spent two full days on the Cabot Trail, which is a road through the mountainous part of Cape Breton spanning approximately 120 kilometres.

JJ insisted on driving the first day but I got to drive the second!!  It is a fabulous drive.  The topography changes constantly.

There are all sorts of little curiosities along the way, such as, for example, the Lone Sheiling (a replica of a highland hut):

The federal government pours lots of money into the Cabot Trail (quite rightly, I think) so that they can keep it vibrant and replant trees… here is a baby birch tree!

I was happy for that, because it means that we can keep enjoying lovely views like this:

…and this:

…and so on…

…and so forth:

That’s me, by the way, at one of the highest points – about 500 metres above sea level!

I loved the mountains, obviously:

…but also the beaches.

…and even the rocks.  Nay, especially the rocks!

JJ, on the other hand, loved this site the best!


When I gently suggested that he was perhaps spending too much money at the place which manufactures the only Canadian malt whisky, and that he didnae really need a sample of every year that they’ve made..

…he pointed to the back of my newly acquired T-shirt:

Fair enough, I guess.  Anyway, he was just feeling cocky because we were in Scottish territory, where some of the road signs are even printed in English and Gaelic!

We also, by the way, ate fabulous Acadian food in Cheticamp, where the signs are in English and French.  (And by the way, if you’re coming to Nova Scotia, bring your fat clothes.  The food is great, unless you’re a vegetarian.  JJ wanted to take a photo of me eating the 10th order of fresh fish and chips but I refused as it would have been embarrassing to show my face buried in the plate.

I will part with photos of my favourite place in Cape Breton, which was Inverness, where we stayed.  This beach was within a two minute walk of the motel…

…and the sun sets very kindly on Inverness (when it’s around, that is, as the locals would hasten to tell you.  Apparently it’s not around all that often.  But when it is, it is glorious!)

That is about it for the vacation photos, I promise.  Only I still have to show you some of my fabulous acquisitions, as there are many great artisans in the province.  And you can get a palace of a condo even in Halifax (the capital) for what it would cost you for a 450 sq ft bachelor in Toronto.  I really need to move there.  Sigh.

Cheers,

Kristina

boring vacation photos, part I…

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(…and don’t say you weren’t warned.  Now is your chance to hit the back button.)

I must say that JJ and I both had a blast on our extended vacation down East.  JJ had decided that we should take the train both ways.  At first, I was a tad sceptical (it takes just over 27 hours total, and I am not all that guid in close quarters as you can imagine).  But then I learned that they had a bar car on the train…

… so all was well.  It was also a great way to travel in that I got to see parts of Quebec I’ve never been in, and also New Brunswick…

…and somehow I didn’t even manage to piss off JJ!

Our first port of call was Halifax, which is on the Atlantic Ocean.  So you get to see lots and lots of big fancy boats:

… and look how clean the water is right in the dock!

A far cry from Lake Ontario, I can tell you.

Unexpectedly, I got to see Pier 21, where most of the immigrants to Canada landed prior to 1971, including my own father.  They had an interesting museum, including a photo of the boat that he came in on!

Halifax is also chock full of Irish pubs, which didnae take us too long to find.

And after a few pints of Guinness, JJ even managed to capsize a ship!

I should really, really be living in Halifax.  I mean, check this out… they give you potato chip topping for your street meat!!

While in Halifax, we also went on a real life pirate sailboat!

And see… here’s Johnny Depp piloting it!

Well, OK… not Johnny Depp.  Lars Lancebottom or something like that (I’m sure that was his real name, too)… but he was a nice guy.

And then we found another Irish pub of JJ’s past acquaintance, with real-live Irish snugs!

We were actually staying in Dartmouth, which is a twin city to Halifax and across the water.  Since JJ did not want to pay the 75 cent toll for the bridge, we had to take the ferry…

Oh – and I got to meet my all-time hero, Mr. Alexander Keith!!!!

We would have taken a tour of the brewery, but they wanted $16.50 per head and we decided that was best spent on some cold Keith’s.  Far cheaper, by the way, than in Toronto.

After a couple of days of debauchery and hanging around the Halifax waterfront, we decided to rent a car and hit the road.  The first stop was apparently a mandatory one if you visit this province: the lighthouse at Peggy’s Cove.

This is quite the tourist spot and I was happy we were there out of season, I can tell you!  They have spooky signs hanging around such as this one:

… and if you picture this coastline in winter, you can see why.

We then spent a day travelling the South coast of the province, which includes such lovely sights as Lunenberg:

It’s full of houses like that, all painted different colours! Lunenberg is also home of the Bluenose II, featured on our dime:

This is what she looks like in real life, at least when on vacation:

We then decided to travel to Cape Breton, a large island which is part of Nova Scotia.  Upon JJs insistence, the first stop there was at an old French military installation at Louisburg:

I thought this would be quite boring, but the scenery was spectacular!


They have set the fort up as an exact replica of what it would have looked like in the 1700s when it was in active use – right down to the house of worship that the soldiers were all forced to attend:

This is just a small part of the grand apartment designated for the Governor (Old French for “Grand Poobah”) at the base:

And, pray tell, where did his wife stay?

Er… not quite.  But this was about the extent of her quarters:

Go figure, eh?  Leaving the fortress, you come upon an ancient (by Canadian standards, anyway) cemetery right next to the water:

We then found a place to stay with, reputedly, the best sunsets in the East Coast:

This is the beach at Inverness, where we stayed for five days or so:

I must confess that I was fascinated by the ocean rocks and brought an embarrassing number home with me.  So many, in fact, that our baggage weighed… ahem… well over the alloted amount.

We tried to leave our mark on the beach…

…but sadly the ocean had washed it away within five minutes or so.  Sigh.

Well, I think that’s about enough for now.  Stay tuned for tomorrow’s installation, with more pictures of the Cabot Trail than you want to see, I’m sure… and also the PayDay Haul.  Here is a preview:

Cheers,

Kristina

yet another meme!

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Man alive… a girl goes on (hard-earned, by the way) vacation for two weeks and, in addition to facing the 1,027 work Emails which will have arrived in my inbox tomorrow, gets tagged for not one but two memes! Sheesh!!

But I do like Clarabelle quite a bit, so I will indulge her curiosity. However, Clarabelle, in exchange, I am tagging YOU for the meme sent to me by Amy, which you can find right here.  All guid? heh heh

In the interval, here are my responses to Clarabelle’s meme:

1) What was I doing ten years ago?

Skiving off attending the second year of law school, and working three jobs to pay for my beer tab tuition.  Those jobs were: doing data entry at a hospital fundraising department, slinging beer at a student pub, and tying up and whipping men for big bucks.  Not necessarily in that order.

I had no idea what I wanted to be when I grew up at that point.  I still don’t, but at least I’m using the law degree, more or less.

2) What are five (non-work) things on my to-do list for today/tomorrow:

– get highly irritated by cell-phone wielding SUV driving maniacs

– go for plenty of smoke breaks to catch up on all the work gossip while I’ve been away

– scheming about where I can buy a rock polisher to fix up all my ocean rock booty from vacation

– have a coupla three Keiths

– decide what next I should knit in the face of having lost motivation on all the WIPs

3) Snacks I enjoy:

Anything involving the words “potato” and “chips” (or “crisps”, for my British friends) in the same sentence.  Oh, and of course… spinach and broccoli.  Can’t forget that

4) Things I would do if I were a billionaire:

– Quit my job immediately (and by the way, all those ones who win the multi-millions and say their lives won’t change and that they will still work at WalMart or wherever?  I don’t believe it).

– Buy the entire shoe inventory of John Fluevog in my size and others (to give to friends)

– Get my hands on to the entire world inventory of Tilli Tomas swarovski crystal silk

– Buy a waterfront property in each of the following locations: Greece, Cape Breton, Australia

– Acquire enough smalti mosaic tile, stained glass, yarn and needles to keep me busy for the next ten years at least, and also a sewing machine and a really guid camer

5) Places I have lived:

Kingston, Ontario.  About 17 locations in Toronto, Ontario.  Ho-HUM.

6) Jobs I have had:

Dishwasher in a breakfast joint.  Library page in the Kingston Public Library (where I got asked to leave after the probationary period as I was too “rowdy” and “distracting to the other pages”). Waitress. Bartender.  Doughnut slinger next to a Greek Jehovah Witness Hall in Scarborough.  Various boring office / data entry gigs. Translator/interpreter (not as interesting as that might sound). Dancer.  Library page at the law school.  Dominatrix.  Articling student.  Legal secretary.  Articling student again.  Lawyer of last resort at the Ontario Rental Housing Tribunal.  Legal clinic lawyer.  Legal researcher.

7. Peeps I want to know more about:

All of you!!! So, if any of you want to grab this meme and do it on your blog, please do let me know when you post your responses. I don’t think that I should tag anyone specifically at this point… except, well, perhaps Amy in heartfelt thanks for tagging me earlier.