Tag: greed

bubble bubble toil and… yum!

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OK, OK, so it’s not a direct quote, and it doesn’t even rhyme. But it reflects how I spent a good part of the Labour Day long weekend…

Yup. The Mad Princess of Preserves is at it again, folks.

You see, I made the mistake of going to Loblaws on Saturday for…oh, toilet paper and other boring things. But for once they had some local Ontario produce going!

So, I had to buy about 20 pounds of plum tomatoes and 10 pounds of these Shepherd peppers. I’ve never really noticed these before – they taste like red bell peppers, but sweeter and better. So, my first thought was to try for some flavoured booze:

This, in about three weeks, will be Shepherdised Tanqueray gin. I have no clue whether this one will taste like anything you’d wanted to drink, but I had a bunch of Tanqueray left over from the recent party, so thought I’d give it the old college try.

This, on the other hand, I can hardly wait to crack open:

Iceberg vodka with Shepherd peppers and ten jalapenos with the seeds left in. Better stock up on those ulcer meds… I love pepper vodka!

I also decided to make some infused rice vinegars, one with the peppers and one with lemon and lime:

Then I decided to roast the hell out of the rest of the Shepherd peppers:

…and start making some real stuff. First, I made a whole lot of tomato sauce with roasted pepper, roasted garlic and onion puree:

That took care of about half the peppers. So, what to do with the other half?!?

Initially I wanted to try to make some tomato/roasted pepper low sugar jam. Unfortunately, however, I made the mistake of musing about this aloud, at which point JJ overheard and suggested very reasonably that I not make any more jam until some of the stuff I made some weeks back was gone.

When I say “reasonably”, I mean this of course in the Scottish fashion:

Ye daft wee lassie, what on God’s grrrrreen airrrrth would possess ye to make more jam?!?! Every time ah open the cupboards, ah almost get murdered by a flyin jar of jam. And ye doan’t even eat the stuff! Ye should go tek a long harrrd look in the mirror…

He did, however, have a point. So, instead I made…

… salsa! Three bloody litres of the stuff. It has tomatoes, the peppers plus a third major secret ingredient. I first premiered the secret ingredient salsa at my party to great accolades (I must say I was shocked – I had only come up with it at the last minute when I realised I had 5 million bags of nachos and no salsa as I had dumped all the salsa into the slowcooker with IKEA swedish meatballs in a panic…). That version, however, did not have roasted peppers.

If it turns out at all good, perhaps I will post the recipe here. Or, perhaps I’ll just send it to the Food Network and wait for the telephone call offering me my very own programme.

I also made a V8/coriander jelly:

… and rehabbed some former jellies I had made which hadn’t set properly, including this bell pepper one:

So, I think that was a guid weekend’s work, don’t ye?

Off now to premiere the fabulous new salsa with the colleagues work.

Happy Tuesday, all!


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I’m in arrears of rent!!!

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Hey, I was out having a fun time with the Tenant Advocates yesterday evening…

…when I came home last evening to this dire message from my landlord:

Auggggh!!! I’m in arrears!!! Will they file to evict me?

Hmm… I’ve just spoken with my new in-house counsel, Gabriel.

He advised that it wouldn’t be worth their while to file to evict me, as it would cost them $150.00.

As prudent counsel, however, he did also advise that if they should file to evict me I should bring up the fact that I overpaid the previous month according to their ledger:

Gabriel did advise that, if the worst happens and they file to evict me, I can claim this $0.68 overpayment as part of a relief from forfeiture eviction (sorry – I happen to like the old language “relief from forfeiture” as it really brings home the feudal aspect of the whole thing… but I’m a bit old school that way) argument before the Landlord and Tenant Board.

However, I decided to do the wise thing and just rectify the situation by payment.

This is only because I don’t know that the Board would accept the “I’m maths challenged” argument, especially when landlord/tenant is my chosen field of legal practice.

However, I’m just a bit pissed off right now – I figure it cost the landlord more than than the $8.86 outstanding to have their staff person print this off and have another staff member hand-deliver it to my door fourteen days later. But this is why the landlords keep making money and fools like me keep paying them rent, I suppose.

Now, if I wanted some real drama, I’d skip Gabriel’s opinion and get my real legal team onto it:

It’s actually such a big legal team that they don’t all fit in one photo! Check it out!

(You will recognise JJ in front. He is the honourary security person. We need him around because people like this start creating commotions in the street by nearly running over a cyclist, then getting out of his car and nearly decking the cyclist, then when someone like me intervenes and says she’s calling the cops, gets out and calls the cops himself, parks his car in one lane on a major thoroughfare in the city at rush hour, then gets laughed at by the cops when they finally show up:

Need I say more, really?)

Anyway, even more members of my legal team:

…and still more again:

… and our glorious mascot, who is a(n) (in)famous actress and has actually been on TV!!!

So, who needs to fear The Landlord when you have all these people on your team?!?

Stay tuned… because if I ever face an eviction hearing for non-payment of rent for $8.68 outstanding, I will be calling in the media.

(And, by the way, it wouldn’t be the first time this has happened. I’ve seen many clients with an eviction order for non-payment where the eviction order says the landlord owes THEM several hundred dollars. Such is the beauty of the landlord/tenant law in Ontario.)

But enough shop talk!

A very happy Tuesday to you all.

Regards,

Kristina

slip slidin’ away…

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Well, His Excellency JJ, Ruler of the Remote, has finally managed to guilt me into making him some new slippers. Admittedly, the last ones I made him, depicted above, have seen better days.

In this regard, I had bought a new pattern … um… two months ago or so. And then I went off knitting for a while (and I’m still not 100% back on my previous zealous track, I must confess). And then I started two lace shawls while ignoring forgetting about my promise to JJ to make some slippers.

That’s when the above sad looking tattered specimens made their reappearance on the otherwise pampered feet of JJ. He is nothing if not subtle. He didn’t bother to mention that he was wearing ragged slippers, but waited patiently for me to stop ignoring this notice. And then waited some more.

Finally, last evening, he stuck his feet up in the air all of a sudden while we were watching Food Safari, waving his puir wee nekkid wee heels which were sticking out of the chequerboard slippers and bellowed said in his usual dulcet tone:

Lassie, when am ah gettin mah new slipperrrrrrs?!?!?

So, today after work, I stopped in at Knitomatic and finally bought some feltable yarn:

Lamb’s Pride Worsted, in Turkish Olive and Kiwi. The colour choice, thankfully, has met with the approval of His Nibs.

And, I’m proud to announce that I was completely selfless in this mission – I did not buy any yarn for myself!!! Hard to believe, eh?

I should, however, mention that I did have to buy this mag and I suspect that there won’t be much content there for JJ:

I was taken in particular with two of the patterns I saw within, and couldn’t resist:

These Europeans know what they’re doing with design, I tell you. And – such stashbusting potential!!! I’m picturing this in either a rich blue (Madil Eden) or poppy red (Dalegarn Svale):

And as for this beauty…

…well, maybe, just maybe, I can finally start dipping into that ridiculously large Super 10 stash.

Great. Another thing to feel guilty about… cheating on my beloved Butterfly Greek Super 10 cotton because I discovered the loveliness that is laceweight silk. I’m a terrible person, really.

More evidence of this home truth: the only real reason that I didn’t buy myself more yarn was because I had already gone on a shopping binge on the lunch hour.

But hey – since I’ve been off knitting, I’ve started to run out of clothes!!

Besides, they’re just so colourful I couldn’t resist… and they’re nice and cool.


And the best part – they cost only $10 apiece! So really, I couldn’t say no, could I? Does it count as selfish when you get such a great bargain?!?

JJ: It counts as “selfish” so long as ah’ve no got mah new slippers on mah feet, ye wee bampot.

Hmph. He’s obviously getting a bit too full of oats sitting at home all day. I’ll have to hide the remote before I leave for work tomorrow just to teach him a lesson, eh?

JJ: More paw, less jaw, lassie!

OK, OK… how’s this for a start, then?

Does anyone know if they have a Bigfoot Monster in Scotland?

Happy Tuesday!

all the world’s a stage…

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At the ripe old age of almost38, I had thought I’d pretty much figured out every way that people can be convinced to part with their money for no real reason.  Was I ever wrong…

You see, of late I’ve seen all these ads on TV for some four month course on something called “staging” – you know, “you too can become a home stager and command big bucks.  Call within the next 15 minutes and receive a free coffee at the school canteen…”

Now, I don’t tend to pay too much attention to television, so I simply thought that this was some new fancy new name for “interior designers”.

And this is the case, in a way.  Only you don’t hire stagers until you actually want to sell your house – then you pay them thousands of dollars to redecorate.

I only finally clued into this because my good friend B. is in the process of selling her condominium so that she can move to another city (also, ironically enough, called B.  Sigh.) and her realtor is apparently putting huge pressure on her to bring in one of these “stagers” and throw away spend even more cash.

Personally, I consider this notion to be completely preposterous.  So, I did a bit of research and came up with some info from the place who has been running the television ads for the educational programme:

Home staging is the design process of de-personalizing a private residence prior to putting it up for sale in the real estate marketplace. This is often achieved by re-arranging, de-cluttering and improving on certain items.

The goal of staging a home is to help it sell quickly and for the most amount of money by appealing to the largest amount of prospective buyers. Staging focuses on improving a home’s potential by transforming it into a ‘neutral’ property because the way we live in our home is completely different than the way we should sell our home. Staging creates a living space buyers can “see” themselves in, similar to how model home displays are presented.

Staging also helps create an environment that will lead a buyer’s eye to the home’s attractive features, while minimizing its flaws.

Uh-huh.  And here all these years they’ve been telling you things like “Just boil some apples and cinnamon on your stove before you show your house and it will be sold in no time.”  Were they lying all this time?!?!

But this TV ad says that if you take the course you can get guaranteed employment starting at $31.25 an hour or some such thing.  Not too shabby – I think that’s more than I make, actually.

So, perhaps I should take this all a bit more seriously.  Here’s some information about the course, if you’re interested.  Hmm… $1,000 for a bunch of textbooks, some correspondence learning, a tape measure and a colour wheel!!!  And I thought they soaked us at law school!

I mean, do people have no imagination whatsoever?!  I mean, if I were buying a house, I’d end up decorating it in my own inimitable fashion anyway…

And why the hell should I depersonalise a house I’m trying to sell while I’m still living there, anyway?! I quite happen to like the personality of my place!!

Talk about your false economies.  I spend $5,000 or $6,000 getting someone to paint a house that I’m leaving anyway, so that I can maybe get an extra $1,000 over that tacked on to the selling price – a percentage of which, by the way will go in commissions to the realtor, the lawyer and (doubtless) the stager.  So, at the end of the day I will be $500.00 or so ahead – and will have been stressed out because people were in painting my place, moving my furniture, etc.  Does this really make any sense?!

I must confess, having said that, that I have been known to “stage” an apartment myself – for quite different reasons.  The landlord had put the property up for sale approximately one day after I moved in and I did not wish to have to move three months later.  So, whenever the realtor came by to show the place, I made sure it was an absolute disgusting mess (this, I must admit, wasn’t really a huge challenge).  I also painted the walls in extremely gaudy colours which I happened to like but which proved anathema to prospective buyers.

Hmm… so, maybe there is something to this “staging thing” after all.  Maybe it’s time to pack in the law thing and start a rewarding and exciting new career?!

Then again, that’s how I always feel on Monday mornings.  Sigh.

Have a guid one!

duckie invasion?!

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My beleaguered mother, no doubt shaking her head about my wee obsession with rubber duckies, very kindly sent me the following scan the other day…

 

 

Although I couldn’t help but think that this image was cute cute cute, on some level I’ve since been quite perturbed about the abuse of the humble rubber duckie by the advertising industry.

I mean, the rubber duckie is not just a plaything for our use and abuse, you know.  It is an extraordinarily hardy and brave species. 

These are some rubber duckies and other plastic toys which crossed the Pacific Ocean from China and ended up all the way in New England, 11 years after falling off a container ship.  They were apparently quite the speed demons, travelling at double the rate that the water in the North Pacific moves.  They washed up back in 2003 and a reward was offered for a specific duckie which had gone completely white from its trials and tribulations at sea. 

I’m not sure the reward was ever collected.  But you can read about their journey here, if you’d like.

And, I mean, really – could you cross the Pacific without a raft? Think about it.

But not only is the humble rubber duckie brave, s/he is selfless and giving, working tirelessly for charity.

S/he is also athletic, by the way (far more so than I!):

 Rubber duckies, as you know if you’ve read this blog for any length of time, are capable of forming strong loving relationships:

Yet they continue to be used and abused by Evil Corporations such as Adidas to sell products and make rich fat men even richer and fatter!!!

 It all makes me want to weep, really.  Plus, it makes me afraid.  It is only a matter of time before the rubber duckies stage a revolution and take over… just last night I had a nightmare about this.  Click on this link to see it in full colour.

Scary, eh?

Well, we have the power to stop this abuse of the Rubber Duckie and the ensuing rebellion, revolution and takeover which will lead to the end of life as we know it.  Education, I feel, is key.  To learn more about the honourable rubber duckie, you can click here.

And next time you see a cute little ad featuring a rubber duckie, please spare a thought to the abuse and degradation that led to the ad, and boycott the product… would you?

(Yippee!  Another excuse not to have to shave my legs!!! Huzzah!!)

Happy Thursday!

and on the eighth day…

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… she succumbed to the siren call of Romni Wools.

(OK, OK – I know that the people who frequent here knew it was only a matter of time. But I had managed to delude myself that I could make it through July at least without hitting a yarn shop – as is evidenced by this rather heartfelt post last week. Damn this blogging thing, anyway – it means I can no longer fully delude myself about promises made after they are broken!)

But it’s not my fault. Really. You see, I was stupid enough to misplace my 2.5mm lace needles (which I need for the Year of Lace Blueberry project…

GOOD KRISTINA: But you’ve just started two other lace projects! You won’t even start this one for another month or so…

EVIL KRISTINA: How do you know??? I knit faster than you do, you lazy wench. You’re too busy being goody-goody and doing things like working and being sociable.

GOOD KRISTINA: You can’t finish two full lace stoles by the end of July! That would be impossible.

EVIL KRISTINA: Besides, whose fault is it the needles are gone anyway?!? I wanted you to hold onto all that Dale Svale lightweight stuff but no… you had to clean out the stash room and take the whole bag of it to the Goodwill box. And that’s why the needles are gone – they were in that bag, you twit!!!

GOOD KRISTINA: But there’s no more room in the storage locker!!!

EVIL KRISTINA: Who said anything about the storage locker??? What’s wrong with the living room floor? We don’t even walk in that corner where all the stuff was stashed…

GOOD KRISTINA: (holding head) I … I … oh, never mind.

… and besides, the evil people at Romni have moved the Malabrigo to the front of the store, instead of hiding it in the back where I actually had to go and look for it.

Malabrigo? you might well ask. Didn’t I say just last week I already had 4 kilometres of the stuff in my stash?!?!

Well, yeeeeees… – but not in the Molly colourway:

Shocking pink! And, in yesterday’s ultra hot weather, it reminded me of a refreshing watermelon ice.

Or, for that matter, of my new favourite beverage:


So, how could I resist, really?

GOOD KRISTINA: Hey – have you forgotten it’s JJ’s birthday?!? We should be buying stuff for him, not for us!! Today of all days!

EVIL KRISTINA: Whatever.

GOOD KRISTINA: I mean, at least I bought him that fancy $90 bottle of malt whisky from Cape Breton – and you never even chipped in. So, what did you get him? Huh??? Huh???

EVIL KRISTINA: OK – NOTHING.  All right? Satisfied????

Well, I probably should have resisted, actually. Why? Because, on the way home from work yesterday, I was all of a sudden plagued by a recent memory – something that I had not only actually come across in the stash just last week but documented in that dreadful “I’ll never ever ever – and I mean NEVER – go to the LYS again!” post.

I hoped that perhaps my memory was failing me (as it seemed to have while in Romni earlier – but then I can hardly be blamed for that, can I?!?).

But no. Sigh.

One thing very clear in my failing memory, however… the image of me tossing the Romni receipt blithely away into the bin at St Andrew station on the way to the train.  After all, I wouldn’t need it, right?!

GOOD KRISTINA: heh heh heh heh heh.  Serves you right.

EVIL KRISTINA: Ah, shuddup already.

Hmph.

Happy Tuesday!

reward for PayDay forbearance!!!

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No, no – I did not rush out and buy something else. Instead, I got a lovely surprise in the mail today – the latest package from my Year of Lace 2008 subscription! And lovely it is indeed!

However, since some people have still not gotten their kits in the mail, I feel obligated to put up a spoiler warning…

… and also to engage in a wee digression (that’s today’s excuse, anyway). So, bear with me for a minute or so.

I know it will be very, very difficult to believe this – but on occasion I do get accused of having a rather narrow outlook on certain things. I can be prone to rather myopic behaviour sometimes, as it were (not to mention “obsessive”, but that’s a topic for another digression). It is a trait that serves me well in my vaunted profession of top notch hard working lawyer …

JJ: Ah, go oan, sell me a bridge, would ye, lassie?!?!?! D’ye actually think your blog readers will believe ye tae be hard-workin’?!?

KB: Um… er… (searching for witty response, then muttering) Ah, shurrup, wuid ye?

JJ: Ah telt ye, stop makin’ fun of the way ah talk.

And so on, and so forth.

Man, a digression within a digression. I’m really firing on all cylinders today!

… but it can tend to be a rather unlikeable quality, or so I’m told.

However, I intend to demonstrate to you that tunnel vision can sometimes be a beautiful thing indeed. The other day I took these photos of a field…

Isn’t that pretty? Let’s zoom in just a wee bit more, shall we?

But in fact, I just lied to you above (and yes, yes, I know – lying is another unlikeable quality in a person. However, I’m Greek. It’s genetic. I can’t help it. Really.) when I told you that these were pictures of a field. It is actually a photo of the garbage depository area of my building.

See? Far better, in this example, to take the narrow view, don’t you think?

Well, enough of that… time to show off my latest yarn acquisition!

First, a wonderful pattern by Joan Schrouder!

Blueberries!!!

And – my first ever skein of Lorna’s Laces laceweight (half silk, half wool):

I suspect it won’t be my last, though… look how soft it is!

And the yarn even comes with its own free shawl pattern…!

But now I’m torn!! Should I make the fan shawl, or Joan’s creation with the Lorna’s?

Help!

Oh – I forgot – I still have this radiant Claudia’s Handpaints in the stash…

I think the fan pattern would look very flash in this colour – perhaps I could call it “Daedalus“?

Yes!  Yes!

Oh – but another dilemma.  What to do with my other fabulous blueberry coloured yarn?!

And no, none of you can have it.  Sorry.

Hmm – I guess tunnel vision is not my only unattractive quality.  Apparently I need to work on generosity as well.

Sigh.

Wishing you a wonderful, wonderful weekend – and a happy 4th of July to my American friends.  The Tenant Advocates and I will be raising several glasses to you this evening…

the litany of the wiseguy

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WARNING/ATTENTION/ACHTUNG/EKTIMISI: The post you are about to read contains references to drugs, addiction and other generalised bad behaviour. Reader discretion is strongly advised.

I have a deep dark confession to make. One of the reasons I find it difficult to knit of late is that I have become readdicted to one of the darkest forms of music ever: the rembetika (Greek blues – and believe me, the Greeks are experts at being blue. It’s a national condition for us – even here in the diaspora – it’s inborn and we can’t really do anything about it. Combine that with extreme fatalism and I’m surprised the Greek race has actually managed to last this long without indulging in mass cultural suicide. But I digress…)

I blame the Eurocup, actually. This passion for evil music reignited in me when I attended at the Danforth to watch the game where the $#*(@$&(@#* Greeks got themselves put out of the Cup. As it happened, the place we were watching the game was right next door to Greek City Video. I had promised myself I wouldn’t go there (Mom – stop laughing NOW!!!)… but on the first smoke break (I guess I could also blame the ubiquitous “smoke outside” by-laws or, for that matter, the tobacco companies which keep me addicted to the demon weed…) wandered in and spent … oh, slightly more than the average PayDay haul’s worth of yarn.

Amongst the booty – one of my favourite ever movies:

Yes, yes, I know – you’ve never heard of it. And, for that matter, I don’t really know why it is one of my favourite movies. It is very, very depressing – about a Greek rembetiko (blues) singer who basically gets treated like a whore, becomes drug addicted then dies, over the course of 30 years. Every Greek movie ever made, by the way, is either “I want to slit my wrists now I’ve watched this” morbid or along the lines of a really bad “Carry On” comedy – if “Carry On” had featured horny priests. But anyway…

Another terrific score was this new CD by George Dalaras, the hottest Greek singer going:

The title of the CD is “Songs about Drugs” in English… and features primarily Rembetiko music again. It was recorded at a concert in Greece in 2007 which was held someplace that looks like this:

This is Dalaras himself… I’m only posting this photo for my mother, as she thinks he’s cute! (And here’s a video for you as well, Mom! And another one.  And if you want more, just search “tragoudia me ousies” on YouTube…Don’t say I never gave you anything!!)

So, why am I going on about this “Rembetiko” stuff, you might well ask?? Well, it’s bad boy music from the 1920s in Greece. SERIOUSLY bad boy music. Rappers had nothing on these guys and the few women that they allowed into the circle). People got arrested for playing and listening to this music. If you’re really, really bored, there is a great explanatory newspaper story from the Guardian here.

(At around the same time in Greece, by the way, the fashion for these “manges” or “spivs” (or, for want of a better word in US/Canadian English, wiseguys) was to wear very pointy shoes with toes extending four inches out from the real toes on their feet. The cops went around at the time with machetes and would just chop off the toes of the shoes. If they happened to hit the real toes in the process, too bad.)

But why were the rembetiko musicians and the characters they attracted treated so badly? A sampling of the song titles from the Dalaras CD should give you a clue:

– Alcohol and Nicotine
– The Castaway Cigarette
– Rumba of the Drug Dealer
– Clink Clink Go The Glasses
– Hashish
– I’m an Addict
– Heroin and Hash
– In the Basement
– The Tobacconist
– Five Spivs
– Bring Drugs So I Can Get High
– Ouzo and Hashish
– I’m a Flirt
– Why I Smoke Cocaine
– I’m a Cocaine Addict

Well, now finally I understand why this guy always looks so damned happy:

…while his wife and daughter slave away at home:

But seriously, what is not to like about this music?!? Perhaps I was just deprived as a child. The Greece painted through this music is certainly not the Greece I was raised to think ever existed, let me tell you. I mean, the one little rebellion I tried in high school – wearing head to toe black – resulted in my father’s telling me “Black is for Funerals” and grounding me for a year or so.

Plus, my (very lovely and extremely youthful looking) mother used to refer to this stuff as “migraine music”. To an extent, she had a point… especially when I hauled home the authentic 1920s recorded versions which featured singers coughing their heads off on tape (there’s a lot of tar in that hash, you know!!), whiny Greek bagpipes and violins which sounded like two cats in the backyard – um, well, you know.

However, they sure seemed to have a lot of fun!!!

So, now I’ve decided I’m going to quit my day job – finally – and resuscitate the Greek blues in Canada. First, all I need to do is learn how to play this:

Now, I don’t want to tell you just how long I’ve had this in my possession… it’s a bit embarrassing. But, I will learn.

Also, the renewed interest in the Greek Blues, plus another addiction to the fabulous music of Cape Breton, has led me to dust off the old keyboard and start practicing again:

So, doubtless I will very, very soon catch the eye of some impresario who likes cocaine music, and will be appearing very soon at a major concert venue near you.

Stay tuned… and in the meantime, a happy Thursday!

why there will be no PayDay excursion today…

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No, this is not an ad for the upcoming summer knitting chick-flick film blockbuster entitled “How Blue Was My Valley”.  I can only wish.

Instead, this is a photo of only one of the yarns that I forgot… yes, forgot!… that I had in the stash.   It was like Christmas in (almost) July when I finally got around to sorting out the stash room yesterday, let me tell you.

I should mention that I think most of the yarns I will show in this post were purchased within the past year (or so say the vague flickers of my brain when I was struggling to remember whether I had actually bought this stuff, or whether the Yarn Fairy had been overly generous of late.  I know – nay, I hope – that the knitters who visit this board will understand this ongoing problem of moment-specific amnesia that I apparently suffer from.  That is, I buy the stuff, I photograph it, I post yarn pron on my blog and then the yarn actually ceases to exist.  Hmm.

Anyway, first in the roll call of Great Forgotten Yarns: this gorgeous Handmaiden Lace Silk!

Two skeins of it!  I’m racking my brains trying to remember what it was for.

Next, a skein of Sea Silk in a forgotten colourway:

I do recall that I bought this relatively recently… but that’s it.  I don’t know where.

And next?

Ah, yes.  This one, I remember.  Phew.  I acquired this on a trip to Knitomatic – I went there frantically after work one day, having decided that I just had to make a geometric rib-fronted sweater by Norah Gaughan right then.  I could have bought something more pedestrian like Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece, but also just had to have some cashmere.  This was at least five months ago.

And this?

Again, another must-have from Knitomatic.  It’s gorgeous, isn’t it?  It certainly doesn’t deserve to languish, forgotten and unloved, in my stash pile of stuff on the floor drawer…

Man, my back is starting to get sore what with all the self-flagellation, really.  I had even managed to forget about this:

Schaefer Anne in perhaps the most beautiful colour ever.

And what’s this, then?

Ah, yes – some Berocco suede that I was desperate for longer ago than I care to remember.  I entered a swap with Natalie to get my hot little hands on it. I was going to make the Snapping Turtle Skirt by Norah Gaughan with it…

And, finally this:

More forgotten Lace Silk!  And again, two skeins.  I have no clue when I bought this, where it came from, etc.

And actually, I must confess… that isn’t really the “finally” item.  There are more photos – but I’m starting to get rather embarrassed.  As I was, by the way, when JJ ignored the crime scene tape that I had glued the stash room door shut with while cleaning and came in to see me surrounded by … well, yarn.  I then told him that I had forgotten buying much of it (all right, all right… I then confessed that I must have been in a trance when I bought half of the stuff that he saw surrounding me on the floor).  He just shook his head and, thankfully, left.

You may have noticed that I had taken most of the photos on top of a piece of graph paper with scrawls on it.  That was my attempt to catalogue the stash.  I soon gave up… but the list does document:

– eight skeins of Malabrigo laceweight (each around 500m)

– nine skeins of Fiddlesticks laceweight (each 600m)

– nine skeins of Misti Alpaca regular laceweight (each 400m)

– seven skeins of Misti Alpaca Handpaints laceweight (each 800m)

– eight skeins of Blue Moon Silk Thread (each 1100m)

– two skeins of Claudia lace thread (each 1100m)

And, that’s without the Handmaiden.  And, that’s also only laceweight stuff.  It does not take into account the Super10 stash (which now has its very own container) or other lovely stuff like the milk yarn that Amy had so kindly sent me some time back… or the lovely yarn from Clarabelle (not naming the provenance as it is very, very hard to come by and my UK blog friends are having problems getting enough for their own needs).

Plus, it appears that I now officially have enough laceweight yarn to cover Canada with lace.  And, in case you weren’t aware, Canada is a very, very large country indeed.

So, that’s it.  No more PayDay excursions for a while.  And yes, I know I’ve said this before, but this time I mean it.  Really.

Off now to phone the insurance company to up my household coverage…

Cheers,

Kristina

PS.  And, no, Amy – you can’t have my yarn.  Sorry.

another PayDay, another $50 out the window…

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Well, yesterday being the Ides of May, I headed to the local yarn shop as usual.

And here’s what I got!

First, a skein of Blue Sky Alpacas cotton in the Curry colourway (pictured below in the middle).

I’m hoping to make the Delft top in the current issue of Interweave Knits with these colours (I had the red and the orange in the stash from past swaps).

Oh, you should all congratulate me on my extreme forebearance. Why? Because, even though they had a brand new shipment of Handmaiden products in, I did not buy Handmaiden yesterday. I didn’t even look at it.

Er, um… ahem… I should confess that this is only the case because I was so taken with the Blue Moon collection:

The colourway is called “Atomic” of all things. Cool, eh?

And damn and blast (and double and triple damn) Lettuce Knits for being only one of two stores in Canada for carrying the stuff!! They’re just a bunch of pushers, really. Sheesh. I really, really can’t be blamed for losing my head (even though a whole bunch of Blue Moon stuff is winging its way to me from the US as we speak).

Actually, with all of those kilometres of laceweight yarn due to arrive, maybe I could use one of these as well:



Do you think I could program it to make Shetland lace?

Hmm. Actually, I doubt it. It was probably intended to make more useful everyday items of wear such as this:

Just check out that hunk o’ burnin love, would you? That fancy top wouldn’t be staying on him too long in my vicinity, I can tell you!!!

Or, how about some toys for the kiddies?

A very topical set of toys, I should think, given all the talk about bullying in the news these days (and you can click the link if you want to see my view on this issue!).

And, just to end off the work-week, I thought I’d post my top three weblinks for today:

(a) Passive-Aggressive Notes: I figure we’ve all seen such notes from time to time, although of course I’ve never written one myself! (cough cough). I get a real kick out of this website.

(b) Stitchy McYarnpants: some very funny photos of vintage knits, together with commentary. And, she reminded me that I hadn’t looked at Passive-Aggressive Notes for a while. Thanks, Stitchy!

(c) Stephen Fry: he is a rather funny English actor and has recently set up a blog. I’m not sure what I prefer about it – reading his excellent writing or checking out the self-important commentators who either pretend to be buddies with him or pontificate using poor grammar and big words that they dont know how to spel.

Miaow!

Happy Friday!