Annie Knits

Bullets -- Life Gets Disjointed, You Know?

• First off, this  (it's a Yahoo News link).  Here's what I think (and this is totally not a viable solution, I know, I'm just hoppin' mad).  Everyone should get to opt out paying for of so-called safety-net programs like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, WIC, Food Stamps, etc if he or she wants to.  If someone doesn't want to participate in society, it's obviously his or her choice.  Two conditions, though.  It should be a public choice -- you don't want to pay for this stuff, don't just cheer anonymously in a rabid crowd, put your name down so I can see it.  Second, you opt out of the benefits as do your dependents.  Period.  If that's what you believe it means to support each other in society, fine, you're un-subscribed.  Hope nothing bad or out of your control ever happens to you.  I mean that with all my heart too, because I'm just that kind of gal.
• Speaking of bad or out of control, a family we know has had a difficult time lately with a severe injury happening to an adult child who lives across the country.  Luckily, he has insurance and he'll be ok.  Meantime, his mom has flown there to be with him and his dad and younger siblings are here.  Through church, we're making meals for the family this week.  Monday, I cooked for much of the day and caught up on Boardwalk Empire.  Add Steve Buscemi to the list of people I'll watch do anything (it's a short list... Colin Firth, Anna Paquin, Rufus Sewell).  Weird, I know.  I made lasagna, Mulligan Stew, and these cookies.               Peanut butter, chocolate chip, butterscotch chip.  They are awesome, but they'd be better if I'd sprinkled them with sea salt and turbinado sugar before baking them... a little sweet/salty crunch on the top would have put them into the "sublime" category.
• Knitting the Fibonaci striped sweater has stalled.  I'm going to run out of yarn and it's 8 years old and discontinued and the place I bought it originally doesn't have it any more and no one who has it in their stash on Ravelry will talk to me.  Pooh.  I've found a sub and may order it.  Pooh again.
• Since Fibonaci is stalled, I started something else.  Vitamin D in my hand-spun.  I'm Ambivalent so far.                       I love the way it's knitting up, but it's a little uneven.  Gauge issues I think.  Soon, I'll wet it and see if I like the results.  The yarn is this:   I plied Spunky Eclectic's club colorways Night Owl and Changes together.  The resulting yarn is a squooshy dk weight 2 ply.  We'll see if it's the right yarn for this sweater.  Time and knitting will tell.
• Now, The Game of Thrones is the black hole of my time.  Bridgett thinks it's dark.  There must be something wrong with me that I don't really...  I'm hard wired to enjoy the medieval I think.  I can look past the filth and throat slitting and just enjoy the rawness.  The social network in this kingdom?  Someone else's dagger...  And I love Peter Dinklage -- he's a kind of out-of-the-ordinary but very appealing choice for this role.  Lots of knitting and watching.
• And finally, I made this little craft project for our bedroom out of some toile I found and fell in love with.   
• Yeah, loved it until Rachel made me watch this:     

Yeah.  That's all.

A Bunch of Stuff

First of all, this picture illustrates the gobblety gook I talked yesterday.  On the left is a 3-ply merino I spun in August.  On the right is the 3-ply yarn I spun yesterday after I laced my wheel.  Much finer, in fact about half the diameter.  The technique simply ads finer yarns to my arsenal. 

The main problem with learning this trick is that it virtually eliminates the need for me to acquire a new spinning wheel in order to spin finer yarn.  Harumph.  Now, what will Hubster get me for Christmas?

 

Second of all, whose great idea was it to launch all manner of hot air balloons in a field right next to our main highway artery at 7:00 a.m. this morning?  Could there possibly be a single person in St. Louis who does not know that the balloon event that we have every year on the same September weekend is happening this weekend?  Are the publicity stunt organizers willing to accept the blame for all of the fender benders and work hours lost in the ensuing traffic jam that resulted from their ill timed show this morning?   

 Seriously, people can't help rubbernecking the balloons, or even snapping cell phone pictures while they drive at 55 miles per hour -- we all know that -- so why tempt us them?

 Third of all, I swear to God, I'm canceling my St. Louis Post Dispatch subscription.  I'm really doing it this time.  Only I just paid for three months, so I'll cancel after that.  But I swear, I will.  The whole local botanical garden former honcho kerfuffel has me breathing fire.  Under what journalistic heading does "publish mistakenly received and obviously not for you email messages" fall?  How does doing so make you anything but the author of drivel better suited for the bottoms of bird cages?  The guy is 72 and had just returned from a several week trip to China (forwarding our interests btw), for goodness' sake, and hit "reply" rather than "forward".  And since when is it gossip that someone's hostas are kind of brown and their grass has gone unwatered?  When they moved into the house, that was full of mold and had been unoccupied for awhile, only a few months before and where in I have personally witnessed tons of work going on?!  Are there any editors left over there doing any kind of gatekeeping?  Sheesh!

And fourth of all, how on God's green earth am I supposed to start a Father's Club at Dear Daughter's school (which the principal and president fervently want) when I blanket the whole parent population with emails and make announcements at Back to School Night and call eleventy seven people and I only get ONE firm commitment to help paint the parking lot from 9 to noon on an October Saturday morning.  Of all 221 fathers (ok, there are 221 girls, and they all had to have dads at one time, but perhaps they don't have them now so maybe if I trim my number to 150?) I get only ONE who is available and willing to help?  And I'm married to him?!  Could we pony up an hour or two people?!  For your kid?  I'm disgusted.  Yeah, yeah, people are busy, blah, blah, blah.  I'm busy too and so is Hubster.  Whatever.

And Pigs are Flying...

Husband handed me an editorial piece from the Wall Street Journal this morning.  He said he was sure it would fire my propensity to rant, but he was also sure it was something in which I'd be interested.  As he's on his way out the door to teach Dear Daughter to start the car and drive it in a parking lot, I'd say it's his weekend for living dangerously.

 I've linked the piece here.

The article is an interview with Wendy Kopp, the founder of Teach for America.  Dear Daughter had a TFA teacher for first grade -- this lovely young woman chose to relocate here and still teaches in our parish school.  We had a wonderful experience with her.  I also sing in the choir with a TFA teacher who works in one of our local middle schools.  Top flight.

The article states that this fall, TFA will send 4500 of the "best college graduates" in the country into urban and rural school districts -- 100 of the worst performing of those says the article.  And that is a group culled from 46,000 applicants including 12% of all ivy league graduates.  

Pick your jaw up off the floor and wipe that soda off of your keyboard.  Apparently TFA is quite the feather in a graduate's cap.  

For those who don't know, TFA folks go thru a summer of extensive training and serve a two year stint.  Superintendents hire them like regular teachers once the school district qualifies.  

But does it do any good, you ask?  Apparently so.  A 2008 survey found that high school students in TFA classes 'significantly' outperformed their peers in the classes of more experienced and more conventionally trained (I might add) teachers on state-required-end-of-course exams (don't get me started on those!)

Hmm.  And the teacher's salaries are funded in part by this not for profit organization?  And the TFA teachers receive ongoing support and training (more than one can say for traditional teaching programs)? 

So why does the City of St. Louis have a shortage of teachers at the beginning of each year?  There are 46,000 folks out there who would purportedly like to teach in our urban district or one like it.  

According to the article, one reason is funding, although this has been steadily increasing through the private sector as the program is very successful.  The other?  Wait for it.  I bet I could still find my membership card in my teaching stuff... teacher unions.

I am a 13 year veteran of the classroom and was a member of the union all the way through those years.  I was educated in the traditional fashion -- I have a BS in Secondary Education with an emphasis in English, Speech, and Journalism.  I have all but 3 hours of an MAT in English (my pregnancy with Dear Son was a difficult one.)  I know the insider story.  Even so, I can't imagine not trying every avenue, especially one that's working, to improve our city schools.  To preserve the tenure and jobs of ineffective teachers at this point at the expense of students is unconscionable.   

TFA is not a silver bullet, but it is a beginning.  And it proves, to me at least, that the traditional way of doing things has become so unwieldy that it no longer works.  These fresh faced, enthusiastic, energetic volunteers are what our sagging educational system needs.  Well at least some of what it needs.  God almighty, take 'em up on it fer Pete's sake!

Ahem.

 

Tour de Fleece -- four ounces or thereabouts of Corriedale.  Four bats.  Kim told me I could fit four of the things on a bobbin and she was perfectly correct.  Now, mind you, I don't watch the race -- I listen to Georgette Heyer, but it's all in the honor of, you know.

 
 

A clay pot we purchased last night at the Cahokia Mounds Contemporary Indian Art Show.  It's a Victoria McKinney clay pot called Snake Knots.  The design is based on carvings found on shell fragments found in a mound in Oklahoma.  It's killer.

I need a nap.

Every Neighborhood has One

You know, an information mainliner.  The guy or gal who knows all the goings on and then some.  Mine is my stylist.

D. opened his shop across the street from my neighborhood in 1984, 5 years before we moved in.  We've been getting our hair cut there off and on ever since.  He's probably 10 years older than I am and his wife and daughter work in the shop with him.  His kids went to the same elementary school as mine did -- he's a city guy through and through.  

And there must be something about sitting in a chair while he cuts or does whatever to your hair that makes you confess your secrets.  Or at least someone else's secrets.  No kidding.

Last time I went in, he told me about a new neighbor of mine, a relatively well known gentleman who's retiring from his position at a prominent attraction/organization here in town.  He's moving in a few houses down as he had to buy a house since the house he's lived in for 30 years belongs to the organization, but the purchase had been finalized only the day before and I only knew because Hubster does business with this organization.  Of course, D. had the scoop -- turns out he cuts this man's daughter's hair who lives a few neighborhoods over and told him all about her father moving in nearby.  

He knows about businesses moving or closing before anyone else, and he knows someone who knows nearly anyone else I might mention in conversation.  He probably knows their mother too.  He's conversant in any of the political issues of the day, in all the new books and movies, he even hears about reassignment of priests and ministers before their congregations...

I went today for my cut and *cough*color*cough and he surprised me again.   He knew all about the possibility of a charter school moving into the facility across the street from his store (it's a defunct facility for that organization about which the Village People sing and you make the letters with your arms and your body...)  The building's been empty and collecting vagrants for 10 years, ever since the organization referred to above promised they wouldn't close it once they got the money and the tax abatement to build a new facility a few miles away.  Bridgett's blogged about them lately (but I can't find the post... maybe she'll link it in the comments)-- they're doing it again.

Anyway, this eyesore of a building has weeds growing in the parking lot and D. sees folks going in and out all the time.  He doesn't even call the owners or the police anymore.  He's so disgusted that he told me that he wouldn't care if they put in a beauty school across the street -- he'd just hang out a sign that says "We fix bad hair cuts".  Anything but the current state of affairs.  

Well, as I heard it, this school deal is a super secret thing -- very hush hush.  Not anymore.  D. knowing about it is akin to the town crier having the goods -- maybe even more far reaching.  

He also has the goods on the crazy veterinarian who owns the old dry-cleaner/gas station on the corner a few blocks down.  That guy better get on the stick and renovate  or knock that building down is all I have to say.  D. is on the case, and it's about to blow sky high.

Variations on a Theme

I love my church.  I've blogged about this before, but I have to say it again today.  

Each year, the St. Louis PrideFest Parade stages itself in front of our church front steps.  In fact, this gentleman greeted me after mass.  He was charming.  And orange... ; )

 

I asked him if it would be ok with him if I put the picture on my blog.  He told me, "Honey, any publicity is good publicity."  

The St. Louis parade has grown to be one of the largest in the Midwest, if not in the country, and the South Grand area expects tens of thousands of parade and festival goers each year.  It's a great shot in the arm for our businesses.

But that's not why I'm writing about this parade today.  I'm writing because, as I said in the first sentence, I love my church.  I looked around during mass this morning and saw several PrideFest t-shirts.  Now I know that the prevailing wisdom is that Catholicism and the gay and lesbian community do not mix.  It's a testament to our place of worship that at St. Pius the two mix very well.  I could enumerate the folks in leadership positions on our  Parish Council, the folks who volunteer at our fundraisers and who proclaim from our ambo, but that would be a lot like saying, "Some of my best friends are..."  And that's not how I mean this at all.

   

I sense no irony or cognitive dissonance in the fact that this parade begins on our parish steps on a Sunday morning just as mass lets out.  I suppose it bothers some... on both sides.  The enmity engendered by the small minded and the elite is great.  I know, though, that in my little church, Catholic people worship together.  Regardless of ... oh, whatever.

The fact that it's the best parade in St. Louis, and that it takes place within walking distance of my house, and the fact that its participants throw the best swag from their floats is not influencing my opinion either.  Ahem.

 

Here are some of my parish friends with their newish little one, Jeremiah.  It's Jeremiah's first Pride Parade.  I remember Dear Son's first -- his sister was 4 and she oooed and ahhhhed over the "princesses" riding in the convertibles.  (Off color joke coming up -- I lay it at Husband's feet -- don't read it if you're sensitive that way.  We told her they weren't just princesses but that they were queens.  Even better.)  Over the years, my little ones have taken home shirts, leis, beads, balloons, frisbees, floaties, more beads, flash lights, ... you name it.  All bedecked with rainbows.

 

This set of puppets was produced by on of the city's magnet schools.  

Which begs the question.  A question Husband put to me this afternoon when I started this entry.  Is the parade necessary any more?  Is it relevant?  We've come a long way baby.  His point was to wonder aloud whether we need to discuss sexual orientation any more?  Do we need to have a parade about it?  

I'm writing this entry because I think that the parade is necessary and relevant.  While I care not one whit what happens in someone's bedroom as long as they're consenting adults, I do care that there are many who would like to legislate just that.  And while they're rabid over keeping government out of boardrooms, they're just as rabid about letting it into bedrooms.  

Bridgett blogged this issue this week for very different reasons.  I voiced a kind of 'out there' opinion in her comments, but it's relevant to my thinking here.  

The Gospels' primary point as I think on it is two fold:  Put God above all things and love each other as you love yourself.  We do it here.  And that makes me proud.

You Knew I Had Something Brewing

First, knitting.  The sleeves for Portland are kicking my butt.  I should just do them one at a time, but doggonit, I should be able to knit them together.  Apparently, I cannot.  Just this afternoon, I was compensating for an extra row on one of them.  The increases are going to get messed up for sure.  

 

Sure are pretty though.  
 

Ok, enough chit chat.  On the Today show this morning, a congressman (I hesitate to refer to him as such) was allowed to tout his Fire Nancy Pelosi website and spew his vitriol all over the set.  The imagery on the website, while not technically disturbing is certainly reminiscent of a witch hunt and burning... nice addition to the national health care conversation, buddy.  I'd link it, but I don't want to encourage it.

John McCain has called from the mountaintops that he and the GOP will not cooperate at all with the current ELECTED government in future governing decisions.  Way to go, dude.  Make sure the whole thing stops in its tracks ... that won't threaten the economy or anything.

I'm shielding myself from most of the national health care conversation.  I'm of a mind that what we've got now is a start and thank goodness for that.  We can tweak it from now until kingdom come and it won't be perfect, but at least we'll be moving toward a merciful approach to the health of the citizens of this country.  Health insurance has been the elephant in the living room of every small business in this country for too long.  I'm afraid that if I listen to too much so-called news, ostensibly right or left, I'll get crabby...

I attended a non-partisan health care bill informational meeting and learned from insiders (a health care watch group worker) exactly what the bill that has now passed will require of us and of small and large businesses.  Complicated to explain here, but if you look at the Missouri Budget Project website, you'll get enlightened.  I'm satisfied that it's a start, just like everything in government.  

Now if we could just undo the No Child Left Behind garbage, we'd be on the road again.

Oh, and hey, St. Louis Friends:  the last Friday Fish Fry at St. Pius V is Friday night.  Good food and live music (why, yes, yours truly indeed).  Hope to see you there.  4 to 7 p.m, Grand and Utah.

Not Even a Drive-By Post

I know.  I haven't even accomplished that since the beginning of this month.  How about bullets then, so my thoughts can be disjointed and it won't interfere with coherence.

• The new drive to Dear Son's school is killing me.  I spend two more hours in the car every day now than I did last school year.  Those were, apparently, the hours I spent doing laundry and blogging.  No whining though.  I've not gotten into a car-pool yet, and there are several, as we are kind of enjoying the time together and I'm getting to spend a lot more time with my Audible.com book cue.  Anna Karenina is up now. (BTW -- that snoozer is classified under Audible Kids.  Are they kidding?  I mean, I'm kind of enjoying it and not having to read all the extra words and not being able to nod off in the middle of a soliloquy on Communist philosophy is a plus and the narrator is excellent, but kids?  I don't think so.  This book's got nothing on Twilight.)
• The political and financial situation in this country right now is freaking me out.  To whit:  Why are we giving dishonest stock brokers and weak dealing bankers money for making asses of themselves and us? (Oh, I know -- it's something about worldwide financial collapse, but still...)  Does Governor Palin's voice grate on anyone else like it grates on me?  (Oh, gosh, cheap shot.  Ok.  Can I object then to the newfound Republican sensitivity to sexism?  Yeah, my politics are no secret, never have been.) 
• And did you hear about the older woman in North St. Louis County who got the phone call telling her to write in Hilary Clinton for president? The caller id said the call came from an equipment company near Kansas City, the owner of which claims it did not.  The news speculated (with phone line evidence) that the call was masked and came from a local Republican group trying to undermine the Democratic ticket.  Nice.
• We lost power for a little while last Sunday as the remnants of Ike blew through.  There was pretty major flooding and I think 6 people lost their lives to rushing water and falling limbs.  Such a tragedy.  Several of my family in the Columbus, Ohio area have been out of power since Sunday night.   Do you have power back yet, Mom?  And this is to say nothing of the devastation in Texas and the Gulf area.  That storm was a doozy.

I've been spinning.  A lot.  I've got about 12 1/2 ounces of this yarn that averages out at 10 wraps per inch, maybe a heavy worsted?  It's a gorgeous, shiny gun metal gray shot through with light gray and a little brown.

 

It's spun woolen and omg.  I love it.  I really just fluff it straight out of the bag and it's pretty clean -- see?

 

Enough for a jacket is my goal.  I think I have enough fleece, don't you? 

 

Every time I pull a handful of fleece out of this bag, it grows.   That's my kind of fleece.

Did I tell you about this fleece?  Corriedale lamb, 4 pounds of fleece, cleaned but not combed or carded.  Yum.

I've got more -- Bridgett's been over to spin, Rachel is dying lots of yarn and will be at Strange Folk at the end of the month, my brother's book comes out next month.  But these things will have to wait because I have to go drive somewhere.  Of course.

Oh, No, He Dih'int!

It's no secret here abouts that I love Jon Stewart and his commentary.   On Thursday night, he broke this tidbit:  John McCain's campaign launched an ad last week that compared Barak Obama's baseless fame and fandom to that of Paris Hilton and Brittney Spears.  No news there.  What Stewart brought to light for me is the fact that Hilton's parents have donated the maximum amount allowed by law to McCain's campaign.  And, as Stewart put it, then McCain "took a nationally televised dump on their daughter."   Nice.

While John McCain always struck me as a relatively straight shooting guy with integrity and smarts, he's obviously not hiring that kind of person to head up his ad campaigns.  Yikes.   Before running such a personal and distasteful ad, you'd think someone might have thought to look into the principals just a little. 

So now this gaffe is all over the internet and Barak Obama is calling for the media to refocus it's attention and discuss the issues at stake in this election.  Hmm.  Like that's gonna happen. 

And President Bush is calling out Congress for not approving drilling in the Alaskan Wilderness, because, dangit!  We need that oil.  Nevermind that anything we drill up won't come into our national gas tanks for like 10 years, by which time I hope we're relying on wind power. 

And with that, we're right back to grapes.  Which I will never live down.  Hubster says I'm using something called a convenient abstraction, which if you look it up (why on earth would you?!), means that I've made something very complex very simplistic.  Yeah? So?  Now, Chez Annie, everything is all, "Well, if we have grapes in the refrigerator, we might as well (fill in some silly extravagance)" and all "Who will save the South African Grape Pickers if we don't (fill in some silly extravagance)?"  Blah, blah, blah!  Wish I'd never brought it up...  ; )

Onward.

Yes, I still knit sometimes.  But I also get birthday presents.

Kim left this lovely bag for me at work -- in it are locks and wool for me to spin, stitch markers and a great project bag that she made herself.  I'm one lucky birthday girl, aren't I?  Especially if I can get my birthday to go on all week.

You Say Potato, I say Xenophobic

I was listening to NPR yesterday while I was running errands, this edition of All Things Considered in fact, and it's a show I normally enjoy.  You know, interesting talk, out of the ordinary approaches to news of the day, etc.  Some one of their reporters, a woman, was interviewing a French reporter about French First Lady Carla Bruni's new album.  They played a few selections -- it's kind of jazzy, smoky music -- better, quite frankly, than I expected given the lead in.

 The NPR reporter began with a question about how the French people are taking all this.  You know, having a First Lady release a cd in which she refers to having other lovers (I think the number was 30...) and then there's something about a chrysanthemum which might or might not be a thinly veiled sexual reference.  The French reporter paused and chuckled and said that, well, this woman had greatly softened Sarkozy's image as a workaholic, and how she's poised in public, and how she's well, 40, and she's had a life and well no one resents that.

 And the NPR gal asked again whether anyone is up in arms about all of the SEX on the cd, and the French reporter chuckled again and said that the French like their women of a certain age to have a past, that it makes them interesting. 

And the NPR gal asked AGAIN if there wasn't some objection, somewhere, please, to all this?  And the French lady said no that the French are more mature about this stuff... Sheesh!  Ok?  No, they don't care already!  And a 3 minute piece on a prime drive time serious news show about a the wife of an elected European official's new cd? Really?  And we care ALOT about that why?  And it was an annoying piece about all of that to boot.  I was yelling in the car... glad I was alone.

And then, of course, on Ravelry, there's been a lovely, nasty bit about a well-known Canadian blogger who posted on Canada Day (July 1) about loving her country.  And she even prefaced the piece with a little "I know you Americans think that when I post about Canada, it's some kind of swipe about you, but this is not!  This post is about me! blah blah blah".  Which still didn't stop the vitriol.  I was appalled.    I read the thread with mounting disgust -- it was in a McCain for president group I think -- and sat on my hands.  Post after post with jealous, snarky, xenophobic, conjured nonsense.  Actually, I'll admit to reading only the first several pages of like 17.  And some of it was something about how she's a public figure so none of the Rav etiquette applies -- she likes any kind of attention, even this nastiness.  I turned off the computer and rinsed my eyes with Clorox. 

Ok, so no computer, no radio... I'll read the paper.  WHAT WAS I THINKING?!  Excommunications, arrests of immigrants for working in a slaughter house (nothing about the boss!) etc.  Gadzooks, I think I'll knit.

That's better.

Filey is coming right along.  I'm on the neck decreases in the front.  The Rowan Denim is lovely to work with, even though (I know Rachel!) it's  cotton.  You can't tell but these are two 30 inch long pieces of knitting... remember how it's supposed to shrink in the wash?  Like jeans?  Let's just hope. 

Oh, wait.  That's a pattern based on an Irish sweater.  By a Brit designer, with British yarn.  Quick, I'll change the subject to something else...

Bought some Dyeabolical yarn yesterday.  It's too staid to have a name written on it's label. **grin** (And this is a better representation of the true color of Filey of which we shall not speak again.)  This yarn is Amanda's socks.  Some assembly required.  But, yikes!  This yarn's been dyed by someone of Chinese American descent, the the recipient's gone and married a Korean American!  Hang on...

We bought this small (about 5 inches tall) piece last night at a Native American Art show last night at Cahokia Mounds.  It's by an artist named Keith Yazzie Jay and he wins this adjudicated show every year.  Hubster's been wanting a Yazzie Jay piece for a few years and last night we caved.  This man throws the pots, coats them with multiple layers of colored clay and then carves down into the layers with an Exacto knife to create his designs.  And they are stunning. 

There, American enough for you?