Annie Knits

I Know You Are, But What Am I?

More rant inside that has got to come out or I'll bust.  Or my friends will stop hanging around with me because they've had to listen to the same thing over and over.  

As to my post earlier this week about my daughter's school, I posted a comment in response to the local blogger's guest post about preserving the 128 year old building on the campus.  In a nutshell, I commented that we have to make sure the school stays open (phase one of the capital campaign) before we can have any kind of conversation about the extent to which we can preserve the campus buildings (phase two of the capital campaign). I'm going to make an addition here because I haven't been clear.  Phase two of this project consists of constructing a fine arts facility, the fine and performing arts being a strength of this school, and renovations of the gymnasium.  I'd like to frame the conversation this way rather than letting someone else frame it as a demolition.  

The guest poster's wife (a neighbor, btw) responded (publicly, in the blog's comments, using her name) thusly:

Perhaps the girls' educational needs would be better served if the millions of dollars necessary for demolishment (yes, demolishing the buildings costs a great deal of money, too, estimated at approximately 8 million dollars) were allocated to endowing scholarships and recruiting qualified teachers. Moreover, that money could be put toward renovating the historic buildings so they better suit the school's needs (yes, this can be done, and it *has* been done at other schools with more enlightened views regarding historic preservation). If the school administrators continue to maintain that they do not want to use the historic structures on their campus, they could easily sublet these buildings for another use, a possibility that they do not seem willing to entertain. 

It's not an either/or proposition. You're setting up a false dichotomy: either preserve the buildings or offer a high-quality education to the girls. This strikes me as disingenuous at best. 

I would be willing to do what I could to help the school, but only provided they take demolition off the table. However, they refuse to do so, which makes the "maybe Phase 2 won't even happen" scenario highly suspect to me. I can understand why they don't want this controversy to detract from their fundraising efforts, but surely you can understand why people who care about historic preservation might not want to donate money to an institution with the knowledge that it might someday go toward destroying the most historic structures in the Tower Grove East neighborhood.

 

I'm going to respond point by point here, on my blog, because doing it on the original one would be a total threadjack and not appropriate.  

I'm doing it here because if I don't, I'll have to keep saying it to everyone I meet (friends, colleagues, knitting students, random barristas)...

1.  "Perhaps the girls' educational needs would be better served if the millions of dollars necessary for demolishment (yes, demolishing the buildings costs a great deal of money, too, estimated at approximately 8 million dollars) were allocated to endowing scholarships and recruiting qualified teachers."          

 I have it on good authority (the VP of a large local contracting firm and the architect to which I'm married) that  the "demolishment" of this building would cost between $320,000 and $470,000 depending on asbestos abatement.  For God's sake, it's not Pruitt-Igoe!  (Thanks, Bridgett.)  

Also, every teacher in that building has a state teaching certificate and many of them are super excellent teachers -- I have some expertise in this field.  This is a particularly nasty swipe as many of them spend long hours and tons of effort and expertise making sure that these girls have a most excellent high school experience.  The current fundraising effort, which you are blackballing, addresses this item exactly.  Pay them a living wage, get more kids in the school.  Check.  We've got that covered.  

2.  "Moreover, that money could be put toward renovating the historic buildings so they better suit the school's needs (yes, this can be done, and it *has* been done at other schools with more enlightened views regarding historic preservation)."

Ouch.  "More enlightened."  Renovation of the historic buildings.  Here are the uses to which this building is currently being put to use:  an older adult day care center (hmm, sponsored by the religious order and serving poor, local, special needs adults); administrative offices; fellowship rooms; art and music rooms; auction headquarters; the Sanguis Christi retreat center (gosh, haven't seen any neighborhood organizations organizing retreats here to support this entity.)  I'd say that they are utilizing the space, but I've been in this building and, as it was built with just a few classrooms on the first floor but primarily as a convent, it's pretty broken up inside.  

Condos would be cost prohibitive as the rooms are about 6 by 12 and, via three large hallways, it's connected directly to the school building.  Who'd want a condo the back of which would face a high school parking lot?  What else you got?

3.  "If the school administrators continue to maintain that they do not want to use the historic structures on their campus, they could easily sublet these buildings for another use, a possibility that they do not seem willing to entertain. "

"Easily sublet."  Buildings that are directly connected to an all girls high school?  To which the community demands entrance be carefully controlled?  Ok.  Give me some options keeping in mind the constraints of the configuration of the building and the surrounding traffic patterns...  I'm waiting.  

4.  "It's not an either/or proposition. You're setting up a false dichotomy: either preserve the buildings or offer a high-quality education to the girls. This strikes me as disingenuous at best."

It is an either/or proposition, but not the one you'd like to discuss.  Keep the school open or close it.  Support the school or don't.  It's easy to be a proponent of an old building.  Of course we love old buildings -- we live in the city, fer pete's sake.  The difficult conversation is the one that concerns an aging religious population and the education of urban students in a modern city.  That conversation is fraught with latent prejudices and confounding numbers.  No dichotomies there, false or no, but many facets and nuances.

As for that last bit, see the title of this post.

5. " I would be willing to do what I could to help the school, but only provided they take demolition off the table. However, they refuse to do so, which makes the "maybe Phase 2 won't even happen" scenario highly suspect to me."

Would you?  Because I go to all the school functions:  basketball games; drama productions; concerts; the auction and trivia nights.  And I've never seen you at a one of them.  And you live one block from the front doors.  

Take demolition off the table?  What table?  The negotiating table?  What negotiating table?  This is private property.  The owners of which have been excellent neighbors and stewards of our city and it's children for 128 years.  And I know these women.  They don't lie.  Phase two won't happen if phase one isn't successful.  How's that for binary?  You shove a spoke in the this fundraising effort, which is for an educational endowment (definition:  lawful entity) which will go to getting low income and middle income students in the door, and the school fails?  You've got 4 acres of empty buildings at the end of your block.  

6.   "I can understand why they don't want this controversy to detract from their fundraising efforts, but surely you can understand why people who care about historic preservation might not want to donate money to an institution with the knowledge that it might someday go toward destroying the most historic structures in the Tower Grove East neighborhood."

I'm not going to do dueling city resident with you.  Well, maybe I am.  We've lived here for 22 years.  We've renovated two homes, one as old as SEA (1897) and one not so old.  We work in the city.  We shop in the city.  When possible, our kids attend schools in the city.  We worship in the city.  We are preservationists.  The disinformation in this last bit makes me quite angry.  Read the proposal.  Endowment.  Lawful entity.  Only for education and renovation.  Not fungible.  

Whew.  I feel better.  Carry on.

File This One Under ...

It's about damn time!

A)  The City of St. Louis delivered my recycling dumpster this morning.  Yay me.  Now they'll collect garbage once a week, recycling once a week, and yard waste once a week.  I used to pay a local recycling company to collect my recyclables, but when my recycling day (Monday) coincided with so many holidays one year that my collections were reduced by 15% and they basically told me tough toe-nails, I quit paying them to abuse me.  Since then, my recycling has been haphazard, as in when I wanted to schlep it to the city recycling center nearby.  Not any more.  

B) Baby's birthday sweater is nearly finished.  Most of one sleeve to go and then piecing.  Today?  Maybe.  It's his actual birthday after all.  On my monitor, this yarn looks pinkish and I can't seem to get that straightened out.  It's more maroon, or claret.  I have to say that making the push to finish this sweater in this yarn has given me a repetitive stress injury to the tendon in my elbow.  Inflexible yarn plus heavy cabling equals elbow problems.  Good to know.  Ice helps and I'll be just fine.  On the bright side, my chiropractor is enjoying treating what he says is his first "knitting injury".  He's a barrel of monkeys...

Too Dumb to Live!

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/duty_calls.png

A) Today's joke:  How many preservationists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?  Ten, one to screw in the new light bulb and nine to admire the old one... WHICH DOESN'T WORK ANYMORE!

There is an internet hoopla into which I've injected my opinion.  Surprise.  The local all-girls high school from which my daughter is soon to graduate (God willing) is gearing up to make some changes.  This institution (along with a few of its buildings) is more than 125 years old and has been educating young South St. Louis women for that long.  It was begun by an order of nuns, several of whom I count as close friends, and is their mission.  Sadly, the order is an aging one, as are many religious orders, and maintaining the school and it's physical plant has begun to be a drain on their resources.

For the last several years, stake holders at the school have spent time developing a plan to keep the school thriving ... or even open.  The plan has two phases.  The first phase is to raise several millions of dollars to fund a tuition endowment (to help low income girls attend and keep the school a viable option for our urban poor) and fund renovations to the 1957 building.  Good.  

The second phase is where the problems lie.  In that plan, the stake holders have explored tearing down one of the older buildings to make room for a performing arts center (music and theater being strengths of the school).  Let the hoopla begin.

A local blogger (whom neighbors are quoting as if he's a journalist with journalistic ethics and a journalist's passing nod to unbiased reporting) got wind of the plans and has blogged about the gloom and doom of the second phase of this plan.  He can't have actually read the whole plan because it's clear that the possible demolition of the venerable 128 year old school building is years off if it even happens.  He blogged about it anyway, though, and he's got local panties in a twist, that's for sure.  Mine included, I suppose.  

I've left comments to both of his posts, which neighbors are referring to as "articles" when they forward the links around, reminding the melee that what they're discussing so urgently and stridently is PHASE TWO of the MULTI MILLION DOLLAR PLAN which is likely at least 8 or 10 years away and could we please discuss whether or not the school WILL STAY OPEN!  

Christ in pancakes, I'm ready to kill someone.

So help me, if this tempest in a teacup impacts one bit the efforts we're making to raise money TO EDUCATE CHILDREN ... well, I don't know what I'll do.  

Anyway, hubster wants me to calm down and stay out of it.  

Hey, at least I didn't leave the preservationist joke in the comments of the blog.  Internet benevolence points to me.

An aside:  Ravelry Rubberneckers?  This post looks and sounds like Ranch Dressing.  I'm officially crazy.

Both Barrels.

That's what I'm gonna hit you with this afternoon.  I'm a little over caffeinated.

Why is it a feather in the cap of the Missouri legislature that we pay, per capita, some of the lowest taxes in the country?  We rank in the bottom 10 states for every kind of tax collected except for individual income tax in which we rank 27th?  Crowing about tax cuts and the low level of taxation of a common pastime in Jefferson City and I'd like to know what they're so dang proud of.  

Is it that we rank 37th among the 50 states in our investment/funding per capita in local elementary and secondary education?  

Is that that we rank 45th in local investment in higher education?  

Maybe it's that 44th place ranking in the funding, state and local, of Corrections.  

To be against taxation is one thing, but ladies and gentlemen?  What are you for?  Because the giant slash to the funding of the Parents as Teachers program boggles me.  It's that first line of defense for families and kids in crisis... it was the one thing that Missouri was doing right for it's kids.  That free, in-home assessment of babies and toddlers is an invaluable tool for regular parents like me and a godsend for families and children in crisis.

With other cuts to education and to the funding of special education for children with Autism in this state, it looks like Missourians care more about unborn children than those who have been born.  

Every state in the union is struggling with budget issues during this economic downturn.  Our response to this fight has been to cut services to the elderly, the indigent, and the young.  Modernizing our tax structures (the last time we adjusted tax brackets was in 1931!), collecting taxes on internet purchases (gasp... that one would hit me right in the solar plexus let me tell you) and collecting taxes that most other states collect ( we are among only 6 states that allow the deduction of Federal tax from our State income tax) would be a start in dragging our state back up to at least 30th in services.  How about that?  Worse that 60 percent of the country but better than 40 percent?  

Being against taxes is fine, as long as you're also for something.

**le sigh**

I spin, you know.  

 

460 yards of Rambouillet, 8 ounces, Hello Yarn, Burrow colorway (club fiber for October?).  I read about Rambouillet and that the breed is a derivative of the Spanish Merino, imported from Spain to France in the late 1700's.  It's soft and springy and MUCH easier to spin evenly than it's cousin.  Whereas I've sworn off Merino except in blends (ahem * Merino yak blend next on the wheel  * ahem), I'll spin Rambouillet 'til the wethers come home, so to speak.  Me likey.

Oh, and it's Fall.

This is the Sweet Gum tree outside my kitchen window.  Bridget noticed it the other day and I had to photograph it in the waning light today.  Yeah, waning light being like 4:07 p.m.  It's Fall.  Pretty, though, huh.

Crawling Out from Under My Rock

Since the last Presidential election, I've lived under a rock newswise.  I consumed broadcast or print news only on the advice of someone else.  I'd gotten my fill of cruddy reporting on icky political figures and non news local news.

Time to cut it out and become informed again.  This election has done it.

A multi-millionaire conservative who lives in my city bankrolled a statewide Proposition that promoted the removal of the 1% city earnings tax here in our city.  Actually, Kansas City was also included, so Missouri Urban areas.  You can imagine how it shook out.  Rural vs. Urban.  Republican vs. Democrat.  

Proponents wanted a vote every 5 years on whether we should have an earnings tax.  This tax provides roughly 31% of our city budget.  Police.  Fire.  Streets.  Inspections.   Which third would you like to do without?

It succeeded of course, because this man spent millions of his own dollars promoting his proposition outstate... Tell me what people who live in Rolla have to do with whether the City of St. Louis charges an earnings tax.  And of course, it's a TAX.  Everyone hates those.

So in April, we'll have to fight this fight again.  Proponents will say that the city need only trim unimportant (read Democratic) spending to trim its budget to fit within the new protocol.  

N'k.  Again, I ask, which third would you like to do without?  That third that is the nearest first responder to your husband's heart attack?  Oh, that third that is the nearest fire house to your house that is BURNING DOWN?!  No, wait, I know, that detective tasked with finding who is tearing apart the window coverings on the nearby vacant building so that a bad guy could drag someone's kid in there -- yeah, that detective is expendable.  Maybe it's the city inspector in charge of asbestos inspections or who helps neighbors rid themselves of problem properties.  Wait, I know, it's the guys who fill in the potholes.  We can do without them 'cause city folks will know not to drive where the potholes get big and only folks not from here will get flat tires.  Perfect.

Hey, I can be just as much a fear monger as the next guy.  I love invoking worst case scenarios to prove my points!

Let's just get the money from an increased sale's tax.  Stick it to the tourists, right?  Oh, wait... that sticks it to the small business owners as well because why would tourist shop in a place with high sales tax that's just a few miles from some place with a lower tax.  And conservatives supposedly like small business owners, don't they?  Hmm.  Maybe they only like small business owners who own businesses outside of the City of St. Louis.  That must be it.

Bridgett peeled back the layers for me today while we drank coffee.  It's the people who approach the world from a position of distrust and fear against those of us who face the world generally (not stupidly) with trust and openness.

Next thing, it'll be a bill for the ambulance and fire truck when you are in an accident in the City of St. Louis, but you are not a resident thereof.  Don't be surprised.  It's the case in several cities in Texas where earnings taxes are against the law.  The law of unintended consequences is a law too after all.

 

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.

Ruminations That Devolve into Rants... As Usual

I'm ruminating again.  

• I've had a new experience.  We've all heard of Tourette's Syndrome, I'm sure, and I've seen it on Oprah or some such show, but until yesterday, I hadn't experienced it first hand.  It's a devastating condition.  One of the receptionists at the singularlyunpleasantdoctor office had what I assume was Tourette's as she let loose eeps and such as well as a great deal of truly foul language along the lines of n*gger and c*cks*cker seemingly directed at a black woman receptionist and a male nurse delivering film (well, certainly not really, but uttered in conversation with same) ...  Kudos to the office for hiring her.  I guess, since it's an osteopathic practice and I was the youngest patient there by at least 20 years, they get very few kids and the adults among us can handle the nature of the outbursts.  Kudos to her too.  I'd be curled up in a ball I think.  The experience put my little hip thing in perspective.  
• Adolphus Busch IV is quoted at the top of our illustrious print newspaper's sports section today.  He's lambasting Mark McGuire's lapse in judgment.  You know, the one on which the statute of limitations for prosecution has run out?  Yes, St. Louis, a neer-do-well of our former first family has something stupid to say about something irrelevant.  Shout it from the mountaintops!  I swear to God, I'm canceling my subscription.
• And along these lines, Al Sharpton visited our fair city last week for the MLK festivities and spoke at a nearby traditionally black college.  The speech was covered breathlessly by the same print newspaper.  It was said that Mr. Sharpton achieved a cadence reminiscent of a Sunday sermon.  Really?  And that his voice climbed as he chided the black population of St. Louis for abandoning the city and moving to Mc Mansions in the county and sending it's kids to private schools and letting them listen to loud music.  What the coverage didn't report was the part where Sharpton intoned his regret at losing his political relevance.  No, wait.  I made that up.  God forbid people should move to good neighborhoods and have normal teens. Shame on them for forgetting that Al Sharpton needs a raison d'etre and they're it!  Gawd.
• The fog and rain and drear is slated to remain in St. Louis for at least the foreseeable future... the clouds thinned somewhat this afternoon, but not really.
• We've got more construction going on Chez Annie.  The kid's bedrooms have been shuffled about and Dear Husband has claimed one for his Man Cave.  We've painted it medium khaki, installed manly window treatments (an oxymoron if I ever saw one ...) and we're in the process of having bookshelves built to house our prodigious collection of books.  He just poked his head out and asked if I wanted to house any of my collections (pottery, milk glass, blown glass) on his new shelves.  I gave him the answer he wanted.  "No, honey, you choose what goes on those shelves, I've put my stuff all over the rest of the house."  He gets credit for asking.

Pics of at least one finished sleeve tomorrow.  I hope.  

Oh, I Don't Know, You Decide

It's election season here in San Looee and I've gotten my fair share of glossy post cards and tri-fold things and phone calls.  Feels like more than my fair share, but I bet we've all been inundated here.  Most of the phone calls get a , "No thanks," click.  The mail all gets tossed or recycled, depending.  See I have a special friend who knows just everything political and I admire her and she's kind of an insider without being obnoxious and she and I think a lot alike.  So I usually just ask her about issues and candidates and do basically what she says.  Then I don't have to read all of those political posts and articles and listen to all that blah, blah, blah.  I let her do all that 'cause, well, she gets paid to do it.  I don't think she minds... 

And as I was going through the junk mail we got last week (I leave it for hubster to glance through because sometimes our opinions differ as to the nature of junk mail), I came across a white envelope embossed with the name of one of the candidates for State Senate.  It was a plain white envelope, laser addressed, but there was something so unglossy about it that I decided, uncharacteristically, to open it.

This is a scan of the note -- can you read it?  It contains birthday wishes.  From a candidate whom I've never met.  Lucky for him, my birthday comes at an electionally fortuitous time.  How many of these do you think this candidate mailed out?  And how does he know when my birthday is anyway?  I wonder whose job it was to collate addresses with birthdays. 

Should I be creeped out?  You decide.

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.

Lazy, Hazy, Crazy Days of Summer

That's where we are here in St. Louis.  Hazy for one. And I know it's not my windows because I bought window washing from a nun-friend at daughter's school auction in the spring and she came this week.  She washed, I cleaned screens and wiped moldings.  Boy does my house sparkle...  Yay me.

That same day, Tuesday I think, Deborah came over and we grilled lunch and knit.  In my sparkly house.  Both kids were out doing their things and it was too hot for the dogs to get too rambunctious, so we drank Arnold Palmers and ate grilled squash and knit on our socks (Mine are Spring Forward, two socks at a time using one 47" Addi Turbo needle, size 1).  And we looked at my hurt books, which arrived earlier in the week, and looked through the Sisterhood box which arrived weeks ago.  A lovely day all in all.

Lazy?  That will be this post.  Mostly pics and a bullet rant.  Here we go.

I had a birthday this week.  I didn't tell anyone at the shop or in my daily activities that day because, well, flipping that chart into the second half of your forties isn't exactly newsworthy.  In fact it feels slightly ooky.  And usually I'm not one to care what age I am as long as there are presents and cake. 

Speaking of.  I made myself a cobbler of blueberries, strawberries, and super luscious CSA blackberries as a cake and Hubster got me the ecoist bag I've been eying at the Missouri Botanical Garden's gift shop.   Yay me.  He's very good at following gift suggestions.  I will keep him.

You don't know the ecoist bags?  The ones folded from candy and chip wrappers?  Sounds crazy, I know, but once you've seen one in person?  You too will stalk the suppliers until they get the one you want and you'll scarf it up.  Promise.

The four of us also went out for dinner to The Three Monkeys for pizza.  I had a good birthday.

Also on Wednesday, Rachel brought in some ... well, what would you call these.  Slivers?  Pencil roving?  It came on a cone, she wound and dyed it and made no bones about the fact that before she dyed it, it was very fragile and that winding it into hanks for dying was a PITA.   After the dying process?  Beautiful sheen and crimp and strength.  It's BFL superwash and it's dyed in exactly my colors.  So I get to have it.  Yay me again.  Here I'm splitting it into it's two obvious ?plies? and winding it into loose balls ready for spinning.  Or knitting.  I've begun to spin it.  There is a learning curve there though.  While I don't have to predraft, I keep breaking it because, well, there's no where to go when you get in trouble.  You know, no big wide hunk of roving to let the twist creep into when you get too tight.  I have to slow down is all and I haven't had time to perfect the technique.  But boy, did I mention the sheen and the crimp?  And the softness?  And Rachel's colors?  Yep, I'm a lucky yarn shop worker.  Now, go lobby her to dye some more of this stuff.  Go on.  I'll wait.

Speaking of Rachel.  It's so nice to have my own personal indie dyer who wants to try her stuff out on me.  I fell very ... well, fortunate. 

Crazy?

• Jon Stewart's hilarious commentary not withstanding, do we really have to go through this whole election cycle?  Until NOVEMBER?  Really?  Will the next FOUR MONTHS of campaigning change the vote of any single one of us?  Is there anyone out there who is as of yet an undecided voter?   Do you know how many political phone calls I am going to receive by then?  Let's count.  Starting now.  I'll keep a running tab for you.  I'm betting above a hundred. 
• Did you know that the grapes in my refrigerator (along with the rest of the planeload they rode in on from South Africa) used about 60,000 gallons of fuel to get here.  (I looked up how far it is to South Africa, and I guessed that the grapes travel about a 1000 miles by truck once they are in the states, and I found how far a fully loaded cargo jet flies on it's fully loaded tanks, and how many miles per gallon a fully loaded semi truck can get, and I did math... um, Bridgett and Janet, I re-did math actually so the numbers we discussed on Wednesday are even worse...)  This is VERY general, and I know, there are ALOT of grapes on that plane.  And I'm not really talking about dollars here, but about fuel expended.  I'm just saying, for the purposes of conversation, that for this pound of grapes to even be here in my kitchen, more fuel was expended than I will use driving my family around in my mini-van for 71 years.  

That is all.

edited:  Except for this... New Typepad does not underline spelling errors.  I have to ask it specifically to check my spelling.  Which I did not do this morning.  I hate posts with errors. 

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?