Thursday, September 14, 2006
This is where I knit...
...and this is what I'm knitting.
Man-sized ankle socks! Manklets! But these aren't for Duck (sorry Duck, you lose again!). These will be a Christmas gift for some other manly member of the family. I'm doing real good with the early Christmas gifting, people.
So the yarn is Regia 6-ply and it is horribly, horribly itchy and raw on the fingers. Love the striping, but officially hate the handling. The last time I knit with this stuff was back in April, and in between then and now my hands have come in contact with bunny-soft Sundara Yarns, Koigus and Yartinis, that I don't think I want to knit with this new wool ever again.
***
Santa Fe continues to be sunny and delicious to eat. Despite Duck's bumpy bullfrog of a cold sore brought on by the green chile (I'm looking at his lip right now and it's in that lovely in-between stage of bubbling and scabbing over, like someone back-kicked him in the face and then rubbed Crisco all over the wound. Hi Duck don't hate me! I'm just being honest!), we have not shirked away from eating more, oh no.
Look at this. Death in a Ziploc Bag. We purchased these roasted chiles at the Farmer's Market near the apartment. Whole Foods sells them too, albeit for exorbitant rates. We made a dinner with chicken and diced chiles - accompanied with generous helpings of cheese and sour cream - and for lunch today I chopped one chile and tossed it into the pasta sauce. Hot but manageable and very very delicious.
Last night after work we biked into the Plaza to catch the sunset at a rooftop bar. We took sidestreets through residential neighborhoods and were in the Plaza in less than 5 minutes.
We probably could have made it there in less time if
1) we hadn't gotten a little lost. Roads here are very Bostonian in that many end unexpectedly in dead ends or curve around back again
2) we weren't already out of breath in the first 30 seconds. This air still takes some getting used to, but the upside is that by the time we get back home I'm actually going to be in shape. For the first time in my pathetic, slothy life!
Here I am at the Bell Tower Bar at the top of the La Fonda Inn, having a drink and reading the NYTimes while we wait for the sun to set. The light changes were fast, dramatic and beautiful.
Afterwards we had dinner al fresco at The Pink Adobe. It was a little pricier than what we were expecting, and almost left but I'm glad we didn't because hawow!
I ordered:
Crawfish Enchiladas
Two blue corn tortillas filled with crawfish tail meat and goat cheese, topped with green chile crawfish bisque.
I scraped every last bit off the plate, and if you know me, I never do that. I always get completely, cannot-possibly-eat-another-bite full right before the last bite.
And if you know me, you also know that I hardly say no to crawfish or goat cheese. Put them together and it's guaranteed. I've just never had them together, and it would never occur to me to eat have them together.
French meets Cajun meets Southwest meets my mouth. It was 100% delicious.
Filed Under: Socks | Travel | Santa Fe
Monday, September 11, 2006
The sky is blue, the walls are orange, and the green chiles are hot hot HOT. We've been here 2 full days and so far the sun and the spicy cuisine have kicked our butts. Loving it here so far!
I just mailed the yarn to the contest winners, who were:
#1: Diane the blogless of the Seattle area
#2: Jen of JenLa
#3: Alexandra of artisokka.com
#4: Erika of redshirtknitting.com
Hooray! More updates to come. Lunch is a-callin'...
Filed Under: Contest | Travel | Santa Fe
Saturday, September 09, 2006
This is Day 3 of about 10 to 11 hours of driving per
day. It hasn't been so bad, but then again, I haven't sat behind the
wheel once. And this allowed me to finish reading my book, and to
finish Clapotis. Ha.
We've gone through Mass., New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana,
Illinois, Missouri, Oklahoma, and Texas. Only four more hours of
driving until we reach Santa Fe. I guess if we pushed it we could have
gone all the way and made it there late tonight, but. We are pooped.
And we are in need of something crispy, something
crunchy, preferably raw, preferably green, food. After 3 days of
Arby's, Waffle House, various truck stops and the like, we both
screamed like little children at Sea World when we saw a
billboard for the Olive Garden off route 40 here in Amarillo Texas. I
mean, not to bash the place, but does anyone really physically CRAVE a
meal at the OLIVE GARDEN unless they have been under extreme
conditions? I don't even want the pasta. Just salad. Saaaalaaaad.
Anyway here are just a couple of pics from our journey.
 
St. Louis and a Texas field
Filed Under: Life | Travel
Tuesday, September 05, 2006
Pattern: Boston Red Socks aka Madder Ribbed Socks from Knitting Vintage Socks
Yarn: Cashmerino Baby in red; brandless merino yarn in cream
Needles: US2 dpns
If I had waited to resume these socks once the Red Sox went on a winning streak, they would never have been completed. Despite the fact the team has fallen apart, we still have a winner in the Red Socks! I modified the pattern by casting on 48 instead of 60 stitches. The fit is perfect, the toes are pointy, and the horseshoe heel is cushiony.
***
SO. Thank you all for participating in the contest! I enjoyed discovering new blogs, and seeing what cities you had to guess. Some of them I definitely considered, particularly Santa Barbara, CA, as well as Savannah and Charleston. We've been to both Savannah and Charleston on short visits, so perhaps someday we can make it a little longer.
I decided to have a grand prize winner and 2nd, 3rd, 4th place winners and send off all the yarn. Why be stingy? The sun is out, the air is clean, and tomorrow we're headed off to...(drum rooooolllllll)....
SANTA FE!
Capital of the state of New Mexico, and second oldest city in the United States (who knew! I didn't). Sunny 300 days out of the year, hot in summer, snow in winter, 7000 feet above sea level, for a capital city it has only a municipal airport, cluttered with lots of art galleries and best of all, GREAT FOOD. How many different ways can you have green or red chili? I'm about to find out!
I'm sorry if this contest was too United States-centric, but I did receive a few entries from out of town, like ESTONIA, who were able to guess correctly. I mean up here in what, the "liberal", "Ivy-League educated" Northeast we had friends and family who had no idea where Santa Fe was.
California? Texas? Mexico?
My favorite response was from a certain someone who said: "Oh wow Santa Fe, that sounds great! So you aren't worried about the hurricanes?"
Um. No?
This was how I picked the winners. Names of those who commented or emailed with the correct city was written on a small piece of paper. There were lots of paper, you guys are so smart. With Bunny Bunnitons presiding, all pieces were gathered in a small box, shaken, and then thrown into the air. Whichever Bunny swiped at first would be considered "picked."
The only flaw in this method was the assumption that the cat would give a shit about flying pieces of paper enough to participate. Alas he was not quite so hands-on as I hoped he would be.
Whatever, looking instead of swiping was good enough. I have the four winners!
I'll let you know who they are once I get a response from them. (Most of them happen to be blogless!)
We're just about packed and ready to go. One last thing to do will be to take the boys to their favorite aunt's house in the next town over. I will miss them, but there's no way we could take them. The ten minute drive to Auntie's house is just short enough not to kill them. They're going to be in good good hands.
Thanks again for participating, and see ya'll in Santa Fe!
Filed Under: Completed Projects | Contest | Socks | Red Sox | Travel
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
I'm holding my first ever contest! It's to celebrate us temporarily relocating (full story in previous post), and my second year of knitting, hooray!
So all you gotta do is correctly guess where Duck and I are moving to, I will randomly pick the winner from the group of correct answers and send the winner yarn!
Clues about the city:
- It is in the United States
- It is one of the oldest cities in the U.S.
- It is sunny 300 days out of the year
- But it has four seasons (so I'm told)
- It is a major small city
- But it has no major airport
- It has a large concentration of artists
Hopefully these hints are neither too obscure nor too obvious.
The winner will choose from the one of following array of yarns:
1) TEN (10) gleaming skeins of "Super Merino: Best Qualiting Knitting Yarn"!
Composition: merino wool
Color: cream
Yardage: 125 meters (136 yards)
Gauge: 22 sts = 4inches
These were purchased in Taipei and are still in their bag. It is
brandless, but is Made in Italy and is 100% merino wool. The yarn is
very soft and curiously spongy.
-OR-
2) Ten (10) shimmering skeins of Peruvian Quecha!
Composition: 65% alpaca 35% tencel
Color: #546 Periwinkle-ish
Yardage: 112 meters (122 yards)
Purchased from elann.com with Angelina in mind. Still intact in the bag. There were 9 skeins when I took the picture, but there are 10 in total.
-OR-
3) Seven (7) plump skeins of Debbie Bliss Merino Chunky!
Composition: merino wool
Color: 1401013 Grey
Yardage: 50 meters (54 yards)
Gauge: 14 st/4 inches on 6.5 mm
Make a chunky vest, like I was going to do!
-OR-
4) Five (5) skeins Filatura di Crosa 501 Tweed!
Composition: 97% wool 3% silk
Color: 0003 Olive with light blue flecks
Yardage: 126 m (138 yards)
Gauge: 22 sts = 4 inches
Make a preppy vest instead!
-------------
Submit your answers - by comment or email - by 8 p.m. EST Monday, September 4.
Email is: domesticat ---(at)--- c-a-t-d-u-c-k---dotcom.
Oh and if you email, please include a link to your website if you have one.
I hope to have a winner and their choice of yarn
secured and mailed before we leave on Wednesday. But I probably won't
announce the correct city until we get there, which won't be til
Saturday or Sunday. We're driving from Boston...
Those of you who already know where we're going of
course cannot play. Besides, you have your prize already, which is that
you get to be my friend/daughter/cousin/in-law, heh heh.
Filed Under: Contest
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
So many cities, so little time...
Ever vacation somewhere, whether it be for one day or for one week, and for whatever reasons be it the beauty, the food, the culture, the lifestyle, you wonder what it would be like to live there, if only for a little while, in order to really experience life there beyond that of a passing tourist?
I do. All the time. Everywhere I go, whether it be a town 30 miles away, or a town an ocean away, I never want to go home. I covet and fixate on some small aspect there enough to want to live it. The salt-water ponds in Martha's Vineyard, the bicycle paths in Amsterdam, the wrought-iron fences in Charleston, the cassoulet in Paris, SoHo in New York City, the Spanish moss in Savannah, foxgloves and delphiniums in England, the shaved ice and black sesame dumplings in Taipei...Just for a moment! to be a lucky resident and have all these lovely things all the time, instead of for the too-short moments as a salivating tourist looking in.
Well, for the past couple of years or so, we have been trying immerse ourselves elsewhere. To Taipei, the seat of my Large Family. However this move was largely contingent on my own parents moving there, and we were all ready to go within the year, my parents were THIS CLOSE to putting the house on the market (hence my extended visit to Atlanta in May to say farewell), when they abruptly changed their minds. That shouldn't stop us from going, but it has. It just feels weird to go without them.
Also have I mentioned that I'm kind of Chinese illiterate? When I'm there I feel this need to mention this to every waitstaff at every restaurant so they don't wonder at my illiteracy because I can speak but am pointing at only the pictures in the menu. If I just outright say, HELLO I CAN'T READ! then the air is cleared and everyone feels better. Or I do. Maybe they feel sorry for me. Anyway.
So we're not moving to Taipei now (but someday still!), and I was left feeling very unsatisfactory. We must go somewhere, and we must go there now.
You see, our time as a carefree, childless couple is running out (no I am not presently with child, but I am getting older, and Duck is older still. How long can one put this off?). Not only are we right now blessed with no dependants, we have jobs that allow us to work anywhere, thanks to the awesome glory that is the Internet. And having graduated during the dotcom era.
So if we can work anywhere, why don't we just...work from anywhere? Immediately? If we dilly dally diddle dawdle any longer, we will fall into complacency, we will have a whole troupe of howling monkey babies, the flexibility will disappear, and we will be full of regrets.
We tossed around the idea of living Amsterdam for a year. It's the perfect little big city. I researched on the web, got advice from Jeannine, went to Martha's Vineyard and talked about it to strangers at the roofdeck bar, all of them egging us on. We wondered aloud what a pain it is to figure out what to do with our house for a year. Sell? Rent? Nothing...? We can't afford Nothing...
But while talking to these people from different parts of the country, a totally different-but-manageable-while-still-fun plan emerged. We would not relocate for an entire year or more, but maybe just for a couple of MONTHS. So no worries about our house. And instead of thinking of the rest of the world, I started thinking about the good ole U.S. of A. I mean, it's a big big place! There is so much of our fair country that I have not seen.
And so! Out of the air I fixated on this certain U.S. city which I have never been to but have heard nice things about. What I heard and from whom, I don't even recall, which makes the whole thing even funnier. I just had this romanticized idea that it was...nice. I put it to this couple we met at MV, who was from a surrounding area. They confirmed that this city was indeed very nice. We came home and researched some more, bought some books, asked other people. All had positive, even effusive things to say. I went on craigslist for housing, emailed about a certain place, got a prompt answer, negotiated, questioned, emailed some more, and guess what! We have keys! Keys to a loft in this certain U.S. city which we will be leaving for in a week, for TWO MONTHS! Two weeks from initial conception to roll out! Yeeeeaaaah!
Now, we will still be working, lest you think we are independently weathly and can afford to lounge around for two whole months. If we were independently wealthy believe me I would not be telling you about it, because I'd be too busy doing what really wealthy people do, which is to not keep a blog. About knitting.
But what we do have is a wealth of flexibility, at the moment, and I am determined, VERY DETERMINED, to use it to its full advantage. So I call this a business trip. A working vacation. Long enough to get much more than just a feel for the city, but short enough not to feel completely uprooted.
OK, so where are we going? Well I'm not telling you. Yet. I'm going to hold a contest and have you guess. For prizes! I was going to post the contest right after announcing our plans, but I have just written a really boring novel so now I will post details about the contest and the prizes in a separate post. Stay tuned...
Filed Under: Life | Travel
Tuesday, August 29, 2006
Yes. I took a picture of a bed. But it is a GREAT bed.
Just got back from spending 24 hours in NYC. There was to be a client-and-team meet and greet this morning but due to the client not being a very nice person with whom we could work effectively, the whole contract was abruptly scraped and the meeting cancelled.
But I couldn't cancel the train tickets and hotel room I had already booked, so rather than let them go to waste, I went to NYC anyway, if only to sleep in that heavenly bed. Yummmmmmmmyyyy. I could die in that bed. It is really like sleeping on a cloud. Or on the plush bosom of a gigantic, warm hen.
I set my alarm earlier than I needed to this morning, just so I could wake up and have the pleasure of remembering where I was sleeping, and could afford to stay in it a little longer by turning over and sinking my face into a new part of the pillow, and nestle back down into the soft sheets, so cool and plump and airy. Mmmmmm, so decadent. If I could dream up a perfect, most decadent scenario it would be to get a pedi/manicure on that bed, then be served kobe steak on that bed, to be followed with warm apple crisp on that bed, then knit thick cashmere socks on that bed, a glass of warm shiraz and a cat within reach, and a roaring fire in front while all the windows are open and a crisp fall breeze blows though.
I love that bed.
I had drinks and dinner last night with Kitty and her boyfriend. That was another nice reason to go too, heh. We had drinks at Pegu (yummy Whiskey Smash, which is their version of the mint julep) and dinner at Public, both in SoHo.
Thank you all for your comments regarding our "legal issue." But hopefully with the help of the deputy sheriff, it will continue to be a non-issue. I'm going to send him a basket of doughnuts!
Filed Under: Travel | NYC
Friday, August 25, 2006
A couple of years ago we started getting phone calls from strangers looking for "Duck." Though they were not telemarketers, they called every single day, and though they were looking for some same-named "Duck," they were looking for the one that owned a automotive/mechanic business in a nearby town, and not the one who is a software developer geek and who is only automotive in the sense that he owns a car and can drive it.
These people would not stop calling, even though we told them every time that, yes there is a "Duck" here, however he is not the Duck are you looking for. We don't have a car business. Please check your information. Again. And stop calling.
But they didn't. Obviously they had major beef with this Duck the Mechanic, because soon after we started getting voicemails from some lawyer, saying if we didn't respond to the "charges" being "brought,", then "action" will be "taken."
Well naturally we were alarmed at first, but that quickly gave way to extreme annoyance, because it became obvious that even though these people had some sort of dealing with Duck the Mechanic and his Automotive Business, they had no business address nor business phone number contact whatsoever, only a name to go on so surely we shall find the business owner using this here trusty RESIDENTIAL phonebook.
We called this lawyer back, always getting a voicemail, and explained for the umpteenth time that they have the wrong person.
There was no acknowledgement from the lawyer of this fact. We wouldn't hear anything for a few weeks. But then invariably he'd call back again, with the same message. And we'd call back, with the same message.
It was already far beyond ridiculous that we couldn't get a hold of this person on the phone or that after all this he didn't seem to realize that MAYBE using just a name from the residential section of the phone book is not exactly reliable, because there is such a thing in this great big world of ours as two people with the same name.
I mean, use a private investigator! A protractor! A freaking telescope, whatever! Anything's more reliable than just a phone book! They just latched onto this person my Duck and were intent on nailing him, regardless of their clear lack of evidence that this is the person they were looking for.
We didn't pursue it anymore because we stopped getting calls...due to the fact that we coincidentally disabled our land line and were using our cell phones exclusively. We haven't thought about the phone calls since.
Until yesterday when a Deputy Sheriff showed up on my front doorstep with a court summons. For Duck. Of the Automotive Business. Yes that's right! Court summons for Duck the Mechanic WHO HOW MANY TIMES DO WE HAVE TO TELL YOU DOES NOT LIVE AT THIS GODDAMNED ADDRESS!!!!
This nearly two years later! For the past three years these idiots have been adamant in pursuing the wrong person, ON NAME ALONE, and here I am sweaty in my workout clothes (hooray I worked out yesterday! for the first time in like 30 years!) trying to explain the situation to the big burly sheriff on my front steps who was probably feeling sorry for me because I am clueless that I have married a con man, and it's going to be terrible scene when she finds out.
Why are these people so stupid? What a colossal waste of their time, and ours! Not only is this just a plain nuisance, but we have Plans that cannot be disrupted by going to court for something we didn't do (more on the Plans later).
The sheriff did not hand the court summons to me, as it wasn't for me, but did hand me his business card with his phone number which Duck called a million times yesterday to try to get this annoying matter resolved.
He finally called back today, Duck played his They Have The Wrong Person, Same Name record, gave the whole phone calling history, and to our relief the sheriff said he would write a letter to the attorney, the plaintiffs, the judge, whatever and get the matter settled. Not only will he not attempt to serve him papers, he won't serve any more that he sees in the future addressed to Duck at this location. And best of all, we don't have to do a thing.
Except maybe to find who the plaintiffs are and give them a good kick in the mouth.
Have a good weekend!
P.S. We get a credit report every year, and it's been clean. So no ID theft. Thank the dear sweet goodness.
Filed Under: Life
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