Pointless ramblings

Hi.  More nothing to report, here.

Most of my week last week was spent trying to hide under a rock.  But all was in vain.  I was really just depressed about state debate, I think.  Last weekend (like, the nine days ago kind of last weekend) was the state debate tournament and... well, I don't really want to brag, but my partner and I have the ability to fucking walk into that tournament and OWN BITCHES.  Except, that didn't happen.  We got knocked out in octafinals.  Jeff and I were a favorite to win state and we got knocked out at octafinals.  It was illegit.  I don't want to whine so much because it's bitchy and annoying, but sometimes I just can't stop myself.  It wasn't because we messed up that we got knocked out... I'm just in policy debate, the most complicated debate event there is, and the people in charge of the tournament decide it's a good idea to have people with NO BACKGROUND in policy judge us.  Needless to say, we won the debates (according to policy's standards), but the judges voted us down.  It was painful, sad, sickening, tearful, and depressing.  So I spent a lot of last week just wanting to stay in bed, because I care about debate quite a bit.

By the way, please read that link.  It's the absolutely hilarious and somewhat true explanation of policy debate.  I linked it directly to the solar implosion sub-section, but the rest is very entertaining.  My debate event is so crazily complicated and just plain awesome that Uncyclopedia has written about it!  I laughed so hard when I read this article... It is seriously one of the best internet findings, ever.

Ummm in other blog-worthy news, I worked for fifteen hours this weekend and went to see The Twelfth Night at VU.  Dear lord, it was hilarious.  I was a tad dubious in the beginning, because I honestly think that actors in plays try too hard... But towards the middle it became extremely entertaining, especially in the scene where Malvolio reads aloud the letter Mariah forged, and Toby and his friend are scrambling around the stage trying to hide from him... it makes me laugh just thinking about it.

You totally understood that last paragraph, didn't you?

A whole lot of nada.

So, I've been doing absolutely nothing.

I've been working on the EPS raglan, and I've been watching a whole lot of Lord of the Rings (Extended Editions, naturally).  I started the swatch for Hope's Scarf today.  I think my color knitting runs on a tighter gauge than my regular knitting, which is WONDERFUL.  But we'll see how it turns out when it's blocked... it'll probably all smooth out.  Hopefully.

I haven't even been working.  I haven't worked in about ten days.  I wish I could get some boring desk job or something, then I could do it at home and make some money.

I should be doing housework.  But, hey, who does that?  My grandmother's down in Dallas taking care of my really sick aunt, and since she's gone nobody in my house does anything remotely close to housekeeping.  Well, I went grocery shopping yesterday... does that count?  I need to clean my entire house, ha.  But I don't think I'm going to do that today because my sister/aunt is coming over tomorrow with my two nephews and they regularly trash my house, so what's the point of doing it now when I'd just have to do it again?  Exactly.

All in all, these past few days, I've just wanted to crawl under a rock and stay there.

Meh, oh meh.

I should be packing, but instead I'm cruising Ravelry looking for free sock patterns.  I'm trying to decide whether or not to start some new socks (bad Nicole!) or take along the EPS sweater.  I'm still not certain on what to do with that dropped stitch on the Monkey socks...

That's all for now.  See you on Sunday.

Moar knitting (and some mistakes)

I've been knitting for the past few days as solidly as my schedule will allow me... With school, state debate, and just plain old life in general, I can usually only knit for about an hour or two each day.  Knitting is stress relief for me, so it's kind of crucial I get it in.  Seriously.  Holding the needles and going through the familiar movements really calms me down.  People usually think the opposite when I end up swearing at my project (which happens quite frequently), but it's just more stress relief.

Here we see my most swore-at work in progress ever, the fabulous Monkey socks by Cookie A (found on Knitty).  It's really quite a simple pattern and well-written.  I would know because this is my first time ever knitting socks, and I can understand these directions pretty well.  It's not the pattern I ever curse at... usually it's my inability to knit correctly.  My latest curse-fest?  I dropped a stitch somewhere in the gusset.  Not making the gusset, but the lacework that forms the top of the sock in the gusset... It's in one of the purl triangles and I just now noticed it after making good headway into the foot.  AND I absolutely have NO idea what to do!  I'm not stressing out about it too much, but I don't think these socks can be worn by anyone when I finish them.  Which is a shame... if I wanted to create a pair of socks that were a wash, I would've been far better just knitting a pair of plain old stockinette socks.  I think that's what I'm going to do when I finish this sock.  Because I do need to finish something.

Meanwhile, progress on EPS raglan sweater continues.  Usually I knit the socks during free time at school (Spanish, personal finance, English, and SRT... all free classes!) and save the sweater for home.  That way I can make sure that some progress is being made on both projects everyday.  The EPS sweater is easy because I can just mindlessly knit it while watching Lord of the Rings.  Man oh man, will there ever be anything more uplifting than seeing Frodo and Sam succeed in saving Middle Earth, Merry and Pippin cheering, Aragorn get crowned king and then sweeping Arwen off her feet, and Sam getting his girl?  I just want to cheer and dance around every time I see the end of the movies.  Just thinking about it now makes me enormously proud and happy.

I'm proud of hobbits.

Anywho.  I've told myself that after I finish both the sweater and the socks, I can start on my blanket.  Hope's Scarf kind of falls somewhere in between... I measured a scarf that's the size my friend wants it to be, and the base of the triangle is five feet.  I'm scared.  And I still need to swatch for it so Bree and I can chart the pattern.

New!

Blanket.  Bought the yarn for it today.  Due to my crappy camera phone, the picture doesn't really do the yarn color justice -- it's really this nice warm toffee color.  I have a pound and a half of wool / 1561 yds there, ready to be knit up.  I was going to go with six balls, but they were on clearance and something inside of me whispered, What if you run out?

So I ran back in and got the seventh ball.  'Cause, you know, I don't have enough things to knit already.

FFXIII: Hope's Scarf

So, my friend and I have this idea.  To anyone who's played Final Fantasy XIII, my friend is in love with Hope and wants his scarf.  Of course, no one is selling a remake of this scarf, so she turned to the only person she knows who can make clothing - me.

For those of you who don't know what it looks like, here it is.  Basically I'd be doing a colorwork scarf of our own design (my friend drew the design, I'll have to chart it).  It's triangular in shape.  Looks pretty badass, if I do say so myself.  Yesterday we got the yarn and managed to match the colors almost precisely.

Today, the gauge swatch will be knit.

I just need to find time to knit everything  @_@

Hooks and Needles; Un Dia sin Zapatos

So two girls at my school decided to start a knitting and crochet club called Hooks and Needles, meeting every 5:30 on Mondays.  (Even though we met today.  We decided on Mondays after today.)  Four of us came today, plus the teacher who's sponsoring the club, and two more people are supposed to come on Monday.  So that'd make seven of us and I am so excited.  Everyone's really super nice, and everyone crochets except for me!  It's so weird, being in the minority.  I know how to do the basics of crochet, and everyone crocheting there made me want to start again.  One girl had this pattern book with instructions on how to make all sorts of things out of crochet, and I really want to make these containers.  They're made out of kitchen twine, and in the end they look like baskets.  Super cool.  It really made me think about expanding my textile crafts outwards.

I also taught that same girl to knit.  Almost everyone there expresses an interest in knitting, but only Mandy had knitting needles on her, so I taught her how to cast on, knit, and purl.  She caught on a lot quicker than other people I've taught, actually, but I suspect that's because she already knows how to crochet.  It's basically the same concept, really.  Loops through loops.

I was thinking on my way home that I should really start keeping a binder of all of my projects and what I use with each project.  Like a knitting journal-scrapbook hybrid.  It's a good idea... I'd need a lot of postage tape, though.  For laminated pages and whatnot.  And glue.  But other than that, I'd just need a three-hole punch and some printer paper.  A binder would be optimal because then I could put in a table of contents and never have to worry about flipping through pages and pages to find a specific pattern or running out of space in said table of contents.

Now, on to the non-knitting section...

Today is Un Dia sin Zapatos - A Day Without Shoes.

There is a company called TOMS Shoes (TOMS is from tomorrow, ultimately deriving from Shoes for Tomorrow Project).  For every pair of shoes you buy from them, they give a pair of shoes to a child in need.  There are lots of poor children in Africa and Latin America who cannot afford to have shoes, and the complications that can arise from constantly going barefoot in questionable conditions are serious.  They're pricey, but it's because you're essentially paying for two pairs of shoes -- one for yourself, and one for a child.

To raise awareness, every so often TOMS does an event called One Day Without Shoes.  The point of the day is to go the entire day, or even just a part of the day, barefoot to raise awareness about what it's like to not have the luxury of shoes.  Also, people see you and wonder, "Hey, why are you all barefoot?" and then you get to spread the word about TOMS.

So, the Interact Club from my high school did an event for the Day Without Shoes.  Apparently, it's against the health code at our school to go barefoot for the entire day, so we couldn't do that.  Instead we hosted a walk to a park about a mile away from the high school and back.  Today turned out to be a perfect choice for the day, because today is the one day that the weather was crappy, cold, and rainy!  A lot of people were complaining, but I thought that really drove home the purpose of the event.  Your feet are supposed to get snagged and hurt and sore.  That's the point.  People without shoes have to deal with this every day.  And since the conditions were crappy, it just made it worse.  There are others who have to go through so much more than we do, and the least we can do is sample a little bit of their suffering to really raise awareness.  We were pleased.  It was a good turn out.

And yes, my feet do hurt.  But I'm proud.  Help a child in need.

Jump for joy!

I am feeling like a million bucks, I tell you!

No, I didn't get any knitting done... shame.  Oh well.  It doesn't matter right now!  Today I finally got my financial aid letter in the mail from IU.  Over the past few months my grandmother has kept hinting about how there was this very real chance I might have to attend college around here and stay at home because she wouldn't be able to dredge up enough money for IUB tuition (which is ridiculously cheap).  So I've been worrying my ass off, because if I had to go to some place around here... well.  There's not a university near me that even offers my major - let's just keep it to that.  But a huge burden was relieved today, because IU's practically giving me a free ride.

I could SING!

I also worked five hours today, took an anatomy test that went well, got rained on, aaaand... yep.  I plan on eating a huge bowl of chocolate ice cream to both celebrate and make my day just a little bit better.

... have I mentioned my pile of personal finance, Japanese, and Spanish homework...?

Only Tuesday?

I don't know how it can only be Tuesday.  Seriously.  How is it not Thursday?  Then again, part of me should be very glad it's not Thursday... I already have so many things to do, and sitting here blogging instead of studying for a physiology and anatomy test tomorrow certainly isn't helping anything. 

I sat down on my bed about a half hour ago with the very relaxed notion that my window was open, lovely spring air was blowing in, the birds were singing, and I actually had some free time in order to get a few things done so my life wouldn't resemble the national debt.  This morning I had a battle with my bed, and my bed inevitably won, causing me to oversleep considerably and be late for school.  The extra sleep is nice, but there's always that little interim when I get home in which I long for a nap.  And unless I start doing something immediately, I will inevitably succumb.  Today I managed to avoid napping, and it just amazes me how much time there is in the day now!

In other news, I learned how to salsa and meringue today.  It was very, very fun.  I love dancing.

Hopefully tonight, more sock knitting will be done.  I've turned the heel successfully without fucking anything up (hooray!), and so now I just have the gusset to do.  Due to life, I haven't had much of an opportunity to knit, so very little progress has been done on my sock.  What a shame.

I have an urge to cast on so many things!  My next project is absolutely going to be a black, scoop neck vest to wear over a blouse.  Since I'm not one to buy patterns, I bet money that I will end up designing this myself.  But really.  How hard is it to design a simple, scoop neck vest?  But first, in order to figure out how the armholes work, I really need to finish the simple EPS sweater that I'm working on for my friend (and also his socks and beret...).  And, my other friend is in love with Final Fantasy XIII's Hope, and particularly with his scarf.  She's commissioned me to knit it for her, and so the project of designing it and charting the colorwork and actually knitting it will surely be interesting.  And did I mention that I am in a bargain for knitting socks for a friend, in return for kitty/dragon smut?  Bahaha.

So, things to knit:
1. Finish Monkey socks
2. Two pairs of plain old socks, one blue, one red.
3. EPS sweater
4. Two berets
5. Scoop-neck vest
6. Hope's scarf.

Ohhhhh, I can do this!!!

Happy Easter

This is what I did for about ten minutes today, which is far less time than I would have liked to be knitting:

 Happy Easter to all, even though I personally don't celebrate it.  But we had  lovely time with all the family and whatnot.  About three minutes after this was taken, I spent the majority of my time looking after my sister (2 years), my nephew (3 years), and my cousin (5 years).  Let the good times roll.

The weather was an absolute DREAM today.  It felt just like summer.

Fatigued knitting

I've been working on the socks for quite awhile today.  Since my cousin managed to get herself into even MORE trouble, I've decided that she doesn't get these; my friend Brie does instead.  At my school I'm in the IB program, and there's only nine of us, and we've been in all the same classes together for nigh on two years - needless to say, we're pretty tight knit and like each other well enough to shout at each other and not get offended/angry.  And they all (well, I would like to think) affectionately tease me about my knitting, because I knit in school a lot.  Today I offered these socks up for grabs, and Brie immediately claimed them.  And so, they're hers.

When I finish them.  They're supposed to be done by, uh, Friday.  But, that's obviously not happening.  I took my sock into the guidance counselor's office and told the scholarship lady that this is my talent I'm doing for the scholarship - but it takes time and won't be done by Friday, so could I please send a picture of a work in progress?  She okay'd it... thankfully.  So I get a week or two extension on these things, and then they get handed over to Brie and I can work on something that I actually want to work on for ME!

It has occurred to me that I have never, ever knit anything for myself in my one solitary year of knitting.  Everything has been baby clothes or gifts or a lot of other small, unfinished things.  I really should knit my next project for me and me alone... after I finish another pair of socks and a hat for my very best friend in Ohio.  -_-;;

Have you ever knit so much in one sitting, and been so tired, that your knit stitches start to seem/feel like purl stitches?  I was sitting here, knitting and reading archives of this wonderful, witty blog when all of a sudden I had this panic attack that I was actually purling the stitches I was supposed to be knitting.  False alarm, but it sure felt like it to my tired eyes and fingers.  Oy vey, I need to go to bed.

This reminds me of the time I stayed up all night playing Guitar Hero, and after awhile my eyes got so abused and tired that the TV screen started swirling in front of me.  Freaky stuff.  Or the time that I was practicing marching for a parade in the marching band I used to be in, and it was swelteringly hot and after we stopped marching everything in the world got farther away and came back... farther away and came back; repeat.  It was odd.  Strangely enough, the one time I almost fainted, the only visual thing that happened to me was my vision slowly faded to black.  But I was still conscious (and walking, at that - but with help, of course)... it was pretty interesting, witnessing your vision fade away and then regaining it later.

Blog title changed

Confessions of a gingersnap.  Because I am a ginger.

And my life goal is to be just like Sam Gamgee.  He is such a loyal and wonderful little hobbit.

"I ain't been droppin' no eaves, sir!"

A smattering of everything (AND a sock!)

It feels a little weird, posting seventy million posts a day and then abandoning this thing for a few days. But, life calls. I went to a college visit thing at Indiana University (where I'm going next year) yesterday and today. I would be cuddled up and sleeping right now, except I can't really sleep. And so, I blog.

IU was awesome. I love it there, and I'm so glad I do, because it is really a super convenient set-up for me. I want to go to college to study East Languages and Cultures (what their major of Chinese/Japanese/Korean things is called), and IU is both near, SUPER cheap, and ridiculously excellent in the areas I want to study. Not to mention IU is a good school overall and has one of the most beautiful campuses EVER. It's gorgeous. Trees everywhere, lots of little cobblestone paths, big buildings that look like Hogwarts (if Hogwarts was made of limestone)... beautiful.

I didn't get very much knitting done. But this is how much I have on my sock:

I use the camera on my phone, which sucks.  I know.  The colors are all faded and grossly inaccurate; the color of the yarn is actually this wonderful, lustrous, leafy green.  The pattern is Monkey by Cookie A, available on Knitty (but I found it on Ravelry).

In other news... I've been thinking about changing the blog title.  I would really like to call it "I Don't Give a Shit [subtitle: and neither should you!]," but I think people would be offended by that, even though that's my life's philosophy.  Life is so much easier once you stop caring about the little things.  And then I could write some blog posts about the things I do care about, like education, philosophy, yarn, books, coffee, food, yoga, religion, and the quality of my water.  (I could go on a huge, multi-paragraph rant about how Fiji is the best tasting water ever because it has no taste - and yes, SOME WATER HAS TASTE.  I hate it.  I hate when I can taste my water.  Dasani water is particularly horrible.)

The reason I'm thinking of changing the title is because I don't really blog about knitting all too frequently... it's not like I have time to sit and knit for six hours everyday.  Maybe I would have that kind of time this summer, but I seriously doubt it.  And so I can't really update on my knitting progress very often.  This blog is really just a blog about whatever babble spews forth from my fingers.  I don't necessarily consider this a bad thing, but then again, I like to hear myself talk.  I think I can even be somewhat witty -- occasionally.  I think it comes from being in debate.

So I'm thinking of calling it Gingersnap.  My friend thought it up today, and wanted to call me it.  I think it sounds positively adorable, as does my other friend.

Suffragette style

So, I've only ever had a bad haircut three times in my life: once when I was four, I cut a square into my bangs; twice last summer when some douchefag cut my hair way shorter than I wanted him to and I looked like a boy (at least he got the layers); and thrice, yesterday, when some bitch did not listen to a WORD I told her and decided not only to cut my hair far too short, but to not give me layers, either.

I'm ticked. It is SO HARD to give me a bad haircut, too! I'm not saying this to brag or be vain or anything... It just comes from the fact that my hair is a big, curly, coarse mess and will swallow up most mistakes that hair stylists make. Uneven ends? Awesome. My curls will swallow it up. Messed up the layering? See the last sentence. My hair does whatever I want it to do. Hell, it even grows twice as fast as the average human's does. Most people's hair only grows about a half-inch a month: mine grows an inch a month. A foot a year.

In my case, I'm going to have to wait a month before my hair will even RESEMBLE what the stylist was supposed to cut it like. Ugh. Everyone keeps telling me that they think my haircut makes me look cute; one guy at work even said it made me beautiful, lol. But people flatter. Since my anger has cooled down a tad, though, perhaps I don't look like a dyke anymore -- I'm just rocking a suffragette style.

Blather

Today I talked to my cousin. It was... strangely normal. She doesn't seem fazed. Meanwhile, I am confused as to why she isn't a wreck.

Progress on sock continues. Pictures up later, for those (no one) who care. Why is using five dpns to knit a sock SO MUCH EASIER than using four dpns? I add a needle, and all my problems magically go away. It's going smashingly.

Firefox, why is smashingly considered misspelled?

Curry: results

This is how my curry rice went: runny.

I ended up using too much water in the whole shebang, which really took down the flavor as far as I'm concerned. Due to my Mad Scientist method (looking in the herb cabinet and going, "Ooooh..." and subsequently dumping seven different herbs into the pot), though, it definitely has a flavor kick. Not a very big one like curry is SUPPOSED to taste, but it tastes like the herbs I put into the pot. If I hadn't used so much water, this concoction probably would've blown my head off (which would be a GOOD thing. I LOVE flavor).

So, lessons? Use exact measurements. It's not the knuckle thing I'm spazzing out about, actually, because in reality there wasn't much rice left and so my hand couldn't fit into the small pot and I had to just eyeball it. That was another problem... None of the pots I was using were the size they needed to be. I used this mammoth of a pot for making my curry, and I looked into and thought, "More water. More carrots." (We don't have any onions at the moment.) Result? Too many carrots, too much water. Also, this rice we had sucks. It was "instant" rice. I didn't believe it. That probably was a factor as well.

All in all though, it's gooooooood. I'm trying this again, soon.

Herbs that I tossed into the pot: mustard, cumin, thyme, sage, paprika. I don't even know what any of those taste like except for thyme. I remember hearing thyme and sage used together a lot, and paprika, cumin, and mustard all sounded Indian, so in they went!

CURRY RICE

So I don't forget. Also, writing/typing things helps me remember.

My friend and I were trying to do mochitsuki over Christmas break, and we ran into quite a few obstacles along the way. In the end it was a total disaster, but I remember we figured out from a website how to make rice without a rice cooker. It came out PERFECTLY. Trouble is, I can't find this website anymore, so I'm going to have to try to re-piece this method from other information and from memory.

So. To Make Rice Without a Rice Cooker:

- Wash and rinse your rice a few times.
- Dump your rice in a pot and fill with water. I use the knuckle method.
--- THE KNUCKLE METHOD: place your hand on top of the rice and fill the pot with water until the water level comes even with the second knuckle on your index finger.
- Cover pot and cook rice until water boils.
- At boiling point, immediately turn the heat on low. Simmer for 10-15 minutes.
- Turn off heat and allow rice to sit COVERED for at least five minutes.

CAUTION: I have not actually tried this. Do not repeat until I give the go ahead!

On a similar note, we have a recipe for curry rice:

INGREDIENTS: chopped onions, chopped carrots, thyme, 1 tsp curry powder/paste, 1/4 cup butter, 3/2 cup water, 1 cup rice, etc. Maybe some chicken, but eh.

Saute veggies with butter and herbs, then add your water and bring to a boil. Once it boils, turn the heat down to low and allow the veggies to cook for about 15 minutes (covered). Then gradually add your curry and wait until it's all nice and blended (this recipe says about 10 minutes), and VOILA! Dump over rice.

The advent of the run-on sentence

That title alone should scare you.

This always happens when I get off on some break from school and then my whole sleeping schedule turns itself inside out in THREE DAYS, and before you know it, I'm up until 3 and in bed until noon. What a drag. I'm musing on this because it's 10:30 at night, and I've yet to do another day of Jillian Whoever-the-fuck, shower, make DELICIOUS CURRY RICE!, put away dishes, start on that infuriating sock for a third time... and other things.

My sister-aunt is at her friends house and therefore skipping a day of Jillian, I bet. What a wimp. (Watch. She'll have done it with her friend -- or better yet, have taken the DVD with her and left me Jillian-less). My legs really hurt today. God damn you, Lactic Acid.

Today I started twice on a sock. I really hate working anything on three double-points, because for some reason it always creates ladders that spiral out of control and leave me looking bewildered at the pile of yarn that used to be a sock. Four dpns are much safer. Unfortunately, due to my step-mother being in the hospital, I was stuck at my dad's today watching my little sister (she's two). Now, I love watching my sister and don't mind doing that at all, but guess how many dpns I brought with me today -- yep, four. Not five. I bravely tried to soldier on, thinking that thousands of women have knit socks using four dpns. Why can't I? But in the end I gave up. So tonight will be Attempt Four at Beginner Sock. Hopefully the CURRY I bought today will soothe me.

Did I mention that I bought CURRY today for making DELICIOUS CURRY RICE? Curry, curry, curry!

This is almost enough cause for excitement to distract me from the fact that Abby will be home tomorrow. I don't know what I'm going to do...

I changed my mind.

I'm going to knit these instead.

I'm working on a deadline. I hate deadlines. So I'm ditching the two color approach. I will learn how to knit socks with one skein, and then proceed to knit the above socks with the other skein. It will work.

Oh, and...

socks.

I fucked up the jacket I'm knitting. The pattern motif is off by ONE STITCH. When did I make this mistake? At the beginning of a round. When did I realize I made this mistake? At the end of the round. I just don't have it in my heart to rip back 258 stitches and knit the round again any time soon, so I give up on trying to knit this garment on a deadline.

I'll just knit fair isle socks for the damn scholarship. Just as colorful, just as "wow" to non-knitters, and small. Small enough to finish in a few days. Except...

have I ever mentioned I've never knitted a sock before?

Ha. Still, if I spend a few days knitting, I should be able to pull off finishing these before April 2nd. It's totally doable. I've got a few yarn balls in my stash that I can use to learn how to make the sock, and then today I nipped out to my local, little yarn store and bought two skeins of Cascade sock yarn. One in green, on in a soft gold-yellow. I intend to work these colors in a pattern for these. They look neat-o. And then at the end, I'll have cool socks!