Hello, there...

I'm blaming Mercury retrograde for this, mind you. Just about every electronic device I own has taken a powder, had glitches and otherwise strictly obeyed the planet Mercury this past three weeks.  I won't bother to enumerate them all, but the camera cord has gone missing amongst other things. Now it could not possibly have anything to do with the whirlygig that is my life right now, oh, no.

And I just hate to post about all the lovely things without showing you, doncha know. But I will.

Firstly, Neena came to visit on Thanksgiving. Despite vibrating faintly when she walked into the house (could the wacko cast of characters I call my friends have had anything to do with it? nah) she bucked up like the trouper she is, glommed a glass of wine and pitched right in.  She even hung tough when my mom strolled in as we were about to sit down.  And peeps, if you can hang with her, you can HANG. I'm sayin'.

So we ate and did dishes (she shakes a mean dish towel, folks), and ran hither and yon running errands in Miami including one hilarious trip to find Steve-o who, after demanding that breakfast be brought to him at the car repair shop, promptly went strolling down the highway in 80-something degree heat on a mission to find stereo speakers.  We found him, against all odds, amongst the chaos of a Black Saturday Tar-jay parking lot.  Go figure.  And Neena? she just rolled with the ongoing chaos.  Then off to the Keys we went.  And O, My Peeps, what a grand time we had.  In no particular order this involved:

• going out on a dive boat in the 6 foot plus waves (highest I've ever dove in)
• NOT getting seasick
• stuffing ourselves with eating as much seafood as possible in a 48 hour period,
• dancing the hootchie cootchie funky chicken (I think, the details are blurry) in front of a Santana/John Lee Hooker-soundalike band in Sloppy Joes (they're called The Bubba System and have a standing gig up until 10 pm on Sunday nights at Sloppy Joes in Key West. Go see them if you're there. They kick ass. And there's not a one of them younger than 55)
• singing karaoke for the first time
• having a Corona at the World's Smallest Bar (really)
• hailing through an open window at Sloppy's meeting Joe Forte, Key West artist and ancient curmudgeon extraordinaire
• eating chicken and dumplings with two sides of overcooked vegetables and LOADS of Key-sy ambience at the strip mall cafe in Tavernier
• finding out where to go, stay, eat from all the locals
• hearing that huge numbers of locals are living out of their cars due to the two hurricanes that slammed them (and where the hell is this on the news? hello? anyone from useless FEMA listening???), and
• compensating for a lack of sunset at Mallory dock by buying clothes. All good.   

I am SO looking forward to visiting Cedar City (and SLC, too, Margene, don't think I forgot, heh) and seeing if we can keep this show going on the road. Neena assures me there is NO trouble to get into in CC but we shall see.

So what else?  In three weeks and three days I will be officially unemployed. And this is OK. There may be days when it isn't but for now it is.  In two weeks and two days Gomez (she of earlier posts Warped in Finland, et al) arrives from Finland for a quick week. And in two weeks and three days, inumerable friends and family arrive for Noche Buena dinner expecting to eat and drink themselves blind before staggering off to Missa de Gallo (literally, the Rooster's Mass, more colloquially, Midnight Mass).   Let's just say the to-do list is endless.

Knitting you say?  Well, Neena and I did visit the LYS and she is now officially knitting again. Heh. Nothing like fondling yarn to bring you charging back into the fold. There was this involved:

from a recent Gedifra booklet, I think. And maybe that luscious, tibet lamb-trimmed red cardi from the Winter 2004/2005 VK.  I think this totally counts as knitting content. 

Comments

[margene]

I saw the Gedifra book in her bag but she didn't say anything about knitting!
You might ask Neena if she took the cord for your camera...she left 3 of them here and she is right about no trouble in CC except at her house, that is. We can make up for that in SLC.

[Catherine]

Coffee and KIP sounds most excellent. You pick the date, anytime after the first of the year the landscaping will be done and the house will look a lot more presentable. :-)