Summertime, and the living's getting easier

I see a lot of pictures of Buddy, and I though that maybe everyone might like to see a good picture of me, because I'm a pretty girl. Sometimes they dress me up with a bandanna! -- Lucy the Dog

It's like putting sparkly hair clips on a Holstein. -- Buddy the Cat

I know a lot of knitters stop knitting during the summer because of the heat. Basking in the glory that is Mr. Slim, I have no such problem. It was 110 degrees today, but my kitchen is a pleasant 78. Sure, it's almost midnight and my garage is still 95 degrees, and the wine fridge is costing us something like four hundred dollars a month to run because it's out there, but my favorite knitting chair is cool.

No, my problem is one of time. Right after my last post, I fell into two months of looney work, and haven't had more than a couple of hours to knit. The arms of Bristow remain unknit, I haven't been able to knit any socks from all of the yarn and patterns that Purly gave me, and I have so much yarn shoved into the Yarn Cave that it's acting as attic insulation. I'm afraid to open the door and pull any of it out, because I'm afraid the heat blast might melt my face off. It's good for peppers, though.

I spent the past two months working on my company's disaster recovery drill in Arizona. We were only in Scottsdale for a couple of days, but the prep work before and the post-test work took up most of May and early June. Here's a picture of Belligero the Clown at the hotel during an afternoon gale.

I came home, then dove immediately into the next adventure -- driving my mom around for a couple of weeks after her knee surgery. By the by, if anyone knows someone with a need for total knee replacement, I know the guy to do it. My mom had the minimally invasive surgery, and she was walking around without aid within a couple of days of the surgery. I still had to stay and help them a little bit, because my dad's not what you'd call a good caregiver in situations like that. I ended up taking care of them both for a couple of weeks, and in that time I did some work around their house and painted their living room. Yes, I did finish the wall, but I can't find the complete picture.

Then I got back here and Buddy the Cat was so traumatized by my absence that he developed some kind of feline stress disorder that caused him to yak all over the house no matter what he ate, and fear his food as a result. He lost several pounds and just looked terrible. He's better now, after a couple of days of steroids and a couple of weeks of having me home, almost back up to his fighting weight. (That'll teach you to leave me, the Woman. I'm emotionally fragile, for God's sake.-- BtC)

So what's happening on the knitting front? Well, I decided that Bristow needed a couple of weeks off, and then it was my birthday and my friends bought yarn. I've put myself on a yarn buying freeze until at least Stitches West, but I figure it's O.K. if someone else buys it for me. Lookie!

That's Artfibers 'Chai', tussah silk, a pair of Bryspun needles and a pattern for a herringbone lace scarf.

And this is the Lucy bag, ten rows from the top. I'm knitting it in Lamb's Pride Worsted in 'Prairie Fire', which is oddly appropriate considering the weather. In fact, I only had it outside long enough to take this picture. I was afraid that the blazing sun would cause it to combust. I've never intentionally felted anything before. I'm looking forward to finishing it. Again, my friend bought the yarn for me, so no rules were broken. Just to make sure that I wasn't subliminally encouraging my friends to help me build up my yarn stash, I pledged to complete these two projects before starting anything else. Neither of these things are going into the stash box.

How do I have time to do any knitting, with all the housework and yardwork and such, you might ask? Two words: robot vacuum. It was my birthday present from Accountant Boy. It sweeps under the couches, it gets into the corners and under the cabinets in the kitchen, and it parks itself back on its charger when its battery runs low. I love it. Buddy tolerates it. Lucy fears it.

It sings a little song when it starts up...dooDoodooDOOOO!!!