Entries from July 2009 ↓

Whew I do have a brain up there, and a normal one at that – “age appropriate” whatever that means!! I only had 236 black and white images to peruse so not sure which portion of it is coloured orange or is the cause of my orangeness.

Anyway, despite the trauma of waiting for the MRI and results I feel quite excited to be able to look inside my own head, a literal look being far less dangerous than a metaphorical look I suspect!

Recognise me?

Jif let me know about a pattern on the SPCA website for knitting or crocheting sweaters for their puppies. Am not really a puppy or dog person but in between knitting projects it’s been good to have something to do.

I just finished it the other night then rather fortuitously the SPCA had a group of puppies down at Kirkcaldie & Stains so I was able to deliver the sweater in person. However they only had biggish puppies there so they weren’t able to dress one in it. I’ve written to them to ask for a photo if one does end up wearing it so I’ll just have to wait and see.

Will Twitter bring about some new kind of honesty? As it spreads and people get used to getting their point across in 140 characters there’s just no room for mincing words. You just say it. Perhaps our conversations in life will finally become like those we see on TV & movies, I know there’s not enough time to air the whole conversation but people just often seem to make a decision or say something in a conversation and get on with it. Not an hour-long chat or meeting that drags on with no outcome!

I think our lives are being reduced to a life-bite style as well. It’s not only Twitter 140 characters at a time, it’s everything. How many people nowadays just have no time to fit anything in? People rarely do lunch, Christmas cards, weekends away, phone calls, wash the car. Or maybe that just me. Phone calls? My phones rarely ring and for me that’s a good thing. Unless the caller has a question, gets the answer and goes, I have to admit to being rather frustrated that what could take 10 minutes stretches to an hour because I feel like I never have an hour! I’m always in the middle of the current life-bite (or string of them when it comes to work) and I just don’t have room for an hour-long interruption that wasn’t at my instigation. Which reminds me, I must find time to write a long email to someone I haven’t in a while that I used to write to every week. How did I let that slip?! Probably because it takes more than a few minutes in between something else.

Oh humans, go on take my photo if you must. Haven’t you taken enough already? Here’s my best side.

She likes them! After 4 attempts at getting a ’smoother stitch’ for Short Dark Friend’s arm warmers we have a winner. Even though she was dubious about the ribbing having to be on either end to stop them curling up the results are good. Am quite pleased with them and impressed with how ’smooth’ they look.

So, my second attempt at cupcakes was better (the first yeilding rather solid little things) – orange cupcakes! Made with a cupcake batter that contains the egg yolk in with the traditional cake ingredients, with lots of orange juice and stiffly beaten egg whites folded in later. Orange juice and rind in the frosting. Only disappointing thing is they look more yellow than orange but that’s probably just the type or orange or the season. Taste lovely and orangey.

Trying to find interests outside work to get this damn crick out of the back of my neck and my first adventure was making a birthday card for a friend. Inspired by this very very cool truck one I found for SF Girl I came up with my own version which will feature my own photos.

So thanks whoever you are for the idea and I hope I don’t get into copyright trouble – but mine is quite different because it is my photo and my cards involve double-sided tape whereas yours are much more top-of-the-line with image printed on the card inside an embossed border!

Anyway, not going to show you a picture of the one I made, just know it was received with much amazed praise and was very topical for the recipient and occasion, and you all may end up receiving a hand made treasure (or several) in years to come if I continue!

The whole thing has been made easier by finding out that Gordon Harris sell card with a ‘crease’ (being the arty hand-making set’s term for fold-line) down it in many colours, and that Photo Plus do ‘mini prints’  so can print several of several (or the same) image onto one of the standard sized photos direct from my camera’s memory card! Am not upgrading my camera or buying a guillotine or anything, so the cards will definitely have a homemade feel about them.

So if you receive one, I hope you like it!

I’m loving our wall of overseas trip photos! I blame the wonky hanging job on the fact that you just cannot get the same frame twice in this town! I suppose I should’ve just bought a truck lot when I hung the first photo (which was at about my eye height and has since been moved to the top) but who knew things would’ve worked out so wonderfully that we’ve had lots of trips over the last few years. Before long we’ll have to buy a new apartment with better wall space or stop travelling!

We’ve been looking for a spot to people watch in the city for a while now, it’s one of our favourite things to do in New York – sit in the window of a cafe and watch people go by. Unexpectedly we went into Wholly Bagels on the corner of Willis & Bond yesterday for lunch and got a great spot in the window. And kind of New Yorky because we were having bagels! Didn’t try the coffee and there was waaaay to much cream cheese on my bagel. But still a nice spot in the sun to use again.

Every day last week walking to work I was treated to a gorgeous arrangement of orange roses in the window of Vanilla hair salon. I was too embarrassed to take a photo when they were open in case they came out and asked what I was doing so it proved quite hard to get a shot because they seem to be open all the time! Even at the early and late times I was walking by. However, in the end, got a photo when they were closed which meant the flash, the dark and my reflection all got in the way. However the result is quite arty I think! Am quite proud of myself.