Ready for the weekend!

Lots happened today!  I went to court this morning and as it turns out, I owe no back alimony and won't have to pay anymore from here on out!  WOOT!  I got out of court, went to work for a bit and watched the kidlings from the daycare downstairs parade through, came home, put on a suit and went to a job interview.  The interview went pretty well, but I didn't walk out of there thinking I had nailed it.  It's hard to say though.  I will definitely need to bone up on my technical network and troubleshooting skills in case I get called for a second interview.  This weekend is just going to be a chill weekend, but I am very ready for it for sure!

Nice day for a jog...

I decided that I would work from home today and that afforded me the opportunity to take a run this morning.  I didn't run very far, but I did run some, and thats a start!    

News from Nathan

Nathan and Bre are doing well in China.  They have gotten a language tutor and are making their way around pretty well he says.  Eating in restaraunts is tricky he says, but picture menus help!  The teaching is also going well and they are enjoying it.  The did put in an order for hats as winter is coming on over there...



A hat for me...

Today I started a hat for me.  I have had some really nice verigated yarn that Sandy got for me and today I started a simple, straight knit hat for myself with it.  No colorwork, which is unusual for one of my hats, no ribbing, no texture, just a straight knit hat with some slubby yarn! Here is the Fractal Hat (a Mandelbrot Set) that I knit and ended up with Rory.

Ping Pong?

Over the past year, my ping pong game has improved, well not quite dramatically, but it has improved!  I beat Sandy 2 out of 10 games on Saturday!  Now that may not seem like a huge deal but trust me, playing her in ping pong is like playing a ninja!  Holy smokes!  I have to say too that in those games I did lose, I lost by not very much!  After ping pong on Saturday, we walked around Discovery Park for a while which was nice.  A pretty chill weekend overall. 

poem

A tired hag

peddling possessions

for scraps

aggrandizing

forcing a toothless smile

against rejection

from a hermit. clw

True confessions of a knitter...

Ahhh, its finally Friday!  This has been a wierd week and I am glad it is over.  Gonna start a new hat...last night I gave Rory his "fractal hat"...the most complicated hat I have ever knit, as the pattern was self-made and every row was different...not like most where you get to zone out and knit!  The pattern on the hat repeated itself every 17 stiches to make a mandelbrot set 5 times around the hat.  The confession?   I actually gave it to Sandy a while back (hey she's got pull!), and knitted him another less complicated hat, but when she saw that one she wanted it instead so I washed and blocked the fractal hat and presented it as new...I know, I know...but it's not like he will ever know...point is, I wanted him to have something from me before he left town, and it worked out well for everyone. WOOT!  It's Friday!

Patience

You know, its easy for negative thoughts to creep in, for self-deprecation to win out, and to get to feeling down because things didn't work out the way I thought they should or as fast as I thought they would.  Truth be told, I didn't start out today feeling very positive, but as I look around today, and I see all of the positive things going on around me, I have to smile and I have to think that God is looking out for me, and that he wants me to be happy.  I am healthy, I have a great partner in Sandy, and I have opportunities.  I have people praying for me, I have people that love me.  I have great kids.  Things will eventually turn around for me, I will have the things I want, I just have to be patient.  And stay happy and not let the thief take whats mine. 

sometimes...

things don't work out the way you planned, you know?  On Friday, my hiking partner for the weekend couldn't get it together and we ended up not going to the backcountry and yesterday at court, things didn't move forward at all.  They didn't move backwards, either, so its not as frustrating as it could have been I suppose.  I shaved my beard off and everything, so I souldn't look like a thug in court, and now I look funny!  Oh well, it grows back quick...

Indian Heaven

This past weekend my brother Patrick, Richard, and myself went hiking into Indian Heaven Wilderness Area, a perennial favorite of mine and definitely one of the most beautiful places on the planet.  We arrived in the afternoon on Friday and were set up in no time. 

Patrick and Richard were all about survival skills, but I myself (having suffered before) chose to camp the way I do and was pretty cozy.  They proceeded to build a "self-feeding" fire, which worked really well.  Instead of starting small, and adding logs to the fire, you pile the large fuel wood, and build the fire on top of it.  As the fire burns down, it ignites the larger logs and just keeps burning.  When I went swimming the following morning, it was still smoldering, and could have been restarted quite easily.

Instead of relighting the fire, I took them for a walk into the berry fields.  We were there at the perfect time of year and collected about two quarts of berries in no time.  Talk about a grubbin breakfast!

By the time we got back to camp, the sun had warmed us up and they started in making small traps for animals and building fires using a bow-string and spindle.  Quite impressive fire building I must say, and I was glad to have learned how to do it.

Like I said before, I camped the way I usually do, so I was well fed.  Unfortunately, Patrick and Richard didn't eat so well!  The only thing they were able to trap was a large frog, which, split between the two of them didn't really go as far as they would have liked.  I had checked my "trap" and found tortellini with marinara sauce :)

All in all, it was a great weekend to be out!  The weather couldn't have been better, and those two guys are fun as hell to hang out and chill with.    Hopefully we will be getting out again soon.  That said, I was glad to get home to my baby!