The Four Year Blanket is nearly complete.....

I've been working on this blanket since I learned to knit. This was back in June of 2003. Those of you who have ever done a show with me since then may remember the squares that I was knitting whenever we were backstage. I was always reticent to say that I was knitting anything other than squares in case I lost patience and gave up. Well I didn't! look at that!

Some changes to the pattern--I've decided that it needs to be square, so I'm adding three more rows, then I have to knit the border and line the back, so it's not finished yet, but it's close. I've also decided that I am going to embroider something on the "khaki" squares. I find them bland and generally unpleasant, so I've got to sass them up a bit. Not sure what I'll do yet. I'd love suggestions. Maybe a skull and crossbones--that or flowers. Yeah, flowers..... or maybe a longhorn....

Actually maybe I'll sew funny patches on there! The possibilities are endless.

The World's Ugliest Dog Contest

Last night, Amy and I watched the World's Ugliest Dog Contest on Animal Planet, expecting to see some ugly-cute dogs, maybe some droolers, you know. What we saw will haunt my thoughts and dreams for the rest of time.

Ladies and Gentlemen, meet SAM!!!

Look away if you can, but you will continue to come back to this picture and to send it to your friends until it becomes a part of your subconscious, and that's when Sam will begin to take over your life.

You'll be enjoying a cup of coffee tomorrow morning and you'll have to look "just one more time." You'll find yourself plunging the depths of his one cloudy eye searching in vain for its pupil. You will wonder whether the discolorations are freckles or warts. You'll ask yourself if perhaps his owners filed his teeth down in order to prepare them for more attractive porcelain veneers.

Then you'll do some research. You'll find out that Sam is a purebred. That's right, a purebred. He looks like that on purpose. You'll think to yourself what is the purpose of the Chinese Crested Hairless??? Lap dog? Guard Dog? Further research will uncover that "The ancient Aztecs kept them as bedwarmers and, believe it or not, did eat them. The Chinese trading ships stopped along Africa on their routes, and it was there that they picked up these dogs because they were excellent ratters for aboard their ships. The stripper, Gypsy Rose Lee, used to breed them."

So, there you have it. These dogs are good for "ratting," bedwarming, and eating. Good luck EVER sleeping again.

You know you want to see more....

On the Road Again

We have just commenced a tour of Pirates which will last two weeks and take us to remote small towns in the far reaches of North Carolina. I fondly recall my tour of rural Louisiana... My favorite part of touring is finding local restaurants and unusual tourist attractions and, of course, the requisite roadkill watch. Some of you may remember accounts of the prison rodeo in Angola,LA and eating fried Alligator in Crowley, LA "the rice capitol of the world." I can't wait to see what we'll discover on this tour!

Amy and Keith and I tried to go to "The Strangest House in the World" in Kernersville, NC. Unfortunately, it was nowhere near us, but it sure had an interesting brochure, and the concept of a 7 level 22-room home built by a "dapper gentleman interior designer who became famous as a painter of bulls across the south" and who intended the house to be "a combination bachelor’s quarters, artist’s studio, office, billiard and ballroom, carriage house and stables" was intriguing. Keith suggested that in addition to the portraiture of bulls we might find a series of interesting nudes above the "15 fireplaces of differing designs of American Encaustic Tiles." A missed opportunity indeed.

Hoppy Easter!!

This Easter has been wonderful. Amy and I made the Southern Living Carrot Cake with Buttermilk glaze and Deluxe Cream Cheese Frosting.... sooooo tasty. Also, it has 42 grams of fat and 750 calories per 1/18th of a 9 inch cake.

Amy made a ham, and we had a potluck. We ate blue cheese mashed potatoes, and green beans with almonds and lots of shrimp and yeast rolls (not to worry, they're just rolls--they sound gross because of the word yeast. As I understood it, the presence of yeast in bread was understood, and I don't know why they feel the need to put it in the title of the food, which makes it sound gross. But in any case they were tasty.)

This picture is with some of the cast from Pirates, we all put on Easter Pirate tattoos! They were out of the 12 disciple tattoos at the grocery store, apparently. Tatts!!!

On your heels

I went to spinning again today, but this time we had a new instructor. She is, apparently, the "Director of Group Exercise." She totally phoned it in. My Spanish instructor was sweating and spitting and yelling in two languages. This lady stood by her bike and talked us through a series of hills and intervals. I don't want talk! I want action!

Understanding her was also strangely challenging. The words "heels" and "hills" are used often in spinning classes and it was impossible to discern one from the other. There were only 2 of us in the class, and one was an instructor in training. Under such circumstances I, rightly, took every instruction and correction to pertain specifically to me. It was mentioned that I needed to push through my heel, so I'm pushing--my foot in a perfect flex.

It wasn't until the third or fourth time that she said "Now really focus on your heel" that I realized that she was trying to get me to visualize the terrain of the country we were traversing on our imaginary bike ride. I think that I shall soon have the most viciously sore calf muscles in the world.

Also, she seemed like a mean popular girl from the 80's. I'll give her a second chance. She said she had a migraine.