WOO HOO! it's OVER.

I feel huge relief, finding out a couple weeks ago that I had passed my doctoral comprehensive examinations with distinction (whatever that means...). My pursuit of a PhD continues.

No new episodes of left wrist pain in the last 2 months. Perhaps b/c there has been very little knitting.

My lemon kitty is doing great. Click on pic below for before, right after, and now pics of my baby. You can see how pink/red his third eyelid is in the first pic, how swollen and frankenkitty he is in the second (2 days after the surgery) and I took the last pic yesterday)

Cosmo's eye journey

For awhile, I was calling him Frankenkitty. But now the fur has grown back, and can't see the stitches.

Am currently working on manuscripts for journal article submissions like a mad fool, finishing up overdue assignments, and prepping an undergraduate class I'm teaching in the Fall.

Last: am SO excited for my trip to Denver next week!! Camp, here I come! An old work friend is also visiting Denver at the same time, so hopefully the old gang can do a huge meet up.

Next post... I swear I'll take a pic of something knitterly to share.

Psst! is anyone out there?

Ok Ok. I was the one who was missing. Well, most of you know where I am/was, and believe me, I'd rather be blogging and knitting. Er, knitting and blogging about the knitting.

Surprise (not), that I have no actual knitting content to discuss. I am casting on like a mad fool, with almost no actual intention of finishing any project anytime soon. Recent cast on projects include another sweater for my adorable niece, who has just begun to crawl, the ubiquitous Noro Striped Scarf, and the Modern Log Cabin.

Reasons that I barely knit
1) a belief that I have carpal tunnel or tendonitis in my left wrist. very uncomfortable, which is made worse when I knit for prolonged periods or on larger than usual needles (anything bigger than a US 7)

2)my doctoral comprehensive exams. basically, the faculty assess whether we have learned what we were supposed to have learned in the last three years, by way of torturing us slowly and surely over a period of almost a month. First up, is two days of writing in class, where we are not allowed to use our notes or books, but expected an answer a series of essay questions thoroughly and citing relevant literature. A stupid futile exercise in memorization. THEN, they send us home with a take home portion, a 20 page paper where we address another three questions. THEN, we wait while they read our written portions, and then schedule our oral defense. Three faculty and one student. Where faculty can ask us any question they want. I am waiting for my orals defense, which takes place on Tuesday. Knitting girls beware: if I fail, I'm packing up and coming home, b/c I am NOT doing this again.

3) Cosmo: sigh. My lemon kitty has earned a new nickname. Lemon kitty is still appropos, but his recent surgery has left him looking a little... frankenkitty-ish. He looked like he had an eye infection, but several vet appts discovered that he had a tumor wrapped around his eye, and that he has lymphoma. So, we removed the eye, and now he looks like a rakish pirate.


"Arrrrrggggghhhh. I'm a pirate kitteh!"

so. to sum up. I am alive. and sorta knitting.

Pictureless.

b/c I'm too lazy RIGHT NOW. I'm hoping this weekend, I can show a few pics. of what?

1) birthday presents!! I turned a year older in early-mid December.

A Mat & Nat wallet from my brother/sister in law. I love their stuff that feels like leather, but isn't.

yarn gifties from Michelle, Stacey, Tiffany, Jeni (aka, what I bought at Colorful with their gift certificate)

a holiday mug and sock yarn from Wanda

and a project bag (Stacey) and hand sewn ginormous knitting bag (michelle). Michelle made me my very own birdie swing bag! Not sure if the birdy swing was an Xmas or b-day gift... but gifts are good!

a pretty pad of paper for making lists from my friend Ann.

my gift to myself: a new Offhand Design bag (Weekender in a lovely aqua and brown fabric). Tiffany is a bit evil and a bit of an enabler, and gave me a wee discount to make it impossible for me to say no.

hmm. pic of the "old" weekender (left) and "new" weekender (right)



*both pics from the offhand designs site

No one can tell what my favorite color combos are, can they?

2) Christmas pressies:
tons and tons of foodstuffs. One of my friends made me a huge batch of ground turkey and basil tomato sauce (I normally don't like red pasta sauce, but she doesn't add sugar. it's sooo good!) plus one big thing of her "christmas pasta sauce" which contains beef, pork, veal, and PANCETTA. Yum. She also gifted me with homemade biscotti, and spiced walnuts.

Oiyi surprised me with a box of Christmas goodies! Check her blog to see pics (b/c I already ate most of it) of homemade vanilla marshmallows, some yummy choc. chip pecan cookies, and some toffee! The marshmallows are SO decadent in a big mug of hot cocoa.

and a funny water bottle my friends in NYC got me from the onion. Captioned: "I will never take this camping." ha ha ha.

*pic from the Onion online store.

I also have some FO pics to post. My Hanami made with Woolen Rabbit lace weight, the peapod sweater I made for my niece, and a DB hooded cardi I made for my niece too.

hope everyone enjoyed their holidays!!!

A rare artifact has been dug up...

An FO!! My friend just sent me this pic of her daughter wearing it around her first birthday. Forgive me for not remembering RIGHT NOW the name of this pattern, except it's designed by Libby, and I used Cotton Ease. Used a crocheted scalloped edging at the bottom instead of whatever the pattern calls for. I now wish I had made the straps wider (maybe some thicker knitted I-cord, or some flat-I cord).

Two months and change

And what change!!! I am currently watching some football (let us not speak of Michigan's horrible rebuilding season, ok? I have enough to cry about lately) and listening to the new Will.i.am "It's a New Day" song. And it makes me cry.

Maryse posted a link to these beautiful photos that made me tear up at the coffee shop earlier today. These photos are so gorgeous, and show so much of President elect (i love saying that) Obama's personality.

I've been knitting... still working on Hanami... and have moments of weakness where I feel like ripping it out b/c I chose to use a variegated yarn instead of a solid. Even if it was a tonal variegated yarn, I think it would have been better. Not that I don't love it, I just think the pattern would pop more if I hadn't chosen a variegated. Oh well.

So, Since early October (October 5th) I have been working to vote in Colorado. I still have my condo there, and plan on moving back, so I consider myself a 'student' and my Denver address my permanent address. I sent in my registration/application for an absentee ballot on Oct 6th, and received both email and mail confirmation that they had received it and my ballot would be sent to me. Come October 24th, no ballot. I call and they say, it will be there tomorrow. Nope. Call again. It'll be there tomorrow. Nope. Now I insist on some action. They say they will overnight the ballot to me, but since it is Thursday at 4pm, it might not get out until Friday's mail, and should def. be here by Saturday. Nope. Monday morning, I spend a few hours on the phone insisting on an emergency faxed ballot and spend the day sitting next to a fax machine in order to get my APPLICATION for an emergency faxed ballot, fill the app out, fax it back, wait for the ballot to be faxed to me, and fax it back. Never you mind that the ballot they faxed me was illegible. I could make out Obama's name, and that's all I really needed. VOTING FOR THE PRESIDENT should NOT be this hard.

And guess what I got in the mail today? TODAY?? My ballot. Is it totally paranoid to feel like someone was holding it somewhere? who the eff wants their mail ballot the Saturday after the election??

Prats and Pitfalls of Being a Busybody

I'm trying to be a good, conscientious student. As I told someone last night, I can get work done just by procrastinating... by doing work I would rather do than the work I don't want to do. Work still gets done, and at some point, the work I don't WANT to do becomes work i HAVE to do, leaving me little choice. Which explains why I am at Panera Bread, enjoying soup and free wi-fi while I edit documents, manuscripts, and skim book chapters for class this week.

***POST IS NOT KNITTING RELATED. POST IS ABOUT POLITICS AND ME BEING NOSY. If you do not want to read about my political opinions, you should probably SKIP THIS POST****

A lovely family sitting in a booth across the way are having THE DISCUSSION. About politics. On one hand, I congratulate them for being mature enough to be able to discuss politics within the family. That's not how it works in my fam. I pretend my parents are voting with their pocketbooks, and they pretend I didn't vote for Clinton two terms in a row (though I think that's the closest I got to being disowned).

The son, a physician (they were talking about his job previous to the politics discussion) started talking about how Obama's minister/preacher, Jeremiah Wright is an anti-semite. How he has often had Palestinians and TERRORISTS (how I hate that word) come and guest speak at his church. How since Pastor Wright and Obama are such bosom buddies, that Obama must be an anti-Semite as well...

**convo became to quiet for me to get particulars for a minute**

Then, we move onto how the SON (the doctor) is also pro-life. In my head, I grumble, EVERYONE IS EFFING PRO-LIFE you asshole!! No one is pro-abortion! But I am staunchly pro-choice. oops. Got off topic. My anti-men thing is coming out here, b/c I am not sure that I respect the opinion of men about the topic of the legalities of abortion. Should men get a vote on what a woman can do to her body and reproductive organs? (I had more vitriolic rant going off here... which I deleted. You can tell I'm not happy.)

So, my question to you, (should you still be reading my rant here) is... is any of this true? Is Pastor Wright a known anti-Semite? Should we judge Obama based on this... allegation? Then my question becomes... how come we didn't judge the current Prez on these criteria (judged by associations and their alleged values).

-- off to Stapes to buy school supplies. Pens. Pens with a very very fine tip make me happy. Graph paper for my statistics class. I love graph paper. It helps me take very neat notes... I can be happy with the small details.

Labor of Love

As per the usual (of the past 2-3 years), I just spent a very enjoyable Labor day in NYC. My friends moved (3 mos ago) to a new apartment, and I was excited to see the new 'hood and place.

I took Bolt Bus down, which is as cheap as Fung Wah, but nicer. A lot nicer. Wi-Fi access, air conditioning, and reclining seats. I slept on the way there, but read on the way home (nothing exciting. I read a text that I'm making my students read this semester. Yalom's The Gift of Therapy, if you must know).

Upon arrival, we took the subway to the new place to drop off my stuff. It's a gorgeous pre-war condo that has a partial view of the Park. It's big, by NYC standards, but still so small. We got a quick snack to tide us over, b/c we didn't want to ruin our appetites.

Who here watches Iron Chef America? Then you are familiar with the name Masaharu Morimoto! I knew he had a restaurant in Philly, but my friends let me know that he had opened a restaurant in NYC. I was DYING to go. Every time he battles in Kitchen Stadium, I become a ravenous mess at midnight. Morimoto in NYC was everything I hoped for, and more.

We started out with some drinks. Pretty names, yummy sips. I had the hydrangea, while my friend had the snapdragon (her DH declined, as he wanted to stay sharp for the upcoming Scrabble Tourney). We shared the rock shrimp tempura, which was served in two different sauces (a wasabi aioli sauce, and a korean red-pepper sauce) which were crispy, creamy, and absolutely delish. Then, the surf and turf main course came out, which comprised of a waygu beef in hot mustard (cooked medium rare) and some yellowtail with avocado. The beef was SO TENDER that no knife was needed. At all. You barely needed teeth. The fish was fresh and buttery. On the side were some roasted fingerling potatoes that just melted in my mouth.

We followed the main course with some sushi. Spicy tuna, spicy yellowtail, and spider rolls. Even though we were not yet stuffed to the gills, we decided we should wait it out and look at the dessert menus. Roasted bananas in chocolate creme, with banana ice cream for me. Warm chocolate cake with popcorn ice cream for the friend's DH. Chocolate mousse and ganache with black sesame for my friend. NOW we were full. So full, that we passed out when we got home.

Saturday was spent exploring. We went to the MOMA, b/c a classmate's husband had been invited to design a pre-fab house to show at the MOMA (on the 54th? 56th? street lot). During the exploration of the inside exhibition (more the history of pre-fab homes) I bumped into a professor from my program. Totally random. Going outside to the street lot to explore the five pre-fab homes was incredible. One was built with NO NAILS! (that's the one my classmate's husband made). SO COOL.

we did a walking tour of the west side (midtown and chelsea) to see the neighborhood where Sarah Jessica Parker lives, where her brownstone from SATC was filmed, and just cute neighborhoods. We were way too close to Billy's Bakery not to pop in and have some cake! If you are ever in the neighborhood, treat yourself to some moist, decadent cake while watching the cute cupcake guy sing along to the radio. We enjoyed this, this, and this. Yes, my sweet tooth has been totally satiated. All that sugar helped me to win the big game of Scrabble that night.

Sunday, we did bagels (nothing like a NYC bagel) and then re-arranged the apartment. You know how when you move, you have to arrange the furniture around a few times to see where it fits best? I love doing that. So long as it's not MY apartment.

That's how I spent my lovely 3 day, pre-school starting weekend. Next year, I hope to spend some time in Flushing Meadows too, to watch some tennis.

Sorry for so many links and no pics. My friends are muggles, and unknowing of the blog. carrying around a camera to Morimoto and Billy's would have been strange.