ProseKnitic – of Words und Wolle

Completely devoted to tourism (not just the film festival), Cannes wears her paint and clean streets proudly. From Castle to the far tip overlooking the beach, Ms Kletter and I hiked the town.

The Maus stayed on the ship, avoiding the grey day and the rocky tender ride to shore.

The day ended with a halloween party. I am not sure what time the girls got in.

Once more, my piece (peace?) of mind is being fragmented by various running, screaming and obnoxious small children. Oh, and the large one on the piano across the room who is starting a round of “name that tune.”

This is the last night on the ship, we are headed into Barcelona in the morning.

Not to sound like a crab, but the small people (IMHO) should be in bed by now. The teens have been great, and are all packed.

I should have the photos up tomorrow (Sunday).

Again, Livorno where the ship docked is a distance from those places which might be interesting. We saw a bit of the town considering that we did the hike from the shuttle stop to the train station.

Given the choice between paying $89 each for the bus ride to Florence, we elected the 15€/3 people and the 10.50€/3 people and went to Pisa. I even spent some of the savings on presents and still came out ahead.

The weather was beautiful, Ms Maus did not want to climb 300 steps. Ms Kletter and I hiked up. Now, you have to ask yourself. Why would people who never climb a flight of stairs or walk more than a couple of blocks decide they are fit enough (and will fit through narrow passages)? I have been doing 4+ miles a day and still felt a bit winded by the time I made the top. Never going to volunteer for a skyscraper race…

Civitavecchia is not Rome. Even if you call it the port of Rome, it is not Rome. Not when it is 90 minutes by bus. Another nasty surprise: unlike other cruise lines, NCL does not provide a shuttle into town. In those ports where you can’t hike out, they charge for the shuttle. Go figure. Not high on my “taking care of your vacationers”

Of course, if the girls had managed to get up like we planned at 0700, we might have gone to the train station and traveled somewhere. But at 1100+ when they finally rolled out of bed, it just did not seem worth it. Something about a late party….

They are having a good time, including spending 1-2 hours a day studying and plenty of time in the gym.

I am still trying to find a nice quiet knitting place, and came across an “I love me wall” for the ship as well as more primitives passing as art work.

I have not fallen off the end of the earth, but with the cost of connection from the Norwegian Gem, I am limited my connect time to almost nothing.
We started in Barcelona, went on to Malta, spent yesterday in Naples and today it is Citiavecchia (actually the girls and I are turning down the high price of a coach in favor of taking the train).
Tomorrow will be Livorno, (and off to Pisa – see above) with Sat in Cannes before getting back to Barcelona on Sunday in time to catch a flight back home.
Shopping wise we have done none. The girls are spending time on both studies and the hot tub with regular forays into the gym.
There are a lot of people on this ship, but no one else likes the gym at 0500 so I have not had any problems having lots of time on the treadmill.
Knitting is going well (2 prs of socks done, one sleeve to sew in on the first sweater and 15% into the second.

And then there is Naples. Having been here before, I took the girls out for a hike, we surveyed the castle

+ did the Hop-on, Hop-off bus.

The sun was shining, there were mopeds and motorcycles everywhere.

There were all these fancy, expensive tour packages.

And one could also wander around by themselves. I think our choice was obvious and a morning was well spent hiking around the island, seeing most of the streets and otherwise keeping ourselves entertained.

Did I mention that in spite of there being way too many people on this ship (500 below the age of 21 alone) the exercise room (open 24 hours a day) is completely empty at 0500?

A day at sea meant that I could knit, the girls could do some home work and everyone spent time in the hot tubs.

25 Oct – starting out from Barcelona. Me, Ms Maus and Ms Kletter. What you are mostly going to get is picture galleries.

Where did it all come from?

I arrived here with a backpack and a suitcase.

I am going on vacation with a backpack and a suitcase. And I was planning on going back to the UK at the end with a backpack and a suitcase.

But I have a problem. I have more than what fits into the suitcase.

Admittedly, I stopped at a couple of department stores and Rödel. I might just have bought a few balls of sock yarn at a good price. 3.95€ for a 100gm ball of sock yarn is a good price, especially when it is going to become a vest or sweater. Then there were the books, did I mention buying a few paperbacks? And a magazine, and some underwear.

Oh, and I broke down and bought a winter coat. I have not had a nice one in years. A cape, yes, but not a coat. Coats close and have pockets.

End result is that I have three boxes of stuff (oh, and some DvDs) to go in the mail. I am contemplating just leaving all the warm weather clothing here till summer. Then I could, maybe, get all that needs to be in the suitcase packed in.

Only the sleeve cap to go on the second sleeve. I would show you a pix, but the camera is packed.

I thought about it, then decided to knit socks on the plane. They are just easier and go quite quickly. Boot socks out of 6 ply, that is.

I should get some sleep…..

There are those times when you totally and completely luck out.

First, I managed to figure out the changes to the CME process this year so that I managed to leave with my certificate for 16 hours clutched in my hot little hands.

Secondly, the transportation to Harthof at the end of the conference went extremely smoothly. Enough so that I was able to grab the 1923 train rather than wait for 2040. Even better, the Bahn had switched trains so that everyone on the original 1923 train no longer had a valid seat reservation. I was able to grab a very nice seat, a single with a table and relax all the way to Mannheim.

Then, the nice guy came and picked me up at the Heidelberg Bahnhof – beat midnight by a couple of minutes!

Sitting in comfort as the German countryside flowed by my train window yesterday, I reflected on what a lovely husband I have. It is not just that he is willing to do kitchens and bathrooms, maintain a sense of humor inspite of our jobs pulling us in different directions, it is that he bought me a Bahn Card. On Sunday when we took Ms Maus to the train station he first got the discount card, then the round trip train ticket to München.

If it had been me, I would have gone ahead and booked a seoncd class ticket rather than pay what is a bit less than the normal second class full fare and sit in first class. So, instead of being crammed into second class with comfort comparable to sitting in ecomony on an airplance only with less lugage space, I relaxed, listened to my audio book and knit for three solid hours.

I will admit to cruising a few department store yarn shops downtown before taking the U-Bahn out to the SanAk.

And today, I managed to make it through the full day of lectures without a complete brain fry. I skipped the conference dinner. With 300+ people, they will not miss me at all and I can finish up that last 1/2 sleeve on Oragami. Found a yarn needle so I might even wear it tomorrow.

(and start a new project, tra la la la la la).

A long time ago, some bright person developed a “finder” for keys. A simple, battery powered chirper that attached to your key ring, it sounded off in response to clapping:

Scene 1:  you walk through the house, clapping your hands and cursing.

Scene 2:  you are in a lecture, keys in your hand when everyone starts clapping.

Another one of those ideas whose time really never came.

Carmen mentioned lost phones. I don’t count mine lost till the battery runs down.  At that point, it could be hiding several inches from my nose with high success.

Knitting

Pictures will magically show up when I am at a computer that allows for pix upload. I suppose I could have loaded them from my MAC to a memory stick, then hauled along to the pay computer station, but I don’t trust my toys in foreign USB ports.

What I managed to do was finish the body on Oragami, 80% of the first sleeve and about 8 cm on the second. I had forgotten how wonderful and mind numbing it it is to knit a patterned yarn in garter. Progress is actually visible as the color changes. Unlike those kilometers of solids in Hanne Falkenberg kits.

I also restrained myself and did not start socks to have an alternative knitting project (Pats self on back).

Yarn lusting and train trip reported tomorrow…..

Heidelberg Meddac personnel are just incredibly helpful. The security guy is going to check and find out why I need to do another set of fingerprint cards. If actually required, he will help me get them off to Ft Sam. The Medical Librarian is an old friend and found me several articles. In return, I got her signed up on Ravelry. Perhaps I did not do her a favor.

But most importantly, the optometry clinic personnel decided that there was more wrong with my military issue glasses than bent frames, found me an appointment this afternoon and replacement glasses on order for me.

All of this put me in an obviously cheerful mood as I headed into the Altstadt at the end of the business day. I found the mate to Ms Maus’s fleece jacket, only in black. Somehow I can’t see myself in mint green and the only one they had left in the nice red was a size large.

To thank her for both suggesting the jacket and giving me directions – I found this

which should coordinate with her jacket, highlighted by two of her other favorite colors – yellow and orange.

(This is the only one of my offspring who has not spent months in the I will wear anything as long as it is black phase of teen age fashion).

Rödel now stocks KnitPro needles (KnitPicks for you US based knitters). They are more expensive than mail ordering from the US but have the advantage that they were right on the rack in front of me. The woman who forgot to bring along sock needles. US price = $6.79 EU price = 5.95€.

Oragami

Since the body of the cardigan is not all that portable,

the sleeve came along with me today.

I am making progress, but it is really slow going. 50 gm of yarn makes 12″ or about 31 cm of sleeve (the magic number is 49 cm to get to the sleeve cap shaping this is looking like a really good train knitting project.

Off to pack – it is back to München in the morning.

You have heard me muttering around about the two houses that are going in on the lot next door to our house in Heidelberg.

To say that they are sad and ugly is an understatement. From our terrace I bring you …. cement box

But there are two of them

We are thinking of creating a fairly dense border at the edge of our property. Sadly, it might just obscure anything they could see out the windows facing our house. Wouldn’t that just be so sad?

Looking down toward our street entrance, the green is finally growing back

Better – is my new red wallet!

Oragami Cardigan

and progress on the first sleeve

Audio

The Accidental Sorcerer – K.E: Mill

Actually, I know I lost my mind a long time ago so that I don’t have to convince anyone really that it is rapidly fading.

But there are things that I could do to make my life much easier.

One example is tossing my keys on the basket next to the door everytime I come in the house. Over the last month, I have managed to do this more than 80% of the time. As a result, I have spent little time hunting keys. This led me to the realization that I just have to do something about the wallet.

I love this wallet, it does everything I need and holds everything without a problem. Those three disasters in the last few months have just about wrecked me. Getting to the Chunnel and not having ID, passport or money; getting to a dinner in München and finding I did not have (you guessed it) ID, credit card or money and finally last night wasting 45 minutes tearing the house apart looking for a wallet that was hiding on the floor next to my suitcase. I really could have used that sleep.

This wallet is black. I just can’t see it when it is dark, against anything dark, or in the bottom of any bag.

Solution?

Red.

On other fronts – Terminal 5 at Heathrow can be a challenge. Perhaps it is just because I am really familiar with Terminals 1&2 and can even manage Terminal 4. But 5 is not well signed, Bag Drop off takes 50 minutes and security almost as long compounded by the fact that Saturday travelers seem to be comprised more of vacationers and less of people who are used to traversing airports.

In spite of all that, I happily waltzed through security with backpack containing cameras, lenses, computer, knitting, several extra circs, stitch markers, needles and who knows what else. By the end of the train, bus, waiting, plane, car travels I had almost 8″ completed on the first sleeve.

All that time and so little? Garter stitch on 3.00 needles my friends takes a long time. More stitches across than a sock has around.

Pix tomorrow.

Admittedly, I managed to get a great deal done today, including a number of things that had not even had a chance to make the list. Heading off to Germany this weekend in preparation for a course in München this coming week, I packed a suitcase.

Did I mention that I am taking leave the week after and need a completely different set of clothing for that journey? I will have to check the bag. Phooey.

Ready for bed, I double checked everything – suitcase, computer, camera, knitting, meds, toys, Ms Maus’es book and coat. Only thing left was to make sure that I had my railpass.

Which is in my wallet which wasn’t to be seen.

30 minutes later, I still did not see it after searching all possible rooms, car, bedroom x3.

As I headed for bed, the thought was that it might just still be in the office and set the alarm for just that small bit earlier.

Grabbing my suitcase and backpack, the wallet was just sitting there on the floor underneath my boarding pass.

Bedtime.

(if you are here for the knitting, please feel free to skip the next few paragraphs)

It was one of those days. The kind which are both good and bad. Bad because I woke early with a migraine. Good because it responded properly to some meds. Bad in that I got on the road about three hours later than planned which meant I arrived at Croughton right at the beginning on lunch hour.

I can’t say enough good about the Post Office crew at Croughton. With the construction on the mailroom not yet complete, all the post boxes are in a separate trailer. I can get open my box and take package pickup slips to the main building without problem. What I can’t do is access the boxes of the others in my mail pick-up pool. For months now whomever of the Airmen or Sergeants is on the window cheerfully tramps over to the trailer, pull slips, digs out packages, and double checks to make sure I have everything. That kind of service rarely happened in Heidelberg, and certainly not at Landstuhl (both of which had severely limited hours for package pickup).

The library offers the same kind of service and small town feel of community. I can hardly imagine the PHV library letting me stay on a computer for a couple of hours in order to complete an on-line course that could only be accessed from a US IP or .mil computer. Or giving me access to a DSN phone so that I could call through the system to a state side 1-800 number to straighten out a billing problem.

Oh, the bad? I would up with duplicate airline reservations for later this month due to a web page freeze and lack of email confirmation of the reservation. The good? I actually reached a wonderful lady on the US Air France help desk. She finally tracked down the reservation, gave me all the information and explained the workings behind the fine print.

(Non refundable plane tickets. Read the fine print. If you cancel prior to the flight, you are out the cost of the ticket. Not the taxes and fees, just the ticket. It turned out to be cheaper to cancel than to to pay a change fee and rebook). Of course, I could also spend the next six months on a letter writing donnybrook in an attempt to convince them it is all their fault in an effort to recoop that last 10%.

I would rather spend the same time knitting.

Oragami is progressing. By the end of this evening, I completed the back to the arm holes. The patterning is obviously narrower than the front, but I don’t think it is going to bother me. No eyes in the back of my head and I doubt that anyone else is going to see both the front and back at the same time.

The final episode of Captain’s Share by Nathan Lowell was just released and I am plugged in and ready to listen. Good story and some fantastic dialog.

I am making good progress on the Drops Cardigan. Starting with eight balls of yarn, 150 gms has taken me to here.

The first ball of yarn took care of the lower back, the second took me up one front and the third for the second front. Short rows created the curves.

Folded, the sweater looks like this from the front

and like this from the back

placed flat, the upper portion of the back is also knit in garter.

which on close up looks like this,

as I am catching one ridge on each side as I go back and forth. I thought about just knitting it, then sewing a seam under the arms, but really, I don’t see the point. I am considering seriously knitting the sleeves in the round, even with all the purling (I can’t do it by reversing directions since that will affect the patterning) so that I can completely eliminate all sewing….

It starts just before 0600 with a stream of headlights reflecting off my bedroom ceiling. Clearly visible in the now dark mornings, these cars carry British officers off toward their duty at various locations around London. That kind of privilege, car and driver, just amazes me but explains the housing out in the middle of nowhere and families who manage easily on one car in an area with less than ideal train connections. Of course, the children seem to be off at boarding during the week, but that is another story all together.

Me? I live only about a mile from work. I can walk, bicycle, or drive. I picked the later this morning after spending the hour from 0700-0800 listening to Captain’s Share while hill climbing on the treadmill. I have found it pays to be at the gym when it opens since the cadets come blasting in around 0730. Since they have priority during the duty day, I can finish up just as they are done with drills and thrills.

Did I mention that Army/Navy is closing their notions department? 50% off seemed reasonable on some very nice buttons when I strolled over on my lunch break. Nothing fancy here, but a solid stock of Rowan (which means a great price on silky tweed if I can justify it to myself).

Knitting

Fäfner is on hold for the moment till I decide if I go on or frog. This yarn just does not seem to be exactly the right thing for the pattern. Too blah.

Meanwhile, I am keeping myself entertained with one of the Drops Cardigan patterns in a fingering weight yarn. Garter stitch. Seems like there seems to be this Scandinavian tendency toward garter stitch… Rather than knit 5-6 pieces, this will be another exercise in origami. except for the sleeves: garter stitch in the round is just too painful.

and did you notice? Not grey, red, or black……

Since today was a totally boring day, I will, instead, admit that I bought a few things at Ally Pally.

A pack of discontinued colors at a great price (14 skeins)

A bright and cheerful scarf kit

The new Hanne Falkenberg Kit. I am still contemplating swapping out the cream for navy

and last, but certainly not least – a bit of buffalo. Incredibly soft plus I love the color.

Now, I just need a couple of life times…..

The desire to start a new project is just about overwhelming. Pagode, Pyramid and Faery Ring are all done. I have a whole stack of wonderful patterns and books to go with my closet full of yarn.

Two sock kits arrived in the mail this past week (purchase months ago, so they don’t count as new acquisitions). Fäfner has taken a hike and hopefully will turn up soon.

I am holding out strongly and might just dip into the UFO pile since it would be so nice to finish something else. Really, I should be able to ignore the siren singing of yarn, needles, patterns.

I can wait, really, I can.

Maybe.

Meanwhile, Army/Navy (aka House of Fraser) is closing out their yarn department and has everything at 50% off. Since I just went to Ally-Pally, I really don’t need any more yarn.

Do I?

It really was. Normally I get 1-3 SPAMs a day, picked up by the filter. I always check before hitting the delete button just in case there is something there that I might want.

Today, I hit the jackpot. Eleven spams. High point of all time. Couple of them were left over from Final Faery, but the rest were all from Lost Thoughts. Now what on earth in that title triggered off all the Russian SPAMers?

I mean really, did I just get lucky? Would I have gotten the same response from a description of last night’s Mitchiner Lecture followed by a formal dinner at the Mess? How about a description of the RAMC Territorial Army Band (Volunteers)? Of having to run from the house to the car, the car to the Mess in the pouring rain and me with fancy shoes?

Didn’t think so.

Let us see what happens. Maybe if you are lucky, I will show you more than this from Ally-Pally.

I have all these opening lines for essays, discussions, commentaries – whatever you want to call them. They pop into my mind as the start of a conversation at the oddest moments. Usually wehn I am behind the wheel of the car or otherwise engaged so that I have limited acess to recording media. It might be my subconscious working or the confluence of random bits of information that coalesce into a coherent whole.

Today the idea formed as I drove through the front gate on the mile drive to my front door on the way home. When something occurs to me, it is wise to get it down as soon as possible. I have learned through bitter experience that if I don’t stop and capture those thoughts/ideas/sentences they will flee – forever gone and irreplaceable.

There are two possible places to stop on my drive to the house. The first is by a small bridge on the left, a tiny gravel pullover that is normally occupied by fishermen’s cars. The second is on the right as you turn at Queen Victoria and the Cricket Field House.

Choosing the second, I had paper, pen, and an empty mind.

Need to block this critter, but otherwise I am done.

It is heavy, it is warm, and it is big enough to wear as the outer layer

The smudge on the two photos? It is not your eyes, looks like there are dog nose prints on the mirror in Ms Soprano’s room.

This morning I got up, looked outside to see the grey day, and finally stopped shivering after putting on a robe. Not only was it raining, but all hope of being wrong, avoiding the meaning of the steadily decreasing temperatures obviously had not worked. Summer had not come back and no break was in sight. It was obviously time to pack away my summer clothes.

What summer clothes? For that matter, what summer? You might ask and it would be a fair question for the UK. There might have been a bit of summer this year; probably in early August while I was out of country.  According to several at work, it happened in late June/early July.

I have a few summer things: a dress, a linen jacket, a light weight suit. And then there is a pair of shorts, traveling pants, and t-shirts too good for the gym. All in all, a pitiful stack to be moved to the office closet.

To consider changing out my sandals

for sturdier foot gear

Positive? Time for the warmer sweaters,

handknit socks and wool pants

Oh, and my lovely fleece jacket to complement my ACUs. Didn’t do a thing for the rain today, but at least I was not cold.

Faery Ring

Third time is the charm.

The hood shows the real color better

with yesterdays mess up fixed.

Fäfner

turned up in a fairly logical place, considering my habits

and a DH who has been in Germany, San Francisco and Switzerland.

Media

read three books yesterday, started the new Season of Bones, CSI: 10 and previewing Stargate Universe.

Perhaps having iTunes is not such a good thing.

Today has been a comedy of errors or close there to. I was late getting out the door to meet a friend in Guildford to take a train to London in order to participate in a charity treasure hunt.

Late because my knitting bag containing Fäfner seemed to have gone astray. Racing upstairs to round up another long standing project, I bailed for the car. Halfway to Guildford I realized that I did not have my handi.

Ok, the train station is not that big, there are not that many tracks and it should not be that hard to find Mary.

(can you tell already that those were famous last words and I had thoroughtly jinxed myself?)

After parking in the garage and jogging to the station I quickly purchased a ticket and bailed for the track since it was 1145 and we had agreed on the 1147 train. Unfortunately, this is a British train station. Inside the station there are no yellow boards with destinations and tracks organized by departure time. There is only the sign on each platform which is not readable except by standing on that platform. Now, if you regularly depart from a station there is not a problem. You know which track. For a strange, this is a real challenge.

I checked 1 & 2 before running up the stairs to check on the other tracks. No signs, no clues. Going back to the first platform, I then trotted through the tunnel to check each platform vaguely remembering taking a train to Waterloo from Platform 3.

No sight of Mary anywhere and disgusted with myself about the phone, I gave up after 30 minutes figuring there are more expensive lessons in life.  Driving home, the CD player started disc 5 of The Anansi Boys by Neil Gaimen.  If you are not that familiar with the book, this is right at the point where Spider starts completely wrecking Fat Charlie’s life. Some how, it seemed apropos.

My cell phone, sitting smugly on my bedside table had recorded seven missed phone calls and five texts. Mary had been looking for me at the same station, including at the bottom of the stairs to platform 3. Not finding me, she had taken the 1208 to Waterloo. Obviously, there was a good reason I had not seen her for the last portion of my search.

Rather than start to clean the house, I went searching for a puzzle.

There are plenty of stores that are open on Sundays. The store store is not among them. The charity shops are also closed. The only puzzles I found at all were in a discount bookstore. Not wanting 1000 pieces worth of horses running, 18 wheelers or hippopotamuses I dragged my feet back home.

Faery Ring

Now, here was where I was going to tell you all about being finished with Faery Ring. Note the was. Rather than have a hem that went all the way around the hood, I decided that I wanted a slighter wider edging, and only on the actual jacket front.

First side went without difficulty, complete with turning row and neat looking bind off on the inside.

Second side? CSI: Season 10 must have gotten in the way because I picked up too many stitches with a resulting difference in both appearance and length of the sides.

Frog.

Started again, careful to pick up only as many stitches as were needed. Knit the turning row and decided to get a picture for the record, and then one of the bind off.

And I saw this -

Just in case it is not completely obvious, here is a closer look.

Time to go do something else for the remainder of the evening, like burn back up DvDs since I can obviously not be trusted with simple counting, measuring and knitting.

The realities of age 59:

I am now less than 365 days from 60. entering 59 in the treadmill means that it reports my heart rate as elevated a couple of beats lower than it did the day before. And of course, I have my grey hair frosting the top of my brown.

Why is it that the grey seems to hang on tightly and it is the brown stuff that seems to fall out?

Wait, that is not completely true. My hair is half-way down my back and some of the silver has certainly made it that far. There are long grey hairs on my brush along with the brown. It just seems that all the brown that falls out is being replaced with grey.

Should not complain, I think my mother was completely gray by the time she was 40. But then, I am not sure what hair color she really had since artificial color was her friend as far back as I can remember. I am still convinced that dyeing ones hair can not be good for the roots. Can’t convince any of my off-spring that their natural hair color is fine, but I keep on trying. On the other hand, my DH has gone grey for years and he has just left it alone.

Means that we can both claim the off-spring as the source of our grey locks. Never mind that he is following a familial pattern or that the onset of grey is more likely to result from age and only related to the younger crew because we happened to be older when they were born. You get the idea.

Anyway, please remind me of all of this next year if I am not so positive on turning 60.

Meanwhile, I can do puzzles and knit just like someone in their 20s, or 80s. I can continue to avoid housework and take a hike (weather permitting) whenever I want. The Faery Ring has both sleeves and only one inch to go on the hood. Then it will be only the front band and closures to go.

Unlike many other women, I do not have an issue with everyone knowing my age. I just had not planned on announcing my birthday prior to today (Thank you ….Cat..).

Long ago when the world was young, I wasn’t in it. Fast forward a few million or billion years, give or take. Go with a bit less than 57xx if you firmly believe in the non-evolutionary calendar and can just not be dissuaded.  Even a bit more than that and I had been born, survived to adulthood, got through school, married, the Army, children, and living overseas. For after all is said and done, all of us perceive the world from our own unique point of view of which we stand at the center. To pretend otherwise for me would not be particularly honest; my filters of what is important has grown and changed as I have aged.

I am delighted to have made this age. For a long time, several years in fact, I did not think it was going to happen. The only positive that I was willing to tell myself was – gee, if you die young then at least you will not develop Alzheimer’s, be a burden to your kids, or land in a nursing home.

Background is below. Meanwhile, I am keeping my grey hair, wrinkles, and sags as a testament to survival. I hit the gym at 0700 this morning, managed to get something done at work, and will be going to dinner with another US ex-pat and Mr Mole.

I have a wonderful family, good friends, an employer that sends me to interesting places (well, what did you expect me to say about the Army?), and non-work related activities that are satisfying. Life is good.

Back about 14 1/2 years

In 1995, I went in for what was to be routine surgery. Came out minus my thyroid, found it was not routine and had the added discomfort of getting through the next few weeks with few people being able to make eye contact with me. Seems like medical professionals especially do not wish to be smacked in the face with reminders of their own mortality (especially when it is their boss). One, our hospital’s pathologist, was able to see me as a person and Brad and I have remained good friends to this day.

Looking back, I can recognize that I was not completely sane for a while. (Who me? What self respecting doc does not want to see her own path slides and CT scans? We will not discuss getting faint and realizing that detachment wasn’t working.) Adding to it was the joys of dealing with the US system (we need to evac you to Ft Sam for radiation, chem and a bone marrow transplant) vs the German system (well, this particular version of Non-Hodgkin’s is really low grade. 50% survive 5 years. Odds are 1/3, 1/3 1/3. It might go away on its own, it might slowly progress (what it had been doing) or it can morph into something really ugly which is not likely to respond to treatment. Low grade means horrible side effects as there is not much difference between tumor and normal tissue: as many die as a result of the chemo as from the disease. You can always change your mind later if you don’t want treatment now.)

Unlike the other 98% of patients, I elected to wait and see. I had three young children (Ms Maus [you might remember her birth announcement if you were on the Kaffee Klatsch in 1993 or otherwise connected by email back then] was only 6 months old when we moved to Germany for what turned out for the family to be the last time and was now just a bit past 2) and a teenager. I wanted time with them, not to head off to the US (bone marrow mortality=10%) with the potential for future or never to return. It took about 2 years for the peripheral lymphoma cells to clear from my blood: to learn that my parathyroid had been wiped by the same disease process and was never coming back. I made a lot of people unhappy during that time.

It was extremely hard on George, and our eldest who was old enough to understand the issues. It was months before I wasn’t thinking about it every hour, years before I went days without being worried about it coming back. My attitude and coping were made worse by those well intended medical professionals later who questioned the diagnosis since I was alive and apparently disease free (Hello? What part of “confirmed by University of Heidelberg Hem/Onc Center and AFIP do you not understand?).

I am now at the point where even taking my replacement meds for my parathyroid and thyroid are just routine and the reason for doing so has not particular importance. I plan on being around for years to drive the rest of my family crazy. Plus, there is all that fabric yet to sew, yarn to knit and fiber to spin….

A bit of general silliness for the day – there is Twitteleh for the Jewish mom in me.

After all, is there anything more important than knowing where your offspring are? If they are eating properly and … here is the real stickler…. are they warm enough. Makes the cockles of any knitters heart happy to know that you can bundle them up in layers of nice wool to keep them warm.

What? The child is reporting that the outside temperature is 40 C? But it could get cold at night and I am sure there is some air conditioning somewhere in the area. Getting a cold is not a good thing.

And then there is this – provided by my good friend Steven who seems to think that upstate New York is a great place to make your own wine.

And then there are distractions – wonderful distractions which arrive the mail. Some are fuzz (spinable) and others are soft and fluffy (yarn). No, I am not buying new yarn. I joined a couple “Sock a month Clubs” last winter. The packages arrive over the course of the year. Already paid for. I am still saving my pennies, pfennings and cents for Ally-Pally.

Even better? Liberty Puzzles

which are expensive but exquisitely made wooden puzzles with glorious colors and laser cut whimsy pieces

Yes, that is right, old fashion critters and plants and graphic designs. No two pieces are alike. Some parts go quickly, but there are lots and lots (469 of them) really weird looking  pieces. This art is by Phil Lewis. So far the only other puzzle by him is a whole lot bigger than I want to tackle. But I am hopeful. I like his work for this kind of activity.

And finally – Captains Share by Nathan Lowell has been released on Podiobooks (and of course on iTunes).