Crocheted bracelet

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Knit update

Two horizontal sections done




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Knit update

First horizontal row of color




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logic through the ages

I'm reading Andersonville, a memoir of a Civil War POW, and came upon this passage:

All whom we met were eager to discuss with us the causes, phases and progress of the war, and whenever opportunity offered or could be made, those of us who were inclined to talk were speedily involved in an argument with crowds of soldiers and citizens. But, owing to the polemic poverty of our opponents, the argument was more in name than in fact. Like all people of slender or untrained intellectual powers they labored under the hallucination that asserting was reasoning, and the emphatic reiteration of bald statements, logic.

Applicable today.

Knit update

Done with the border




After knitting the whole thing, I'll fold over the border and sew it, sort of like this:





But I have much to do before then -- tomorrow I begin COLOR from this promising pile:



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New knit project

Starting a throw blanket for (the other) Sarah. Here is the progress I was able to make on the drive back from Maine:








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Web flight

Did you ever read Charlotte's Web? Charlotte's children climb to the top of (whatever), spin some silk, and fly away.

I just saw it happen. Sitting on Nick and Sarah's front steps (Bob is helping put in a walkway), I noticed a little spider that kept climbing up my leg (and I kept removing her and placing her in the grass). A while later I saw her at the top of the railing, and before I could blink, she had launched herself over my head. I watched her cross the yard, hovering 4 to 3 to 2 feet, before I lost sight of her.


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Time travel

Driving north to Maine, going back in time, seeing the hawthorn bloom again


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End

Finished reading John Adams just after midnight. Now bereft.


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Shiva's Eye

Turns out, the filed-shell jewelry (usually a cabochon) that I love has a name: Shiva's Eye. It is the operculum of many shelled marine animals.

Also true

In last night's dream, I told a friend about a dream.

True story

Last night I dreamed that I was sleeping.

incredible book

...unfortunately one of those things that make me despair of ever making something worthwhile myself! just LOOK at this!

Really, the only possible flaw is that the type is not embroidered, too.

separated at birth: music edition

Sometimes I mix up Jack Johnson and Jason Mraz. Am I a bad person?

Try this jewelry

http://jmnt.me/hGyfSR

(no commitment necessary)

(don't like it? no harm, no foul)

Spider Mating Dance

too funny -- how does evolution come up with these things??? Good stuff starts at around 2 minutes.

too lazy to look it up

Ordinals question: why are the ordinal forms of "one" and "two" "first" and "second"? (instead of, say Onth and Twain or whatever)

what are the roots of "first" and "second," I guess is my question.

books and TV

still loving John Adams -- and being entertained by hints of Jefferson, too:

Alone is his upstairs parlor at Seventh and Market, Jefferson went to work, seated in an unusual revolving Windsor chair and holding on his lap a portable writing box, a small folding desk of his own design which, like the chair, he had had specially made for him by a Philadelphia cabinetmaker.

At which point, of course, I had to put the book down and find this video:

and bless, again, Dame Maggie Smith.

music tastes: a taste

I still haven't gotten very far in sorting out my thoughts about good/bad music, etc., let alone writing them down.

But here's a quote from Tina Fey (she was responding to a man saying women aren't funny):

“It is an impressively arrogant move to conclude that just because you don’t like something, it is empirically not good. I don’t like Chinese food, but I don’t write articles trying to prove it doesn’t exist.”

So that's sort of my riff when it comes to music collections and value and time. More to come (honest).

I'm such a sap

but this is so awesome:

Surprise song trio

The wood song
Wooden ships
Woodstock


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morning bird report

Our juncos are still in town (yay! I love their coloring and spunk), the goldfinches joined us a week or two ago, and this morning we have house finches. I've heard the nuthatches in the neighborhood, but they may be mad at us for taking down the trees, I haven't seen them.

font decisions

this is awesome:


http://julianhansen.com/files/infographiclarge_v2.png

what he said

You know what interferes with my writing? Good writers.

Because I read something like this, from Ryan O'Connell (requoted by Andrew Sullivan, as usual):

Here’s what it comes down to: Any victim of sexual assault is in no way responsible for the attack. “Oh, I apologize that my super cute dress from Zara caused you to force yourself on me. Next time I’ll wear a burka!” As fucking if. How does anyone expect women to advance as a gender if we subscribe to these rules?

and I think, Ditto. Why come up with my own screed when someone has already done it so well? (I'm thinking of you, Tracy -- ditto to everything you write...)

I mean, really

I was just googling whether the post office will close if the govt shuts down.

WTF, if the govt SHUTS DOWN???

How is this something that any sane person will accept?

How are we not fomenting revolution a la Adams and Jefferson?

We have water treatment plants, roads, mail, hospitals, snow removal, police and fire -- all paid for by our taxes and set up long ago. The idiots don't need to even think about that stuff.

So they can use our money to bomb Libya and limit abortion rights, BUT THEY CAN'T BALANCE A FRICKING BUDGET?????

you know what else?

Why do we have such a bunch of idiots in our government that they can't just run something that's totally been set up for them for years? And why are we so blithely letting them stay there?

(and yes, I mean all of them. beloved obama is pissing me off)

what is opinion, what is truth, what is good, what is popular

Freddie Deboer, requoted by Andrew Sullivan (re-requoted by me):

I worry about the urge towards conformity. I worry about Twitter. I worry that all of those retweets and all of those "right on"s contribute to a kind of coarse postmodernism, where what the truth becomes what is most agreed on. I worry that dissent is confused with a lack of etiquette. And I particularly worry about the echo chamber effect, and the way that small groups of people who are just like each other can come to think of themselves as representing the opinions of everyone.

I'm thinking of a reply post to Tracy's "music machine" (http://bighipsopeneyes.blogspot.com/2011/04/music-machine.html), about changing tastes (through time, through our lives) and why we devalue things in our past. Whether music that is loved is good by definition. Whether someone (anyone, even a music connoisseur) is justified in throwing someone else's CD out the window.

Stay tuned... 

Snap Time!

I'm going to have to make a special snap category just for the new york times, they've been messing up so often! Is it budget cuts?

Today's online front page story:

"The United States Supreme Court on Tuesday morning granted a temporary stay of execution to Cleve Foster, a former Army recruiter convicted of killing a woman he met in a Fort Worth bar who was scheduled to be executed Tuesday evening in Texas. It is the second time he has been spared hours before his appointed death by the Supreme Court."

what a coincidence! he met a woman who was scheduled to be executed, too?!

good news in sunglasses

I just read on The Sartorialist that Wayfarers are back! They are my all-time favorite sunglasses style.


http://www.thesartorialist.com/photos/22511GDlaugh0468Web1.jpg

Snap Time!

I am disheartened to give a sad snap to David McCullough (and his copyeditors):

"...Adams was Jefferson's senior, both in years and political experience."

On the bright side, the book correctly spells the possessive of Adams.