The older I get, the more of a Scrooge I become. I’m sorry! I know some people absolutely love Christmas/the holiday season, but I’ve never been that way, even as a child. It’s weird, but I guess as an adult I associate Christmastime with so many bad periods in my life, so whenever it rolls around the following year, I just feel…blah. I’d call it winter blues, except I actually enjoy cold weather now and bundling up in sweaters and coats and scarves…

Work is still going pretty well. The library job helps to balance out the crapola at my day job. The head librarian is throwing a holiday party on December 8, which I might go to. I’m off that whole day, and I need to take Autumn back to the vet that morning for her booster shots.

I feel really sad lately about my dogs–I hardly see them during the week anymore, though I say good morning and good night to them every day and give them pats and kisses and snuggles, it’s just not the same. I used to have them around me constantly in NM, to the point where they would sit next to me while I knit or watched DVDs, and it was so comforting. I would do laundry and Autumn would follow me around the house, literally. (Orion was usually sprawled out on the couch or tiles.) I would go from room to room and Autumn would shadow me. Then if I had to go to the bathroom or something, she would actually lie down outside the closed door and wait until I came out! Soooo sweet. I miss that. Now that I work so much, I’m gone an awful lot, and I barely see them during the week. Also, I haven’t been able to work with Autumn on the leash the way I was doing daily, and it seems she has forgotten her training because she pulled me around when we went to the vet a couple weeks ago…sigh. I feel horrible, like I am neglecting them, because I do think of myself as a dog parent and it’s like I’m being a deadbeat dog mommy! My parents help take care of them when I’m at work, but they don’t play with the dogs–just feed them and clean up after them. And dogs really need some love and attention. I’ve noticed a change in Autumn–she seems more sedate now, though still happy to see me at the end of the day…holy crap, I feel like crying right now! I need to stop. I keep telling myself that I’m working so much in order to be able to give them AND myself a better life for the future, but it doesn’t feel right lately. I don’t know anymore.

See, the holidays are so melancholy for me because people talk about “cheer” and “joy” and all this, but all I feel is sad about a lot of things. It’s hard to explain. I want to feel joyful and celebratory, but since I don’t really have a strong connection to family or religion anymore, I just feel…kind of empty, I guess. I’ve reverted into my shell during the day–in the mornings I listen to podcasts and knit while sitting in my car before work, and do the same during lunch break. It keeps me distracted, but obviously not enough.

It just seems like I am wasting away, not just mentally or whatever, but kind of physically, too. I’m not even 30 yet but my health isn’t all that great. This Saturday I have to get my blood drawn again for my cholesterol re-screening (can you believe it’s almost been 3 months?), and I highly suspect that it’s still going to be high. I’m sort of dreading it, but then I dread a lot of things like my day job and working so much in general and mean people I have to deal with and the holidays and all sorts of things. Melancholy and dread. Not exactly comfort and joy, right?

I hope all this subsides, I hope that I can pull myself out of this rut long enough to get to a point where I don’t need to have two jobs anymore, where I can sit and knit with a dog on each side of me, and just feel content. It’s awfully lonely where I am right now.

Posted: November 28th, 2007 under Deep Thoughts, My So-Called Life.
Comments: 5

My fellow knitters,

I resisted valiantly for 3 months and 3 weeks and my yarn diet is officially over. I decided to reward myself for my self-imposed yarn buying abstinence by buying yarn this Thanksgiving weekend. Can you believe I made it this long?

I had to go to the yarn shop anyway to buy supplies for someone’s Christmas gift, who shall remain nameless because she reads this blog, and so I can’t catalog the yarn or the project in Ravelry because she will see it! But suffice it to say that I think it’s going to be a very cool project, if I can pull it off, that is. hehe!

While I was at the shop, I had the chance to fondle some Colinette Jitterbug, which I hadn’t seen in person before. But it was the ShibuiKnits Sock that really drew me in. I bought two skeins in Peacock, which will make some lovely lace socks. And that’s all I bought, along with the yarn and needles for the gift project. I was worried I would gorge myself and spend hundreds of dollars (because that has happened before, albeit a long time ago), but I tempered myself and only bought what I really wanted.

I need to go do laundry now so I don’t have a photo to show off, but just wanted to post and say that the yarn diet was successful! Originally, I had set a goal of 1 month, and I made it nearly 4 months! I’m proud.

Posted: November 25th, 2007 under Knitting.
Comments: 4

My PersonalDNA Report

I think that’s pretty accurate!

Posted: November 23rd, 2007 under Q & A.
Comments: none

Happy Thanksgiving! I began the day by waking up early around 7:30–why?! It’s my day off!–so I ate breakfast and went back to sleep. I slept from about 8:30 AM till 3:30 PM. Not kidding. All the sleep I’ve been missing lately finally caught up with me. Unfortunately, what tends to happen when I sleep for that long is that I get a headache, which I did today. But I popped an Aleve and had Thanksgiving food, and all was well.

I do plan on going Christmas shopping tomorrow, though not at the ungodly hour that some people are waking up. Can you believe that places like JC Penney and Old Navy will be open at 4 and 5 AM, respectively? That’s INSANE. All in the name of consumerism, you know! geez. Anyway, I do need to find gifts for my parents and sisters, but I’m going around 10 AM or so. There will be some good deals, and I need all the sales I can find, lol.

I’ve been watching the Ghost Hunters marathon this afternoon–apparently it started at 8 this morning but I really didn’t miss anything since I have all the dvds anyway!

I vaguely remember knitting on my Secret of the Stole this morning before I konked out and went to sleep…I’d like to work on it tonight, but I still feel kind of tired, so I think I’ll just relax and watch more TV. I don’t know how I’ll be able to get to sleep tonight though, after my uber-nap that I took today!

Posted: November 22nd, 2007 under My So-Called Life.
Comments: 6

…as in Benadryl and exhaustion.

For some reason, I got a raging sinus headache earlier this morning while I was working at the library. I thought maybe it was a normal headache due to being hungry or something, but then later in the day, the headache went away (thanks to some Aleve) and was replaced with congestion. I popped two Benadryl and now have an alternating runny/stuffy nose. Also, the Benadryl has really gone to my head, so if this post makes hardly any sense, it is because I have medicine head.

Today I went to work–Sundays at the library are so nice because I work before we open, so there are no patrons there and I can be noisy if need be! Also, I get to leave at 12:30 and get other stuff done, which is really nice. M and I went to a restaurant we hadn’t been to before and that was pretty good. After that we went to Target since I needed a few things…I found a cute thermal shirt on sale as well as a case for my BlackBerry. Also bought things like a new toothbrush and Nylabones for my doggies, stuff like that.

I came home and spent about an hour balancing my checkbook because I had procrastinated for about two weeks and hadn’t balanced it at all…I was somehow off by $0.58, not sure how that happened but I didn’t care much and made the adjustment.

Tomorrow morning, I’m going to get my official library ID badge, kind of exciting because it will be really official. Today was my last day of training with my co-worker…so we won’t work the same shift ever again! She’s going back to day shift and I’ll be there at night. We will still have contact with each other, just not in person. I’m kind of sad about that because I enjoyed working with her.

ok, I need to go lie down and take a nap or something…it’s too early to go to bed though, if I sleep now I’ll wake up at 3 AM or something. oh, my parents moved their treadmill into my old bedroom (it used to be in the den, where my dogs sleep), so I’m going to try to use it every morning from now on. I used to walk at a park after work, but that was before my second job and now I simply don’t have time to exercise. I have to go back to the lab in 3 weeks to get my bloodwork redrawn for my cholesterol rescreening…I’m afraid it’s still going to be high…time to get back into oatmeal and exercising! I hope I can pull it off before I go back to the doctor, haha!

oh and this week is a short work week of 3 days due to the Thanksgiving holiday, yippee! I am soooo happy about that! Now that’s something to be thankful for.

Posted: November 18th, 2007 under My So-Called Life.
Comments: 3

I think lack of sleep is really starting to get to me–I just looked out the window and thought it was raining. Then I looked again, and it seems to be clear. Then I looked *again,* and it appeared to be raining. So I have no idea if it really is or not!

My job at the library is going really, really well. Like, way better than I hoped it would! It is such a pleasant surprise. It’s probably too early to say “I love that job” but I enjoy it very much so far. Way better than my day job of late, but that’s another story.

We’re doing this learning exercise at the library called Learning 2.0 and it’s basically an overview of different Web 2.0 technologies–Blogger, YouTube, MySpace, etc. Completely easy for me but not so much for my new co-worker! So she and I were working on that last night and she was so happy that I knew what to do because she would have been totally lost otherwise. So I was happy to help! As part of the course, we had to create our own blogs so I have yet another blog out there on the Web. It’s on wordpress.com and I’ll probably link to it once I get it looking a little spiffier.

I’m kind of getting into a new routine and schedule, but it’s taking time to get used to. I don’t get much sleep (probably around 6 hours a night, and I never really feel “rested” unless I have at least 8). However, in the past few days I have made time to knit, which I wasn’t doing the first week of the second job. I’m working on my Secret of the Stole, but am still behind a couple clues. Also, I finally cast on my second Austermann Step stockinette sock when I realized they would make great work socks!

That’s pretty much my life lately…wake up, breakfast, maybe some knitting, work, lunch, work, drive to job #2, work, go home, eat, and try to unwind by giving my puppies some kisses and watching Ghost Hunters on perpetual repeat. I feel like a zombie most days but keep telling myself it’s temporary. I’ll get my first paycheck from the library on the 30th, so I’m really looking forward to that!

Posted: November 15th, 2007 under My So-Called Life, Working Girl.
Comments: 3

If socks can be classy, I think these are. I never posted a pic of these as a WIP, and now they’re done! I know they’re not my usual variegated socks, but these will be worn at work and will match everything I wear.

They are the Raindrop Lace Socks from Fiber Trends–this pattern is very well written, without errors, which I appreciate very much! I will be buying more FT patterns in the future. I used Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Sock in Chocolate, 2 skeins, but I had a bit left over from each skein, which is why I love LL–so much yardage! I was surprised that the pattern called for size 2 dpns because I normally knit Shepherd Sock on 1s–but the socks fit me perfectly.

Something kind of funny that happened when I was decreasing for the toe? I DROPPED a stitch. aggghh! Thankfully, I SAW the dropped stitch and picked it up–it only dropped about two rows down, so was easy to fix, but good grief! Can you imagine if I had kitchenered (is that a word?) the toe closed, only to discover the dropped stitch then? But I saw it, and fixed it, so it was ok.

Posted: November 11th, 2007 under Knitting.
Comments: 4