Slow internet, and life

In the past few days I have started and completed my Dad's hat, bought some new tea, and a new tea cup. Beyond that life and the internet have both been rather slow.

My new tea cup

Dad's hat was a fairly quick work up, the pattern was nice (Turn-a-square hat) and I liked the yarn that I spun myself. The only thing I did not like was that my bamboo circular that I was using started to splinter. Pictures of the hat will come when I get back to school and can use my computer again. 

Bus Rides, Broken Heating, and Maine

Yesterday I took a series of buses home. I started the bus rides at 11:50 and reached where my Dad picked me up a little after 21:00, didn't actually reach home until about 22:00. I hate riding on buses, I always end up sitting next to people, and there are never any good movies. My highlights of the trip are as follows: the first bus being late, sitting next to people, sitting next to the guy with spikes in the shoulders of his shirt, sitting next to the guy wearing suspenders and a T-shirt, having a coughing fit on a bus, having to listen to others cell phone conversation. So much fun, really not worth it.

Currently my house is a bit chilly as the heating isn't working properly, my room is down right cold at times. Also I have the internet working for me, for now at least.

First thing I do when I am at home is go to the library, I now have lots of pleasure reading books. Borrowed on spinning book and one book of tea cozy patterns. 

In good news, I have more yarn for the fish hat. Merlin came home and my cat still likes me(mostly). Did a burn test on some of my yarn in the driveway, rather fun, the results were that one yarn was wool, the other was acrylic.

Also tea is yummy, currently drinking Ginger Peach which is a nice black tea. 

Maine: land of darkness in the fall, it isn't even 16:30 as I type this and it is getting dark already. Beyond that the weather today was nice and so was sleep.

November Day 6 or Election Day

For all of my readers in the US if you have not voted already go do so ASAP. Personally I voted a while ago, absentee ballot, just because this is when I get a say in who run things in the national level and the local level. Also why are human rights up for the vote, just legalize same-gender marriage already Maine. Seriously you would think that this would be legal, it was for a while but there was a citizens veto. I am probably stay up way to late tonight due to watching the results come in. On a more amusing election note, my college has lots of geeks.

Sorry, can't vote for him, wrong side of the ocean.

Me and my Star Wars shirt

My parents sent me my fiber stuff so Merlin is actually spinning things now! Also included in the package was tea, chocolate and other assorted goodies.

Goodies, and backpack

In other news, I hate humanity less right now. The weather looks really nice out but it is cold outside.  Also there have been some sightings of the fighter jets flying overhead. In some really good news, my heat is on and working, my room no longer requires layers to function in! Don't know why it took so long.

Novemer Day 1

First official day of November, I will not be thinking up fun titles for 30 blog posts, I would never sleep then. The last post I did does not count for November as it was meant for October 31. 

Random news for the day, someone on my floor decided to smoke pot in their room yesterday night. They managed to not set off the smoke detectors however the hallway stunk, it is a problem because M is allergic and it stinks.

Oops meant this to be longer. So I decided to take pictures of works in progress, so here they are:

Grandma's Hat

The dishcloth

Other things that hang out in my dorm room:

My teapot and teacup, please ignore the desk mess

My orchid 

My jade plant that I rescued from a kitchenette last spring

Ending one month, beginning another

Ending October is a bittersweet experience. October had its good and bad points. For the good points: we had mountain day, the changing leaves were beautiful, I went to Rocky Horror picture show for the first time, knit, took lots of photos the heron that hangs out at my college.

Let's not go into the bad points as they are kind of sucky, suffice to say that parts of October were horrible.

In happier news, I have been making progress on my brother's hat, except I am now running out of yarn (pretty sure that I have more at home).

Yes, I have Star Wars sheets

It really doesn't look like a fish yet.

I went to a Halloween concert and there was someone dressed as Loki from the Avengers, so I got him to hold the hat! Not sure why all my friends weren't really impressed that I managed to get a boy to hold my knitting (I go to a women's college, not many men).

Other then that I have started on a hat that I will give as a xmas gift (Grandma) and I have started to make dishcloths.

The Rocky Horror Picture Show was fun and rather amusing. I did wear a mini-skirt however it was accompanied by leggings as it was a little cold to be wearing just a mini-skirt. M wore a red dress I have (I don't really wear it) and her really big boots, which are beyond awesome.

When Hurricane Sandy came through thankfully all we had was some wind and rain, the college kept power the entire time and we had a day off. Of course a portion of the day was used to text back and forth with my family to make sure everyone was ok. My only prep for the storm was setting up contact plans in case of no power, making coffee, and bringing my bike in. My bike lived the entirety of Sandy in my closet, I have also finally named my bike it is now officially known as Kilgharrah, the dragon from Merlin.

I have also on occasion been attempting to drink obscene amounts of teas, in some very interesting combos. Trying to remember to drink non-caffeinated things before bed can be a little hard when you have black teas that you like.

Next up, November, the month of Thanksgiving and the bus ride to home and the cat (dogs too). In November I will be trying to blog every day for the entire month.

Also if you haven't seen this you should watch it now!

School

I got back to college last Sunday, after much packing, and moved in with my roommate. We actually live in a suite, have separate rooms with one door to the hallway. I am in the same dorm as last year, on the north side and the third floor.

My Dorm, from the hill.

Once I got everything in the room, I started to unpack, that was the easy part. The hard part was the decorating. It is mostly done, just the entry way needs to be decorated. Above my bed I strung some multi-colored christmas lights, only half the string works, and it looks so cool.

My bed with lights and posters

Other neat things found on campus include: lots of turtles, two types even, and pretty plants, also a paper mache and duct tape Kermit head.

Plants by Prospect

Turtles on a log

Baby Snapper

Kermit

In semi good news, my orchid is growing two mini orchid of course this is because the main plant is a little dead; but we're all good. My jade plant seems to be very happy on his window sill. My roommate gave me a mostly dead rose plant that I managed to finish off.

The mystery knitting is going along quite well, I have stated on the next phase of it. I crocheted myself a new soap bag after my old one was retired, it is a fairly simple pattern that takes no time to make.

Other than that I have been going to class, drinking large amounts of peppermint tea, doing homework, watching Doctor Who, and practicing getting on my bed without a running jump. I lofted my bed up high enough for my fridge to fit under the bed. That was so that I had enough room in the room as one of my closets is taken up by a wardrobe that I named Narnia.

With that I give you:

Yes, that is the tune of Little Drummer Boy

Internet, Power outages, and other random stuff

Lately at my house we have been having issues with our internet. If you can connect at all it is slow and spotty at best and there are periods where any attempt to connect fails. At one point we also had some issues with the phone. Not being able to get on the internet makes getting in contact with the rest of the world rather difficult, also watching Doctor Who is rather difficult when the internet is down and you don't get BBC on the tv. Course we haven't gotten any worth while channels on the tv in a while, 2 channels only. Also my email has issues.

Today when I went into town to pick up my paycheck the power for the area went out. The store where my dad works was roasting coffee at the time and the coffee roaster filled the store with smoke when the fans in it stopped working. Burnt coffee is a rather interesting smell. Also the traffic lights went out, that made crossing the intersection an exercise in nerves, it was rather fun. I think I might need to replace my sanity, it seems to have stopped working properly.

 After power was restored I went and bought some tea, and a bamboo whisk.

I have been working slowly on my project that shall not be shared or named. It is going pretty well. Of course it is the only knitting that is getting done.

I apparently have a talent for making the internet not work. Seriously it is getting ridiculous how not working the internet is. I give up, will get a better post up later when the internet works.

Work, tea, and geekery

I started my summer job at the library last week, and it has been taking up most of my time. My evenings are mostly spent reading, watching movies and generally being antisocial. Working at a small town library is rather fun as you get to know many of the regulars, or you already know them from other places. 

The Library

 

The children section has a boat called Booklogged

Beyond work I have been drinking large amounts of tea, especially in the mornings. Mostly drinking black and green teas. I have a black tea from Kenya that makes a wonderful iced tea, it has the right amount of bitter and flavor to hold up to being cold. It is best if made in my glass jar in the sun. The green tea that I drink the most is a pomegranate green tea so that it doesn't get really bitter but also not too sweet or fruity.

My random geekery of the week was partitioning the hard drive of my laptop. Most of the partitioning was spent with me growling at my computer to work and basically bribing it alternating with swearing at it. It had to restart all the time. 

 Now I can run Windows 7 or my regular Mac OSX! Also I can play Battle for Middle-Earth again.

The making of my army continues, I have completed one Weeping Angel and it is rather cute. My cat liked it so much she licked it multiple times, I thought that she was going to eat it briefly.

They get along well.

So I guess that my cat will be using my army to get rid of the dogs.

In other crafting news, one of my coworkers is pregnant so I am crocheting her a baby blanket and if I have time I will knit a sweater. The blanket is a rather easy and somewhat mindless stitch to do so it is a good pattern for when I am on the computer. My mom is getting another scarf for her birthday, I say another because she keeps requesting the scarf in different yarns. This will be her third scarf of this pattern.

This is her first scarf in the pattern. Mom is not the penguin.

My mom was out somewhere and found this:

Yes those are toilets as a rainbow, some with stuff growing in them. Somedays Maine is really entertaining to live in. It is also really pretty when the weather is nice and the bugs aren't out.

Nutella Day

Today was World Nutella Day and so to celebrate my friends and I had a Nutella and tea party, complete with fancy dress. Much Nutella and tea was consumed, good company was had by all.

The tea and nutella

The friends:

The awesome one/ The one with the lamps

The picture of the DJ (Co-Host/ Owner of the dorm room)

The awkward picture

Knitting has also been moving along quite well with over a foot on Missy's shawl and the yarn is working quite wonderfully for the pattern. The pattern is Milk Run Shawl found on Ravelry. For those who don't know Ravelry is an awesome website for knitters and crocheters. 

The shawl, photo taken using photo booth and it is not the best picture ever.

The pattern is rather simple, as it calls for straight garter stitch though I have changed that to stockinette to save yarn and to make telling the sides from each other easier. 

In other news the laundry got done and was even put away quickly, this is a major accomplishment as I really don't like doing laundry because it takes time and money. But on the positive side my wardrobe is constantly expanding as I raid the free bins for new clothing. Free bins are where other students put the clothes that they don't want for whatever reason and others take them to wear/ repurpose into other things. The use of the free bins have netted my friends many new clothes that are basically new and other highly useful things (lamps). I am the proud owner of a desktop gargoyle whose name is Sauron because his eyes glow red. 

Hopefully this works

Also I officially dislike Super Bowl Sunday, too loud for proper concentration.