I wish the English language had a gender-neutral pronoun one could use to refer to a person. "It" is not correct, and "one" is too archaic. Sometimes I just use "they", and try to refrain from wincing.

I'm still knitting these days, and liking it. Tuesday nights I go to my local yarn shop, Northwest Handspun Yarns, for Knit Night. I've finished quite a few small projects already, but gave away most of them. Recently completed projects include:

- Pair of lace socks that I gave to my sister. They were supposed to be for me, but they ended up slightly too small for me.

- A cap and a pair of little socks for my coworker's newborn baby.

- A pair of red fingerless gloves - for me!

I am still knitting the sweater for jkling. Perhaps it will be finished in time for this year's cold season. Also, I'm about to dive into my first Fair Isle project: a tam.

... that I have glasses.

A week before my birthday in April I tried to renew my driver license. The DMV declared me unfit to drive due to impaired vision, and told me to get my eyes checked. That's how I discovered my LASIK surgery had stopped working. This happened as we were preparing to visit the Philippines for my grandmother's 95th birthday. Fortunately jkling was unconcerned about driving overseas, since he was the chauffeur the whole time we were in the Philippines.

Back State-side it was a different story. Quoth jkling, "You better get your eyes checked, 'cause I ain't driving you around forever, Miss Daisy!" Well, Miss Daisy finally has glasses. For driving I have some huge sunglasses that fit over my regular glasses, courtesy of bookish_girl_. They're kinda dorky, but very effective.

If you think I've been ignoring LJ for weeks, you're right. I have a full-time job right now that involves a lot of work on the computer. The last thing I want to do when I get home is stare at another computer monitor. But I miss y'all! So I will try to make time to read my friends page at least once a week.

So what have I been doing besides work?

Playing Bioshock on the Xbox 360. My first serious foray into the world of first-person shooters. Such games usually make me barfy, but Bioshock's story line was compelling enough to keep me playing until I got past the queasiness.

I'm currently knitting a sweater for jkling. The back is half-finished, and I will soon get to the part where I start shaping for the armholes. I knit every morning on the bus to work, every Tuesday at my local yarn shop's knit night, at our weekly D&D sessions, and sometimes in the evenings or at lunch time.

I have resolved to start exercising regularly. Last night I spent some quality time on the exercise bike. I'm going to do this two or three times a week. I also plan to resume my DDR habit. That's Dance Dance Revolution for you non-video game players.

Last Saturday I went to mcjulie and paulcarp's annual Hallowe'en party. This year had a zombie theme. My costume was (still-living) advocate for zombie suffrage. I dressed up in a flashy blazer and a straw hat adorned with mini-zombies, and pestered all the party-goers with earnest patter about the disenfranchisement of zombies in the USA. I also passed out handbills printed with slogans like "Votes for Zombies!" and "One Zombie, One Vote!"

The other day I saw a poster at my local yarn shop advertising Opal brand Harry Potter und der Halfblutprinz Pullover und Sockenwolle. That is, a line of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince-themed sock wool from Opal yarns. There are several colorways for Harry, Ron, even frigging Tonks, but no Hermione colorway! Boo, hiss!

Happy Birthday, terminusest!

It's 9:30 on a Friday night, and I'm about to go to bed. I bet I wake up at 6:00 am tomorrow too.

This is my second or third time to go to the annual Greek food fest. This year I got a gyro for lunch and loukoumades for dessert. Loukoumades are basically fried dough drenched in honey and sprinkled with cinnamon. Best eaten fresh out of the fryer. Mmm, Greek food.

Two things that make me happy about tomorrow:

• It's Friday, duh!
• Greek food fest - yummy

Current projects:

• knitting a toddler hat for charity
• crocheting a hat with huge yarn for my brother
• knitting a sock for jkling
• knitting a sweater using a Red Cross pattern from World War 2

Unfinished tasks:

• laundry, neverending
• sweeping floor, not done in ages
• arranging stuff on media shelf
• arranging stuff on bookshelves
• catching up on personal e-mail and lj

So far my Fight Club DVD has refused to play on:
- the Xbox 360
- the Marital Aid (aka my laptop computer)

The special features disc plays no problem. This would be weirdly symbolic, but I can't be bothered by such things when I'm jonesing for a Fight Club fix. I may have to hook up the good ol' DVD player to the TV.

jkling and I are off to make raspberry jam with dangerdaisy. I am bringing two knitting projects (a nearly-done wine bottle cozy, and a half-finished sock), a knitting magazine, and the dog. These may all be abandoned in favor of dangerdaisy's latest acquisition: Wii Fit.

What happened to summer? It's grey and drizzly enough to be fall!

I think the alarm clock, aka our dog Rodeo, may be getting the hang of weekends. On Sunday he didn't come into the bedroom until 9am. I had been reading in bed since 8:30, wondering where he was. Today being Monday, I had my cell phone alarm set. When it went off at 6am, in bounded rowdeeoh, ready for his walk!

List 5 things which are basic common knowledge in your culture, which people outside are unfamiliar with. This is not about obscurity, but something everyday to you, that others go "bzuh?" at.

1. It is traditional for the groom's family to pay for a couple's wedding. This includes the cost of the bridesmaids' dresses.
2. Unmarried people frequently live with their parents.
3. At the workplace, birthday celebrants customarily buy ice cream for their coworkers.
4. If you wear clean white tennis shoes, your friends will try to stomp on them to make them dirty.
5. You can buy cigarettes by the stick from roaming street vendors.

I have finally seen The Dark Knight, the latest Batman movie. Definitely worth watching at full price! Just ignore the movie physics and movie biology. Heath Ledger was great as the Joker, somehow able to deliver hokey comic-book lines without being gagworthy.

I had to go to the dentist today to get some decay taken care of. Right by the gumline on one of my upper right molars. Now that it's fixed, I may feel less painful sensitivity to cold in that area.

I need to go back twice more. One of my existing fillings appears to have some sort of chip in it. Also, x-rays revealed two more cavities that need filling.

The weather turned wet and grey just in time for the weekend. What will become of the Chalk Art Festival scheduled today?

In the "Things we do for dogs" category: jkling and I had brunch at the Mount Bakery. Even though it was chilly and grey, we sat outside so Rodeo could be with us.

I would love to do the Bite of Bellingham going on right now, but I don't want to spend any more money today.

Watched the movie Mamma Mia! the other night with jjuggler and dangerdaisy. A thoroughly silly, utterly fun movie that you can sing along with! How can you go wrong with ABBA songs?

Still on my to-watch list: the X-Files movie and the latest Batman movie.

A couple of weeks ago I started a temporary job in HR at the company where dangerdaisy and bookish_girl_ work. (jjuggler is also working there for the summer, so we joke about finding jobs for all the skiffy-club members.) So far so good, although I do miss the interpreting jobs. I've had to turn down several because I'm working full-time. I don't miss interpreting for car insurance phone calls though.

I have started knitting a pair of socks for jkling. I can usually get in a good 10-20 minutes of knitting while riding the bus to work in the mornings.

Having a dog means I've been walking a lot, especially when jkling is out of town (as he is right now). I usually walk the dog in the mornings, and sometimes go with jkling when he walks the dog in the evenings. Exercise is good, right?

This was the view from our campsite at the Signal Mountain Campground, Grand Teton National Park. These pictures were supposed to be stitched together into one panorama, but for some reason did not upload that way. Just pretend you're panning from left to right.

( And now for the pictures )