This is why I can't have nice things

Stoopid Parker, sleeping on my soon-to-be new sweater. It's a damned good thing he's cute.

Of course, maybe I shouldn't have left it on the couch.

I'll never get tired of this

I'm sitting here watching the last episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 6 (my latest TV obsession), when I noticed the coolest thing:

Mattress stitch. It never gets old.

And maybe I should eat some dinner. Because clearly, I've had a lot of wine.

But seriously, a seam that makes it look like the knitting didn't stop? Cool.

Two months without socks

I just realized that I haven't worked on a sock since December 26, 2010. Wow. But, there's a reason for that.

A while ago, I talked about making vests. Well, I finished knitting one about a month ago, but I got busy on Monday (Louis Riel Day, how I love you) and sewed it up.

I am quite pleased. It is a welcome addition to my work wardrobe. Details are here, for those who are inclined.

And in more non-sock news, I made it! Done the day after the initial deadline, but the shower has been postponed for two weeks. I'll have to wash this lovely wee blanket again to get the smell of my house out of it before the Sunday afternoon of wine and tiny sandwiches, but I'm quite pleased with the blanket (I'm definitely using Frankie's patterns again; they are so much fun). The wee nipper it's destined for is pretty cute as well. I wish the blanket and the baby a long and happy life together.

Ten-stitch blanket

Completing the blanket was delayed when I realized that I had a birthday gift to knit with the perfect yarn sitting in my stash. I whipped this off in a week:I don't normally knit with red, and I certainly don't knit with acrylic. But, this was fun, and I'm pretty sure it was appreciated. Perhaps I should break out of my comfort zone more often.

So.... socks. It's time to have a reasonably-sized portable project.

Children paying for the sins of their parents

I happened to be listening to CBC's As It Happens tonight while I was making my dinner. I like the human interest stories; it makes for educational listening while I am puttering.

Well, I did not like what I heard tonight. In fact, this clip (starting at about 20:36) made me angry. The guest was state senator for Arizona, Mr. Ron Gould.

He just sponsored legislation proposing that anchor babies are not US citizens and should be deported, along with their parents. He wants the ACLU to get mad, sue, and hopefully take this to the Supreme Court.

I have a few problems with what Mr. Gould had to say.

First of all, those kids did not ask to be born in the United States. How can sending them back to a country that they do not know, may not speak the language serve any purpose except to frighten, dis-enfranchise and possibly alienate children (!) that are probably perfectly aware of how precarious life is? They are children.

Second of all, those horrible illegal aliens that so thoughtfully got pregnant and had those babies (and this isn't right, not by a long shot) work shitty jobs, pay dis-proportionate taxes (because they don't file income tax returns), go without health care (and that's a whole other discussion), and accept deplorable working conditions because they do not dare protest.

Thirdly, the cost of educating these children is a straw-man argument. A whopping... what was it, $9,200 to educate a child that will grow up, get a job, and pay taxes for the rest of hir life. Yup, that's a rotten return on investment (also, $9,200 to educate a child? No wonder your teachers are living in poverty).

Lastly, you, Mr. Fuckwad (oops, I mean Gould), don't like brown people. You are a racist. You may say that you aren't going to be baited into a race argument, but by avoiding the question in such a hostile manner, you are indeed showing yourself to be racist. We all know the white people coming down from Canada "for the weather" are not who you are really interested in. It's those brown people from Mexico, cleaning your hotel rooms, driving your taxis, building your houses that are the real problem you hope to solve. Solve what, I don't know. Seems to me that they are doing the jobs that you aren't desperate enough to do.

Mr. Fuckwad (oops, I mean Gould), it's people like you that gives The United States of America a bad name. You, and elected officials like you, consider yourselves the leader of the free world, whatever that is. Do me a favour. Stay home, stop bossing the rest of the planet around, and keep your racism to yourself.

Now that Stargate is over (for now)

OK, I've worked my way through the ten seasons of Stargate SG1, two of the three movies and the five seasons of Stargate Atlantis. I stopped by the downtown HMV to pick up the first season of Stargate Universe. I left it there because it was $49.99. That exceeds my threshold of what I will pay for DVDs. So, that will wait. Or, I will get it on Ebay for hopefully much less.

So, I'm getting back to audio books. A while ago, I asked my dear beloved peeps at LSG to suggest epic science fiction/fantasy novels. You know, the kind that create whole new worlds, span multiple volumes, take over your dreams and leave you gasping for more. Things like The Sword of Truth or Song of Ice and Fire. You see, I had gotten the first three volumes of The Belgariad from the library, but the final two volumes were unavailable. I was forced to turn to Audible, and thought I should get some suggestions for my next selections from people I trust.

LSG delivered. Holy smokes, I was blown away by the number of responses and how movingly they wrote about the books. I compiled them into a spreadsheet, with the number of as marking how often that particular author/book/series was mentioned.

If I do a search on for epic fantasy, I get 490 results. It's remarkable how many match the recommendations I got.

I'm thinking Wheel of Time next. Or perhaps The Lies of Locke Lamora. Whatever it is, it will be many, many hours spent with headphones in and hands knitting.