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In which I acquire a bicycle

I got a bike! It is the awesomest bike ever.

It’s a Trek Navigator 3.0 and it rides like a dream with built in suspension. It even has a bell. Once I get into better shape with it I plan on using it to bike all over the place. Today I biked up to the Iron Horse Trail entrance, turned around, came home, and threw up! I fully expect this to be a beautiful relationship.

This was my 30th birthday present from my parents. My birthday is not for two weeks but my dad and I went looking for a bike on Saturday and found this one. What really made me like it was not its lightweight construction or easy maneuverability, but it’s sweet sweet handles. They are ergonomic and awesome. I will eventually get some sassy saddlebags for it, maybe for Christmas. They have these ones that snap on and off and even have a shoulder harness.

The only thing I need now is a lock so I can take it places.  I live about a mile from the Target so that would be an easy ride. I am pretty excited about this whole thing!

I guess the other thing that’s going on around here is that I redesigned the look of the blog, sort of. Full Disclosure: I upgraded to WordPress 3.0, and it is both magical and delightful. I also REALLY love the new default theme Thelonius. I was previously running K2 which I liked a lot, but I’m not gonna lie: Thelonius is way more user friendly plus it spans the entire screen rather than being centered in the middle. And it’s very customizable and includes widgets which is why I was using K2 in the first place. If you haven’t upgraded your WordPress to 3.0, you won’t be disappointed. Plus I am here to tell you that the one-click upgrade from the Dashboard didn’t break anything, which is nice because I totally neglected to back up the blog before I did it.

That is how I roll.

Currently I am working on my jewelry stuff. My desk is a disaster area and here is sort of how it looks on a micro scale:

I will maybe show some of the things I have been working on later.

Plus I’m working on designing a new blog header for my sister’s blog. I hope she likes what I’m working on.

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This is not the end it is only a new beginning

PROLOGUE:

I hella updated my real actual website last week. Check it out! There’s actually a couple of new drawings in there too. It’s still futzy and I’m not totally done with it, but considering it took me like an hour and it was offline for three years, that’s just dumb.

NOW:

Friday was my last day at the job that I have both hated and loved over the last several years. Right now, I’m simply burnt out. I will miss most everyone there but… I need a break. I’ve needed one for a long time, actually.

By lunchtime my cube was super empty! Anybody who knows me in real life knows that I am not a very neat person, but dammit those piles had meaning and organization within them! (You should see my house. Even I am noticing the mess, which is saying something. Should I really be admitting my untold slobbery on the internets? Sure, why not. Still, it’s about 100% better than my wee apartment back in Texas… probably since my house is about 3 times as big. Can you imagine all my STUFF in 468 square feet? Me neither and I actually experienced it. Yikes.)

This week I am going to take it easy and enjoy being off work. I filed for unemployment because I don’t have a job lined up yet (still! ugh!) but hopefully will find out about that soon.

I let myself spend a little bit of post-employment monies and what I got myself was the new Vogue Stitchionary #5, for lace knitting. I don’t have any of the other vogue books, but this one is definitely worth it. I also downloaded myself the fabulous Intwined Pattern Studio, which is a pattern writing/charting program. I first saw it at Stitches West, and I really should have gotten it then (especially since I was wishy washy about buying anything there) but it’s only now that I’m ready to start writing my own patterns.

Here’s an example of what you can do with the program. I’ve only had it since Saturday and I already put several charts into it, including the below Barbara Walker, and will soon work on translating some of the charts from my Japanese books, which I will then write into sock patterns.

Nice, huh? The program itself is only $44 and WELL worth the money I would say. There is also an active group on Ravelry where you can report bugs and whatnot and the actual developers are there to help you out. I have not experienced any problems with it, however, so that is pretty nice.

Here’s some pics of what I’m currently working on. Keep in mind I took these photos at 11:30 p.m. and therefore absolve myself of any particular artistic flava.

wipmosaic

Clockwise from top left we have: Alpaca Blob (a v-neck grandpa cardigan I’m making for myself; it will even have pockets for me to hold tissues and chapsticks), Snow Petals Socks in Fleece Artist Merino 2/6 Pumpkin colorway (awesome AWESOME pattern, and it’s only $1.99 to boot! You can get it via Ravelry or Knitpicks), The Infamous Rainbow Socks (Knitpicks Felici rainbow self-striping; get it while it’s hot, it’s apparently already on “last chance” and dudes, I just made my order a couple weeks ago), and the last blue cuff thing is a test on the above mentioned chart. I like how the lace looks but not in that yarn so I suspect that’s going to the frog pond sooner rather than later.

EPILOGUE:

Anyway, in news that makes me feel like an old, old, OLD person (countdown to the big 3-0, 34 days and counting), my wee cuz the Bean has received her drivers license today and it seems like only yesterday I was fishing fuzz and spiders out of her wee baby mouth. Kid is practically an adult! She’ll be a senior in high school next year! WHAT.

If I remember I’ll write about the Legacy thrift store next time. A thrift store that only has craft items! You will be amazed at what eight bucks and change can buy you.

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Housecleaning

Hahaha! You guys, don’t let the title fool you. I definitely don’t mean housecleaning in the literal sense of the word. I mean, I got my vacuum out of its dark secret closet and put it in the den to “remind me”… and there it has sat sadly for at least a week waiting for me to stop playing Super Mario 3 on my Wii and actually clean up for Easter. “Housecleaning.” Please.

No really, what I mean by it is that I occasionally get a bug to struggle with my website and clean things up and recode or re-upload or revive myself with smelling salts because it generally makes me want to lie prostrate on the floor for periods of deep contemplation.

The thing lately that has caused me massive annoyance over the last several days is the comment system that I currently run on WordPress 2.9.2. Comments are posted and I get them, but the posters do not get my replies. And frankly, that sure is annoying! I certainly don’t expect anyone to keep coming back to my site to check and see if they got a reply – I don’t check other people’s sites to see if I got a reply.  If I don’t get an email, it’s like it never happened.

So, still knowing nothing about PHP except that which I can sort of interpret and copy and paste, I went on a mission not to, you know, learn anything, but to see if I could find a widget that I could install that would force an email to any commenters that I have replied, or someone else has replied.

It took awhile before I realized that I should really be looking for a plug-in instead of a widget, but the lightbulb did eventually flash and I installed Subscribe To Comments.

I think it works.

I tried it out with an alternate email address and it worked for me. You need to check the box underneath the reply field in order to receive the replies. It doesn’t automatically send an email unless you do that.

So to help me out, I would appreciate it if you could post a test post (and check the box!) and report back.

Thanks!