Tuesday, July 31, 2007

what is wrong with people?(continued)

*sigh* So I checked my email this morning and there were a bunch of lesbian biker chick spam emails that had been sent through the Crochet Pages Yahoo!Group. My apologies again to all who received those.

I know the group is terribly inactive since I stopped writing newsletters and I feel really bad that the only that comes through is garbage.

Age

Monday, July 30, 2007

Hrm. Quilt, bras, etc. In other words, what is wrong with people?!?!

*sigh* I went to Staples today to blow up some leaf drawings I found to use as the quilting pattern on my leaf-print, non-pieced quilt. And guess what I found out. You can't pay cash for copies at some Staples stores anymore. And it will soon be most Staples stores and eventually ALL STAPLES STORES!

You have to either use a credit card (FOR 6 CENTS + TAX! WHAT!?!?!) or go to the copy center register and put money on a convenience card (not less than $1) then put your card in to the card thingy on the copier and as you make copies it charges your card.

I wonder if every copy is a separate charge to your credit card or if it goes through at the end. I should have asked. They changed the signage from B&W copies, 6 cents to B&W copies as low as 6 cents, too. Probably cause people bitched cause some of the copies were more than that because of the sales tax.

Just like they probably switched to card readers because people are too damn cheap to find a nickel and a penny for a photocopy. Or because people are thieves. Same thing, I guess.

And while we're on the subject of stupid people, why don't women realize they probably should think twice about wearing a white shirt in the rain? Especially when said white shirt is practically see thru to begin with? And when they're wearing a bra that can be seen thru their shirt at 100 yards already?

What is so difficult to understand about the fact that your bra shows less through a white shirt when is matches your skintone? Why is this hard, people?

Same thing with white pants. If you are any color other than albino, you should not wear a day-glo white thong with thin white pants.

It's called underwear for a reason! And unless you're an underwear model, the general public probably doesn't want to see it.

Tuesday, July 24, 2007

Haven't painted yet, but feeling better.

Wow, so somehow, just knowing that I have the potential to have a way less depressing living room makes me so much happier. (Happy Happy Joy Joy) I"m actually looking forward to the two days or so it will take to paint.

Woo! Now we just need more bookcases and about 6 feet of speaker wire for the stereo and we're set!

Age

Monday, July 23, 2007

Guess we're not painting after all. Ooh, oh yeah, new patterns!

So, Jess is coming up today, and she was supposed to help me paint over the hideous red paint in the living room. But it's raining. So the paint will take forever to dry. Now in fairness, the red wouldn't be so bad if say, it was a slightly lighter shade, or if it didn't make my living room look like a blood spattered cave, or it we hadn't had to sponge paint to disguise the fact that the paint was bad and Jenn and Joe (idiots they are) didn't believe me and wouldn't let us return it. It was watery, and took like 5 coats.

Although that may have been because the genius in the paint department at Home Depot the day we bought the paint sold us the wrong primer. Joe made the mistake of saying the walls were painted plaster and the clerk went on a quest to find primer for plaster. Unfortunately, we didn't actually need primer at all, let alone the primer for "uncured plaster or unsealed wall board" that they sold us.

But, I only worked in the paint department somewhere, what do I know. I tried to tell them we didn't need primer, let alone the wrong kind and I tried to tell them there was something wrong with the paint, but Carl was the only one who would listen and they thought he was "just siding with his woman so she doesn't feel bad."

Ye Gods! but I hate those people. (Not Carl, I mean Jenn, Joe, and Ryan)

At any rate, we're going to at least prep for painting today, so maybe sometime this week I can start making it so that my living room doesn't depress me anymore.

*****

Ooh, here's the important/non-rant part. Two new patterns on Age's Crochet Pages!
Flying Piggy
Courage Bear (does not have a photo yet)

*****


And now, back to the rant. Just kidding, I forgot what else I was gonna say.

Thanks for reading,
Age

Sunday, July 15, 2007

Family Reunion today

The reunion for my dad's family is today. A woman from New Jersey who we just recently (within the last year) found out is extended family will be there. Which is basically why I'm going. We'll probably be heading up before too much longer. Hilarity may or may not ensue.

Age

Saturday, July 14, 2007

New Critters Finished!

Woo! I just gave Sarah her "congrats about the job" gift yesterday. She's a huge fan of Jeff Dunham (check out On A Stick Productions), especially Peanut! So, I crocheted her a Peanut doll. She LOVED it! Soon as we get some pics, I post them. She's in the middle of moving so it could be a week or so.

I also finished another little critter as a surprise gift, and his pattern will be posted to Age's Crochet Pages as soon as I know I won't be ruining the surprise. (ie. the person he's for looks at this blog and my site from time to time.)

I started working on Kon, from the anime/manga Bleach. (see Wiki here) So far I only have legs done, but I think it's going to go well. Will post pics when finished.

I think that I'm going to take a break from Kon and finally get the piggy pattern written down and posted, this afternoon.

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

went hiking after all

So, Dave and I went on a 5 mile hike yesterday. What should be the hardest part of the original 20 mile hike we had planned. We're both really glad we took the time to scope it out.

Plans are still in the works for a longer hike, but we're not sure when or how far.

Monday, July 9, 2007

So, no jury duty after all. I had to report back to the court house to find out that there were no trials happening today after all.

What a waste of time.

Glad there's gonna ba an impartial jury!

Wow, so I got summoned for jury duty, anybody know how that works? They send you a letter and a crappy little questionnaire that you have to send back. Then they wait two weeks or so and send you a letter that says "just thought we'd remind you that we haven't bothered to tell you if you're actually needed for jury duty or not."

Then you have to call and the phone call tells you everything your need to know, should your "panel number" be requested. Except it doesn't really tell you everything. They let you guess at some of it.

Then there's the dress code. "Dress for a job interview." I'm in management. To me, that means wear a suit. However, upon arrival and seeing how everyone else was dressed, I remembered something. Construction workers don't wear suits to interviews. A significant portion of the potential jurors were wearing jeans and workboots with their preppy little oxfords.

Then we actually get there and we're left to sit a half hour, spoken to briefly, shown a video that looks like it belongs in a Jr. High Street Law class, given another crappy questionnaire and left to sit some more, while the initial prescreening of our paperwork happens.

Except that it didn't. It's now 10:20, a full 2 hours after I first arrived at the court house. The jury coordinator comes in at this point and proceeds to admit that while she thought it was strange that a judge who never does jury selection on Monday morning would want a jury at 8:30 Monday morning, apparently it didn't strike her as strange enough to actually check with the judge. She just took the clerk's word for it.

At this point, we're all thinking, thank god, they're going to send us home. If the judge doesn't like to start trials on Monday, that means they'll pick from the people who were summoned for tomorrow, right?

WRONG! That means go find something to do for 3 HOURS and come back at 1:45 for jury selection. Which will take not less than an hour and probably not more than an hour and a half to two hours.

So basically, I got up early, got dressed up, drove 10 blocks because I can't walk that far in dress shoes, parked in a crappy, poorly lit parking garage, walked 3 blocks to the court house (because the parking garage in just past 6th and Linden and the courthouse in at 4th and Hamilton), sat for two hours and then was dismissed for a long lunch and 5 more hours of wondering if I have to serve on a jury or not.

They'll only be picking 14 of the 45 of us, which is basically a 1 in 3 chance, which with my luck probably means that I'll get picked. Oh, and did I mention, I"m not missing work for this, I'm on vacation! Because my manager didn't tell me that the company does jury duty pay and I can't afford to only get paid the piddly $9/day that they pay jurors in order to fairly compensate us for fulfilling our civic duty.

Way to pick an impartial jury! Piss everybody off, then ask us to decide someone's fate. Because this if for a criminal trial, which could last anywhere between 4 hours and 3 days.

I can't believe that there's no better way to do this. Phone interviews or something. I mean they plan the docket ahead of time. Somebody had to know that there was no trial today. Oh, wait, the judge did know that. Apparently it was just the woman in charge of when the jury actually had to be there who didn't bother to find out.

But I'm not angry or anything. Not me. I enjoy it when bureaucratic red tape destroys my vacation. That's my big thrill in life.

Tuesday, July 3, 2007

Almost forgot

We may be losing some of our very first tomatoes this year. We have a birds next in the awning over our back door. And there's at least 3 babies. The other day I stepped outside without realizing and mommy bird flew away and didn't come back for hours.

Hopefully the little ones grow up and fly off soon, because there's a lot of work to be done in the yard. Plus the cat is very agitated about not getting to play outside.

Age

Yay! Pictures!

So, Sarah stopped by and finally remembered to bring the camera with her. So, in no particular order, here are the dolls I've been working on this year that haven't already been posted. I warn you, I'm kinda prolific.


This is Domokun. As cute as he is, unfortunately, there will not be a pattern appearing on Age's Crochet Pages as he is a licensed monster and I do not of have copyright permissions.


This is the girl version of the Dammit Doll. Her pattern is already on the website, this is simply a pic of the new sample which will be getting posted to the proper pages shortly. This is the only doll in this batch which has a posted pattern.

**edit** Her picture is now posted to Age's Crochet Pages. **edit**



This piggy was made at Dan's request. Hopefully the pattern will be posted before long, with a slight modification to the tail. On this one the tail is needle tatted.



These lovely ladies are my kitchen dolls. Red dress is a bag holder. The blue and green ones are currently sitting on very tiny display shelves, hence the floating look. The green ones short sleeves were originally intended for her hands to be stitched together to hold a towel and the blue one was supposed to sit with a soap dish in her lap. I love them so much and I'm afraid of ruining them, so they've ended up on shelves and out of the way of my cooking messes.

The pattern for these three may eventually get posted to the site, I haven't decided yet. It's really long.



This is my simplified version of the Kadoma from Princess Mononoke, complete with his own cherry branch to perch on. He is not fastened in any way, he really just does balance that well. In case you are not familiar with the story Princess Mononoke is one of Hiyao Miyazaki's films. The Kadoma were trees spirits who granted passage into the forest when asked nicely, but didn't contribute much to the action other than looking on with curiosity.



Lastly and possibly leastly, are my "girls." They are basically three dimensional doodles based around three things.
1) I really wanted to make a doll wearing Chuck Taylors.
2) I really wanted an excuse to give a doll a burgundy streak in her hair.
3) I couldn't think of any other way to combine girly pink with camo.

Thanks for reading,
Age

Sunday, July 1, 2007

Age's Crochet Pages Update

I just finished uploading a huge update to the Crochet Pages Site, which among other things, includes (finally) a link to this blog.

Things to expect from this update:
- lots of new patterns
- a few new pictures
- the newsletters are all posted in an archive
- a new link bar at the top of the pages
- a link to this blog!
- error correction to the plain English granny square pattern (Thanks, Sam, for giving me the opportunity to find that!)

A few unfortunate things with this update:
- there may be some unavoidable bugs
- there are still tons of Tripod ads (sorry, can't afford to upgrade the membership right now)

I hope that this update goes over well and hopefully some of you will find your way here.

Thanks for reading,
Age