Knit and the City

Doesn't the title say it all? I'm a 30 something knitter on the West Coast. Expect to read about my life with the guy, two ex-racing greyhounds and a couple of crazy cats!

6/30/2003

Just so you know I actually did finish the front of my Hippy. And here's the proof Pretty spiffy, huh? Still working on those sleeves. I should get a little further along tonight. Look at this Mama told me there'd be days like this.What a great kitty. I got to see my dear Am-ers yesterday! Funny how time flies, but hanging with her was just like being back at the apartment all those years ago. We wandered out onto Commercial Drive and had lunch and saw some bad fashion sense. I have to give a little leeway in the fashion senseI mean, after all, it was Sunday. Am was not so forgiving. It was a blast and I got to hear all about her new dating adventures on the Internet. And her adventures living in Korea. We'll be taking off to have a girls weekend up on the island soon. No work that trip. Just plenty of beach time. Sarah's ankle seems to be doing better. Still a little limp but she's putting most of her weight on it now. Yesterday she wouldn't. She put up with our RICE method and laid still for all the Rest, Ice, Compression and Elevation. Superstar puppy. Check out this funny comic. I know a couple puppers like that!

6/29/2003

If you use butter as your tanning medium, will you get that beatiful roast chicken golden brown colour? Just wondering. Sorry, the brain is a little addled today from lack of sleep. The young 'un's with the hot cars next door decided to have a party after the bars closed. I woke up at about 3am to the stinky, sicky smell of pot filling the bedroom from the open window. The guy said when he came home from work he started to smell it a block away! I'm not sure if they were all having a joint at the same time or they just put a bale on the BBQ and stood around breathing deeply. Beside the stinkyness there was the revving of car engines, yelling, slamming of doors, tire squealing as the peeled out and left. Finally. Sheesh. Sarah has managed to twist her ankle running about in the back yard today. She's hobbling around. I'll have to close the gate to the yard and keep both of them on the patio for the rest of the week. Greyhounds are so stoic. I never heard a peep out of her when she did it or a whimper when I was inspecting her ankle and bending it this way and that looking for any scrapes. I'm gonna try to get her to lie down so I can ice it. I'll have to go get a bag of frozen peas later. I'll use cubes for now. Am-ers is coming over today! I think I'm supposed to go to work. I'll call my boss and ask if I really have to. I hope he says stay home. I think he will but you never know. As long as I get home by one it's okay. I did absolutely notheing yesterday except make an appearance at work and then baked in the sun. Last I checked the thermometer read 92 degrees! I don't see that I got any colour but maybe it takes a day or two to develop. I'm gonna go take care of my pooper. Wish her well.

6/27/2003

I have the best boyfriend in the world. Yesterday he ordered me this a month before my birthday AND rush delivery so I would have it for our vacation next Friday! Yup, Back up to 'Slavery Island' for another 5 days of work, work, work. At least I'll look good in that bikini. Only I'm the one that will know it because it will be hidden under my coveralls! In anticipation of my new bathing suit I decided to go to the Spa and have a 'tidy up' down below. Holy Crap does bikini waxing hurt! Yikes! Thank the Lord, God above that I said no to the Brazilian! June seems to be the busiest moving month end out of the whole year. I think all the families wait until the kids are out of school before they move somewhere. That way the kids have the whole summer to get to know the neighbourhood and make new friends before school starts. That's the theory anyway. Today I had a customer ask me if I really liked my job. I deadpanned that I hated every moment of it. I think it's obvious that I love my job and the people I work with. I'm almost always smiling and making fun. Why do people ask me if I work for Budget when I'm standing in line somewhere, wearing my uniform, with my gas card around my neck, and my name tag on? My usual answer is "No, but I could see how you might think I do. I thought the outfit was cool." or "At this moment, no. I'm off for lunch." Then I laugh and laugh and laugh at the surprised faces. Still no knitting. It's supposed to get up to 37 degrees tomorrow. How hot does it have to be to fry an egg on the sidewalk? I may try that tomorrow. I'm a little bummed out that the BFG's got eliminated from the Amazing Race last night. I thought they were nice. Sad to say the stupid models are still there. I thought for sure one was going to swim in a dutch canal for sure! I don't really care who is who between the two. Bitch and Bitchy. Now I have to pick a new favourite team. Hm...I think I'll weigh my descision a bit more. I have to go to work tomorrow and Sunday . Eweweweweweee! All so I can have more of this.

6/26/2003

Hoo-wee! Even my fingers are sweaty. Another hot one here in the city. Thank goodness we live on the Coast, otherwise I may melt! Almost lost a large account today. Seems that a production wanted an Escalade for their film to be used as a picture car. The main character has it as his car in the film. Our car sales guy said he could get one for sure by last Friday. Never showed up. Eeek. The owner of our franchise has one of these in the colour they want. So we borrow it from the boss thinking that we'll be able to get one exactly like it in a few days. So we get it in today and it's not the same. New one has a sunroof and brushed aluminium tires! And they used the boss' truck in close up shots already for 3 days! Director was very unhappy but I think we may have salvaged it. Who knew that every other Escalade out there has a sunroof except my boss'? That must be why he got a deal on it. Hmmm. Did you see the price on that stupid thing? US dollars too! I'll stick with my Honda. I heard a rumour that Terri might be back from her vacation. I hope she lets you know what she brought back as a souveneir (?) otherwise I may have to tell you all! And! She's probably going to blog about the Amazing Race! I've missed her rants! I can not wait to see what she has to say about the models tonight! I saw the preview and I think they toss each other out of the car!..I can dream, can't I? Stay cool.

6/25/2003

Summer is such a busy time! It seems I have no time to knit or do anything! But I seem to get alot accomplished. Funny story at work. I was helping on the counter. Yes, a brief respite from the phone at my desk. I was helping a nice, elderly man who had had his car stolen and was renting an insurance replacement. His car was a convertible Mustang, He quipped that with the sunny weather he hoped they were enjoying it! Ha! After I completed the transaction and as the man left, one of the other staff commented that I had made her teeth hurt from all my sweetness! 'Could you have been any nicer?' was her comment. Probably, but not much. I really like helping people out to the best of my ability! Hamster Alert! Hamster Alert! We still to seem to have a hamster down! Call someone! Ella lost her collar sometime yesterday. I noticed it was missing when I left in the morning. I searched under the bed a bit but it wasn't there. The guy called later in the day to tell me that her collar was missing. I asked if he had looked around and he told me he had looked everywhere. Even under the huge cedars in the back yard where the girls have dug a hole halfway to China! Still no collar by the time I got home. I was thinking I was going to have to make her a new one. Get a new name tag. Report her greyhound ID tag lost to GPI and order a replacement as well as her license. I decided I would crawl under those cedars myself and take a look. Including the hole to China there's also all the grass clippings under there. Ewwww. Kinda stinky. Lo and Behold, I found her collar buried in the oldest and most decaying pile of grass clippings! Yuck. The funniest part was that the guy came home while I was rooting around. I crawled out from under the trees just like one of the dogs and gave a giant 'Woof!'. Well, we thought it was funny! No knitting. It's been a million degrees here today! I love it! Am-ers arrives tomorrow. I can't wait to see my long, lost roomie! And one of my dearest friends. Safe flight from Asia, girlfriend! What do I have in my pic file today. Me and a couple of my furkids hanging out.

6/24/2003

How do I manage to get more bug bites in one night in my own home than a week away camping? Another mystery of the universe that needs to be solved! Computer crash at work today. That means everything gets done by hand. It usually takes about double the time but still can get done in a timely fashion for most of the staff. Most, not all. Adding machines can be intimidating, dontcha know! I zoomed through another 10 rows on the sleeves on my Hippy last night. The guy had a night off finally. First since we came back from vacation. We just laid around and watched the movie "Blow" with Johnny Depp (yum, even with the 80's hair) and Penelope Cruz. I enjoyed it. A well told story. In bed by 10 and asleep by 10:30. Gosh, are we a stereotypical rock star and the groupie? Sad, sad, sad. The weather was ab fab today! Sunny and hot! I remembered today that hot vinyl or leather car seats will fry the bare skin that hangs out of your shorts! Yeowwww! After all that frying I get to come home to this. Pets really do make your life more bearable.

6/23/2003

Monday's make me feel like this. Just a little snarly. I always hope that when I leave on the weekend something amazing will happen and someone will grow a hamster. Nope, always dissapointed on Monday morning. Sigh. Aside from that work is darn fine. Lots of productions and lots of cars on rent. More accidents, more money. It all works out in the end. My boss has agreed that if I come in on Saturday and we get all our month end stuff finished I can take more holidays in July. I'll hate it but I'll do it. I managed to get the front of my Hippy done! And I started the sleeves. Yes, I said sleeves. I cast on for both (two separate balls of yarn, of course) and it's so neat. No real counting. Just do both the same. I have found that safety pinning them together helps to keep track of where you are. Sometimes they like to migrate to the ends of the circulars if you set them down. That's where it can be a bit messy. I noticed Sandy in the knit blog world blogging about how they keep track of their rows and increases and decreases. So far I've been happy with using the recipe card and the hash mark method. On an increase row I just put a little arrow cap on the hash mark, on a decrease it goes on the bottom. Hard to describe but really simple. I'll try to get a pic. I have found that now I do larger projects and all the rows won't fit on one recipe card. So I started a little wire bound notebook. I'm sure that once I start to do cables and fair isle that I will find flaws in my system. But it's so simple it'll be easy to adapt. I hope. I realized that when I was talking to Terri she got the pronunciation of my name right. It's Ahn-dee. I was impressed. Most folks see the way it's spelled and can't get it out of their heads. I'm Andy forever to some folks. It's just short for Andrea. Once again pronounced with the Ahn sound. Whoa, is the new Trading Spaces carpenter Carter hot or what?! YUMMY! And does that Laurie annoy me to death? That seems to be the only TV moment of merit I remember from over the weekend. I know I watched a lot of cooking and gardening and such but...nope, there's nothing else there. Hope you all had a good week! Is this the cutest, fattest kitten or what?

6/20/2003

Have you missed me? I think not. I don't know if anyone reads. I'd be nice to have some validation but I think I write for sanity reasons. Not that I am insane. I mean, unless you ask my brother. He may tell you otherwise. I got to talk to Terri on Wednesday night! She was on her way back from the Island and while waiting for the ferry decided to give me a call. How nice was that!? She's as funny and witty as she comes across in her blog. I really enjoyed our chat. Wait till she tells about what she did on her summer vacation! I don't think anyone can really top it but I won't spoil it....i promise. Let's see if Blogger will autoload pics. Yipee! This is Bailey. Our friends new pup. What a gorgeous dog. We fell in love about 10 seconds after we walked in the door. Such beautiful brown eyes! Work is going along. We are sooo busy! But the phone has quieted down. Most productions are up and running so they really have all the vehicles they need. We do get the panic calls like "Oh My God! My tire is flat! What do I do?" Um hello, there's another tire in your trunk. Shit, if I can change a tire anyone can. Still having issues with missing hamsters. I realize I'm being too optimistic (?) in believing that one will sprout and grow. Now what do I do? My hands have finally stopped aching from the Construct...I mean, vacation. I've knitted about 6 rows this week and I still haven't finished the front. At least orange will still be in when I finish in the fall! Har har har. My friend will be here in a week from Korea! Yahoo. Am-ers I can't wait! Here's my Ella-poo doing her favourite thing in the car. I thought it was a cool pic.

6/16/2003

Holy MoFo. Man, I've had such a busy weekend that this is the first real moment I've had to sit down! Saturday I took my parents and my sister down to Tacoma, Wash. for my Uncle's 75th bash at the river. Fun, fun, fun but driving 700kms in one day really sucks. I finally relented at about km 600 and let mom drive. She's the only one I trust to drive my baby car. I got home around midnight. Very tired. Then when the dogs started pacing around at about 9am on Sunday, the guy asked me if I was going to get up. Why? Because I always get up around that time on the weekend! I told him I was sleeping in and he better get his butt out of bed or he'd have more to deal with than just opening the door! Yup, I'm very cranky when I'm tired. Sunday was the best. We went over to our friends to see their new kitchen. And they made homemade Eggs Benedict! Yummy! Then we all went for a walk on the waters edge with their new lovely pupper Bailey! As soon as I figure out how to code the pictures I'll post them. I'm on one of those old browsers, don't you know. Therefore I cannot reap the full benefits of Blogger. Whatever. Sunday night Emma was on and I stayed up way too late and was a little grouchy when I had to get out of bed this morning. Work today was nice. It was nice to ease back into it. While I was on vacation I really wanted to be back at my desk where only the phone rang. Not pounding nails till it was so dark we couldn't see the nails anymore. Looking on going back on the 4th of July. There's a scheduling conflict at work and I'll find out on Wednesday if we're a go. Yes! I have been knitting! I've got most of the front done. I think I'm down to the last 10 rows. That means I could finish up tonight! Sleeves started tomorrow! I love orange. The only thing that you can't take a vacation from are your bills. I have to go pay them all now. Sigh.

6/13/2003

Man, I don't think I've ever worked so hard for something in my life. Check out our vacation on 'Slavery Island' here. Blogger isn't letting me upload pics. Twelve hour days of construction and a whole 15 minutes on the beach. I am not joking! I am so proud of how much we got done! I figure by the end of the summer we'll be back at the stage where we just pack a couple coolers and run up for the weekend. I can't wait. I got a whole 10 rows done on my Hippy. I know, I know. I couldn't knit a bit when I got up to the cabin. By the end of the day it was dark and my fingers and hands ached. I actually woke up in the morning and felt pain in my baby toes! Sigh. I'm back on it this weekend. I've decided that my little sister has a little brain. She's almost 26 and she has a boy (all of 19) over to see her overnight. Fine and dandy, right? I mean, she's old enough. Not when you still live at home with your mom and dad! And they're home! Mom busted her and she starts telling mom about the boys I had over when I lived at home! Too late, I told her already! And I waited till the folks went away. At least till their car got around the corner before I made that boo-tay call! Sheesh. I wonder if those crystals she wears around her neck are affecting her brain. I can't believe the stupid models on Amazing Race are still in it. That pisses me off. I really hope that they get their fat asses eliminated. I can't stand their sneering at everyone. I really don't mind when they're sneering at each other. Kinda like looking in a mirror I hope. The morning glory has overtaken the yard while we've been away and the young kids next door have been having all their friends over. Taking up all the parking on the street. And how does a 17-20 year old kid afford a $40,000 car? How can all his friends afford the same thing? I mean, I'm 33 and I just got out of the Hyundai! I've worked hard. I've saved my money. Hm. Nope, I'm not having any kids. I think there's enough of them out there.

6/05/2003

Aaargh! Pushed one too many keys and my whole post went tits up. Sheesh. We're all packed. The new (old) car is all insured and loaded up. I'm so excited! Have a great week everyone and I'll laud you with tales and photos upon my return!

6/04/2003

Today I found it difficult to go from this: To this: I did the opposite 3 months ago but now I need a special form. I'll conquer that tomorrow while I do my running around for this! Ah life is rough. I'm on vacation, I'm on vacation, lalalalaa la, la la la laaaa la! I promise to post tomorrow night before we go. Don't you want to know what I'm gonna knit when I'm away?!

6/03/2003

Somedays I'm glad I'm not the one in charge. Bad renter day. Dad rented for his kid and then the kid kept it for 3 months, damaged it and now Dad doesn't want to pay. Dad and the kid showed up just as I was leaving. When I called back to check up the cops had arrived. Never a dull day in the rental car business. Got a nice email from Terri today. I knew she wouldn't be able to stay away from technology for a whole month. Hee hee! Sounds like her and the big fella are just sinking into some vacation heaven. Sweet! I myself cannot wait for my vacation to start! One more day to work! I won't be able to do any computer stuff because there's no power where we're goin'. So if anyone reads this don't be worried I'll be back! But how hard will it be to return from this? The weather has been spectacular this week and it's supposed to stick around. Yipee! Knitting stuff. Can you tell the difference between these two edges? One is the left side and the other is the right side of the back decreases. I followed the instructions in the knit bible and I believe I'm doing it right. I have to remember that people will be at least 3 feet away when I have it on. Goodness I hope no one pulls out a microscope! I think they look totally different but when I look at the picture of the back I'm not so worried. Alas, dogs get no respect in this house.

6/02/2003

Today we almost lost this. Now wouldn't that have been exciting! The guy had left the gate open when he put the lawnmower away. He just happened to grab some weed killer and head back out front. He saw a cute black dog loose down the block. Hey...wait a minute...that looks like...AAARRRGGGHH! So he followed her down the block, calling her name but she wasn't listening. Selective dog hearing. That is until she heard the word she wanted to hear 'Cookie!' She is home safe and the guy has made a renewed commitment to keep the gate closed. This is the first time since we got the girls that anyone has gotten out. I think 3 years is a good record! Only one new accident file over the weekend. Phew. AND I get my old CRV back! The one with all those yummy options! Like the bum warmers, the sunroof, the leather, the 6 CD stacker. Yipee! Seems like my boss hasn't been able to sell it for the price he wanted. So I get to have it back and the blue baby will go into the rental fleet. Maybe when my second lease is up on the CRV I'll buy it out. We shall see. Second work thing. How long should we have to wait for someone to grow a hamster to spin that wheel upstairs? How many times do I have to tell someone how to do something correctly before it sinks in? How many more customers have to bitch before something is done? I think I'm sending an email to the owner. Last one I sent about the same thing turned into a multi-page rant. Granted, it was in point form but there were alot of points! Got some pics on the weekend. New hair. I love it! I love the colour. This is much more me than the blonde it had been. The guy calls it 'Goth Hair' because of the dark ends. He's a funny, funny man. Also got a pic of my Hippy. Working my way through the front. I'm about halfway and almost ready to join the second ball of yarn to make the v-neck. Lastly is me and a very bad Monk-ey butt. He was wandering out of the yard straight for the street. He's not all that bright. Fat, yes. Street smart, no.