etc.

I’m cheating a bit with self-portrait Tuesday this week. I took this picture last Tuesday as we strolled through Arlington National Cemetary with full intention to go back to the hotel and upload it, but time slipped right through my fingers and I decided to save it for this week. So, here you go.

This might well be my only post this week as I dash around work and home in a dizzying fury, preparing to leave on Thursday morning for BC. I checked the weather — it’s cool and rainy, all the better for huddling indoors with a bunch of librarians. You know it’s time to unplug when you tear through the Emerald Lake Lodge brochure, right past the lovely bits on “Flora and Fauna” and “Animals of Yoho“, in a feverish hunt for the “Internet Access” page. (It looks like there is no internet access. This can only be a good thing).

Where to begin. DC was excellent. The conference went really well, there was a handful of penny-drop moments that were palpable and gratifying. The tourist part was good too, we did The Museum of Natural History, The White House, Capitol Hill, Library of Congress (of course), Dupont Circle, The National Air and Space Museum, and Arlington National Cemetary. Pictures are up to date and here, in case you missed them. I upgraded to a pro account on Flickr and am feeling good about that decision. I uploaded a new theme to this site, as you can see, and tweaked the hell out of it, ending up with a simple, single-column layout that I’m happy with, although I’ll probably continue to futz with it over the next few days. I’m updating course materials for an online intro-to-blogs-and-rss course that begins in a few weeks and, thanks to blog-u, am filled with vim and vigour about it. I’m pulling together course materials for a follow-up blogs-and-rss course that will run in early 2006 and equally enthusiastic about that one too. I’m thinking about my job a lot, mostly because of a day-in-the-life book chapter I’ve committed to that is also due in early 2006, but also because I’m feeling particularly lucky to have the job I do. I’m looking forward to going to BC next week to immerse myself in more library-talk and am eager to tear into the advanced reading materials they sent me. And I’m loving the pink in my hair, you can almost see it in the picture at left.

And the reason why it’s a DC sock is because I finished knitting it & photographed it in our hotel room in DC. It’s a lovely sock, if I do say so, very comfortable and a pleasurable knit indeed (yarn: Lorna’s Laces in seaside).

I’ve been in DC for the past 4 days for Blog University, more info on which, including the talks I gave, is here, in case you’re interested. And if you’re not, here are some pictures to look at. More from home, to-morrow. Cheerio!

later: can’t sleep. redesigned blog. going for simplicity. more tweaking to come!

Yes, more socks. In response to my plea for sock yarn recommendations, Carolyn mentioned Mountain Colors Weavers Wool, which gave me pause. Mountain Colors? That sounds awfully familiar! I’m sure I have some Mountain Colours in my stash. And I did! One skein of Mountain Colors Bearfoot in Pheasant which, upon discovery, I immediately wound up and knit. And I’m pleased to report that this yarn knits up a soft, warm, substantial sock & is an absolute delight to work with.

Right. On to your sock yarn recommendations. Thank you! Did I forget to say that? I think I did, how terrible of me. Many of you came out in favour of Lorna’s Laces, and a few mentioned Cherry Tree Hill, so, off I trundled to eBay and happily did I stumble upon one seller who had both on offer (amongt many others, to tempt and woo), and here’s what awaited me on my doorstep last evening:

Sorry for the terrible pictures. I broke my rule of no pictures in artificial light because I needed to get this yarn wound and cast on and I knew there would be no waiting till morning (and the keyboard circa 1911 in this pic, juxtaposed with the keyboard circa 2005 in the first, was entirely unplanned). That’s one skein of Cherry Tree Hill Supersock in Old Rose and two skeins of Lorna’s Laces Shephard Sock in Seaside. I cast on the Lorna’s Laces last night, and can I just say divine? I think I can.

When you spend most of your non-work time holed up at home, trying to work out the details of impending conference papers, and when you feel guilty about taking any time out to sew or bead or draw or do all those other things you usually do for procrastination on account of said pending conference papers, you tend to have movies going on in the background with your iBook on your lap and your research/presentation on your screen, because, you know, you’re really working while those movies are on in the background, of course you are. Here are some movies that have been on in the background lately, starred out of a possible five:

• Harold and Kumar go to White Castle ****
• Birth ****
• Sin City ***
• Sahara ***
• Hollow Man **
• Stir of Echoes ****
• Hitler’s Secretary ****
• The Final Cut **

Look! This was waiting on my front step when I came home yesterday! “Brecht in Hollywood”, which includes a biography of the playwright, as well as his testimony before the House Committee on UnAmerican Activities in 1947 (which is hilarious! yes, I’ve already listened to both discs!). AND, a wonderful skein of hand-spun, hand-dyed merino singles. And, who, you’re wondering, do I have to thank for this thoughtful and generous birthday offering? Andrea! Keen reader that she is, she picked up on the fact that I’m a bit of a Brecht fanatic, and dug this recording out of the archives she works at, isn’t she a peach? And, here: have a closer look at this lovely yarn she sent (looking a bit worse for wear on account of the cats taking a keen interest in it, damn felines and their fascination with all things stringy). Such bounty! Thank you so much, Andrea!

And, as if my day wasn’t already going well enough, the mister brought these home for me yesterday. Such floral bounty! Thanks, mister!

I recently set up a news page over at homebaked.ca, complete with RSS feed. It’s a miniblog published to a static page and I made notes as I went along, mostly for documentation purposes, but also to help out anyone else who is trying to do something similar (like set up a side blog, for example):

• downloaded, installed, and activated the Miniblog plugin. I’m working with WordPress 1.5 and it works fine.
• downloaded, installed, and activated the RunPHP plugin so that I could use PHP on a static page (without this plugin, PHP code on a static page publishes as lines of code. Who knew?)
• created a new page, inserted this code < ?php miniblog_list_entries(); ?>, hit “Create New Page”.
• proceeded to Miniblog (a tab under “Write”, once you’ve activated the plugin) and created a new post. Voila!

I set up the feed by word-for-word following the directions in the Miniblog documentation. Easy!

While many of you have already heard about this, this is for those who haven’t: Craft Revolution has joined forces with Etsy to bring you a delightful craft shop with all proceeds going to the Red Cross Hurricane Relief Fund.

Word is that they aren’t shipping anywhere outside the US, but if you see something you really want, contact the folks at Craft Revolution & they will ask the designer if they’d be willing to ship to you.

No better excuse to shop indie.