Tonight I am remembering to be amazed.

I'm also wishing that I hadn't screwed up making couscous because some leftover tangine would be really good about now.

Oh, and the internet is made of cats:


That's all.

I need some input on sock needles (this is where non-knitters may want to move along).

I need some new sock needles. I have mad love for my 5" Lantern Moon sock stix but the cost and the brittleness of rosewood has made me look for alternatives. I've used several different brands of DPNs (Lantern Moon, Brittany, Boyle, some unpronouncable European brand, Crystal Palace, Lacis bone needles, possibly others that I don't remember; tried out Hiya Hiya) and they each have their pros and cons.

I've done some looking online and I think I'm going to order a set of Brittany 5" DPNs. The Brittanies I've used before aren't quite as pointed as I'd like but they meet all the other criteria I have for sock needles: the size I like, lightweight, easy on the hands, flexible without breaking, inexpensive, just the right texture, and they're pretty (not the most important criteria, but it helps).

I'd like to know if any of you have opinions on sock needles and/or DPNs. Are there brands that you like, especially ones I haven't considered? (I've looked at the Harmony needle website, and kinda ruled them out because of price.) I haven't made any firm choices yet.

http://www.ryanabegglen.com/

The artist's store isn't up right now, but hopefully will be soon. If his work is priced in my range, there's a couple prints I'd like to buy.

It would be cruel to make a cat live in such a small space with me (not to mention the fact that pets are against housing rules), but right now I'm really feeling the lack of a cat.

I need to rent a kitten for a weekend, or something.

I want a box of Annie's Natural Chocolate Bunny cereal. I have a coupon. It would give me a special kind of joy to be able to eat chocolate bunnies in a cereal bowl.

I'm not sure the cereal is vegan. It's always too expensive so I've never checked.

What's holding me back is the snow that won't stop falling. Also I'm hungry, which is the wrong time to go to the store. Here I am, caught in a vicious circle: I'm hungry and desire bunny cereal, but can't go to the store to get the bunny cereal because I'm hungry.

Plus it's cold. Really, really cold.

I tried to start an LJ post the other day. I got about a paragraph in, got busy with something else; by the end of the day the paragraph was no longer relevant so I deleted it. That's kinda how it's been lately.

Spam advertisements turned into embroidered squares, apparently with the intent of making a quilt out of them.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cauchycomplete/sets/72157622436494477/

And thanks for the compliments on the multitude of miniature marzipan mushrooms. I'll take photos of the finished product. :)

Knit knit knit.

Bake bake bake.

Knit, bake, knit bake; bake bake, knit.

Knit bake.

Paper?

Knit bake.

Knit.

A while back I got to handle a Kindle reader. The guy had brought it just to show me because I had expressed skepticism about its superiority as a reading medium. No really, it has electronic ink, he assured me; you can look at it from any angle and see the text clearly and without any of the eye strain associated with CRTs and whatever computer screens are made from these days. It was small, sleek, portable, and had a nifty leather slipcover. You couldn't lose!

I had to admit, the Kindle was an admirable bit of hardware. The fact that textbooks could be purchased in Kindle format definitely caught my interest. I thanked him for bringing his Kindle to show me, and handed it back to him. I'm impressed by the Kindle, but I won't be buying one, at least not for general reading purposes.

Why? Let me finish.

After getting to see a Kindle up close and fool around with it a bit, I heard the occasional news story about the device, like the news story about the guy who brought legal action against Amazon for deleting one of his books from the device. If I remember it correctly Amazon had some concern over pirated Kindle books and so were yanking those (that?) titles. What got people riled up was that an outside entity could interfere with their choice in reading material without their consent or knowledge. This is a subject I feel very strongly about.

Part of my strong opinion about being able to access and read any material you chose without undue fear of interference comes from the two years I worked at a large independent bookstore in Denver, CO. This business was unwavering in its stance on allowing people to access whatever reading material they may like; they stocked many controversial titles (even if some had to be kept behind glass to deter theft) and were willing to order anything that could be ordered. This philosophy was taken all the way to the Colorado Supreme Court when law enforcement tried to gain access to the records of what customers bought on their in-store credit accounts in order to gain evidence in some local drug case. The owner of the store TTTFO and the battle over freedom and privacy begain. This sort of snafu was repeated in the early days of the enforcement of Homeland Security when Radical Militant Librarian(TM) refused to allow access to patron borrowing records.

I like to enjoy my media without harassment. We all probably do. My resistance to the Kindle and related readers are only partly based in my philosophy as a book lover. Or rather - now that I think about it - it has everything to do with my being a book lover.

Kindle is a product sold by Amazon. The Nook is a product sold by B&N. I've heard noise about a Microsoft reader and a Mac reader and and and.

I don't want to purchase hardware to read. I don't want to purchase multiple forms of hardware to read. To me, books only need one form of hardware - that of dead tree (or dead soy, or whatever). Simple. Convenient. Sure they take up a lot of space, but as a book lover, I don't really mind that. The bulk and physical presence of books is a comfort and pleasure. But the simple bottom line is that I don't want to need to buy additional doohickies in order to do something as simple as read.

Is this contradictory coming from someone who enjoys iPods, record players, stereo systems, DVD players, VCRs, and laptops? Maybe. But really, if I can cut down on needing to purchase one more gadget in order to do something as simple as open a book and read, I'm all for it.

(Still - if and when I can get all my textbooks on Kindle, I'll change my song a little.)

Spending time on LJ: it's the new black!

Well, not really. It takes less time to find clean black clothes than it does to look at Livejournal.

It's Halloween! This makes me very happy, even though I've slacked on the celebrating. Same as every year. I was going to make skull cupcakes, then decided that I'm not being bitten by the cupcake bug. I thought about cookies that could be made to look like tombstones or some such, then decided I didn't want cookies either. It'd be better to make a holiday treat that's a little less full of sugar, I thought, but I haven't actually gotten around to brainstorming. Maybe spiced cider. Mmmm.

It snowed on Tuesday. Blech.

That's all.

I'm on my way back from California tomorrow morning. I want to be at the airport or at least on the BART by 8am. This is where I'm grateful to still be on SLC time.

I'm really, really tired this evening. I still need to pack up all my stuff; that won't take much effort but it all needs organizing, you know?

I would like a nap, a lapcat, a muscle relaxant, and someone to help me get ready for tomorrow. I can has none of these things so I guess I'll get offline and go take care of things.

My visit here has been oddly intense. I didn't expect that. I'll probably feel better in the morning.

I'm still too busy to adequately respond to anything on f-page, or to make the handful of posts I've been wanting to. In lieu of that, some highlights.

Good stuff:
-being asked to include supercute plush skulls in the annual skeleton-themed art show at a favorite coffee house. I'll get to sell them, too. :) Yeah, I owe everyone here pictures of them. Maybe later today (see below).

-Spending time with a good friend this morning. It's been too long since we've been able to sit and talk for any length of time.

-Heaping plateful of vegan nachos.

-My new phone! It'll take better pictures than my old one.

-Getting to see Sister Spit perform last night. AWESOME. I wish I had had an extra $20 to drop on merch. There was some beautiful poster-sized photographs of assorted attractive people eating creamsicles and reading Saphistry.

-I got to see a play earlier this month, as well as pick up a ticket for the They Might Be Giants concert in November. Early birthday present!

-Giving a brief knitting lesson yesterday and making someone very happy because of it.

-Fall break.

Bad stuff:
-Missing out on *two* plays, one of which I was offered a free ticket to. The other one I gave up because I was pressured into/manipulated/misled into a double date. Not happy about that.

-Spending a lot of money on the fun stuff I've been able to do this month. (This isn't a terrible thing; I'm glad I've had some extra money in which to buy show tickets, vegan nachos, gas, etc. etc. Still, the money needs preserved.)

-The funky smell issuing from underneath the bathroom sink.

**

I can't keep myself focused on the here and now; I'm fixated on getting out of the city and am having a hard time taking care of the tasks in front of me. I'm not even excited so much about the being in San Francisco part as I am about the not being in SLC part.

You know, I'd be happy if the Salt Lake fall lasted as long as the Salt Lake winter, and vice versa. The autumn is fantastic this year, and will be over very soon.

Time to play with the new phone. :)

So I've pretty much given on up trying to keep up on f-page, though I scan it daily just to make sure that some other part of the country and/or world hasn't fallen into the ocean, been taken over by penguins, or acquired unexpected amounts of spongecake while I wasn't looking. There's probably about 6 thoughtful comments I want to make, but since the posts I wanted to comment on include those that are at least one month old, if not more, it's not likely that I'll get around to making them. The thought is there.

What's up:
-I wish I had more pair of black jeans. Scratch that - I wish I had more pairs of jeans that FIT. I have lost almost 2 pant sizes in the past couple months; even the items that fit me well no longer do. The lack of jeans that fit is especially felt.

-I have not bought any comic books in a few months. I miss them, but have no time to actually go into a store, look around, and pick a few out.

-I have set aside my knitting in favor of (first) crochet and (later) embroidery. The crochet was thrown over because I would have better luck reading Cyrillic than a crochet pattern. The embroidery continues to be a source of joy and inspiration, ant is preferable to knitting because the projects I'm working on are even more portable and don't take much time to do. I'll post pictures of them when I get a chance. They're awesome.

-I'm very much looking forward to my visit to California next weekend. I've been trying to watch my spending (by continuing to avoid comic book stores, for instance) but have been hit with some unexpected expenses (coughcoughTheyMightBeGiantsticketscoughcough) and am dithering over a couple purchases that, if not strictly necessary, would be nice. A haircut, for instance. Not necessary, but overdue. A ticket to a play I really want to see, for another. Not necessary, but much desired. I have also discovered a disturbing correlation between my proximity to the 24-hour Starbucks and the reducing size of my checking account balance.

-I'm teetering between not being sick and getting sick. I wash my hands frequently and use my hand sanitizer, especially after leaving work, but sometimes I get That Feeling. I'll wake up the next day and I'll feel pretty good. I've been extraordinarily healthy while I've been in school, which kind of amazes me. Still, to be on the safe side I may need to get some Thai food to, uh, sweat out the wee beasties. Fresh ginger is good for you, right?

-I'm being pursued by a young woman of my acquaintance who can't seem to pick up on the fact that A) I don't date; B) I won't date her; and C) I probably won't date anyone she thinks of setting me up with. In order to avoid the profound grumpiness I'm feeling about the situation, I've agreed to go on a double date thingy to a restaurant tomorrow night instead of a play that I really wanted to see. Sigh. I might have to come up with a clever way to bail. I hate that, but I hate that I gave in to avoid a conflict, too.

-I'm preparing for Halloween with ideas for skull cupcakes. I have no particular desire for cupcakes right now, but dammit, it's Halloween. It's required that skull cupcakes get made.

School, work, schoolwork, extra-curricular activities involving gay students, a variety of meetings and projects related to various communities and spiritual groups, drinking coffee and snagging some z's I managed to see a play last weekend. I can't pretend it was all recreation; I very much wanted to see it, but I also had the option of fulfilling a writing assignment in one of my classes by attending.

Each year the university's theatre department puts on a classic Greek play, but I've never gotten out to see one until this year. This year's production was The Bakkhai. I wanted to see it because, well, Dionysus. I also wanted to see it because the play was *banned by BYU.*

Yeah. Heh.

For those of you who aren't familiar with the play, The Bakkhai is a tragedy that involves the divine wrath of Dionysus against the city of Thebes when Pentheus, the heir of Thebes' ruling family, ridicules, insults, and then later sets out to destroy the maenads that travel with Dionysus. Pentheus' family ends up suffering dead or cursed and pretty much miserable (interestingly, the fact that Dionysus saved Thebes from having to go to war by tricking Pentheus isn't every brought up). Though the play can be interpretted in several ways, basically I saw it as an example of the Thirteenth Fairy motif. You know, how it's better to invite and treat nicely the scary ones instead of insulting them by pretending they aren't there.

So I find it kind of ironic, is all. Even though the costumes involved black leather corsets (a nod to fawn skins, I wondered) and OMG TEH GAYZ KISSNG you know - ironic.

**

My new cell phone was returned to T Mobile on Friday afternoon. I eventually stopped freaking out about it and liked certain features of it, but it ultimately wouldn't have worked out, I think. The phone I've had for several yeas is a Nokia so I found a nice new Nokia that I think I'll be a lot happier with. The camera is much nicer (I had no idea how much I'd use the camera feature on my phone) and I'm betting the sound quality will be better (I always had issues with this on my current phone). So yay.

I've been a busy crafter lately. I'll post photos maybe later today.

It's 37F in Salt Lake City this morning.

I have a new phone. This is probably only momentous to myself. I'm sure other people have a symbiotic relationship with their cell phones, bo perhaps there's some sympathy for the distress I'm experiencing as a result of such an earth-shattering shift.

I had a bit of a tantrum upon first receiving it. I've calmed down quite a bit, tweaked a few things, and am marveling at how I can plug it into my laptop to charge.

I'll get used to it, I'm sure. This phone does not have raised keys so I won't be able to text as easily. I was able to text by touch. No more. On the other hand, I can apparently check email. I'll give it a day and see if I like it. If not, I'll get it exchanged.

Dear Pagans,

While will do readings for whatever you want to offer me in exchange, my face painting and the crafts I sell typically involve the exchange of my goods and/or services for actual legal tender. Unlike my tarot readings, I can't accept iou's, banana bread, 100 free business cards, or really anything else that can't be readily exchanged for gasoline, tasty vegan food, comic books, or (oh, I dunno) more face paint and craft supplies so I can continue doing the things that bring in a little pocket change.

See, I like face painting and embroidering little felt skulls. I like that these things make other people happy, and doing them makes me happy. For better or worse, I can't barter for the supplies that make it possible to make you - and me - happy. So I thank you for your generosity, but those little slips of green paper are what I require in this particular exchange.

Sincerely,
Me

Done deal: I'll be in San Francisco for six nights. I'll arrive on Oct. 17 (Saturday) and leave on the 23rd (Friday). I'll be staying at a hostel in the Union Square area.

I hsve no plans, but the hostel is near MUNI, bus, BART, and cable car stops so I'll buy a 7-day transit pass and spend my time doing . . . gods know what. Enjoy the weather. Watch the traffic. Walk everywhere and enjoy the lung capacity of someone who's lived thousands of feet above sea level. Visit parks. Do free stuff. Buy a used book or two.

If any of the Bay Area peeps on the f-list wants to meet for coffee or a snack let me know and maybe we can work something out.

I'm so looking forward to being out of this city for a while. I can't even tell you how much.

I found reasonably priced airfare and a cheap, good-looking hostel in San Francisco. Nothing purchased yet, just trying on the idea - and waiting to see if it turns into a bad one.

On the other hand, it can't be worse than staying put in SLC for another season. I need a break.

I've been looking for signs of the changing season for a few weeks now. I haven't seen much. I began to think that I was seeing a change in the light but if I was the shift was so subtle I couldn't be certain I was seeing it.

Yesterday it rained off and on through the whole day, mostly on. From way up on campus I could look out across the valley and see the mass of clouds moving from east to west, carried by wind. As is typical here, the only difference between rain and shine is a couple of blocks. What kept us all hopping was the way the pattern of rainfall shifted throughout the day. Dry spots didn't stay dry; wet spots didn't stay wet.

The rain actually started on Monday, a cold wet downpour that caught many people by surprise. I've had a bad headache for several days but since I often have headaches I don't pay them much attention. It was a pressure headache though, confirmed by the stiffness in my knees and ankles. Rain. Changing pressure.

Tuesday's rain was less cold and brought a much-needed freshness to the air. I could smell the mountains. I drove up to the highest parking lot of the dorms and sat on my car, watching the sun set over the Great Salt Lake and the mountains beyond. I felt peace, for the first time in months. The cold air brought me back to the rich internal firmament I've been missing.

Today the light is definitely different. I can see that golden autumnal tone on the trees and grass. Spring and autumn light seems somehow indirect, like it's filtering in from an angle. The colors are more brilliant in these transitional months.

Once again I wonder about where I'll live. I should be done with school in 2011. I have no plans or ambitions after that point, and the question of what to do with myself has weighed on me since before I started school. I've felt so out of sync with the weather here this year. I don't think I've ever felt so disconnected. Since May I couldn't step outside during the day without feeling confused about why it was so bright - and no, not in an eyes-are-adjusting sort of way. Since when does sunlight seem unnatural? I want to go where the light is less harsh. I want to go where the presence of snow doesn't burrow under my skin and live there nearly six months.

Maybe I need to go somewhere else.

It goes without saying that this place is like no other on earth. Every place is unique. But the uniqueness here - the wind, the mountains, the desert, the salt - has me hooked. Still, I can't shake the yearning for a different sort of place.

It's been a long time since I traveled. Fall break is coming up, maybe I need to go somewhere for a while.

ETA: Interesting that just the idea and whimsical planning of a trip Somewhere Else has calmed me down significantly. I wonder if my car is good to drive over state lines.