Tuesday

New gadget/tech season is getting under way. I think I'm pretty safe from a new phone. The leaks about the new ones from Google don't really show me anything I'm interested in and I like my current Google one and I have a perfectly viable backup in case something happens to it. So I think I may be stable for now, phonewise...

But... chromebook wise? I could be temped. By a stylus, maybe. If there's stylus storage onboard and it has a couple of other sexy features and it does not weigh a metric ton. My current chromebook is still in excellent shape but it has, from time to time, shown some signs of age and it is not repairable. So... there's clearly a vulnerability there should something tres cool hit the market.

The real softspace, however is in the wrist real estate. I'm already my fitness tracker's bitch but... what if that fitness tracker also showed me swim details, while I was swimming? And gave me date and time. My Pebble watch did all that but it took at lot of hand holding and while the software (native and apps) was always close, it never quite got there. Plus it was big and heavy. What if something not so big and not so heavy with better software that still did it all arrived on the market? I think I'd have to bite. For a long time, I was locked into the Misfit world because I had such a long streak with their tracking but I'm over that. I'll drop Fitbit in a heartbeat if somebody offers me better.

Garmin has something coming out tomorrow but I think it's too big. Fitbit has something coming out soon so maybe? And those are just two that I know about, I know there are more just weeks away. I'm ready.

Meanwhile back here on planet real life, I'm getting ready to go fire up the sewing machine. My new pattern arrived yesterday and I cut out the pieces to test. It's a shirt with an unusual neck. I'm making it out of trash fabric and only making it from the elbows up. I want to see if I can get it over my head and if the shoulders fit. The pattern is for a jacket and I'm faking it into a shirt. Or at least I'm gonna try.

But, first, apparently, there is a cat who is thinking it's time for some food.

My tweets

• Mon, 16:08: OK, but, those bt headphones aren't going to gimme tunes while i swim... why do swimmer always get dissed by tech??… https://t.co/6J81y0sPuz
• Mon, 20:01: I wish the @Mariners explain their broadcaster scheme. Where's Blowers? It would be great to have a place to go to find out who's on where.
• Tue, 09:46: I think I paid $1 for this fabric (online) and it turned out to be barely worth that until I thought to use it for…… https://t.co/wfuiCukDjr

Make Make Making

My test top from the new pattern was a tremendous success. It demonstrated that 1. my idea will work fine, 2. I need to move the shoulders up a little (easy) and 3. making the neck 1" higher will work fine.

So then I made a pattern out of my heavy paper from the tissue version that I had and incorporated the changes. Even created a version with a kangaroo pocket. It was rather tedious but I got 'er done and now it's all ready for the right fabric. I think I'm going to try it first with some fleece.

Today's Care Bear is not my favorite. His arms/paws are weird. If you study him you see that one is up touching his cheek and the other is behind his back but they just look weird.



Then I spent a long time separating out the fabric I got on Saturday. Most of it is small pieces - too small really for dolls. So I'll be piecing it together for stuff, like more monsters maybe or other stuff. It's plenty to make a quilt but I'm just not that into quilting - piecing, fine. Quilting, no thanks. So we will see.

I also signed up (as in paid $6) for a mystery Knit Along. It's cowl for keeping your neck warm. The author of the pattern sends the pattern to you in 3 pieces - one every week - revealing more with each piece. I've always wanted to try one of these mystery knits but never have. This author, however, is the creator of the only knit pattern that defeated me. As in I could not do it. So this Knit Along is a challenge to me. It starts September 1.

By that time I will have finished the sweater I'm working on. I miss having bears smiling at me from across the room but I am really enjoying knitting other stuff for a bit. More bears later.

[I meant to whine a little and hit full blown rant here.]

Meanwhile I just spent an hour culling out my Twitter feed. Yes, Trump is a buffoon and yes, it is a tragedy that he was elected and yes, sarcasm is a great way to commemorate the problem. BUT, he was elected more than a half year ago. Sarcasm and hand wringing and woah is me-ing is NOT going to fix the problem. Getting him out of office might. Electing someone better (And surely that field is full??!!) will absolutely do it.

Absolutely NOTHING in my Twitter feed even comes close to discussing the how of seeing his ass out the door. We only hold elections every 4 years. If someone is going to successfully defeat him we'd better find that someone NOW. Let's forget our mistakes and move on to fix them! Four more years of sarcastic tweets is going to lead right to eight years of this asshole.

So I'm just unfollowing anyone adding fuel to the fire in hopes of finding anyone who is interested in rebuilding and fixing the problem. Not finding many so this should free up a nice portion of my internet time.

[Rant over.]

I have an invitation to a very special home cooked meal tonight and I'm quite excited. And also appreciating a fine reason to skip watching tonight's baseball game. The Mariners have lost a bascillion games in a row with last night's loss being a spectacularly stupid one. Plus, it's a Tuesday home game, so the former player who grates on my nerves will be in the broadcast booth and I won't have to hear him. Double sweet.

I think I'll go do a house check and make sure everything is house cleaner ready. She's coming early (8 am) tomorrow in hopes of avoiding parking problems caused by the Mariner game which is in the afternoon.