Continued

Nothing is happening. I wa shanging around with friends yesterday (meaning not partying, I don't go partying even in better states of mind. Sanna invited me for lunch and then I got some stuff in the center I needed and then we were walking around with Barka and doing nothing).
I'm just tired.

...whatever.

Did I say that there was my thesis in the comp? Which I didn't back up, because I didn't need to carry it from place to place or something, having my comp in my home. So.... I'm afraid that I won't graduate in winter. Meaning that there might be problems with getting to the Ph. D. programme. I cannot work without the comp and the camera. So there's less possibilities for income. It just all sucks.
And people will get socks for Christmas. The yarn stayed in place and it's already paid for.

Fuck'em all

I planned to write several nice entries about the places I've seen. With some nice pics.
Yesterday I came home and found a knocked flowerpot, soil all over, cats hysterical. I cursed them for the mess, then went to my room, the bag with Christmas gifts was not on the bookshelf but on the floor and things scattered around so I cursed the cats again.. yeah, there was a ball of yarn all over, too, and then i straightened my back after picking something and noticed that my comp is gone. I even skipped several minutes of cursing and called the police.
TO sum it up, comp gone, camera gone, the shift lens which ruined my savings gone (blah... jsut some stupid 1500 euros), PDA gone (not that it was a thing i needed urgently but still), Christmas gifts gone, for whatever the reason half of my used makeup stuff gone. And my old bag, big pot, still dirty from dyeing yarn (I hope that the dye is at least mildly poisonous), my ancient discman I've had from 1997 and to which I was deeply emotionally attached. And some cash, luckily, being broke, I didn't have much of it, although those 60euros in coins whichI just gathered in a can.. well, that would make a nice big exhibition catalog from an interesting exhibition. ANd the aquamarine pendant I got for some birthday or what and which I quite liked although the chain always got tangled in my hair.
what stayed: USB cable for the camera - the robbers were probably very smart, the camera was cabled to the comp... fish-eye lens (500 euros) which was in its nice neat case with Pentax written on it and which lay on the floor in the middle of the room. Silver tableware stayed in place. Cats hysterical but alive..... could've been carried away with the pot, as Barka remarked with insight.
I'm tired.
Compassion and material help welcome.

Treasure

I got three kilos of yarn. Yesterday I was sitting in the kitchen with Katarina and knitting a sock (she explained me how to) and the school director came and said something like it's cool to knit, I used to crochet and I don't do anymore and there's some yarn in the attic, should you want some. So we went to dig it up. I didn't expect too much, something like scratchy acrylic whatever but there was a huge bag of.... Wool, another wool, thicker wool, thinner wool.... I got the smaller part. First we sorted it out and realized that the scratchy and itchy thick wool would be maybe useful for army sweaters, s/m apparel or weaving rugs.. most probably rugs, army sweaters or s/m apparel in black and baby blue wouldn't be what people expect. But the rest were wonderful vintage woolen yarns and Katarina had to be pretty strict with me as what to leave there. In the worst cases something like 90%wool, 10% whatever. And wonderful ones. Some strange activity of Providence had made me pack the few things into my weekend suitcase as I had things more than for the shoulder bag and I didn't feel like travelling with a paper bag.. and the suitcase was half empty although pretty small... so I could squeeze the stuff easily in. Well, not that easily. Somehow. Katarina wants gloves and scarf from the thin red one whereas the right row is one type of yarn and as such it calls for some sort of Norwegian pattern with reindeer or something. Should someone from there (I mean Norway or around) read this and know of a pattern for that, here with it.
The sock is wonderful. When I was still halfway in the process, Katarina said that it's like a sleeping bag for the foot and it indeed is, it's the mohair that makes it fluffy and soft and if my mom doesn't love them, then she's pretty ungrateful:-). And by the way, Tähti lost her voice. She meows and no sound is made. Wonderful. And she doesn't seem to be frustrated at all.
Finished the first half of the scarf. It looks hardly different from the sample piece I published the otehr day. Katarina loved that yarn and wanted me to get her some - although it was efore we discovered the treasure.

Living in art school

I needed some life or something of that sort.
The student trip left me in pretty depressive mood and as Katarina had invited me to her place in the mountains, I was pretty glad to go. I had to get up at four which was killing, regarding that it's almost the time when I go to bed, but I managed. I took the first morning metro (what a luck. I thought it works from something like four, not almost five), managed to get to the station and on the train on which I happily slept most of the journey... sell, not happily but slept and at something like ten I was in Jesenik, behind the mountains, where weather was awful (it's autumn and the weather has a certain awful tendency in lowlands too, anyway), Katarina was dissolving some workshop at the art school where she works and resides so I slept meantime... The school is a bit short of money for heating ('I'm ready to go for an internship to northern Finland, after living here for two years', to quote my dear friend. The dreary evening in fact did call for a sauna, snowdrift and not fully reasonable amount of booze but the building is booze-free - the school director is a former alcoholic and as for the rest, we're in Central Europe, whatever we might think about it. To put it simly, we were damn cold.) but there's mushrooms growing in the garden and a magnificent view over the mountains. Unless it's misty, raining or something, of course. the view. the mushrooms are in the season regardless of weather.
Today my main job was to print 450 new year cards.
This is a pic totally destroying my carefully built image of a lazyass, Katarina borrowed my camera and caught me working. Well, I have to admit that I was miming the brave builders of happy future on the reliefs from the 20's and that I have much less charm than those stone guys who keep the power plants operating and stuff. But, I can use my hands, should it be needed. Thru the whole day I produced the goddamn cards (it was a barter trade for some sponsoring or whatever) and developed a nice back ache. The theory that manual work is a healing experience has certain weak points.
But.. I'm enjoying this place.

On the road

We went for another trip with the students. In the morning there was such a mist that i had problems finding the departure spot.
Anyhow, the sky cleared and around noon, the daz was ideal for adverts for beauty of autumn.
I was knitting on the board, yesterday I got a discounted microfibre yarn (torn tags, nothing worse) so I started working on Sandy's scarf. Now I have a nice piece full of badly hidden mistakes but the general look is ok.

I'll write some more but i'm helluva tired and need to get up very early tomorrow....

Just look at

this

Samples

See what i'm into. If you happen to be my friends, you can apply for christmas gifts although I'm not sure for which Christmas. If you're passers-by, there'll be something on etsy.com one day.

The gray and white is Nuvola by Titanwool, wool, mohair, polysomething, warm, fluffy, feels like a hug. Five balls only, two or one planned for the revenge socks. The needles are 3mm ones, to give you the idea of thickness.


The blue stuff is less purple in reality and it'll be all nicely boiled in bright blue to add some undertones. Pure alpaca, guys. Not enough for a sweater, I think, could be combined with the Nuvola stuff, maybe even without dyeing. Dunno yet what to do with it. The yarn is aprox. same thickness as the one above but denser and not so fluffy. I didn't bother with the sample, it'll go to the dying vat once more and it's better to keep it in a hank as it is.



This grey thing is textured meaning that it has no sense to create plastic patterns. Another mohair blend and light colours dye nicely. A scarf or something? I'll think about it.









Superwash wool. Fluffy and lovely. This is gonna be my sweater soon. Featuring with size 5 needles. But this yarn is continued and available all the time... so no need to worry. All the other stuff is from all sorts of obscure sales which are never to be repeated or something....

...some more

I was off to my parents' for a weekend. well, from Sunday up till now. On Saturday I was off for a trip with the students. Parents were in the middle of some sort of continuous argument or whatever they might call their relationship, starting that dad convinced my mom to go to some sort of car races on Sunday and when she said yeah, ok, I have never been to such an event, he started asking whether she really wants to go in such style that she felt she wouldn't be too welcome. So when I arrived, we went for a walk and talked stupidities and she said that they decided to go somewhere warm for christmas, that they deserve, especially she, some sort of nice cool Christmas without any cleaning and forced socializing. She wants to go to Reunion, basically.. and Dad insists on New Zealand stopping in Sydney for some time. So there'll be a bit of fun, I guess. And no trip after all, with quite a probability:-)
I browsed the local yarn stores and got the Nuvola. For the revenge socks and for some more projects.
Tähti is sitting on my lap now, not wanting me to go away and Red is still quite full of fleas... they haven't killed each other when I was gone - good.

Entropy

I live in a continuous mess, forgetting appointments, being late, going to wrong places, my cellphone messed the phonebook up in such a way.. well, I thought I invited someone for a dinned and it appeared that it was someone else. Today it happened again but I knew the guy by voice.... I just wonder what is going to happen next. And where has Niko's number gone (or will I call Niko when calling Mom or the bank? and what if i need to call the bank, who will answer? I should check it all but I have some 200 people there, well, 180 if i delete all the names which don't ring a bell, who the hell might be Dagmar? Don't remember anyone of that name....)
I got the washing machine fixed but didn't manage to do any washing. I came home, a friend was already waiting for me - he had called that he'd appear to pick some things which he had left in my place before, another friend was coming for the dinner... as there's not my name on the doorbell (I didn't fix a new label there yet), he called, i waved from the window and went to open, slammed the door nicely so that the cats wouldn't go out and downstairs I discovered that I was holding the celly in one hand... and the keys were up in the appartment. After thirty seconds of curses in various languages (have you noticed that southern Italian can create a hour-long lament telling everything about someone's relatives, saints, Virgin Mary and unnatural sexual acts whereas in Finnish a few syllables are enough for expressing all the hatred of the world? And that some languages have curses related to final phases of digestion whereas other languages prefer sexually explicit lingo for the same things? I think I used everything of these.........) and then I recalled that those friends who did the catsitting have the second bunch of keys. The rest was a bit of organizing.

Some more yarn

Red is increaisngly curious, today morning she even came to my bed to see what's up htere when the big cat spends most of her time there. Tähti is jealous, bothers me all the time, when she meets Red, she looks hurt and to whos me who is the master of the house, Tähti peed into the bedsheet again. Tomorrow I'll get the washing machine fixed so I'll wash it but anyway. My place ain' one huge cat toilet. Grrr, damn stinking little nasty creature.
I got some more sale yarn. Called Creative pack: Yellow and Creative pack: Black. Something like Salsa bolognese, meaning yesterday's leftovers. I'll create someting, be assured. I love the yellow/pink/blue/green yarn. And te cashmere mix, one of the blacks. And all the rest.

I hope someone up there is adding all that for me.

Yesterday evening I came home after showing the foreign students around the Museum of Applied Arts (there was the usual chaos, the meeting point was at the faculty, the museum is literally next door so some clever guys were waiting at the National Museum which is a different institution somewhere else) and wanted to feed the tabby as usual. He looked quite normal, regarding the illness. He refused to drink and then he died. I was pissed off. I spent a week nursing, cleaning after him and he just died. To calm my nerves I grabbed the rubbish and the earthly remains of he poor kitten to throw it all away and then had a useless and boring walk in Tesco where I bought some more food. I'm always buying food and my kitchen is crammed with whatever - I realized that there's already quite a lot of frozen vegetables in the freezer....
Today I cleaned up most of the traces in the kitchen, disinfected the kitty carrier where he used to spend most of his time and now I should go back to normal work, thesis and stuff. I dyed some yarn instead.

And now about something totally normal.

The upper part of the white sweater. should you be interested how to make it, I don't have much idea. It has to be cast on in two pieces (one sleeve, back part of the neckline, other sleeve, front part) and somehow kept together for soemthing like three rows when it's knit together. It sucks, I couldn't get longer circulars than 100 cm and because even those cost money, I got one and then used an 80cm and a 60cm (this one was a size larger, i. e. 6, because i knit tighter). Apart from the usual topology problems (tangling the cast on part in many impossible ways) I had to carefully plan because of changing the needeles. Four would be optimal. Anyhow, three rows are knit from the top and then you take two needles and knit one stitch to one, one to another to form sleeves and the 'seam' will be on the upper edge as well as on the lower. Of course that the area under the opening for the neck is separate from the beginning so it's all knit on its relative needle. When the sleeves are wide enough, the opposite happens - you knit from two needles to one up to armpits. Then the magic part comes: from one side you knit round the body and return to the end of the sleeve, then the same from the other sleeve, resulting in two rows on the sleeves from their relative balls and one on the body from each ball. Then cast off on the sleeves and go round and round.
I like knitting in one piece. In all impossible ways. I hate stitching the pieces together. When the thing is all knitted together, it's much neater and more interesting.
(Yes, this piece is full of knitting mistakes as well.)

Tired

Yesterday there was the registration of foreign students where I and Kristina had some sort of presentation of the volunteers. The International department (for whatever the reason inhabited mainly by former students of the Finnish language department and pretty annnoying people) did its usual job so us, who were there to inform the goddamn people that we take care about their cultural life, were asked million times questions like And is the International Politics course good? or Do I really have to fill in all these papers. The courses questions would be answered much easier if someone used a few brain cells and stuck the lists of courses somewhere else than at the back of the lecture room where people had to knock over people sitting in the back row and if the papers were printed in something more readable than size 12 letters. But, criticizing is always easy and when one spends two hours answering the same questions of which half should be answered by someone else.. oddly enough, not that many people came asking Kristina. I probably looked clever even though I had some makeup on. But seems that at least part of the people looked nice and cooperative so maybe all the stuff will be ok.
I know totaly nothing, I"m drained of all my mental powers, I should take the red one to the vet and she's hiding behind the fridge, Tähti ocassionally pukes, I caught myself that I'm talking about cat shit all teh time. Thought that this cat business would be much easier. I feel guilty about it but I think about stopping that.