Like I wrote, I went to a Japanese market on Saturday. One of my purchases was a very cute bento box. Truth be told, this one won me over with the cute cloth napkin that came with it. Well, last night I made my first lunch for the bento box. Here we have yaki-soba noodles with orange peppers, baked tofu, and seaweed salad. Yum! I also had a cup of miso soup. I have plenty leftover to have the same thing tomorrow.
Tonight I was a very good girl. After getting home from a meeting at 8pm, I did the paperwork for a meeting that I have in the morning and I wrote two reports. Now, off to bed!
yummy January 26, 2009
this week January 25, 2009
Last weekend was the annual viewing of Little Women with my friend and her daughters. It used to be that every time Beth died (and she dies every single time we watch this movie; just once I wish she’d resist holding the Hummel baby and not get Scarlet fever, but no, every time she does and then she’s sickly and then she dies. Every time.) that the girls would turn around and watch the tears run down my face. But now, the older of the two girls is now crying right along. Yea!
Yesterday, Friend Carolin and I went to Ikea and the Mitsuwa Marketplace. I love the Mitsuwa Market – I never know half of the stuff that I buy, but I love it. Here is what I had for dinner tonight:
yaki-soba with orange peppers and miso soup
Last night I started knitting mittens while watching Sense and Sensibility. I’m using this mitten pattern (ravelry link) in green and a pinky-purple.
Unexpected Weekend January 17, 2009
This has been a longer than expected weekend. We had a snow/cold day on Thursday. I was scheduled to go to a conference all day. Despite calling off school, we decided to go to the conference anyway. It was a pretty good conference. I was seated next to a person who apparently has to process everything verbally. It wasn’t so bed in the morning, but by the end of the afternoon, I was ready to pull my hair out. I picked up a few new ideas (from the speaker, not the verbal processor), which is the point, right? I do get a comp day for attending the conference on a non-attendance day. Woohoo.
Yesterday was also a snow/cold day (it seems weird to call it a cold day and have it mean that school was called off, so I’m using the slash…). I slept late, watched movies, knit a ton, and started laundry. I say started because I ended up have six loads. Crazy.
I started out today with:
Coffee and a chocolate croissant (thank you freezer stocked full of food from Trader Joe’s).
Today I watched more dvds, knit more, played piano, did laundry, went to the library, read etc. Lazy day. Just what I wanted. I really need to do paperwork tomorrow. And clean. Ughh.
PS – Michelle, your birthday present is done!
New Tricks January 5, 2009
I received the book Show Me How from friend Kristin for Christmas. This book is so me. It diagrams instructional steps for how to do 500 different things from everyday things like fixing a leaking toilet to how to fight off a shark. She also gave me the supplies to tackle 6 of the 500 tasks. One was for fixing a bike tire with a dollar bill (she gave me a dollar bill). Another was a bottle of champagne and a foam sword to sabrage a bottle of champagne (I’m not really sure how well it will work, but don’t tell her that!). I also received balloons with which to make balloon animals. See exhibits A and B of my new-found skill:
A scarf for Uncle January 4, 2009
Okay – here’s the story. I went to go visit my uncle in October. He’s definitely a nerdy fellow. He takes Latin classes for fun. Why, we can’t say. He’s completely obsessed with it (as in, he studies a couple hours a day). He’s in his third year of taking Latin, so they are now reading works of literature. This past semester they read something that caught his eye. When I was visiting, he mentioned something about this text and that he’d like a scarf that contains the text worked into the pattern.
Here it is:
nec varios discet mentiri lana colores,
ipse sed in pratis aries iam suave rubenti
murice, iam croceo mutabit vellera luto,
sponte sua sandyx pascentis vestiet agnos
It translates:
Nor will the wool learn to lie in many colors, but the ram himself in the fields will change his fleece, now to blushing purple, now to saffron yellow, vermilion of its own free will will cloak the grazing lambs.
It’s from Virgil’s Eclogues 4.
I smile.
I know you’re thinking that I should knit this for you, but really, um no.
A few days later, while I’m still out visiting him, he approaches me with the text and translation written out.
Ack – he’s serious?
Still, I’m not biting.
A week later, after I’ve left and gone home, I get this email:
“So you could use only the last line in my scarf. I know it wouldn’t be as good, but we do have to be practical. On the other hand, it really needs to have a lamb on it and the lamb needs to be vermilion. Preferably, it should be frisking.”
Okay, now I have to figure out an easy way of doing this scarf. So, here is it. I embroidered, using a chain stitch, a vermilion sheep and the last line of the text.
It was well received.
