It's all... big

Two weeks ago today my mom went into the hospital via ambulance because she couldn't breathe. She had been fighting a chest cold for a week at that point.

On the following Wednesday I got a phone call at 8am from my Dad that they were moving her from a regular room into the ICU. I left work, Dan left his student teaching job and we drove back home. I spent the night in the ICU with her.

The next morning, Thursday, she was placed in a medically induced coma and put on a ventilator because even with an oxygen mask on, she was unable to keep her O2 levels within a safe zone.

It was very scary, watching her struggle to breathe. And when they decided to put her in the coma and on the ventilator it was such a rushed decision, my dad and I were pushed from the room and I didn't get to say anything to her. The last thing I said before she went under was when she got upset at me and I told her not to be sassy.

Since then, everything has been hurry up and wait. Wait for her to get better. Wait for her lungs to empty of all the fluid that is, in effect, drowning her. Wait to see if she's going to be called away from us.

Because the semester is coming to a close, Dan and I were only able to stay for a week. Leaving her bedside was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do.

So she was placed into a coma. And she FOUGHT against it like you wouldn't believe. The nurses said that, with the medicine she was on, she should have been completely unconscious. Instead, stubborn as always, she kept waking up and looking around, a few times she woke up, looking over at me and started to cry.

In the midst of all of this I was at the house, washing dishes when Dad came in. There was such an expression of... pain on his face that I was positive he'd gotten bad news from the hospital. He looked at me for a second before looking away. "You know that we can't come to graduation, right?" I told him it wasn't even anything that he needed to worry about right then. Before I headed back to school to finish out the semester he gave Dan the camcorder so that he could record graduation. (I'm graduating cum laude!!)

Since I left her condition worsened considerably. This past Wednesday she was recieving 95% oxygen and her body was only retaining 92%. The doctor in charge of her case told my dad that he had never seen someone as sick as Mom was.

Then... last night I got a call from Dad. Mom's nurse for the next few days is a self proclaimed "Stubborn Polack" who was sick of seeing Mom in her ICU, so she was going to force her to get better. After a few hours in this woman's care she was down to 60% oxygen and was retaining 98% of it. This morning she was down to 55% oxygen and was keeping 93%.

I don't want to risk jinxing it, but I'm really hoping that she's starting to heal. This upcoming Monday they are going to do a tracheostomy because they can't keep the tubes down her throat for any longer because it'll damage her vocal cords. The good thing about this is that with the trech it's easier to wean her from the O2 because if she has a crisis all they need to do is clip the tubes to the trech instead of intubating her.

Now I just hope that they don't wake her up until after graduation otherwise she'll make herself worse worrying over missing it. As for me... I just want to go home and be with her.

A Better Shot

Of the hair, not so much of my face.

Snip Snip

My hair has gotten really long. Like... stupid long. It's long to the point that I have to lift it up before I sit down in chairs, otherwise it's pinned and I can't move my head.

So I've been debating a haircut for a while. What style, how short, highlights or no. I've decided on this:



I know, I know... a Buffy cut? But I've actually had this haircut before and it worked with my fat face.

Pictures as soon as I get it done, which hopefully will be within the next week, as soon as my student loan refund gets into the bank.

House Bunny

So D's parents invited me to see a movie with the family, very sweetly supporting my current attempts to be away from the dorm of doom until the transfer can be made.

So we all headed out to see a movie. And they picked House Bunny.

Oy.

Being me... I can't stand movies that try to have a deep message, but in the end are just "be thin and pretty girls, that's the best way to be!"

Let me summarize the movie for you all. For those who might be inclined to see it, consider this your SPOILER WARNING...

Playboy bunny gets fired and booted out of the mansion.

Searches for new home.

Decides that a sorority is EXACTLY like the playboy mansion and tries to find a job as a house mother.

Ends up at the "nerdy" sorority that's about the lose it's charter cause of lack of pledges. The members include: the nerd, the pseudo-lesbian-almost-goth, the super-butch-farm-girl, the girl in a back brace, the pregnant girl, the short girl and the girl who doesn't talk.

Playboy bunny proceeds to skankify the girls in a montage that is every confident woman's worst nightmare, i.e. midriffs are ALWAYS to be shown, cleavage is NOT an option and the bottom of your ass-cheeks should be visible beneath your shorts/skirt.

Playboy bunny teaches the girls how to get members, by throwing drinking parties, pretending to be stupid cause "boys don't really like girls who are smart", and, of course, dressing like skanks.

Fast forward to the end of the movie where everyone learns the same lesson. That it's OK to be who you are, so long as you're beautiful, covered in make-up, wearing designer clothes and hiding your stranger personality traits.

I felt so empowered when I left the movie. I wanted to go out and.... get something waxed. Or possibly just retch, I get those two urges mixed up sometimes...

Yay Karma

So apparently I've got some wickedly good Karma going at the moment. It all started when I was at work the other day. I had pulled up the picture of Lil D all knit up and my boss asked me "Oh hey... I was cleaning out my parents' house and I found a huge cedar chest full of yarn. You wouldn't want any, would you? Otherwise I'm going to throw it all out.

Needless to say, I claimed the yarn.
5 boxes so far, with more to come, and "A huge bucket of needles and hooks too. About the size of a paint can."

That same day on campus the used book store in the library was outside with some books. $4.25 for all these books.


I finished knitting this beret a long time ago. I need to felt it a little, as it's fairly large. I have problems with my ribbing always stretching out and losing the bounce. Maybe I need to knit some elastic into my hats...


Continuing with the great deals, I found this gorgeous necklace in a local thrift store today for a whopping $2.


And this fantastic knitting book for 25 cents.






And, to top it all off, I've been searching everywhere for Jean Greenhowe's Knitted Toys book, on and off for the past year or so. I was perusing Amazon and I saw a used listing for $2.98. I was positive that it was a fluke, that it would be one of her shorter pamphlets, but even for one of those that's pretty cheap so I bought it figuring whatever I get, I get.
WOOT!!!

My Theory

Summer classes are kicking my ass. 16 weeks worth of information in 5. It's just insane.

In my literary criticism class there is a guy. A really really really annoying guy. You've all met this type of guy before. The one who knows a little bit about EVERYTHING and talks as if he's studied that single thing all his life. The one who takes your comments and rephrases them using $10 words.

Yup, I have one of those guys in my class. And it's driving me nuts. I am a firm believer that with intelligence comes a certain amount of responsibility. Just because you know every answer doesn't mean you have to blurt it out. In fact, you shouldn't. Give others a chance to shine once in a while. But no, he's got to interject his 'wisdom' into every subject, sometimes cutting off the professor.

If he didn't keep cutting me off so that he could gift us all with his wisdom I'd probably think it was funny. He's 23 I believe and talks about how he lived in Hollywood, New York, Mexico, Europe, Maine, etc. Now I'm thinking army brat but he talks like he's some great world traveler and loves to reminisce about "my time in Hollywood".

But today. Oh my today was FANTASTIC! We were discussing Freud. Not my favorite guy. Very focused on male superiority and all of his theories tend to discount women as anything more than jealous creatures with penis envy. And I didn't hesitate to point this out in class to explain my annoyance. Then... oh then...

He cuts the professor off and proceeds to go into a speech about childbirth and childrearing and how evolution formed women as weaker because in all cultures women, when pregnant and afterwards, do nothing but lie in bed because they lack the strength to do anything else, that it was a universal truth, that that was why men were superior, because they were stronger and didn't have these periods of "innate weakness". Then caps his speech with "but, I mean, I'm a total feminist and I think that girls rule."

At least we're already halfway through the course. Only 2 and a half more weeks to deal with him. But I think I may need to stop bringing my knitting to class. It's too tempting. Plus I'm sure the blood would stain the bamboo.

7 More Days

So last week, with all of the drama with people going into the hospital, was bad. Left me drained.

This past weekend was exhausting. Writing 3 papers in 2 days, one of them a research paper.

Sunday I found out that my paycheck bounced for the SECOND TIME. So I quit my job.

Monday I interviewed for a temp job and spent 2 hours struggling to get people to focus on our group project that was due Wednesday.

Tuesday I got the job and celebrated D's birthday.

Wednesday I turned in the group paper and just realized that, because one person didn't e-mail me her section until midnight on Tuesday, I pasted her section of the paper over the conclusion and had to take responsibility for it with the professors. I'm sure that'll be great for my grade.

Today there was lots of drama all over the place. I'm so exhausted and emotionally drained. I still have an 8 page research paper to write, though it isn't due for a week.

Tomorrow is my last day of classes and then I'm driving home to do damage control and deal with the latest dose of drama in my life. Upside, I'll get to go to a hockey game. Downside, gas is f-in expensive!!!

7 days until this semester is done. Then I have 2 weeks to relax before summer classes start up. I plan to sleep mostly.

And Another

I'm not positive if it was another quake or just an aftershock, but it happened again this morning.

It wasn't as strong, which is good, since I was on the top floor of one of the oldest buildings on campus. Middle of class I suddenly get very dizzy, then realize it's because the whole building is moving!

It's all anyone is talking about. You hear people on their phones on the bus assuring people they woke up, that it lasted 5 minutes (more like 30-45 seconds), that they were thrown from their beds, etc.

Rumbly in my... Bed?

It's 5:00 am.

There was just an earthquake.

The whole building was shaking like it was going to come down.

I could have sworn I was in Illinois, not California.

Oy...

Sick as a dog right now. Started in my nose on Friday and settled comfortably into my chest around noon today. D, sweetie pie that he is, dropped by with medicine for me. I took today as a sick day but it's back to classes tomorrow.

The semester is coming to an end and I really need to get my ass in gear about these research papers. Got the books. Got the articles. Just need to start reading and thinking and, most important, writing.

Got an e-mail from a girl who will be rooming with us over the summer. I'm bummed because I thought I might actually have the place all to myself for a month or so, but nope.

I'm a little worried because she seems very worried about fairly superficial things. She wanted to know if we were clique-y because "there was a situation in my apartment last year" and then wanted to know who she would be rooming with because "I'm really used to having my own room because I live in Evergreen, but this was cheaper, I just don't know if it'll work out cause I'm not used to it."

Frankly... she's sounding a lot like Ly from last semester. This is the one thing I really hate about campus housing. I have no control over the people who come in and out and there's a lot of anticipation and anxiety that builds up.

Will they be complete psychos like Ly?
Will they want to have wild drunken parties every weekend?
Will they be complete slobs who never clean?
Will they be slackers who disrupt my study habits?
Will I find a good place to hide the bodies?

See? Just too many variables for me to handle.

Taco Hell

I feel like I became a real college student today. I ate Taco Bell for lunch (in itself a rare occasion in my life) then went home and took a 2 hour nap with D. It was lovely. He was amused by the fact that I drooled on my pillow but I didn't care. I needed that nap.

But oh, the indigestion! I woke up with fire in my throat and all but ran to get one of my antacid pills. Taco Bell is evil. I wanted soup. I was looking forward to soup. But they didn't have any good soup. Just bean with bacon and broccoli cheddar. I just wanted some nice chicken noodle soup! So instead I got tacos. Ugh. I honestly think I'm going to die. That's the last Taco Hell I'll be eating for a loooong time.

It's pouring out. And thundering.

I took my copy of Victorian Lace Today to my Victorian Lit class, as we had a presentation on Tuesday about fashions of the time and I thought it was fitting. But my teacher displayed dismay and disappointment that I hadn't knit up everything in the book to show the class. Then, pausing on a page with a beautiful shawl, she asked, a little too casually, how long it would take to knit it.

I have learned my lesson about knitting for others. I looked at the shawl, smiled and responded "Oh, between 4 and 5 hundred hours." No way I'm getting suckered into knitting anything else for anyone else. Especially not this teacher.

Wow, Wah and Weird

Wow: My teacher used my mid-term essay exam to teach the class today. Read my intro paragraph to start discussion, read a few bits through the class. I was stunned. And I got a perfect score on it.

Wah: I had all my classes set up and then it all went to poop. So everything changed, it all fell apart and it turns out that I have to take 4 summer courses instead of 3, which is just more debt I'm wracking up in my name.

Weird: The owner of the company I work for just called me and asked me to check my bank. My last paycheck bounced and I was charged a fairly large fee, but he's promised to mail a new check and that he will cover the fees.

But I just happened to look out my bedroom window, where two does are nibbling on the fresh grass that's been growing. It's all good.

Hmm....

I've been knitting a log cabin blanket for a while now. It's great for when I'm reading or reviewing notes, no real focus needed. Which is perhaps why I haven't noticed until now...

I'm using my Knit Picks options and one needle is a size 9 and the other is a size 8.

This is the first time I've used the size 9s since I bought the set, so the problem is in the needle tips. I e-mailed them and got an auto-response saying that it could be up to 10 days before I hear back from them. Holy crap, are they having that many issues with their products?

Updates

Reading:

The Castle of Otranto - This book was fantastic. Published on Dec 24th, 1764, it marks the beginning of the Gothic tradition in literature. Chock full of spookiness, fate and otherworldly events, it's a quick read that I really enjoyed.

Beowulf - I'm almost embarrassed to admit that I haven't read this before this class, as it's such an iconic story. I enjoyed it, but I didn't enjoy the class discussions. My teacher is a very religious person, which I have no issue with, except that he wants to teach Christianity and it's affects on British Literature, which is NOT the class I signed up for. One discussion topic was "Does Beowulf go to Heaven?" and me being me, I raised my hand and asked why it mattered and what it had to do with the text. He didn't answer me.

Fellowship of the Ring - I enjoyed this book FAR more than the last time I read it for a class. And I'm finding Tolkien's excessive detail and unnecessary histories far less aggravating than the last time.

Exercise:

I love the school gym. I really do. I go Monday, Wednesday and, if I don't have to work, Friday. If I do have to work I try to visit Tuesday or Thursday instead. And I try to go at least one day on the weekend. I bike for 30 minutes, which is between 7 and 10 miles depending on how fast I go. I'm not sore afterwards, I feel more awake, I sleep better and I lost 3 pounds. YeeFreakingHaw.

500th Post!!!

Wow... 500 posts of me babbling about random things. I can't believe I've found that many things to talk about.

Well, in honor of my 500th post (not really, but shhh, we'll say it is) I have a whole bunch of pictures.

Action shots of D knitting!He's so proud of his "coaster" as he calls it. He cast off that night and began something new. You should hear him plot his projects out. He is truly one of us. And he's toying around with the idea of starting a blog!
He came over on Tuesday night to take care of me, I've been fighting a cold all week long. To cheer me up he brought this little guy with him:
Continuing with the D theme, I just finished this plain garter stitch scarf tonight for him. It's short and simple, strictly designed for warmth. It's quite a trek from the visitor parking lot to my apartment and whenever he gets there he is absolutely freezing.
It's really difficult to photograph the color. It's a heathered black and teal, very manly. Probably would have photographed better on a carpet that isn't black, but...ah well.

Some recent stash acquisitions include:Stahman's Shawls and Scarves, I won this one on e-Bay.
The Bumper Book of Knitting. I ordered this on December 12th and it JUST got here.
2 hanks of Creatively Dyed Yarn in Gras and King
A hank of Gypsy Girl Creations in Blackberry Bramble

And the WIPs right now:They're knitted olives. They're olives and they're knitted. I am in love with this pattern.

A hat to match my Irish Hiking Scarf

And my in-class knitting. Just a plain garter stitch corner to corner baby blanket. I started it last semester but it's moving much quicker now that I have 3 classes I can knit in, instead of just 1.

It's snowing here, we're expecting 6-10 inches. And the girls downstairs built a giant snow penis. I'll get a picture if possible.

Damn Those Weeks Pass Quickly!

I can hardly believe that it's Friday again.

The Beethoven concert was amazing. It was such an intimate setting and we were in the 3rd row, so all I could do the whole time was gape at the violinist's bow as it moved.

I also dropped a class this week. I did some serious thinking and admitted my own limits and withdrew from my Literary Theory course. Perhaps if it had been a different teacher I'd have battled it out, but this guy seemed nuts! He read to us a whole bunch of student reviews saying that they'd never been so glad to pass a class with a C-, that they'd never had to work so hard for a C- in their life. He told us that in a class of 20 people, 6 were going to get Ds. That's just how it had to be. I'm not fond of teachers who have grading quotas, so I dropped the class and I'll take it over the summer with someone else.

In happier news, this weekend D is going to learn to knit. He asked me to teach him last semester and I agreed, but honestly I thought he was just, you know, fibbing to seem more interested in my hobbies. Well I was wrong. He keeps pestering me to teach him, as he's started promising knitted gifts to friends.

I'm especially excited, not only because I appear to have found the perfect man, but also because he's going to teach me the piano in return. This makes me very happy as I've always wanted to learn to play.

Other parts of this weekend will be spent in intense work on a paper due Thursday and the accompanying presentation to go with it. That I have to then present. To the whole class. Eek!!

I miss spring.

30

Hours. That's how many I worked in the past 3 days. 11 Friday, 12 Saturday and 7 today.

I'm pooped. My feet are actually bruised from standing so much and for so long. And, if you can believe this, I actually strained my wrist while talking to potential customers because I had my hand on my hip all the time and it over-extended the muscles.

I know, what a moronic injury to get. It's like falling out of a chair and breaking a leg or something.

But you know what? Things are great. My refund check came though so I no longer have to decide between bread or milk. I have a few papers to write, but I also have the next two weeks off of work, so I can get them done in more than enough time.

Tomorrow is a holiday from classes, so I'm going to try to get a little ahead on my homework, do laundry, make spaghetti and then D and I are going to a Beethoven concert on campus. And it's free! Woot!!

25 Things for 25 Years

Well, it's my birthday. I had a very nice day today, visited some friends, had a delicious pork roast for dinner, ate far too much cake and opened lots of fun presents. I'm ready for a nap, that's for sure. Tomorrow I'll head back to school to do all the homework I've been neglecting for the past week.

Anyways, without further ado, here are 25 things about me:

1. I've never had a nose bleed.
   
2. I collect gargoyles.
3. Hockey is the only sport I can stand watching on TV.
4. The longest relationship I've ever been in was 6 months long. Emphasis on the LONG.
   
5. I call it pop, not soda.
   
6. I'm a big believer in the Midnight Muse. I leave all homework until the last minute.
7. I changed my minor to Anthropology last Tuesday.
8. I own 1 pair of white socks. The rest are colored or decorated.
9. If I had to choose between a dog or a cat I'd pick a dog. A big one.
10. I drive stick. I can't imagine going back to automatic.
11. I don't like steak.
    
12. I love to color.
    
13. Immediately after eating ice cream I have to eat something salty. Most often it's an olive or a pickle.
14. I've never been drunk. I've been buzzed, but never drunk.
15. I listen to classical music more than any other sort.
    
16. I don't eat anything with more than 4 or less than 2 legs. (Fish, lobster, bugs...)
17. On hot nights I sleep-strip.
    
18. I can't sleep without a blanket. Top sheets don't count.
    
19. Water gives me heartburn.
20. I like to cook but hate to bake.
    
21. I love candles. Living in a no-candle dorm is killing me.
22. I have dreams that are so vivid that often I wake up annoyed with people because of something they did during a dream.
23. I've never tried smoking or drugs. No interest really.
    
24. My first kiss was in 8th grade.
25. This is the first birthday in a long time that I'm happy with where I am in life and what I'm doing. I feel like I'm finally back on track.
    

Well... I'm half-way to 50. A junior in college. Dating a great guy. Doing good in my classes. The Wolves won their game tonight.

Life is good.

Productive Slacking!

This weekends homework was:

Write two 5-7 page papers
Read 3 chapters for Lit class
Do laundry (OK, not school related but needs to be done in a crazy way)

So what did I do today?

I went to the zoo!

D came with. Just kidding! Actually I sent him a text message yesterday that said something along the lines of "I think I'm going to the zoo tomorrow. Since I can't see you (he works) I'll hang out at the ape house."

This was little Buddha prairie dog.

Beautiful tiger.

I love this shot of the cheetah through the trees.

Yeah, my hand is there for scale purposes with that monster spider.





Tomorrow I'm going to be crazy busy!!!

The 3-Day Curse

I am a superstitious person in general. Salt over the left shoulder if you spill it, don't walk under ladders, knock on wood after using "I never" kinda gal.

One of my biggest superstitions is the 3-Day Photo Curse. Which, the short version is, that within 3 days of posing for a photo with a boyfriend, we will break up. It's a curse that has worked it's evil magic in my life a few times. So I tend to avoid cameras for a while when I'm dating someone. Why tempt fate, you know?

Two Saturdays ago I was at D's house for his twin sisters' birthday party and his mom produced a camera. I promptly hid behind a pillow while explaining the curse in muffled tones to the room in general. She promised not to take any photos, though D pointed out that we were going to a Halloween party in a week where photos would probably be mandatory, lest I refuse to pose and other less flattering candid shots of me were taken from afar.

Last Saturday was the party in question. His mom said she'd left the camera on the table, as they had to head out with the twins, and would we please take pictures of eachother. While taking photos I joked how weird it would look if we posed in the typical "prom" pose, him as Ash from some movie I've never seen (he had a chainsaw for a hand and was splattered with blood) as me as dead Alice in Wonderland. Trusting in the strength of our relationship (or possibly just tempting fate) I found the timer feature and we took a photo together.

His mom later asked if one of the cats had taken the picture, cause she didn't know about the timer feature. She's so cute.

Well that was Saturday. Today would be Tuesday. 3 days later.

I got a call from D that went somewhere along these lines:

D: Hey hunny. (He calls me hunny. It's so cute.)
Me: Hi sweety.
D: Well... it's Tuesday.
M: Huh? Oh yeah. So do you want to do it, or should I?
D: Well, to be honest my schedule is just packed. I frankly don't have the time to squeeze it in. Would you mind if we postponed it indefinitely?

I know, could you gag on the sweetness? So, while today is not yet over, I have a feeling that the 3-Day Curse may have been defeated.

Knock on wood.