Month: June 2006 (Page 3 of 3)

OK! Come sit next to me, my knitting friends. Let’s look at this picture, shall we?

All I can focus on are those uncooked sausages. This is a free pattern for a “grill mitt.” I challenge you to keep your eyes on the mitt. No, no! You cannot! Who puts their raw meat on a bed of cilantro? Let’s make up our minds here, food stylist or knits stylist.

Now, did that not inspire you? No? How about a project that calls for both a Pound of Love AND Fun Fur????? HAHAHAHAHA yes, it is your purgatory, welcome, we have your knitting basket right here.

With the bonus being, it already looks like moths, your dog, and Sasquatch have chewed it up. Yes, my child. Snuggle under the nightmare.

And those of you with the accident-prone youngsters will get a big chuckle out of this free pattern:

Why, it’s the Diamond-Back Rattler Cast Sock! As you can see, this hapless youth wasn’t satisfied with scrawling “Don’t Tread On Me”, a popular theme with the passionate Colonists in early Americana as evidenced on Revolutionary flags. There’s a lesson to be learned at every point in life, beyond skateboarding next to an empty pool, and that’s the proud history of our forefathers, the story every teen is hankering to communicate via their leg cast. Because nothing goes with an iPod like a Diamond-Back Rattler Cast Sock for today’s discerning, yet historically-conscious teen! And, please note, for those terrified of snakes, that the EYEBROWS on the snake will reassure even the most skittish that it is not real. We don’t want the lesson to be lost because someone gets squeamish! You think our ancestors turned and ran? The WHITES OF THEIR EYES, people. Never forget. NEVER.

All hideousness courtesy of Lion Brand.

Whenever we’re facing our own mortality, or that of someone we love with every cell in our body, you are not only tackling a daily wash of emotions, but you also get doused with flashes of the past – good and bad – and the smallest things can trigger them.

Driving to work yesterday, I saw a huge rope swing hanging from a tree. Like an ice pick, the image of the swing my father made for me pierced through, the board he cut & sanded, the ropes he tied over a tree branch, so high up, and I can still see his face when he was done, smiling as he grabbed both sides of the board & told me to jump on. I couldn’t begin to count how many hours were spent on that swing, recklessly trying to touch the sky, or at least a wayward branch. A memory I had forgotten.

The other night, I was possessed by a desire for something salty. Not chips, not something fried, but only a straight-up boullion cube would sooth the salty needs. Because yes, back in the day, that was one of my “snacks”. (I loved ’em! Beef? Chicken? Bring it on!) I ate them extremely slowly, gnawing a thin layer off at a time, and I’ve since referred to them as my teeny-tiny flavored salt licks. I was a little disappointed to discover the only boullion in the house was a Costco-sized shaker of granulated chicken with herbs. I dipped a finger in, and while yes, it was still salty goodness, it wasn’t the same. (I’m sure my blood pressure is grateful I didn’t succeed in finding a cube.)

One of my favorite comfort foods is extremely simple, but also extremely particular. It was a spaghetti made by a family friend, and I’ve never had another person make it quite like Frances. First off, when you cook the noodles, they have to be broken in half. Then, and this is crucial, you take home-canned tomato sauce & cook it down. It has to be home-grown tomatoes, maybe it’s the acidity or the “brightness” of such tomatoes, but I’ve tried with store-bought and it doesn’t work. Fortunately for me, I married a canner & a gardener. Then, you fry bacon. And you assemble your dish: spaghetti, topped with sauce, topped with crumbled bacon. A little salt, a brief marrying of ingredients with a quick toss, and then hunker down for a meal that rockets me back to being 8 years old, when my first real summer in Iowa was spent at Frances & Jake’s farm, clambering over hay bales and playing with cats in the barn, picking strawberries, swimming in an old horse trough, watching Hogan’s Heroes on a black & white TV, making a doll quilt, and just generally being a sponge to all of my surroundings.

It was a time of pure innocence and great moxie, before I knew how to be insecure, untouched by anger or depression, free from the responsibility of being a grown-up, unaware of love and all the joy and sadness it brings. I know we can never go back, but in that first bite, I squint, and I can almost be there again.

I have been obsessed a bit with order, not that you could tell it from my desk here at work. (Hm! Maybe I should attack it!) A bowl or glass barely has time to settle in to the sink, and I’m whisking everything into the dishwasher or scrubbing it up and I realize it’s all a psychological effort to maintain control and order while this large piece sits out there, beyond anything I can do, influence, solve or fix. It has given me a bit of a peek into the world of OCD, where touching a doorknob six times before you enter the house is the only thing standing between you & catastrophy.

Today, I took a break. I didn’t make the bed, and I left a dishwasher full, waiting to be emptied, and a sink full of dishes, waiting to be cleaned. It’s when I start lining up the soup labels that you’ve got to be worried, JWo.