Not too bad for few days of furious knitting. The pattern is so simple, no really, it is simply four rows of perfectly easy knitting. After a few rows, I have the pattern in the head. I did not have the Allegra yarn, so I substituted with Shine (60% prima cotton, 40% modal). And changed the color to a vibrant apricot.

Here is the back and the detail picture of the pattern. Put on some dark glasses, this yarn is meant to brighten anyone's day.

I received an email from my father couple of days ago, regards, the english language. It had its usual nutty phrases and gotchas. But the the following excerpt is priceless! Enjoy! (and thank you father!)

There is a two-letter word that perhaps has more meanings than any other two-letter word, and that is "UP."

It's easy to understand UP, meaning toward the sky or at the top of the list, but when we awaken in the morning, why do we wake UP? At a meeting, why does a topic come UP? Why do we speak UP and why are the officers UP for election and why is it UP to the secretary to write UP a report?

We call UP our friends. And we use it to brighten UP a room, polish UP the silver, we warm UP the leftovers and clean UP the kitchen. We lock UP the house and some guys fix UP the old car.

At other times the little word has real special meaning. People stir UP trouble, line UP for tickets, work UP an appetite, and think UP excuses. To be dressed is one thing but to be dressed UP is special.

When it threatens to rain, we say it is clouding UP. When the sun comes out we say it is clearing UP. When it rains, it wets the earth and often messes things UP. When it doesn't rain for awhile, things dry UP.

And this UP is confusing: A drain must be opened UP because it is stopped UP . We open UP a store in the morning but we close it UP at night.

We seem to be pretty mixed UP about UP! To be knowledgeable about the proper uses of UP, look the word UP in the dictionary. In a desk-sized dictionary, it takes UP
almost 1/4th of the page and can add UP to about thirty definitions. If you are UP to it, you might try building UP a list of the many ways UP is used. It will take UP a lot of your time, but if you don't give UP, you may wind UP with a hundred or more.

One could go on and on, but I'll wrap it UP , for now my time is UP, so.......... . Time to shut UP!!!

Do you ever get that feeling that you are running so hard to catch a train that is hurtling away from you. And how hard you try or how hard you run and it is always just out of your grasp? That's where I am at for the last few days.

I believe that this train is going in some direction, dunno where, and going pretty darn fast. It is challenging and taunting me to try and catch, and me like a dufus am trying to. My fervent attempt is to run alongside, reach up and catch the handle bar sticking out back of the train. There are days when I can almost feel the metal of the handle. Those days are the most frustrating; because, I feel that it is so within my reach, when train pulls away just a tad faster. There are days, when I give up and sit down along the wayside. Funnily, when I am sitting the dopey train is just at the horizon, taunting to pick up and start running again. When I do sit down, that's when I get all philosophical about even trying to catch the darn thing. What's the point? Am I even meant to catch it? Maybe it is not my destiny (Whoa! don't even get me started on destiny/faith or beliefs).

I have been running for a long time now, and need to probably sit down and rethink this whole thing. Whatever that thing is! Perhaps that is where I should start.... what is this thing that is making me so overwhelmed!!

What did I do over the long weekend? Hmmm long? It was not a long weekend, but a normal weekend comprising of one Saturday and one Sunday. I needed to catchup with work, so, I came into work on Monday. It was fantastic, with not many people in office, I could concentrate, get work done and get out at a reasonable hour, without my ear being chewed off with "can you get this done?", "can you do this today?", "can you help with this?" so on and so forth.

4th was a working day for me (shame on me!). It is independence day, but since I am just a poor US resident, and not a citizen, I guess I have gotten very patriotic as yet. But, if I were a US Citizen! I would probably have taken the day off, gone to a bbq or two or three within walking distance from my house, so I could roll or totter back without causing undue grief on the mean streets with my driving. I would have a bbq at home, which would solve the issue of rolling or tottering back, I would already be there. I would have watched some movies, ah! played some board games, stayed up late, and in general be merry. But I did none of that. I suck! It was a lack-luster day, leading up to a lack-luster evening and it did not help, that it rained cats and dogs that evening. What a waste of a day! Was it? Not really, I got plenty of work done. So, there was something being done, unfortunately that something was not fun (normal definition of fun).

Anyways, Happy 4th!!

All this morning, I have been patiently moving concrete blocks from my friends house to mine. It took two trips, one car, couple of chipped nails, cuts and bruises all over my hands (I was wearing industrial strength gloves) & legs and one very tired back, to move roughly 50 blocks.

The process was:

1. Drive to friends house about 10 miles.
2. Crawl under the deck space, sort out broken and unbroken blocks, move them to door. The deck crawl space opened to the lawn and I wanted to take care that I did not mess up the lawn and hostas in the neighboorhood. So, the blocks got moved from all over, under the deck space to just near the door.
3. Move block from door to car. Like a priceless dufus, I parked the wrong way, and had a longer walk to get the initial blocks loaded to the car.
4. Organize the blocks in the car, so it is not loaded on one side and just sufficiently loaded to reduce number of trips without having the car to breakdown.
5. Once loaded, drive back 10 miles.
6. Unload the block to the garage. To get to my garage is a fairly sloped driveway. So, I did not drive the car (it wouldn't climb!) up the slope, but manually lugged it up.
7. Repeat from step 1, for one more time.

After that workout, I took a well-deserved afternoon nap!

Watched The Italian Job (2003) and thought Mark Wahlberg (Charlie Croker) (born in Dorchester, MA) was exceedingly cute. The plot and plan to steal gold bullion by staging a big traffic jam in Los Angeles, and getting away in Mini coopers was incredible. Love those mini-coopers.  Some parts of the movie got really boring and routine and rather out of place when Stella Bridger (Charlize Theron) poses as a TV/Cable repair-woman to get to Steve (Edward Norton). But hey, the car chase with mini-coopers was great.

When I saw this one, I researched to find that this was a remake from The Italian Job (1969). I am such a sucker to see the original and the new. It happened to me when I saw Thomas Crown Affair (1999), with Pierce Brosnnan (my then favorite), and I had to see the original (The Thomas Crown Affair (1968)) with Steve McQueen. But then I have moved away from the point. The original one, starts with soulful song "On Days Like These" (Written by Quincy Jones and performed by Matt Monro). I played the starting song about 20 times before I got sick of it. The movie itself was fantastic. The mini-cooper chase was so much more realistic and hilarious. The stunts were believable and stuck to the british flag colors. Some of the highlights which I simply loved:

• Charlie has just got out of prison and has to break into prison to get financing for his Italian Job. How cool is that idea!
• The chase.... great, hilarious, wacky and loads of goofiness
• Charlie's quote "You were only supposed to blow the bloody doors off". All through the movie his manerisms were so funny, it cracked me up. Some of them were:
  • "You wouldn't hit a man with no trousers on, would you?", when he thought he was going to be beaten up.
  • "Just remember this... in this country they drive on the wrong side of the road", when the team is just about to start of the caper and their getaway is primarily in cars.
  • "Hang on guys, I have an idea", {spoiler!} when the bus is hanging off the edge of the cliff with the gold on the wrong end, the team on the safe side and Charlie in between and the bus is swaying, threatening to topple over into the cliff. This is also the ending to the movie. I say chaps! what a perfect ending to left hanging.... literally

All in all, I say five stars, and a must see.

Recently, I became an aunt, the nth time over. This brings the count to five: three nephews (ages: 6yrs+1mth, 2yrs+4mths, 2yrs+2mths) and two nieces (ages: 4mths, couple of days). Do the neighborhood kids count? If they do, then add a 2 year old that I frequently baby-sit to the above list. None of these are really mine. 

Maybe I want one kid, but to have one, I may have to be married (well, okay call me really old fashioned, but wouldn't dream of having a kid (or kids) in this world without being married). To be married, I have to find someone who will marry me. And that is loooonnnngggg way off. I think it is a long way off, because, I am too chicken to do anything about it. Maybe I can adopt one.... nah! Not at the moment.

Maybe I want one pet and not a kid. So, it is much easier to adopt a pet, they (pets) are so unassuming and they love back (most of the time). I say this by experience, as I am the official cat sitter for my friends two adorable kitties. Both these kitties are also my 'docs'. When I am sad or unhappy, I have a serious 'chat' with them and they respond with a very vociferous 'MEOW', 'Purr', and 'scratch my tommy, it will make you feel better'. Perhaps the thing about cats is that they are like me; independent most of the times and need loving sometimes. Or maybe get a dog, but nothing short of a Siberian Husky or a German Shepherd would do. I don't have the space that these large dogs need to thrive. I am some ways away from getting a cat because; I want ones exactly like my 'docs' and I know I won't get that

Maybe I want one plant and not a pet, but I killed my indoor lavender (Wah!), but my outdoor yard work is coming along as well as it can. This year is the year of the yard, so it will be done. A yard and plants are not animated as a kid or a pet.

So, maybe I do want one..... something!