Hip, hip oh well, physio, socks and reading

Recently I've had a bit of a thing with Hippolyta, or more likely adjacent muscles. I blame the many icy days I couldn't get out to walk, though I exercise indoors, and the temperature and humidity swings.  

I'll be seeing my rheumo soon but meanwhile I've been checking what to do.

I did a moderate level strength training yes2next video last evening, iced and even took ibuprofen, amazing, I never think of that. Result this morning not exciting.

So I remembered one of my favorite physios on YouTube, Will Harlow, and checked whether I have a touch of sciatica and if so what then. 

The exercises he suggested and demo'd were among the ones my own physio taught me during my recovery last year.  He'd noted I had a bit of a sciatic issue then, aside from the hip thing.

I like this guy a lot because his demos are excellent and he understands the difference it makes when you're older. 

So I did some of his suggestions, largely about strengthening muscle groups to relieve nerve and joint stress. So we'll see.

In other gripping news, I had a chat with Michael the Artist Contractor about my bathroom and it's definitely going to happen.

But first, he has to be in the South for a bit because his mother is going into heart surgery.  It's complicated and worrying and talking about her reminded me I don't have much to fuss about. 

He still doesn't have a vehicle, a bit of a problem for a contractor, but he's been making do. And he's getting his mother's old vehicle to drive home. She has a new one, so this works.  Anyway the bathroom will happen and it's not yet urgent. And he knows I'm still interested. 

Meanwhile, the spiral knitting is moving. It started as a little experiment, and now I think it may as well be another pair of socks, why not.  

One ball of yarn has made one pair and part of a second, so this second ball will be plenty. Maybe enough left over for a lanyard, too. 

I've been reading a genre I usually don't have much patience with, but this one works pretty well.

It's a mystery in the style of Austen, with characters from various Austen novels, a generation later, Darcy and Elizabeth's son and someone else's daughter are featured. There's also the Knightleys the Brandons and the Bertrams, all old married couples now, some with children, from various novels, in a country house party. Enter the villain Mr Wickham! Perfect arena for murder.  

It's quite well written by someone who knows her Austen and writes with restraint. Up to now, it's going well, aside from my wanting to poke everyone with a sharp stick to get on with it, do.

I just watched a YouTube video about meals the channeler made when they were broke. Several pretty much like my usual stuff. Hm. Except she buys at Wal***t and the dollar store. But I may swipe her baked pasta idea. 

Happy day everyone, swipe only the best. If you're going to commit a crime, do a worthwhile one.

 

Not sure we'll ever get the bloodstains out, but we're working on it.

Spring sunset, cherry logs, and experiment

Last evening there was a succession of colors at sunset, rapidly changing and filling my house with pink light.

 And today was warm

The walk to the pond gets easier each day, less exertion needed to get there, making it look nearer. I wanted to get pictures of the fallen tree to show Chris the bark better.

They do look lenticulated, don't they? Old and weathered but I do think cherry. Around here trees are of long standing and some have hybridized.  But I think this is probably cherry, no? If you know better, please say. I like to know stuff.

Also the daffodils continue unabated, and quite a few that we planted long ago as a 9/11 memorial are coming up again now.

And I did an experiment with the spiral knitted stitch pattern, casting on the same number of stitches as before.  The pattern is k3p1, half the stitches of the other spiral,  still keeping an even number of stitches in the repeats, and an odd number total.

As you see, the spiral still works. 

And resistance continues, this time to send comments to the CDC about making the COVID vaccine available. There are three more days to comment before the window closes. Mine has been acknowledged, and here's what you need to know to comment.

You go to the gov website and they'll ask you to identify the docket, with the report number. That's the last line above. You'll get a drop-down menu to click on the COVID link and go from there.  Please do this. Takes a moment and you might help save lives. Every comment adds to the pressure to make it available universally again.

They do respond to numbers. The ballroom is held up because of the huge pushback of comments. Many of them, like mine, demanded he be forced to rebuild the East Wing! Not just me, then.

I also wrote a firm email to the nyt demanding fact checking, and retraction of the recent transphobic essay by Jesse Singal, full of inaccurate claims about trans healthcare.

Now drinking my tea, after nature study, cooking, designing, bit of gardening with Gary.

He wanted help in mourning the snow damage to his shrubs and I suggested ways to cut and prune a bit.  He hates to prune, and I refrained from pointing out that he'd have done better in snow if he had pruned. 

Anyway, he assured me that when he moves, maybe May, he will be my permanent neighbor, to call on! Such a good guy. He'll be twenty minutes away and since a relative will be his tenant next door, he'll be over here often.  So the friendship will continue to be a source of entertainment! NADM rules.

Happy day everyone, mine was pretty full.

Striped spirals and getting dressed

I've noticed that I feel slothful until I'm dressed for the day. Even today when I fixed breakfast, aired the bedroom, changed the bed, laundered and dried and put away the bed linen, and cast on a sock. It didn't seem to count because I was still in a bathrobe.

Anyway here's the sock in question.

It's a tube design by Noreen Crone -Findlay, usual better known for tiny weavings and fantasy mixed media figures in a range of materials than for knitting designs. She recently had a big art exhibit in Edmonton, Alberta. 

This design has a long Icord arrangement as a cuff, quite fancy and I made a double rib instead, more practical for the Sock 'n glove Ministry. 

There's an odd number of stitches, which creates a spiral as you knit 6, purl 2, forever. No heel turn, because it shapes itself on the foot. But there is a shaped toe.

I've made several pairs of these over the years, as gifts, and the wearers attested to the skidproof effect of the spiral shapes. It's also fun to knit.  Hard to stop, between watching stripes and spirals emerge at the same time.

I'm walking nowadays in those boots you watched me stretch a while back. They're taking on my foot shape with wear now, and I need them because soon I'll be back to walking to the pond. 

Right now it's impassable, storm debris, snowdrifts, but soon I'll be able to get there for signs of spring. Or late winter. With pictures. Meanwhile I'm keeping up, and trying to improve, my stamina. It goes away fast if you don't pay attention.

Happy day everyone, pay attention to what you like to! There's no attention police. Yet, anyway.

On the resistance front I've written to my senators insisting they vote against the confirmation of the proposed surgeon general, basically chief doctor of the US. 

Usually it's gifted, real medical doctors and researchers who are appointed to this job.  This one is Casey Means who never completed medical training and is an online "influencer".  Not even slightly qualified. 

Nearer home, ICE just bought a giant warehouse for a concentration camp, in Roxbury Township NJ. There's already resistance, and I think local zoning and infrastructure issues might stop it. I wrote to my senators anyway, to increase the pressure.

ICE is promising revenue and jobs to the township, without mentioning the huge expense involved in basic utilities, water, sewage, heating, road usage, and the sheer criminal act of imprisoning over a thousand innocent people in their town.

There's an interesting political twist, too, since Tom Kean Jr, an apple who fell far from his decent father's tree, is the House GOP  member for the district. 

He will not want to be smeared with the rep of supporting a hugely unpopular ICE initiative. NJ already has all kinds of anti ICE bills moving through the State Legislature. And he has quite a bit of competition this time around for the upcoming Federal election.

Late edit: a friend nearer the action says Roxbury town council voted against it and HS is now denying they knew it was for ICE.  Sure, Jan.

Our senators are already on it, and ACLU.  Stay tuned. Never a dull moment, sez Ted and Big Ursy and Pony.

No matter what shenanigans they get up to in Kansas. ACLU is on that, too.

Misfits box, yawn, knitting, yawn,

Misfits Market day, and I was starting the reaction to the COVID-19 vax. Mainly crushing tiredness. The kind where you start to wash dishes and have to sit down several times in the process. 

It took half a dozen stages to prep the Misfits box. 

Missing the blueberries, but I'll live. I actually lashed out and bought a jar of marinara sauce. First time in living memory I didn't make the  sauce from scratch, but worth a try. Mainly with the penne pasta in this box.

Plenty of diced tomatoes for various dishes, from spaghetti sauce to baked egg-cheese-tomato on toast, to that eggs-tomato-greens dish from the Together cookbook. 

Lovely fresh eggs, they're really a pleasure to handle, from chickens who'd had a decent life, as you can see from their egg quality.

Strawberries to accompany Tony's Chocolonely. Scallions to include in Yeung Man Cooking recipes. 

I like the feeling, once the boring prep is done, that food is pretty much halfway there for next week. No apples this week, because the berries were the idea, but they ran out. S strawberries will work. And it's all good food.

After a morning spent online with lawyer friends analyzing exactly how much trouble Mayor Adams is in, news of the indictments broke while we were already talking, I started the second spiral sock.

After prep of the Misfits box, I set up to listen to The Twist of a Knife, Horowitz, and knit. At least that was the plan. Two hours later I woke up, made a pot of tea, and staggered back to the sofa. This is why I planned the vax for yesterday, so I could lie around today like a sloth and not miss anything.

I've been trying to be in touch with Florida friends, some of whom have evacuated to South Florida to other friends and are now chilling around the pool with all their kids and dogs. So far so good. I'm still on high alert for other friends, in place because the path of Helene is unpredictable.

Our weather is damp and mild, such a contrast. Happy day everyone, I hope you're safe or soon will be.