Penitential Pilgrimage

I can’t believe I forgot to blog about this.

What started as a walk to clear our foggy heads in the fresh and VERY cold air, has turned into the 8th Annual Penitential Pilgrimage. That first year was COLD, like 0 degrees cold. What seemed like a good idea at 4am, and not a good idea at 10am, turned out to be a fantastic idea 8 years later!

These days the hike is much longer. The original was a walk for fresh air, followed by someone saying “I’m thirsty” in front of one of our local pubs. From that a tradition was born. The current hike is about 10 miles of walking (with some serious hill hunting) and stops at 2-3 pubs for hydration purposes.

Folks join in and drop out all along the route. It’s a wonderful way to get out and about. To reconnect with friends and neighbors and meet new folks. We really should try for a Summer Solstice walk.

STOP SOPA

Squam 2012

Rockywold Dining Hall, originally uploaded by katken.

Is it June yet? My registration is all set to pop in the mail tomorrow morning. (No, Flat Wally isn’t coming this year.)

Waffles

I think I like them more as a cowl than I do as a breakfast food. Nice to eliminate the sticky factor.

Pattern: Malabrigo Waffles Scarf
Yarn: Malabrigo Worsted (1.5 skeins)
Needles: US 8
Raveled

Really enjoyable knit. The Malabrigo is like buttah, the pattern is meditative, and the finished product is just luscious. Perfect for gifting to the care givers of my special needs brother,

The Tap

Great time in Minnesota last week. I was out there to present at a conference hosted by a vendor I’ve done a lot of work with over the years. So much work, that I consider many of them colleagues/friends. It was great to finally put faces to the voices on the phone. For lunch on Thursday, they took me to the local watering hole. We passed on the local water (The Tap brews it’s own beer – another reason to go back) and stuck with the local fare.

Reminded me a bit of that old SNL skit, “Cheeburger, Cheeburger, Chip, Chip. No Coke – Pepsi.” Burgers and fries only. I got my crinkly fries extra crispy.

Best lunch ever.

Heading West

Actually this photo is looking south. When I was in NYC a week ago, there was an AMAZING sunset. So amazing that many east coast twitter peeps so fit to mention it. The point & shoot image out of the office window does not do it justice.

Tomorrow I head west to Minneapolis to attend and present at a conference. My first external public speaking so I’m taking a lot of deep breaths. Myers-Briggs says that I am borderline Introvert/Extrovert. My inner Introvert would like to crawl into a cave, my inner Extrovert is looking forward to the challenge. I am looking forward to the sub-32 temps. It’s December, about time for some cold weather.

trekking

One of the best things about spending time at my parents’ house (besides the home cooking and quality people time) is going barefoot.

So is that a high or medium arch?

Himalaya Cowl

Pattern: Honey Cowl

Yarn: Socks That Rock Lightweight in Pink Granite

Needles: US 3

Raveled

Thank goodness for the long train rides or this would be languishing in UFO land. I do love it, but it was a long slog on little needles. Like when you played ‘Mother May I’ as a kid, wasn’t it more fun to take Giant Steps than Baby Steps?

Very happy with the FO though. Nice weight and size, and the honeycomb fabric is nice and dense against those cold winter winds.

Hope my sister likes it.

oh well

I had the best of intentions, but being on the road for two weeks at the end of the month kinda threw me off. I did compose daily posts in my head, but somehow never got around to sitting in front of the computer and actually posting. (One of these days I’ll sort out the issues with the wireless network at my parents’ house which will make internet access much easier.)

Much time was spent cooking and with family – and a wonderful time it was. Hope you all had a wonderful holiday.

Scene of the rescue

 

Saturday night I crashed hard. Crawled into bed at 6:49 and was all set to watch Jeremy Brett as Sherlock and I’m pretty sure I was asleep in 5 minutes. I left the pup sleeping downstairs. When the rest of the family came back from dinner, they took the dogs out for one last pee. Only problem is they forgot to bring both dogs in.

Yep, Java camped out in the back yard on Saturday. She was so happy when I brought her in early Sunday morning.

Well, not to be out done, my sister’s dog decided to run away on Sunday night. Coco has always come back in the past, but Sunday night we couldn’t find her. Three of us were driving around checking the neighborhood. We are pretty close to the train tracks, and trains go by fairly regularly. The woods behind my sister’s house, lead up the tracks and there is no fence. With no sign of Coco, I was dreading getting up early to check the tracks.

Didn’t need to. Coco was indeed on the tracks, but luckily she was spotted by a Conductor who brought her aboard and called the local police. Coco had a nice ride into Penn Station and the train crew brought her back on their return run.

So lucky that it wasn’t one of the express trains. It was a train that had stopped at the station and the train crew noticed her frozen in the tracks, just staring at the light. So they called to her, and Coco was her usual exuberant self and bounded right up to them.

Yep, never a dull moment with canines around.