working on stuff

* The whole research project is (finally) now up and running. I think there is some issue with the website seeds were ordered from; in the first case, the person doing the official grant-money order wound up not ordering two of the species I needed. Then when I ordered (on my own dime) and thought I was getting the two missing ones (Indian grass and Inland sea-oats), it turns out I only ordered Indian grass. So another ruinously expensive "fast shipping" (not the fastest they offer; I could not brook paying $35 to ship $9 worth of seeds) and they showed up at my door late last evening. (I am normally happy to see the UPS guy but last night I was especially happy).

So, the two remaining treatments have been planted and treated; now it's just weekly applications of either DI water or the allegedly-allelopathic extract and monitoring. No, nothing is germinating yet from the stuff I planted Tuesday; I don't expect it to for at least another week.

I have plenty of seed so perhaps will do a second round of this in the spring. I really waited a little long for this; I will have, at best, two months before the semester ends and if I want to see family over Christmas I will have to break the experiment down then; I cannot get someone to water and monitor it for me while I am gone.

* I started the talk for the Wildlife club yesterday. I will have to track down the president and ask her how long a talk they would like - I'm thinking 20-25 minutes. But if they want something longer, I can do it. I actually invested in personal copies of two of the (older, but still useful) books I heavily referenced in my dissertation: "The True Prairie Ecosystem" and "Fire in North American Tallgrass Prairie." The library here MIGHT have a copy of the first one but this copy was cheap enough from Amazon used books (it is an ex-library copy, from Maddux Library at Trinity University,which I think is in San Antonio? (There are several schools out there with "Trinity" in their name)

* The sermon for Sunday is mostly written. My plan is to look it over tomorrow morning and also find a Benediction and tweak my pre-offering speech from last time. Again, I'll be glad when this is done. I think it's a good (or at least interesting) sermon. I am using the "Mary and Martha" scripture (the one from Luke 10 - where Martha is running around like her hair is on fire doing stuff that you're expected to do when you have guests, and Mary, her sister, is sitting there at Jesus' feet listening to Jesus, and Martha gets ticked off because Mary isn't helping, and she actually tells Jesus to tell Mary to get off her duff....and while Jesus doesn't exactly rebuke Martha, he does tell her, "No, I'm not going to tell her that, because she has made the right choice for this time.") And the point often made is "Martha wrong; Mary right" but actually I think it's more nuanced than that - and some of the sources I look at say that they essentially symbolize the two approaches to the faithful life, and really, we should ALL do BOTH at different times - sometimes, go out and be active and do good works like Martha, but at other times, be quiet and contemplative and learn like Mary.

And I admit, as more of a Martha-type, I like that interpretation better and find it more charitable to those of us who have a hard time being still. (Also: I am not the kind of person who can sit and meditate; I get too antsy. But I can meditate while pulling weeds in the garden or walking on a path or sometimes even doing stuff like entering data. It's not for nothing that I always knit while watching movies on tv....)

* I have plans for mid-fall break, which makes me happy. Laura and I and another friend of hers are going to meet up and go to an oil museum in Kilgore (Laura informs me it's 80s-fabulous, which should be interesting). And then we're going to probably swing by Stitches N Stuff. That will be Saturday and I have to decide whether I want to be the "little piggy" and then also go to Whitesboro either Thursday or Friday. (I know Lovejoy's serves lunch on Friday but I don't think they do on Thursday). I may also stop at the Michael's in Longview on my way back home to get supplies for my niece's Christmas gift.

(My "big check" from the publisher came and has been deposited, and I also realized I have an account in the credit union "back home" - where my parents live - that is bigger than I remembered it as. Interestingly, for a while, that credit union was only letting you get statements online unless you were willing to pay $2 a month. Recently, they started sending paper statements again, and I didn't opt-in for that and there is no charge shown against my account, so - I wonder if some new law got passed about issuing statements? At any rate, it's good to know I have another stash of "emergency money" elsewhere. I paid a bill or two off it over the summer, partly to avoid "inactivity fees" but also so I didn't have to worry about depleting my checking account too badly while being paid adjunct wages)

* And I have been knitting some, but mostly on projects that are slow movers. I've added a couple more stripes to Starbuck (I am on the "decrease for the waist" part of it). I admit I'm nervous as to whether it will fit when done - I made the biggest size but it's a bit smaller than the typical sweater I make. And it looks small on the needles, but then again, the body of it (it's knit in the round) is kind of bunched up on the circular needle, so maybe it's hard to tell. (I hope). If it's too small for me, I don't know - it would probably still be too big for my mom (I typically wear a size 16 on top and she more typically wears an 8), and it's also not colors she typically wears, or I'd give it to her. I don't have a close friend who is just slightly smaller than I am (My sister in law is about the same size as I am, and also, she's taller, so something made to fit me in length would be too short on her).

I'd honestly rather give a finished sweater away than rip it all out and start over.

But maybe it will fit.

Last night, I knit on the first sleeve for the Raven pullover.. This is **almost** done and I'm hoping I can finish it and start the second over the weekend - I give an exam Monday and that is pretty ideal invigilating knitting. I'll also be glad when this sweater is done - this one, I KNOW will fit me right, I've held the finished body up to me. I may need to get a dark brown t-shirt to go under it (to avoid  show-through, and anyway, I like to wear shirts under my sweaters so I can take the sweater off if I wind up in an overheated room).

I kind of want to start a new sweater, too. I'm telling myself instead I should start the second sleeve for Hagrid, which has been languishing for a while. But I have so much yarn stacked up and so many projects I want to do....I spotted the yarn I bought several years ago for that vest in the Harry Potter Knits Interweave "special issue" (it's a shiny gold color) and now I want to start that. But I also have yarn for a blue lace vest that I got on my last trip to Quixotic Fibers. And I have several fingering-weight-sweaters' worth of yarn. And I found a pattern in a recently purchased book for a lace-yoke cardigan and I want to 'repurpose' some yarn I bought a long time ago for something else (and never knit up) for that....