Summer almost done

We had "surprise rain" this morning (Well, really: "Surprise storms"). Rain was predicted, but the weather guy here had been saying it would all be east of us, or wouldn't make it this far south.

At a bit before 4 this morning, I woke up to crashing noises. My first thought was, "Oh crud, did a critter get under the house again?" (I've had issues with cats fighting - or doing something else that SOUNDS like fighting under there; I also once had an armadillo. And I wouldn't be at all surprised that one of those things I heard under there might be a possum. I try to make covers for the crawl space to exclude them but so far they have defeated every one.)

Then I realized - no, it wasn't under the house, it was over. Yeah, we had some storms. Don't know how much rain but any rain at this point is welcome. We're supposed to get more later on, possibly with some bad stuff ("hail the size of ping pong balls," the NWS is saying. Somewhere, Mr. Bunny Rabbit is laughing.)

Actually, I probably should have guessed this was coming; I had a near-migraine yesterday afternoon. (My doctor claims that while on the beta blocker, I shouldn't get migraines any more, but I still have had one or two). In the past, I used to get them with big weather changes. (And I'm sure this was one - I had the near-aphasia, where I have to stand and think for what seems like FOREVER to come up with the word I want - this is scary when you're in front of  a class. And I couldn't play piano worth spit yesterday afternoon, and usually when my brain is hurting it affects my concentration and coordination)

Anyway: I'm effectively done, save for giving and grading finals tomorrow. (One is machine-graded: it's a "common" final that is given to all sections of the gen-ed class. Yes, we have to guard its security incredibly tightly, and I am waiting on the day when someone manages to stealth-photograph it with their cell camera: it's going to happen, just when, I don't know). The other one is all multiple choice, that I wrote, because (a) time needed to grade and (b) lazy.

And yes, faculty get tired and lazy at the end of a semester just as students do. And sometimes we take the easier way out. Part of it IS time pressures (I still have that thesis to read....) but part of it is that we get tired.

At any rate. Monday I leave for a short vacation. I really need some time off, some time in a cooler location, a few days of not having to come home, look at the pantry, and go "Now what do I fix for dinner?" (My mom is a better cook than I am, and since she cooks for more people, there are things she makes that I never would). And KNITTING TIME.

(Heh. Now I want to draw up the Adventure Time logo, only call it Knitting Time, and have a knitting needle running through it instead of the sword that Adventure Time has)

Yeah, I think my desire to knit is slowly returning. Part of it is, as the person who runs Phydeaux Designs wrote in a recent newsletter: "Unbelievable:  August is just a few days away. But you know what that means? Autumn is just around the corner!"

Yes, autumn. The time of cooler temperatures. The time when knitwear is more than just a shawl thrown over my arm on the off-chance that one of the classrooms is too highly air-condiitoned. The time of changeable weather and changing colors and cooler temperatures.

I also did something that I find helps when my desire to knit wanes - I look through my accumulated patterns. I pulled out the various Brit-mags I have (Simply Knitting, the Knitter, and a couple of odd issues of other ones like Yarnwise I don't normally find on the newsstand). I found a cardigan with a geometric lace pattern (they call is "faux entrelac," but I'm really not fooled) I want to make eventually, and I even have yarn on-hand for it (some avocado-green Vickie Howell yarn bought on a very good sale, and it turns out I have enough). And I found the issue with the pattern for the "free" ball of Bergere de France yarn that came with it. (Simply Knitting UK always gives some kind of "free gift" with purchase, which is one reason I like it. Oh, I get that the gift isn't really "free" - it's part of the cost of the magazine, and also, I'm sure the company gets "promotional consideration" for it). But anyway - my next small project is going to be those fingerless mitts made out of pale-lavender Bergere yarn. (And even knit on 3.0 mm dpns, which were another month's "gift"! The pattern calls for that size but that's an odd size in the US - it's inbetween  US 2 and US 3, so it can be hard to find.)

I'm still thinking about projects to take with me - do I take along Basketweave and try to finish it? Or do I just take smaller stuff? Which small shawl do I want to do next - Hop Vines (ravelry link out of a grey-green and cream variegated yarn, or the Ostrich-plume fern (again, Ravelry link) out of pastel colored Phydeaux sockyarn? Do I want to start the Witches Britches (I think I figured out how to slightly enlarge the pattern without altering it too much)?

I think I will probably finish the Boxed Raglan during invigilating tomorrow - I'm on the second sleeve, and I just have a few inches to go on that before the decreases. And I think I'll take Hitchhiker along as a back-up; I might finish that one as well.

(Incidentally: Knitting by Nature - the source of the two shawl patterns I referred to - is a new book I just recently bought. It's very nice - something like 20 different shawls and scarves, mostly lace, all inspired by some kind of horticultural or garden plant. Hop Vines and Ostrich-Plume Fern are just my two favorites; there are a bunch of others in there I'd like to knit some day. Many of them are knit from sockweight yarn, which has easily become my favorite weight of yarn to work with....)

I also bought (from Ravelry) an Anna Paula Rimoli amigurumi pattern - a toy unicorn, designed to look like the "It's so fluffy I'm gonna die!" toy unicorn in Despicable Me. (I had actually considered buying myself the beanie baby type version of this, but never did. But making my own seems a lot more fun). I even took a trip to the local yarn shop (wow, saying that NEVER gets old for me) and bought a boucle yarn (the fluffiest they had) in white, and tan for the nose, gold for the horn, and I even found a Brown Sheep yarn in that odd hot-pink for the hair. So I think I'm going to be doing at least one ami over break....