Couple Monday things

 * I made one concession to the upcoming holiday season yesterday:

 Christmas lights over the doorways, and a strand of giant jingle bells hung up (which I will have to adjust, the door opens into them and doesn't want to open all the way)

I MIGHT pick at putting up the tree this week. I don't know for sure. I'm still not totally in the mood; 2025 has really drained a lot of my remaining capacity for delight, I fear.

* I did do a little Christmas shopping; got to the little gourmet shop downtown on Saturday. It's easier when you go "what might they like" rather than "I want this specific thing for them." Mostly small gifts - some food items, some kitchen gadgets. For my mom at this point I get useful or use-upable gifts like food, she notes that at her age she doesn't need more clothes or jewelry. I will also mail order some things, probably from Stonewall Kitchen and maybe from Seabear. 

I don't know what I want. There's not really anything I need and some of my ability to "want" things has been blunted by ~everything~. One thing I really miss about childhood is the excitement of "I really want this toy and getting it would be the best thing ever" even though it never really WAS the best thing ever, when I was young I could forget that every year and get excited again about what I might get. 

As I've said many times, the things I would really want can't be bought in any store. 

* I also realized that if I was going to give the hat I was planning to give at the AAUW party (we do a "blind" gift exchange), I better start it. So I did on Sunday, and carried it along while giving an exam today

 It's a very dark russet-red - almost a brown - of a Loops and Threads yarn (Michael's). This one is almost a wool-ease clone, except it's smoother and more tightly spun (better: it feels good to knit and the stitches show better) and it's a true dk. The hat pattern I'm using ("Free Breakfast" - a waffle stitch hat) is really for a sport weight but it seems to be working with a dk. I'm using the twisted rib variation on the hat brim - you knit through the back of the loop and it twists the stitch a little. It makes the rib look more defined and tighter and I actually kind of prefer it even if it feels like it takes longer to do.

(ribbing always feels like it takes a long time).

I have some pickle-green or poison green (it's a hard color to explain, it's a very yellow green almost like a tennis ball) from the hand-dyed yarns the former owner of Quixotic Fibers does. I want to make one of these for myself. I was going to do mine first to test out the pattern but I got nervous I'd run out of time for the gift hat.