More odds and ends

I think I've finally found the perfect coffeemaker.  See if you can find the one thing that keeps me from getting it.

We have a new tenant at our office building.

Aftermath

It's the fourth day of Christmas.  There are fresh English football matches to watch and frigid windy weather to keep us inside and stale Christmas cookies to throw away and I'm starting to dream about my job again and to make lists of things I gotta do again and new books to read and old knitting to finish and I'm only sleeping twelve hours a day now instead of sixteen.  Time marches on, but before I start on the final 2010 clean-up and embark on 2011, let's review Christmas 2010.

It snowed:

Just barely, but there were five minutes of "Ooh!  Pretty!" to go along with the cocoa and kringle.  Note to self:  write thank-you note to MIL.

Simmering the sauce

We have achieved the stage of the bolognese when I don't have to stand there and watch any more.  If I just remember to stir it once in awhile, that's enough.  The biscotti are sitting in a turned-off oven for their final crisping, and they will be ready in time for lattes.  And so I am finally sitting down.  Aaaaaaaaaaahhh.


Today's biscotti is Lemon-Anise, only I hate anise, so they are Lemon-Vanilla.  This is the recipe:

I left the magazine on my knitting bag, so Tiki borrowed it and edited it for me.  Maybe it's compulsive to slog through recipes just because they're there, but if I were really compulsive, I'd be forced to use anise instead of being flexible and changing the recipe, right?

It was a busy month chez nous.  My job got bigger and I had end-of-year craziness to deal with that was never my problem before.  Mr. D had to go to Pork Barrel University again.  We took a vacation for the first time in three years.  The old folks visited.  Football started, and so did both Champions League and Europa League, as well as qualifying matches for Euro 2012.  This year, this means more than just hours watching football and thinking unclean thoughts about football players because now I am writing about it for a online community of Serie A tifosi.  I'm responsible for covering Juventus, so I'm doing match reports after every match (one or two every week), and covering the transfer market and whatever other news may come up.  I love it, but it's a time commitment.  Aaaaaaand,  Kirby stopped walking, so he spent a few days in the hospital getting expensive tests, and his progress since then has been up and down.  When he's up, he can do pretty much everything, but his balance is tetchy and he's prone to falls.  When he's down, he can't walk, has to be carried everywhere, and has to be supported when he potties.  And no, we still don't know exactly what the cause of all this is, and yes there will be more vet trips (including tomorrow) so the doggie neurologist can assess his progress on his treatment plan.  The space bar on my laptop needs to be hitjust so, which means weird things happenwhen I write.  And there has been knitting.

Lame Yarn Post

I am in the black hole of knitting.  I knit and knit and knit and nothing much happens.  I've been working on pretty much all of my projects for at least two months and I have very little to show for any of it. Except these:

These are the Scottish Highland socks.  Mindless monkey knitting featuring STR.  No big deal.


I started a pair of socks for my sister-in-law in July.  I finished the first one this morning, but only after forcing myself to hunker down.  This is where I was before the weekend:

Now this right here, this is the big time suck:

Hm.  In the photo, you can actually see the pattern.  In real life, it's just a pile of fuzzy grey stuff that is lace and therefore, ALL TOGETHER NOW, looks like ass.  I can't believe I'm only halfway through.

Oops.  I forgot this:

Hm.  OK now that cheers me up. Nice lace, huh?

Footie, Food, and Fiber

Footie

The World Cup is over, we have a winner, a loser or two,  a great number of national sides who deserve to be proud of themselves, and a handful of national sides who tolerate bad behavior from assholes but otherwise deserve to be proud of themselves.  There were--what?--33 matches?  32?  Dirtbunny watched them all.  All of them.  She has made a handful of new FC Dirtbunny call-ups based on what she saw. 

First, welcome Diego Benaglio, Swiss goalkeeper.  He's a monster.  grrrr.  Also, from the German national team, Arne Friedrich (an underappreciated defender), and--gulp--Bastian Schweinsteiger, warrior midfielder.  I know, I was really down on Schweini a few years ago, but he has won me over with his consistently good play and newly-mature attitude.  Also, he reformed the hair.

Second, welcome to the Uruguayan Diegos:  El capitano defender Diego Lugano, striker Diego Forlan, midfielder Diego Perez, and defender Diego Fucile.  The last one gets in because if I'm going to call up a bunch of Uruguayan Diegos, why not all of them?  It's fun to be arbitrary.  Oh, and welcome Xavi.  Your call-up is way overdue.