Rambling about my garden, my knitting, and Scrubs
This post contains rambling about: the weather, my garden, my knitting, my writing, and the awesome that is the show Scrubs. :)
After a week and a half of rain and wind and blessed coolness that felt almost like the awesomeness of autumn, it is now sticky and muggy and disgustingly summer, without any of the thunderstorms the weather peeps keep me hoping for. Fortunately, the forecast calls for more rainy, windy days for the foreseeable future, so I will be content once again to enjoy cool, moist breezes through my open windows.
My garden is loving the rain, and even though sun + humidity = ick, I'm glad we're getting some rays today for my wee veggies. I've been chopping green onions, garlic greens, and chives for weeks, so that's sort of lost the "whee, this came out of my garden!" factor, but the first lettuce and spinach leaves are almost ready to pick. My strawberries are reddening, my rhubarb is out of control (gonna dig that sucker up next year, I don't even like rhubarb but it was here when I moved in), and my pea plants are climbing all over the place. I need to add another line of twine to my supports. Last time I ventured out, there was no sign of cucumbers, but possible sign of carrots. I worry that the amount of rain we got right after I planted the carrots and cukes might've washed some away, but it's still too early to give up on it just yet. As soon as the ground firms up a bit, more lettuce and spinach is going in.
The herb pots are not doing as well as I'd hoped. I grew herbs from seed on an apartment balcony, so I didn't really think it'd be a problem here. All my basil (Thai, lemon, red, and sweet) started off so well, but after getting pounded by all the rain, I think a lot of it drowned. I may have to start again with them and keep them on the covered porch until they're better established. The parsley and thyme pots, planted more recently, are sprouting, so I'm going to try and keep a better watch on how they progress.
I've been knitting my fingers to pieces. Mosh's shawl is done and looks fab (if I do say so myself). I'll take some pics and then fling it over the ocean. As soon as she gets it, I'll post pics. :) My current project is a summer dress for my niece, and it's going amazingly well. Too well - I had three false starts on other dress patterns I started before this one, and after the third one I was so fed up I said to hell with the 'easy' patterns, I was going to earn my suffering by tackling something more advanced. And I was going to have a drink while I was at it, dammit! *g* (Sucker for punishment, yeah, that's me!) But strangely, it all seemed to just click. So I learned three new knitting things one weekend while drunk out of my tree: knitting on smaller needles, knitting in the round, and (miracle of all miracles) working from a chart.
In related news, skittles vodka is awesome. And knitting clothes is hard. I'm still a little apprehensive about the sweater I want to make for my SIL (and myself, if I have the patience), as it's done in pieces and I'll really have to get better at blocking and joining. But, it'll be a fun challenge, I hope.
My writing is dead in the water. I feel awful about it, because I actually do have ideas, I just... I dunno. I'm going to have a long think about it over the weekend and try and really figure out WTF is going on there, because it's been way too long since I actually wanted to work at it like I used to. Which is really sucky, because I have a great original project I was working on, plus a collab fic with such awesome fun potential that I've only managed to get about a quarter of my assigned work done on. Plus an activity for my writing group that I can actually see playing out in my head but I cannot find the words. Blah!
So while I've been doing all that knitting, I've been watching tv. Old tv, new tv, any and all shows and movies I can beg, borrow, or steal. I recently fell in love with Scrubs - oh my god, how have I missed this awesome show all these years?! It's fun and silly, with the occasional surprising dip into deeper waters. But it's all perfectly balanced, and the characters play off each other so well I really believe them. We watched the whole thing in about two weeks. Half hour episodes are like addictive candy - they're just the right size to keep gobbling without getting full until you realize you've eaten the whole bowl.
Ok that's me. What's up with everyone else? :)