Hibernating

I wish I could hibernate every winter.  Just curl up into a little ball in my bed sometime around late November and wake up at the end of March and the start of spring. True, my annual income would take a hit, but I wouldn't be spending much either, so I could hopefully make ends meet by working the other 7 and a half months out of the year.

Every winter I go into a slump.  I don't know what to write about, because nothing is happening.  If I wrote about what I was really thinking 95% of the time, it would be about how I'm cold and how I'm sick of winter.  Who wants to read that?  A "big outing" for us in the winter is going to the grocery store, because we have to actually take off our (slightly) warmer, comfy clothes to put on something more respectable. 

I already wear long underwear tops and bottom under all of my clothes whenever I'm home, I usually have the hood up on the sweatshirt I'm wearing, and we've even decided to suck it up and turn out heat up a bit this year - something that was very hard for two frugal people to do.  Why would we want to spend money on heat????  Oh, that's right - because I'm going to cry if we don't warm up these bones of mine.  My favorite winter hobby - which DH absolutely hates - is curling up in bed under all of my blankets with a book and reading the hours away, passing the time second by second until the snow melts and the sun finally comes out again.   I dream about the beach, blue skies and blue water, the sun, and warmth.  I smell spring breezes in my dream that are so real I wake up momentarily exhilarated until I realize that it was all a dream.  A tease of a dream. 

If I can't hibernate then I should at least fly south for the winter.  Where it's warmer and I can function like a real human being.  Where winter coats are irrelevant and entire cities shut down for one inch of snow (because I think that's how it should be.)  Every winter - and increasingly more and more as each new winter arrives - I talk about moving somewhere warmer.  Some day I might actually be desperate enough to do it.  If only I could come into a large sum of money that would allow me to keep my heat at 80 starting October 1st, I could manage it here in the cold, cold north.  But until then, I guess I need to invest in long underwear and stock up on good books and warm blankets to get me through.  It's only January, after all.  At least two more months of this crap!  *shudder*

My First Two Sewing Projects

I decided that the best way to learn to sew was just to jump in head first and start with a project.  Since I didn't have any material other than an old t-shirt, I decided to start by making Murphy a tiny, Murph-sized pillow.

First I cut and pinned the tiny pillow. Then I sewed it, flipped it inside out, stuffed it with more t-shirt, and sewed it closed.  There must be a secret for going around corners, but I don't know it yet.  When I hit a corner I just bring my needle up, rotate the fabric and keep going but there are always loose pieces of thread whenever I do this.  However, since this is a pillow and I'm going to turn it inside out, I decided not worry about it too much.

Here is Murphy using the pillow that I made for him.

Recognizing how completely and utterly ridiculous this whole idea even was, I was shocked to find that Murph kind of liked the pillow.

With that success behind me I was motivated for another project.  This time: a squeaky toy holder.  Now that's not ridiculous at all.

The pouch and the squeaky toy

You might wonder why Murphy's squeaky toys needed a holder (or a pouch, if you will).  You would be right to wonder, since there is no good answer.  But I can tell you that after making a pouch for Murphy's squeaky hot dog, it was like bringing a new toy back to life.  Murph almost never played with the hot dog, but now that it was in a sack, he loved it and was super possessive. 

Action shot!

Again success.

Actually, I kid.  Both of these projects, as simple as they seem, were actually quite crappy, but it was a good way to get started and have something to practice on.  I figure that no matter what I try, the first dozen or so things that I make are going to be horrible, so I might as well just take on horrible, stupid projects, right?

Birthday Pie!

On Sunday we decided to go out and by ourselves a small birthday cake.  We're trying to eat healthy but come on - you only turn 30 once!

We decided to buy an almond torte from Giant Eagle, since they don't have anything in them that I can't eat and DH finds them relatively tasty.  Imagine our disappointment when we got to the Giant Eagle and they didn't have any almond tortes.  So sad.

So I decided to make a pudding pie instead.  It was a weekend so I could have dairy without offending anyone and I had been thinking about pudding every since DH made me try yogurt recently.

I present to you, the birthday pudding pie.

It may not look like much, but it was sooo tasty.  Happy Birthday to us!

Here We Go Steelers!!!

Unless you live in a box (or, I suppose, outside of the Pittsburgh region) you already know that the Steeler's won the AFC championship on Sunday night and will be competing in yet another Super Bowl!!!  Woo hoo!!

I had some pictures from Sunday night, but for some reason my computer is refusing to recognize my camera card.  Oh well, they weren't really that exciting.  Let's instead, look at some pictures from the night that the Steeler's won the Super Bowl back in 2006.

My lucky airbrush tatoo

We made the genius (and I really do mean genius) decision to attend a party in the South Side.  Ordinarily I avoid the South Side like the plague - congested streets with no parking and drunk college students everywhere.  But for the Super Bowl, that was exactly what I was looking for.

Carson Street at half time - the calm before the storm

You can't really see them in the picture above (all of these pictures are going to be fairly crappy because they were taken with my 1 or 2 megapixel camera) but I was posing in front of a bunch of police officers that were on horseback, preparing to contain the rowdiness.

Unfortunately, I had the flu, and so was sick I barely remember anything.  But I do remember that they won!  And that everyone was screaming.  And then everyone that was at the party put on their coats, ran out of the house, and down the three blocks onto Carson Street, where people were literally pouring out of the bars and apartments in droves.  It was amazing.

 

I'm trying to convey with these pictures the general sense of absolute chaos that was going around,but it's hard to capture that sort of energy on memory card.  I have a horrible, one-megapixel video that I took where you can really hear the cheering and chanting and yelling that was going on, but it's so screeching and horrible you might go deaf and I don't want a lawsuit on my hands.

I look pretty good for almost dying of the flu, don't I?

People were everywhere.  All waving towels, all cheering, running in crazy circles.

No, we do NOT know that guy in the picture above.  But that was part of the fun of it! People just wanted to be part of history and that guy will forever be part of our history.

Now the question is, where should we go this year?  We don't know anyone who lives in the South Side anymore, and I'm pretty sure in order to get a table at a bar we'd have to get there at like 1 p.m.  I'm not sure we're willing to make that kind of commitment.  I'm also not sure that I want to deal with the hassle of parking in the South Side and trying to get out of the city afterwards.  In 2006 I was in grad school, so not getting enough sleep was the story of my life, and I live in the city, so I didn't have to try to get out it.   Now DH and I are "old" (I'm almost 30!), we live in the suburbs, and we hate the thought of the hassle of dealing with the South Side on Super Bowl Sunday.

But we're also young at heart, and we remember the amazing time we had being there.  And I realize that it's hard to turn your back to an opportunity to relive a moment like that again.  It could be a decision that I regret or cherish for the rest of my life.

Short Title: Sewing

Long Title: My Sewing Machine and the Most Learning I've Done in a Really Long Time

I got a sewing machine for Christmas.  I asked for one actually, after being frustrated by having to get rid of items of clothing because they were too big or because a hem was loose, and also after being inspired by some really cool sewing blogs such as New Dress a Day.

I haven't had an opportunity to really try the sewing machine until this weekend, but I finally got it out.  I decided to start by reading the manual but quickly realized that's a bad idea.  I had absolutely no idea what they were talking about.  So I pulled the machine out and tried to refer to the actual machine while reading the manual.  I'm pretty sure at one point I was so deep in concentration that my brow was furrowed and I was all hunched over.  It was intense.  DH kept making fun of me.

My first bobbin

"This is seriously the most learning that I've done in a long, long time," I declared.  Probably since I took a Spanish class at CMU a few years ago.

But I wasn't kidding. Sewing machines are intensely complicated, and from what I can tell, unnecessarily so.  Let me review.

In order to "thread the machine" you have to take the thread from the top of the machine, wind it around a little metal piece, down a slot in the front of the machine, under a loop, up a another slot back towards the top, around a metal loop and then back down again.  Now you're finally at the needle.  But first you have to hook the thread around this little piece of metal and then only do you get to put the thread through the needle using yet another contraption.  Ridiculous, I tell you.  I'd like someone to explain to my why exactly the thread needs to go up, down and around so many different times and places.  It seems to me like going straight from the spool to the needle would work just as good.  This, I tell you, is why young people today don't have any interest in sewing.  Too damn complicated.

Anyway, if you're just learning how to thread your sewing machine I would suggest skipping the users manual completely - if you're not family with a sewing machine it will make absolutely no sense.  Instead, I recommend going straight to YouTube and searching for "How to thread a YOUR MODEL HERE sewing machine" and you're sure to get a half dozen step by step videos.  After wasting about 3 hours trying to figure it out from the manual, YouTube had me up and running in less than 20 minutes.

 But now that the machine is threaded, what's next?  I tried just playing around with it, but I was clearly doing something wrong, since I kept getting these little loopy things on the back on the old t-shirt I was playing around with.  Still not sure how to fix that, and YouTube hasn't been much help.  But I have 4 spools of thread and not a lot else to do, so I'm sure I'll be showcasing my first project in no time!

The View From Here

It's currently 18 degrees outside.  That's pretty frigid if you ask me.  Frigid enough that when Murphy comes in from outside, he's usually limping on at least one of his four paws, since the pads on his feet freeze.

And yet it's also sunny out.  Blue skies and bright sun streaming in through the window.

It's deceptively nice, enough so that Murphy keeps asking to go outside even though it's oh-so-cold.  Around his third or fourth time outside this morning we found this:

 Can you see him up there???

Yep.  He's laying in the snow.

Lounging in the sun as if it's the middle of June.  Apparently if you're laying down, your feet don't freeze as easily.

Actually that's not true.  When he came in three minutes later he was definitely only walking on three paws.

Dogs.....

The Worst Commute Home - Ever

Last week I mentioned how on Tuesday, January 11 (1/11/11, anyone???) it took me three hours to get home.

I've had my fair share of horrible commutes in the past.  I live a solid 15 miles from my workplace, and unlike my husband - who travels 12 or so miles away from the city and further into the countryside - I drive straight towards the city.  Not only straight towards the city but I essentially have to go through downtown Pittsburgh and then onto Pittsburgh "other downtown," Oakland, which has it's own share of traffic nightmares.

So on 1/11/11, I left work at my normal time - 4:45 p.m. - after watching it snow for much of the afternoon.  The roads didn't look great, but at least from the view from my office, traffic was moving.  I cleaned off my car and headed out, traveling down Forbes Avenue.  In less than a minute I was stopped, and I should have known right then and there that it was going to be a bad night - Fifth Avenue was so backed up that it had backed up onto Forbes Avenue. 

It took me about 30 minutes to get onto Fifth, and all I could see was an ocean of red brake lights.  Nothing was really moving.  It would creep along at once seemed to be about one inch per minute.  I hit Facebook and Twitter and wrote some posts lamenting the horrible traffic.  The story seemed to be the same for everyone - traffic just plain sucked. 

After I exhausted those two distractions I tried to resume listening to my book on tape - Memoirs of a Geisha, which I should say is an incredible, captivating novel that has had me intrigued for my commutes the past week or so.  But I was too angry to listen.  I just wanted to move.

By this time it was about 5:30 - 45 minutes on the road - and I talked to DH for awhile, trying to figure out a game plan.  He went on google maps to assess the traffic backups on the roads I was trying to get to and it didn't look good.  Instead of red, which is the color they usually use for really bad traffic, it was black.  Black means NO MOVEMENT.  This was bad.. very, very bad.

I contemplated heading back to work, but I absolutely hated that idea.  I had already spent this much time making this much progress and just turning around and heading back only to sit in my office seemed like losing in a really big way.  I continued inching along Fifth until I was nearing the Boulevard of the Allies.  It was about 6:05 at this point and I had already been on the road for one hour and twenty minutes.  I wanted to cry. And I had to pee.

This was the point of no return.  If I got onto the Boulevard, there was no turning back.  There's really no where to pull off, no where to stop for the bathroom, no where to go but forward.  Once you're between their cattle drive concrete barriers, you're committed. 

It was around this time that I started to think about ways that I could go to the bathroom in my car, without making too much of a scene, or too much of a mess.  Two minutes later I snapped back to reality and realized that if I was thinking about ways to go to the bathroom in my car, then I clearly could not continue.  I was nearly passed my last chance to get back onto Forbes Avenue, so I took the turn, merged onto Forbes and pulled up in front of the Arby's.

I was pissed to be at Arby's.  But at least I could go to the bathroom.  And at least I could eat.  I ordered a meal and sat down.  It was tasty but I was really too unhappy to be there to enjoy it.  It was also freezing in there. 

Dear Arby's of Oakland - Please turn your heat up.  Your patrons are freezing and it makes the food go cold really quickly.  Cold fast food is nasty.  Thanks.

Anyway, I ate as slow as I possibly could, and then lamented my situation on Facebook.  A half dozen people tried to cheer me up by saying, "Arby's fries sound amazing!"  I quickly shot them down. "I should have been home an hour ago and yet I'm less than a mile from my workplace eating cold Arby's.  It is NOT amazing." 

Around 7 p.m. I couldn't sit in Arby's any longer.  It was time to face the traffic again.  In the end, I was glad that I decided to make my pit stop.  I seriously would have peed the car at some point if I tried to keep going, and I'm not sure that I would have gotten home any quicker.   I left at 7 and traffic still was not great, but I did make it home in 45 minutes, which is my normal commute time on a good day.  I walked in my door shortly after 7:45 p.m.  I had left work at 4:45.  Needless to say, I was pissed.  And exhausted. 

It's times like these when I really start considering looking for employment closer to my home. But the problem with working in higher ed is that there are only so many colleges, and the colleges are in the city.  I'm stuck working in the city.  Probably forever.  I need to learn to better utilize my PTO (vacation days.)  I save a lot of them up so that I can use them "when I need them," and I really should have used one that afternoon to take a half day and leave at noon.  I could have beaten the traffic and been curled up on my couch at home while everyone else was sitting in that horrible traffic.   I always somehow talk myself out of it - "It won't be so bad," or "I'll make it."  But it is always bad, and even if I eventually make it, making it after 3 hours of driving is NOT ok. 

Prior to this experience, two hours and 15 minutes was my longest commute ever.  I beat that by 45 minutes. If I ever beat this new record, then it's definitely time to find a new profession.  I'm thinking farming, or perhaps doggie day care.  What do you think?