As a knit-blogger (or any kind of blogger that prefers well-lit environments) winter is a difficult time to show off your knitting. Even today, a somewhat clear day with a bit of sun, photos turn out murky and with a yellow tinge from the overhead lamp. Even by the window! Hopefully, once the project is over and done with, there will be some clear days to show off (and model) the finished objects.

Here’s where I am with Audrey. See how the yarn fuzzes? I don’t know if I’d call it pilling; it comes off easily in small tufts of black fuzz. My only concern is that the whole cardigan might look worn before I even get to wear it! My swatch cleared up a bit after I’d washed it (all the loose fibers come off in the water) but… hmm. I don’t know. I’ll keep knitting, it’ll be a really cute cardigan when it’s done, and I’ll just be happy that the yarn is black – that fuzziness would show up a whole lot better had it been a cream or pastel yarn!

My mind feels totally blank today – I have to redo most of my media production material (a poster and two flyers) and I don’t want to. Not as in “I don’t feel up for it, I’d rather knit” – it’s “I. don’t. want. to”. It’s not a secret that marketing and media production are my least favourite subjects at school, but marketing is under control now and media… making posters and flyers doesn’t appeal to me at all. Websites are fun, photo manipulation/retouching is interesting and useful, but this…? Doesn’t interest me at all. That makes it really hard to motivate myself – my only motivation is that I’ll be letting my group down if I don’t work on it soon. I know it can’t all be fun and games all the time, but I am so not motivated for this that just thinking about it is making me angry. The thing is… I can write, no problem. But this media thing… I don’t feel inspired for it. I don’t know how to sell this product. I don’t really care that we do sell this product. I have group members that are a lot more talented than me, and why spend hours making something when they’re going to pick it apart anyway? And it’s not in a bad way, they just “see” these things better than I do. It’s just not my thing.

Oh well. I’m planning dinner for this week, that always cheers me up a bit. Nothing like good food to put a smile on your face! :) So far I have spicy chicken pitas, salmon lasagna, salmon with potatoes and a parsley sauce, home-made burgers, and… I thought there was something more. Hmm. I need another dish to complete this week; the school’s Christmas party is on Friday so we’ll be eating there. Free dinner, at least for me!

All this talk of food has made me hungry.. Must go raid fridge.

I think the word “Ugh.” correctly describes how I’m feeling at the moment. I went to a Christmas party last night with work, drank too much soda (barely touched the alcohol) and I think the ribs we got were … off. I don’t know how to burp (seriously) unless I throw up, which means I can’t get the fizz out of my system like regular people. Drinking too much soda therefore makes me feel ill (like there’s a bubble of fizz inside my chest waiting to burst), it hurts and I get the hiccups (which make me feel worse). It was a nice evening but I got home way too late to get up early and continue on the stupid, soul-sucking, asshat project.

My boss got really drunk and really weird (we have him on video tucking some of the workers into bed at a co-worker’s apartment, for some odd reason, and then waving a sword around) though he told me he thought I was a good worker, he was sad I was leaving and he hoped I would come back to work once I return from Scotland, even if there wasn’t a position for me. The guy I usually work with on Friday’s called me an anorexia victim, which hurt me a lot more than I thought it would. I wound up trying not to sob in the bathroom and avoided him all night. I think it was just as much feeling hurt as it was the shock that it hurt me so much. He knows I’ve been teased, accused and glared at, especially when I was younger, and I can’t believe he said that to me. He generally has a hard language, makes a lot of fun of people and thinks the world of himself, but I didn’t know he felt that bad about himself to call other people names for no reason. He also called our second-in-command “four eyes” because she wears glasses.

I did end up having a good time with a girl who switched to another store closer to her home, and I hope I can go out with her again. She’s really, really nice; a bit of an airhead, but so incredibly sweet and caring and fun. She came to find me in the bathroom and squeezed into the cubicle with me. We’re about the same body size and weight, so she could sympathise.

Since I finished my one and only piece of Christmas knitting, and since I’ve run out of KSH for my most luxurious Swallowtail (I swear it exists), I cast on for something else - Audrey in Unst from Twist Collective. I’m using a merino-silk-bamboo blend I got a while ago. I got it really cheap, about a third of the original price, because it was being discontinued. Turns out it’s the perfect gauge for this cute cardigan. I’m almost done with the twisted ribbing, but my. gods. does that take a long time.

The yarn is really nice and soft, but it sheds like mad. My palms look like Chewbacca after working only a couple of rows, and I can’t imagine this yarn would be good for any textured pieces. The surface becomes quite blurry after a while.

I’ll be interested to see how the upper part of this cardigan works out; it’s my first cardigan using this method of construction, and I’m looking forward to doing the top-down set-in sleeves. I also look forward to doing a real button band. I think I’ll be making mine longer; the Danish climate rarely offers weather appropriate for short cardigans with 3/4 sleeves. I have enough yarn for it.

I have a partial skein of KSH in the mail; a really lovely Danish Raveler had half a skein of that particular colour in her stash and is sending it to me for free! She didn’t want anything in return, she was just glad to help. I think I’ll be sending her a Christmas card. :) I can’t wait to finish the Swallowtail; hopefully we’ll be getting some decent, frosty weather soon (what is up with the mildness and the rain?) so I can wrap myself up in it. Mmmm.

Oh, and the watch for Martin was a huge hit. A couple of days after his birthday he went around singing “Oh I’m so cool, look at my new watch, it’s super cool, it’s the most awesome watch in the world..” and so on. One night he came up, switched all the lights off before I could react, and stuck his wrist in my face. The sudden darkness made it hard for my eyes to focus, and he impatiently insisted that I look. at. the. watch.

The hands glow in the dark. Oh, wonder!

I love the first of December. It’s like there’s this invisible, magical … glow to everything. I love it even more now because it’s Martin’s birthday - even though it’s a Tuesday we slept in and I made scrambled eggs, sausage, toast and juice for breakfast (oh, the benefits of being students in project-mode!). It was Martin’s request, along with lots of cupcakes to bring to work.

Yesterday was a blur; I had to get Martin out of the door as fast as possible without looking myself like I was about to get up. I had to go to Århus to get his birthday present – a Seiko watch, which was from me, his mum and her boyfriend, and his grandma. We’d seen it a month or two ago when we happened to be in Århus. He got the model noted down, but then lost the card and forgot the number. I managed to track it down, but when I was in Århus to pick it up they didn’t have any left. Of course. So they had to order it for me, and in my hurry to catch the next train I forgot to ask when they’d get it in! So last week I called and e-mailed lots of different people to somehow patch me through to whoever was responsible for that department in the store. Luckily it came home in time and I think it’s gorgeous. It’s very “him”.

After I’d picked up the watch I had to grocery shop, take the train home, go for a meeting at school, back home to bake lots of cupcakes (from this recipe), make dinner, eat dinner, go bellydancing, come home and finish up some stuff for the project… So a looong day. I quite enjoyed the baking, though; while in Århus I went to a specialty shop (Vom Fass) that sells oils, vinegars and liquors. I got 100 ml of raspberry and apple vinegar, mainly for baking purposes. It’s good! It’s not as distinct and most people wouldn’t notice it, I bet, but there’s a faint taste of berry to the chocolate cakes. I wish I could go back and sample all the oils. They had some really interesting ones.

I managed to finish two things today and not photograph any of them. I finished my first and only piece of Christmas knitting for this year (it involves the yarn I bought recently, but I can’t share in case someone reads this blog…) and… I sewed the buttons on my Moch Cardigan! Yes! I feel kind of ridiculous. I didn’t sew them on until now because I was afraid it’d look weird on me when it was done. So better to just stuff it away and hope it’d fix itself, right? Well, I figured since I was already sewing in the ends of aforementioned Christmas knitting, I could sew on the buttons… And you know? It’s cute. It’s actually really cute. It’s a bit on the short side, I’d like it an ince or two longer, and I’d like the button placket to cover more of my bust, but it’s wearable. Of course, now it’s too cold to wear a cropped, open, short-sleeved cardigan. I think I might wear it tonight when we’re going out to dinner with Martin’s dad’s family.

Martin’s gone to a jeweller’s to get his watch taken in so he can wear it tonight. I’m feeling like I got my knitting mojo back, though I don’t want to knit anything of the stuff on my needles and don’t want to pay for the patterns I want to knit, and I’ve run out of KSH for my most luxurious Swallowtail (which I also haven’t shown you) and FIL is picking us up in two hours. What to do with the time? Perhaps Ravelry….

So I’m sitting here, working on the project (and spontaneously jotting down novel ideas, wouldn’t you know) when I came across Attic24. Long story short, I’ve suddenly got a desire to eat my way through Glasgow. Or Scotland, or the UK, or whichever you prefer.

I want to eat fish and chips. I want to know what bridies and pasties are (pasties brought up quite an interesting search result, and while I’m sure some of them out there are edible, they’re probably not sold in bakeries). I want to try Scottish pancakes and real scones. I’m not sure I want to try haggis but I’d like to see it, at least. I want to try meat pies and curry dishes. I also want to try those puddings you (for some odd reason) fry or boil. The square sausages look fun.

I want to try those Hershey kisses that everyone’s on about. And those cream eggs that come out around Easter? I want to try those as well. Any kind of British candy, really. And I want to see what the deal about marmite is. (Why do you eat it? What do you eat it with?) Hot toddy might be fun, too. I’m not a big fan of beer, it makes me feel weird (not the drunk kind of weird, the “uuurgh my stomach” kind of weird) but I might taste some, just because.

Did I leave anything out?

Gods, I’ll be spending all my money on food and yarn. Perhaps I’ll manage to gain some weight while I’m at it!

November has been a busy month for me. Or rather, it should have been but I haven’t been bothered at all. As I mentioned in the last post, I was captured by the “Twilight” series and I just finished the last one this morning (I got the second, third and fourth book Monday night… the week has been a blur). I’m kind of glad to be done with them; I spent too much time thinking about the characters and what would happen to them, and how the books would end. The third and fourth books were my favourites – much more well-written, too – though I’ll admit that I thought the first half of the fourth book was utterly ridiculous. And Bella was my least favourite character up till the second half of the fourth book. But I liked the ending, it wasn’t how I thought it would be (despite the spoilers I’d read) and I’m happy that I can move on from them now. They were incredibly entertaining and I really liked the stories (legends, myths, character development) and the plot twists, Jacob was my favourite character throughout (Edward and Bella are way too melodramatic for my taste, at least until the fourth book) and they were hard to put down.

Since I’ve been reading so much I’ve neglected my project work. I find it strange that I don’t actually mind; during the last sessions in group therapy (last session was on Wednesday; I don’t know how I feel about that yet) we worked on changing some of the “rules” we live by. One of mine was, believe it or not, that I “must control everything and everyone around me, or my world will come crashing down”. I think a lot of people live by this same rule, aware of it or not. So I’ve been trying to change this in small ways, like not trying to keep the project in a death grip and micro-manage every little detail. I’ve missed a deadline or two(!), I’m trying not to worry about exams or final due dates yet. If I get a mediocre grade, then that’s okay – it’s not going to ruin my life. Instead of worrying and going through the same details again and again, I’ve been able to read and visit my family and go out with Martin. It’s been really nice.

Obviously, the last week before the 17th (hand-in date) will be crazy. We still have to make a respectable report; just because I’m trying to slow down doesn’t mean I should hand in crap on paper. I also still have to respect my group members and remember that it’s not just about me – if I make a mess of it, it will reflect badly on them. So it’s a careful balance between easing into a less-controlling habit and throwing it all to the wind.

I got a nice yarny package from Violet Green the other day. It took 1½ weeks to get here; I assume it’s due to the postal service strike over there (UK). I was worried it might not show up at all; one of the skeins is for a Christmas present and I wanted it ASAP so I could see if the pattern I had in mind would fit the yarn. I think it will. As I mentioned in another post, it’s two skeins of Bluefaced Leicester Aran, in colours Midnight Blue and Plum, respectively (photos from VG’s website):

They are very beautiful yarns. Extremely soft (good for wool-conscious recipients!), seems plump and with a good twist that is neither too hard or too loose. I also think it has a nice drape and I can’t wait to start knitting with it! I’ve often thought about making a sweater with this yarn, a skein is 180 yards which is quite good yardage for a worsted/aran weight (especially in this fiber). The cost isn’t too bad either. Perhaps when I move to Scotland… I foresee many splurge purchases while there! ;)

About Scotland, well, there’s not much to tell. I’ve been trying to sublet my apartment by hanging up ads at school. I don’t want to pay for advertisements on proper (Danish) sites as I’ll only be away for 5 months or so, and prospective tenants will be foreign students. I’ve seen that some have taken a slip with my name and e-mail, but have yet to hear from anyone. I really, really hope that I can sublet it – the alternative is quite expensive. The alternative to THAT is equally (if not more) expensive and time-consuming – meaning giving my notice, moving out and have all my stuff stored somewhere, sign up for a new apartment, pay another deposit, move back in, live there for a year, move back out. And I don’t think I’ll get much of my deposit back on this one since I’ve scratched the floor a bit with my bed. (Not what you think; I move it out from the radiator in the winter and back in during the summer, and back and forth when I change the bedding.)
But I’ve sent in the official papers, applied for international study grants from my government, applied for a crummy little apartment with shared bathroom and kitchen (fun!!) and chosen my classes. If I get my first choices, I’ll be taking Introduction to Media Analysis, Feature Writing and Consumer Culture and Society. I’ve avoided anything that hinted at being associated with marketing (I’ve tried to avoid that course altogether since I discovered I won’t even be getting a bachelor degree in the subject, even though I’ll have it for all 3 years of my education) and multimedia related. The Intro. to Media Analysis is more focused on analysis of media and culture together, e.g. TV, radio, newspapers, advertisements.

Anyway… I should go make a flyer. And a poster. I’ve waited with the more technical parts of my project until this weekend – I’ve written almost all of my other parts. I hope I feel inspired soon – right now I feel like the quote “I’m fine. My nose is just overflowing with awesome and I had to get some of it out” applies. I haven’t caught a headcold. Really!

(P.S. I handed in my resignation last night at work. It felt good. And weird. Especially since I hope there’ll be a job opening once I get back. That place is a revolving employee door.)

I may or may not have become a Twilight nut.

It all started out innocently enough some months ago when me and Martin wanted to rent a movie but couldn’t agree on anything (he likes horrors, I like chick flicks) and ended up getting Twilight because it “looked interesting”. Well, I absolutely loved it. When the end credits rolled over the screen I had “post-watching depression” and then made myself forget all about it.

Until Thursday when I was on my way home from visiting my mum, and yet again my train to Herning was cancelled. That left me with 45 minutes to browse the huge department store connected to the central train station in Århus (Bruun’s Gallery) and I figured “I’ll just pop by the bookstore. I won’t buy anything, I’ll just look!”. ‘Just looking’ is not something I do very well and since I’d just finished “Lost in a Good Book” by Jasper Fforde, I needed something else to read. I almost bought the first of the Sookie Stackhouse books (I only ever buy fantasy books) but then I noticed the huge Twilight display. The first book in that series was actually cheaper than the Sookie book, and I figured that if I didn’t like it, I could probably pass it on to someone else.

I finished the book Friday noon after rushing home from school to read the remaining 150 pages. I’d finished the other 300 the day before while waiting for the train, riding the train, and after getting home. I got completely caught up in that universe and I now have “post-reading depression” and can’t wait to get my hands on the second book. Fortunately, my SIL (who is actually Martin’s step-brother’s girlfriend, but SIL is easier to write) has the whole series in English and will lend me the last 3 on Tuesday!! I also just purchased the Twilight DVD from Amazon (so much cheaper than buying it in Denmark) so I can watch the movie again.

I will say this, though. I love the story. I (most of the time) love the characters. I love the scenery and the plot and everything. I accidentally spoiled the rest of the books for myself by accidentally reading some stories about the cast of the books (couldn’t remember what half of them looked like in the movie) and I think some of it sounds ‘out there’, but still pretty good.
However… let’s just say it’s not the greatest piece of literature in the world, mkay? I’d like to give Stephanie Meyer a thesaurus and suggest a few alternatives to describing the colour of Edward’s eyes, the way his lips set in his face, or the way Bella moves her hair down to create a curtain between them. Fortunately, though, I’m a very visual person. I don’t need a lot of cues before I can see it all in my mind, so whenever words or scenes are repeated I kind of skip those passages and just see it in my head instead. Same goes for all those weird silences between them, or when I don’t really get why Bella gets so angry or why Edward thinks it’s so funny.

I’ve read a lot of people don’t “get” the whole Twilight thing, and honestly, I don’t really know what it is myself. I like good stories, and I’m willing to let poorly written scripts go if the plot is absorbing. I fill out the blanks myself. And then there’s the whole fantasy thing. I only ever read fantasy books because I don’t want to read books about real life. I really rarely do (can’t remember the last time I did) and my only exceptions are historical novels – they happened so long ago that they still seem fantastical to me. If I wanted to know about real life, I’d turn on the news, read a newspaper or just go outside. It’s the whole escapist thing, I think. It lets me get away from everyday worries and chores and lets me live in a universe that’s exciting and new. It may sound sad, but sometimes they fill that need for (romantic) attention, adventure, being outstanding, or clever ‘inventions’ that stimulate the brain (e.g. the Harry Potter universe) in a parallel universe that’s so close to our own that it almost feels real.

So it’s not a surprise that I feel sad once I’ve finished a movie or book like that. You have to go back to reality, no? Still, I wouldn’t trade those hours of complete engulfment in a book for anything. It’s so rare that I have time to read these days, and even rarer that I find a book that really catches my attention. It’s nice to look up and see that 3 hours have flown by and it’s gotten dark outside without you noticing. I have a bad habit of counting hours and minutes and never getting anything done, so it’s a relief to have something take that away. But now… now I have real-life chores to do. Like shower and possibly clean the bathroom and definitely keep writing on the project. We only have three weeks left until hand-in and I’ve gotten absolutely nowhere. I’m trying to relax this year and keep repeating the mantra “I will do the best I can right now, and if I only get a C, that’s okay too. It won’t impact my future or my relationships with the people I love, nor will it ruin my life. I did my best, and that’s all anyone can ask of me.”

I think it’s helping.

We’re only halfway through November and I really, really suck at this NaNoBloMo thing. I think about it every day, “I could blog this!” but then I never get around to it because it’s dull or I think of something more interesting to do, like watch sitcoms on TV.

But today I actually have something fun to blog about! I got around to taking pictures of my newly-finished cabled hat. I didn’t block it because the bowl I usually use for blocking stuff I used to mix cookie batter last night, and I couldn’t be bothered to clean it. (On the upside, all of Martin’s dirty dishes have finally been done. I’d say they’d been there for about 2 weeks. Yeah.) But I was taking out the trash waiting for Twist Collective to come up (it’s up!) and figured that since I was already semi-dressed I might as well ask Martin to shoot some pictures before the sun went away. It’s been raining for weeks now and it’s getting old.

(Pardon the tired look; I’m still not over whatever it was that I had. It wasn’t really the flu, I haven’t had any fever since Friday, but I feel blergh.)

Pattern: #10 Cabled Cap by Suvi Simola from Fall Vogue 2009
Yarn: Rowan Kid Classic “Lipstick”, one skein
Needles: 5 mm. small circular and DPNs
Mods: None.

Comments: I managed to squeeze this out of a single skein! I only had 20 cm. of yarn left once I’d woven in the ends. I really like Kid Classic but I sometimes find it hard to work with. I feel 5 mm. needles are too large for this yarn; for me, I’d use 4.5 mm. or even 4 mm. to get a nicer, denser fabric. Perhaps it’ll change once blocked but I felt that my knitting was really loose at times.

I am a bit annoyed that my cables don’t look as nice as the sample in the magazine, but I put this down to the needle size. I think they would’ve been a bit plumper had I gone down a needle size. As it is, though, I don’t think they’re terrible. I really like the look of this hat, I think it suits my face and my personal style and it even matches the hoodie I’m wearing! I really, really love the colour, too. I’m glad I went (a bit) beyond what I usually buy and chose a very bright colour. It’ll be a nice spot of colour once the days become darker and greyer.

It’s also great for covering up those bad hair days. I did this on Friday with huge success. No one noticed I had a bad hair day at all! (Perhaps this was because my face was puffy and both my eyes and nose were runny, but whatever.)

I love having Martin take my pictures, even if he doesn’t always know what I mean with “You have to get a good detail shot of the hat, but not so much that you only get my face, you should get some of my shoulders and torso too, and… stop taking pictures of my boobs!” Here’s a good shot of me trying to demonstrate:

He he. ;)

Is it just me, or is “twelfth” a weird word? Did I spell it wrong?

I feel like I’m coming down the flu, but I think I’m going to wait with the final verdict until tomorrow on grounds of it also being that time of the month again. I was supposed to be super productive today (I did write 1½ page and did some research, but not near what I should’ve been able to do in one whole day) but I’ve only felt like reading in the Jasper Fforde book I got from the library (awesome!) and eat sweets. I’m having hot flashes and I feel tired and heavy and blank. Here’s hoping it’s not the flu; I so don’t have time for that right now…!

I was productive on the knitting front today, though! I finished my #10 Cabled Cap and hopefully I’ll get Martin to take some pictures this weekend. I’m planning on knitting a hat for him for Christmas (he doesn’t know though, so sssh!) out of Violet Green’s BFL Aran in Midnight Blue and I bought an extra skein for myself in Plum. I think I’m going to make him a Koolhaas. I originally wanted to make one out of Malabrigo because he’s extremely sensitive, but 1) I couldn’t find Malabrigo in any suitable colour in Europe, and when I did find it shipping was almost the same price as the skein itself, and 2) lately it seems he’s becoming more accepting of woolly things. He has two woollen sweaters (wool blends, anyway) that he first complained itched all the time, and now he barely notices. So I’m hoping the BFL will be soft enough that he can wear it around his ears and forehead. It’s getting chilly out and he could use a hat for when we take walks and when he goes mountain biking with his friends. (Just went to look, and the yarn’s machine washable! Huzzah! At least in a gentle wool wash. Though I probably won’t stick it in the machine when it comes down to it…)

Anyway, I really like the look of my new hat. It’s very chic and cool, like in “Yeah, so, I ski sometimes and I’m totally badass at it”. I’m not, really, but I think it looks a bit like a ski cap that all the cool skier girls would wear. So I’m wearing it now and bobbing along to “Sexy Bitch” by David Guetta ft. Akon. Say what you want about the title (I don’t like it myself) but it’s a damn good song. Maybe that’s why I’m feeling so hot? Kid Classic seems a bit flimsy when you knit it on the recommended needles but it’s really, really warm to knit with.

Yesterday we had a meeting about the study trip we’re going on on the 5th semester (in a year). In our class we’ve been talking about cheaper alternatives to China and the US which is where the last two trips have gone to. I don’t have the money to spend 20.000 kr. on a trip after I come back from Scotland. Especially if I can’t sublet my apartment. And it bugs me that I haven’t heard from that girl looking for an apartment even though I’ve sent her 3 messages now! She could at least write me and tell me if they found something else. I’m probably going to put up posters at school about it and spread the word.
Anyway; the study trip thing. There’s a study course here at school where the students are rumoured to be very… arrogant, snotty, bratty, full of themselves, selfish, narrowminded, elitist, etc. etc. No one really likes them. I know a couple from that study course who are really nice, but yesterday they just cemented themselves as being all of the above.

Here’s the deal: to be able to go to a specific destination, your group has to be at least 80% from your own class or 70% from the entire year. So it can be pretty difficult to find more than two destinations. But the representatives from that particular study course, they raised their hands and the conversation went a bit like this:

Student: “So.. what if your class already knows where they want to go?”
Teacher: “You’ll have to put the destination up on the board, for discussion.”
Student: “Yeah, I know, it’s just… we’re over 80% from our class that want to go, so we’re safe, right?”
Teacher: “… yes, but you still have to put the destination on the board.”
Student: “… but if we already know where we want to go, and that all of us want to go, why do we have to put it on the board?”
At this point, people are looking at them and wondering what the problem is.
Teacher: “You have to put it on the board so that it can be noted as a suggestion for a destination.”
Student: “Yeah, but… us in (this study course) want to go to India, and since we’re enough already…”
People groan and shake their heads. It’s obvious what the problem is.
Teacher: “It still has to be on the board for suggestions, so other people can sign up if they want to go to India.”
The students clearly aren’t happy about this, and there is whispering that they don’t want anyone else on their trip but students from their own study course.

It’s so typical. And now no one WANTS to go to India. Who wants to go with a bunch of people who don’t want you there, anyway? The entire school dislike them and they just really blew it for themselves. I think some of them like the hate going on; makes them feel special or something. I just try to ignore them, they’re in another building anyway so we don’t see them much. But I hate listening to them, it makes me want to shake them hard and yell at them to get their heads out of their asses. They’re also making it hard for themselves when they go into the business world; chances are they’ll run into someone from this school later in life because the educations are similar in job outcome. Besides, they’re annoying the heck out of the companies who’re renting office space in their building. I really don’t know why they think they’re so much better than any of us…

I think I’ll go watch TV now and eat some more sweets. I would’ve baked a chocolate cake if I wasn’t feeling iffy but at least I have some sweets left over from the weekend. I so hope this weekend will be more productive!

So I guess this whole NaNoBloMo and NaNoWriMo is a total failure for me. I’m not even that sad about it; I could easily think of something to say in a blog post every day but it would be junk. Just a recap of my day and not even I think it’s exciting. And as for the novel… I’ve written about 1,000 words and I’m out. I have tapped all my creative sources and I’m dried out. Seems I get better ideas when I don’t have a deadline hanging over my head.

This weekend I went home to see my dad and my brother (I was crashing there after a Christmas party with my old classmates) and it made me realise how much I miss them. I’m going home again in two weeks to see more of my dad’s family, and this time Martin’s coming too. I love it when we go home and see our families together; makes me feel like we’re more of a couple. Weird, I know. But it’s nice. Hopefully we’ll get to see his mum on Saturday and then my family on Sunday. There’ll be lots of family visiting over Christmas but we might not make it all – it’s hard to coordinate visits with 4 different families when some of them have bonus kids that have other families etc. etc.

We finally have some more information on Scotland! We got some different application forms today to fill out and hand in as soon as possible. I still have to decide which classes to take – I can only take 3 and I can easily name 5 that would be interesting. It’s also very uncertain that the five of us going will be able to stay in the same apartment building. Hopefully we can at least live close together so we can share expenses for food… For some reason I have the idea that Scots don’t eat pork (is this true?!) and I can’t really deal with that right now. Danes eat a LOT of pork and many of my staple easy-but-healthy dinner recipes contain pork. I suppose you could sub beef or chicken in some cases but it’s just not the same.

The project is looming over us like a bad spirit and it’s driving me nuts. I just don’t know where to start with it! I know nothing about Lithuania, I know nothing about disabled people, I can’t see how we’re ever going to get all the background research done in time and I don’t know where to find all this information. All I really want to do is grab Martin by the hand, shake him up a bit and take him home to Århus. I’m bored and antsy and push for us to spend more time together. He’s busy and stressed and plays more and more computer games to rest his mind. See the vicious circle? I push, he pulls away. So to calm both our nerves I can start planning a trip to Prague (it’s on the blog now! can’t go back!) in June or August next year and he is left alone with his computer games, totally nag-free. I think it’s a fair deal.

Knitting news… there is none. I have to rip back 2 (two) rows on my Swallowtail Shawl because I miscounted and I just can’t seem to get around to it. I joined in new skeins around those two rows and in my mind that just makes things more difficult. But there’s a chick flick on TV right now, so maybe I should watch that and tink back those two rows. I want to finish it… Wearing cashmere and silk and KSH can’t be anything but good!

(P.S. Since I got my wisdom teeth removed, it’s like the molars in my upper mouth are moving back to the position they once had before the wisdom teeth ever entered the picture. It feels weird and gives me headaches. Should I see my dentist? I’d really rather not.)

I’ve had one of those days today that you wish would end with you in one of those large, lion-footed bathtubs covered in soapy bubbles with a glass of chilled, sweet white wine in your hand. Some relaxing music by, for instance, Melody Gardot playing in the background wouldn’t be bad, either.

After 6 hours in school (out of which I spent at least one looking at food blogs, like eating s/f which lead me on to a delicious-looking cake over at Lottie and Doof’s) I had an Event Group meeting from 3 to 4 where I managed to delegate a lot of assignments, thank gods. I’m really looking forward to the Christmas party but there’s so much work. After that meeting I had another Christmas-related meeting where I spent an hour exchanging sour words with a girl I don’t know but very clearly dislike. We’re doing a theme for the Christmas Friday Bar this year (at many Danish unis there’s a tradition for the uni bar to open until late on Fridays – there’s usually something going on, like live music or contests or something) and there were different suggestions like Western (no), Hawaii/tropical, celebrity and disco. I was voting for Hawaii since I thought it would be easy to pull off. Out of the 8, six of us voted Hawaii but this girl was dead-set on doing disco. As was her lapdog of a guy she brought with her to the meeting (he’s not her boyfriend – very obvious class difference on the two, and it’s sickening to watch her stringing him along) and they kept saying “We could do disco lights and flared pants and neon colours and stirrup pants and big hair and 80’s music and…”

And this is where I had to stop her. Neon colours are not “disco”, sweetheart. 80’s music certainly isn’t disco! We’d all been saying how we really need to do this 100% so that people will get in the spirit, otherwise we’re just a couple of weird people in coconut bras and sunglasses. And mixing those two decades is not going all out. I think people (at least people here) have a tendency to confuse the disco era, which I believe was the 70s and Travolta and Bee Gees and flared pants and plateau boots and skin-tight shirts. I’m not sure why so many think that 80’s is disco – I know that some  trends carried over for a while, like they always do, but the 80’s was an era for itself (I’m sure we can agree on that!). When I pointed this out, she went quiet and I asked people what we were aiming for if we were going to go with disco. Most people said 70s and I could see she was getting annoyed; I think she mainly wanted sequins and glitter and neon colours so I don’t know why she didn’t just suggest 80s theme.

Anyway. We went with the Hawaiian theme and I’m pleased. I also ate two of the cakes even though there was only one for each and I don’t feel bad at all. After the meeting some of the various committee people went to clear out the storage room we have at school. All the different committees get a key so they can store e.g. leftover stuff from freshman trips in there. I think I’ve inhaled a decade’s worth of dust and chemical particles; the storage room was made when the school was built and we found things from 1988. We found old cartons of corn flakes from the mid-2000’s, pictures from old freshman trips (when people had mullets and moustaches), lots of buckets and bottles of brown soap and inner tubes from bike tires, crusty brooms and fake palm trees and a CD collection from the 90’s. One place someone had spilled some kind of chemical, put the containers back on top of it and left it there. There’s no ventilation in there and it had seared its way into the floor and it just smelled toxic.
I think we threw away a third of what was in there, if not more. And we’re not even done; by 8 p.m. we couldn’t fit more into the dumpster so we had to put the rest back inside even though we were still missing the last third of the room. But we decided to do that another day – we were all tired from a long day, and sorting through years’ worth of trash is hard work!

When I got home to Martin’s apartment I almost fell asleep on his bed, but decided to stay awake to at least watch Desperate Housewives. We were supposed to watch a movie, you know, but instead we watched DH and had B&J ice cream. He’d gotten the fudge-y brownie flavour and it’s gooooood. I wish they sold more flavours here – I’ve only seen the brownie one, the New York Super Fudge Chunk one, Baked Alaska, Chunky Monkey, Cookie Dough,  Strawberry Cheesecake, Caramel Chew Chew and Phish Food. I’ve tried Cherry Garcia at one of the few specialty stores but I wish they had more here – I’ve seen that in America they have … they have many! Many more than we do in Denmark. And I want to taste them all. Maybe they have Ben&Jerry’s in Scotland?

I can tell that I’ve started babbling; I should’ve been in bed an hour ago. Fortunately I don’t have to get up early tomorrow and I think I’ll sleep like a baby tonight. And tomorrow I’ll go get all my cards and maybe bake banana muffins. And now I’ll go to sleep.