Knit Addictions

Never Mind the Bollocks!

Obviously, I love pink. But I didn't know I would go so mad over pink and green. It's so very Sex Pistols and I knit up this swatch.....I'm not sure I like the combo of yarns but I love the combo of colors. Soooooooooo loud!

You can see how bright that is! The Pink is Berroco Suede and the Green is Online .....oh shoot. I can't find the ball band right now. Well, anyway you get the idea.

I also started a fan and feather scarf for someone. Very pretty. Very not me but very very pretty. I think it's important to knit for the wearer and not for me!

hmmmmmmmm..........well, I'm rambling a bit here.
We drove to the beach tonight and went for a bike ride in the dark on the Venice Boardwalk. It was AWESOME! Nobody around to crash into and very quiet. Plus it was really mild. Not too windy or anything.

My knitting problem? I love love love to start projects. But I get so bored and hate going all the way. Having said that, I do actually finish them. Sigh.
what can I say?

Did I mention we've given up coffee too??????????????
yes.
no more cappuccinos.
We've been trying Yerba Mate. It's .........ahhhhh.........well,.....interesting.
Getting used to Green Tea.
Just trying to make ourselves healthier and more ready for anything.

Oh. Here's a funny one.........I took a snap of a big box of yarn. I was gonna sell it all on Ebay. Then, knitter's regret struck me and I couldn't part with it. Sheesh! Will I ever knit with those six balls of scratchy white mohair yarn? Will I ever use the sorta dull blue yarn? Probably not. But I just wasn't ready to de-stash it all just yet. LAAAAAAME!!!!!!!!!!!
Does anybody else go through this?
I can't believe I couldn't go through with it.

How much yarn can one person have? I don't even know what I have anymore!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ah well.
I guess that's why this blog is called knit ADDICTIONS!
later fellow enablers.
I know you're all gonna tell me that it's okay.
Hey, it ain't cocaine, right?
just yarn.

Back in Smogville

The DAD news
Well, my dad is back in the residents home. He is stable again and has his good days and his bad days. After speaking with my mom, it's comforting to know that all of the other residents and nurses welcomed him back with great big hellos and hugs and how much they missed him. He's a pretty funny guy when he's not in agonizing pain so it's nice to know they appreciate his sense of dry humor.

AMOEBA
Remember a post a few months back when I was all pissed off at Amoeba? Well, they took our cd and apparently they listened to it cuz they contacted us and now we're going to be their featured "Homegrown Artist" on November 17th. So if you live in LA, go to the shop and check us out and please buy our cd there! :-)
Of course, you'll see us on their site that day too! (The Hollywood store)

ZZZZZZZZZ FILM
We went and say "I 'heart' Huckabees". OMDG! I fell totally sound asleep twice! So did Bam! This is more of an idea than a film. I highly recommend it for a lovely afternoon nap. I thought with all those superb actors in it this must be a fantastic script and story. Alas. Very meandering and .......well, not very good.

AROUND THE HOUSE
But I tell ya, sometimes, a nap in the theater is as good as it gets. We still have the evil homeowners next door who knocked down their condemned shacks and are building a new house. The issue I have with them,.........they work 7 as in SEVEN days a week. Starting at 7:30 am and generally going until 7 or 8 pm. After a while, ya get a little loopy. Not to mention, the edge of their new house is literally, 4 inches from the edge of our garage which doubles as Bam's office/recording studio. So he sits in there with the banging right on him. It's enough to make an ex-smoker start smoking again.
But, .........he is at 16 days without a cigarette today!

NEVER MIND THE BOLLOCKS

That's what I should call this scarf cuz it's like a pastel version of the Sex Pistols colors! (who I adore!!)
Thanks to my Secret Pal..........I used the yarns she sent me to start this scarf on the airplane ride home from Minnesota. I think it's turning out uber cool and I can't wait to wear it with something pink/green. It's making me want to find neon pink/neon green and design a very loud, very obnoxious sweater!!!!

MORE KNIT
I swear, all I do is work these days. Well, that and watch movies. (I have to have ONE addiction, right?) But I did finish the Lulu sleeve and am gonna put that together. It still involves more knitting...have to pick up the collar yada yada yada. But that should be fast. I have so many projects on the go.......a second Janis Tank in Pink/Black. But ....well, it seems there is a strong publication possibility so now I cannot post piccies of all my knitting designs. (this is weird to me)
Anyway, here's a pic of a scarf I did last year out of the Vogue knitting magazine. It's still a fave around the house and we have to decide who gets to wear it! ha ha!

SITE MANIA
Lately, I've got more sites that need building and just not enough time to build them. I guess I'm a slow website designer cuz man, oh, man. I just have a tough time.

On that note.........here's to dreams of yarn...........

Update on My Dad, the Pesto and VH1

First, the good news...
My dad is doing better and they think his seizures were due to some antibiotics they'd given him. My mom and I are going to look at a different 'home' tomorrow that she already checked out once. It's a longer drive which is very very tough on her but it is much nicer than his current 'home' and she thinks they would take better care of him. They have a special section for people with dementia which he has. So that's all good if you ask me.

Ah.....the PESTO!
It's so easy it's almost funny.
Ingredients:

• Fresh Basil (one bunch)


• Fresh Garlic (between 5-10 cloves)


• Pine Nuts (about 1/3 cup or so.)


• Olive Oil - 1/3 cup


• Black Pepper - to taste


• Fresh Shredded Romano or Parmesan Cheese - 2 Tablespoons

Re: the ingredients......I never measure anything. So be intuitive and use your taste as judgement!

Put everything in the blender and mix it up until somewhat chunky/liquid. You don't want it to be too liquid or too chunky.

Scrape it out of the blender and into a small pot on the stove.
Simmer while you prepare whatever it is you're going to spoon it over.

Enjoy!

Vixen on VH1
Many of you have asked for a reminder when VH1 is going to show the Bands Reunited episode that we did. It airs on November 9th at 11:30 am/10:30 am central time. Again at 10 pm/9 pm central time on the same day.

Then it airs a ton for the next several days.

There is also a 'compilation' best of Bands Reunited airing on November 11th at 10 pm/9 pm central time which has goofy stuff from both seasons and apparently there is some funny stuff in there.

On the Home Front
Bam has still stopped smoking! It's been over a week now.
He read this book. Twice! He said it was like reprogramming his brain. But you really have to want to stop.

He has gotten funnier and funnier since he stopped smoking!
We were talking about cleaning out the house cuz it's so tiny and we have so many things we do and quite frankly....we are running out of space.
I said, "we need to make 4 piles, Keep, Toss, Giveaway/Sell, Storage."
He said, "nah. I use the hammer method. Blindfold me, put a hammer in my hand and what doesn't get smashed up is what we're keeping."

hmmmm.....at least I would get to keep the yarn!

COMMENTERS
Thank you so much for your thoughts and kind words. It's so comforting to know people care. Knitters rock.

Not Quite Home Yet

I was supposed to be on an airplane right now.....
But alas.
My dad had two seizures last night.
He's a very thin guy who's never had a drug/drink problem nor any diabetes so it's really puzzling and pretty scary. The doctors simply cannot figure out why he had these seizures.

We reckon it's one of the meds he is on for his dementia.

Tough stuff to deal with all the way around.

So, I ended up extending my ticket and am here until friday.

KNIT
Made a duplicate of my new pink scarf for the main nurse that takes care of my dad. She indicated her love for it and how she would love one like that. She really goes beyond the call of duty for my parents so it was a great knitting pleasure to make it for her!

In other knit news..........I plan to cast on something tonight........but I don't know what!
ha!
Must admit, there is a strange pleasure to having a limited supply of yarn at hand so I have to figure out what to make with what I have.

FOOD
To the commenters...........thank you yet again! You'll be happy to know tonight's feast was the following:
Salmon with homemade pesto sauce (after discovering my 19 year old niece orders this at her favorite Italian restaurant and yet fails to sit down to dinner with us everynight....it worked tonight!)

Fennel, celery and pear salad. (simple, chop up the fennel, chop 3 or 4 stalks of celery, chop 1 pear. squeeze lemon juice, add 1 or 2 spoons of organic mayonnaise and crack pepper to taste. chill and serve.)

Now if that strikes your fancy, I'll post the recipe for the pesto too.

But I really have to go now cuz my hands positively STINK of garlic and fish! argh! The cooking definitely kept my spirits up.

Report From Minnesota

It's been a rough visit on a few counts this time. First, I got sick! Me, who never gets ill. I came down with a nasty head cold and fever but thankfully, I was able to sleep like crazy and it was pretty much gone within 48 hours. Of course, that's a big chunk of a one week visit. argh!

Outside of that, my dad is currently in the hospital. He was taken to ER late last night and my mom and I were with him until 2 am. He had some troubles which I won't go into here but it isn't life or death but still very serious. Now my mom is wondering again if she can possibly handle him at home. It's so hard. The toss up between the guilt of having him at a 'residents home' or the exhaustion of having him here. She is battling lung cancer so she ain't exactly bustling with energy. Anyway, I've promised to find out some information for her tomorrow to help her with her decision.

In the meantime, I've cooked for us every night. (even with my cold!) Tonight we had Moroccan chicken stew with a side of good old fashioned beets. But at the same time, I made 'green soup'. The anti-cancer soup! It's basically tons of green vegetables: celery, spinach, broccoli along with earth vegies like potatoes, leeks, carrots and garlic. Heat it all up in filtered water and puree the lot. Simple eh? It tastes like pure health when you eat it! It is supposedly really good for anti-oxidants and helping immune systems.

I've hardly knit a thing here but I did manage to finish the other sleeve for Lulu's sweater. When I get back to LA, I plan to get some help stitching it (to make sure I do it right) and then pick up the collar. Then comes the job of sewing the whole thing together. Oh, and a note to Rowan and/or anyone considering making this sweater, ....beware, they call it 'beginner' level....I say it's tougher than that! But I'm excited. The finish line is close by. Hooray!!!

It's been cold and rainy and windy here and I'm looking forward to going home to our California rain. Ha!

Oh, Bam has stopped smoking while I was gone. He is holding his own against the evil nicotine curse and I think that is so amazing.

To Lana, Jessica, Michele, Emily, Dave (Ragged Hearts!) Ellen and everyone else.........thank you for your wonderful comments. I appreciate your thoughtfulness sooooooo much!

When In Doubt, Knit a Scarf!

Here's the pic of the scarf I made for Jo for his birthday. However, we haven't seen him yet and now I'm leaving town...so it's modeled by Bam next to a painting by Jo.

In a mad fit, I dropped in at the Stitch Cafe and flipped for this new Labirinth Yarn. Where does my hair end and the scarf begin??? Pairing it with Pep Leo by Lana Grossa and a thin black ribbon, I made this tonight while we watched Fifth Element for the 30th time.

HAIR
For anyone who is interested..........I did get pink hair extensions! Yep! I love having pink hair but it fades too fast so Tommy, my uber hip and motorcycle riding hair dresser, convinced me to get hair extensions put in instead. Voila. Never fades and just hangs there lookin' cool. If you need a very low key but excellent hair salon for cuts or dreads or braids or extensions or great color..........in Silverlake!!! Sugar Hair Salon! Highly recommend them!!!!!!!

FAMILY
I'm off tomorrow for Minnesota. Sort of preparing myself mentally and emotionally for it. I'll be posting as much as I can but if I go blank for a week,............well, it's cuz I don't have anything very upbeat to say.

ROCK
In Bubble news, we are finally playing a damn gig in Hollywood!!!!
November 17th.
Pretty Pussy at the Dragonfly
6510 Santa Monica Blvd.
more details: planetbubble.com
For you rockers, you know it's a normal showtime: 10:30 pm (which really means like 11:15 in Hollywood!)
For you knitters, drink a ton of coffee and please come up and say hello to me after we've played!!!!

THAT PIC
A lot of you commented on my new groovy pic.....THANK YOU!!!!!!! That was taken by Robert John, the legendary Guns n Roses photographer. He did a photo shoot for Bubble and that was a candid shot of me wearing a knit tank top of my own design. Funny thing is.....in that pic, you can't even tell I'm wearing ANYTHING let alone my knit tank!!! ha!

Dig Dig!

Just saw Dig.
If you are lucky enough to live in a city where it's playing and you love rock n roll........go see it.
If you love independent film making, go see this film.

Here's the thing, very few movies portray rock n roll the way it really is. They usually dramatize it and thin out the characters or else the film just sucks. (prey for rock n roll.....sorry, i thought that was utter shit.)

If you want the real thing.......see DIG.
But hurry, cuz if they don't get enough folks to see it by MONDAY, the theaters are pulling it.
In spite of the fact it won the Grand Jury Award at Sundance.

That alone is reason for you to RUN to see this film.

And no.......they're not paying me and I don't know them. ha ha!
I just love art that fights back.

Knitting n Travelin'

OMG!
I totally wrote a post and then accidentally used this page to click onto another page!
Poof!

How many times have you done that?
ARGH!

Anyway,........so what I was saying even though you couldn't hear me........
I am leaving for Minnesota again. Gotta go visit the folks and help out where I can.

I knit up a scarf for a friend's birthday. I can't wait to give it to him. Speaking of which....I still need to weave in the ends. (I'm so lazy about that!)

Pic when I weave the ends.

I redesigned the Stitch Cafe site. For you tech heads, it's a tableless CSS site! My first one.
So forgive me if something falls down.

Alright. It's a saturday. It's warm. It's sunny. And I'm so slacker feeling today.
yes!

Getting Organ-ahzized!

I make lists. Lots of lists of the things I need to do, want to do, 'should' do, (but usually don't until I absolutely have to) and things I dream of doing.

I always thought that getting a computer would make my life easier, more organized and I would suddenly become this uber executive rock chick who had it all under control. I started making lists on the computer but that was tricky because I couldn't always remember what I called the damn things and would end up wasting time searching for the file until finally I had to write a new list!

So then I tried to be pro cyber geek and print out my lists.

But somehow, even that didn't work. It just made the lists longer and I hate huge impossible lists. They need to be small and doable.

So forget the computer. All the computer has done for making me 'organized' is given me MORE ITEMS to add to my list like:
-clean out email and delete old ones so it gets below 1000. (currently at 3000?!)
-design new band website
-work on CSS tutorials
-try to figure out how to best utilize the RSS feed thingy
-post on blog

But what usually happens is I end up surfing and wasting tons of time ....."reading" interesting "educational" sites on the net.
Hang on......it's not like I'm TOTALLY wasting time.
I'm learning!
Learning where the best coffee shop is in Eagle Rock, CA. (definitely the Coffee Table.)
Learning where to get the best push up bras. (Bita Saviss)
Learning which places in LA have free WIFI. (and even some faraway places in case I ever go there like....Thailand.)

Ya see? That's educational! Surfing the internet is like going to school right?

Ahhh....where was I?

LISTS...............
So I had to get AWAY from the computer to make the lists as that was just too big a distraction.

Now, my new trick is using little index cards.
They don't let me have a very long list and I can just use an old fashioned pen to write on them and throw them away when I'm done.

I know it's wasteful.
But some of us will just never be that icon of cyber-hip-laptop-palm-pilot-cell-phone-usb-keychain-toting future president of ORGANIZED CYBERHEADS with address books synchronized and all that bollocks.
IT AIN'T GONNA HAPPEN!

So...........what about those iPods??????
hmmmmmmmmm...........
they do have them in pink. Well, the mini-ones anyway.
Then I would have to download and organize all the songs ...............
But they're soooooooo cute. And Target has them. Or.....online at Amazon.
Right there. Only one click away.
But then think of the time I would spend figuring out which songs to pick. And dealing with all of those lists!!!!

Maybe just a normal cd instead.
Or I heard they've remade and repackaged the portable record player!!!!
Yeah.
That and a little notebook with a pen.

Maybe that's the way to go.
Back in to the past.
So I can get everything done to keep me moving forward.

The point????
For a week, I've stared at my list and there was one item I kept ignoring:
POST ON BLOG.

ha!