Off to Tallinn

The company I work for has an annual "kick-off" outing. This year it's Tallinn with a mandatory guided tour in the Old Town. Yay. It's not like I haven't studied the history and the architecture of the Old Town at a level beyond ordinary guides. I'm taking knitting and lots of Ruoska, Rammstein and Megadeth on my iPod in case the guide is too painfully inaccurate.

On one hand I'm disappointed that they couldn't pick any other city around the Baltic Sea. On the other hand I get to see my family and I don't have to pay for the tickets.

See you on Monday.

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Challenge

I've been challenged by Marika. The challenge is twofold because I've also translated the original challenge to English.

Five non-work-related things on my To Do list today:

1. Exercise.
2. Knit.
3. Pet the cats.
4. Design a web site for a friend.
5. Play WoW.

What was I doing ten years ago?

I was working as an information systems (databases, data warehouses, etc.) analyst in Tallinn.

Places I have lived in?

1. Mustamäe, Tallinn, Estonia
2. Mariager, Denmark
3. Hornstull, Stockholm, Sweden
4. Tyrrelstown, Dublin, Ireland
5. Vantaa, Helsinki, Finland
6. Castleknock, Dublin, Ireland
7. Göteborg, Sweden
8. Huntstown, Dublin, Ireland

What five things I'd do if I was a millionaire?

1. Pay off my mortgage.
2. Buy a log house for my parents.
3. Pay off my brother's mortgage.
4. Invest.
5. Improve my SCA kit.

I won't tag anyone, if you'd like to participate, please be my guest.

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I'm Pooped

I visited a customer in Gothenburg today — 6.5 hours on a train. Oy! I'm off to bed. Gnight!

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Project of the Month - July

Yes, I'm late blogging this, but I finally managed to get passable photos of the new bed and curtains. I've also updated the flat photo album with the new pictures.

The "bedroom" corner. I really like this setup and I love the new bed.

The bedside table. It is off the floor at the front and I adore it. The colours are inaccurate in this photo. The curtain is green, the above photo is much more accurate in colour rendering.

This is a much better place for the chair — there is nothing tall directly in front of the window. It looks like it is at this angle, but the chair is actually beside the window, not in front of it.

Future plans of improvement:

1. get a new computer table that is on wheels;
2. get a chair to replace the current sofa;
3. organize the yarn, fabric, fibre and general crafting stash;
4. organize the research printouts.

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Random

I had to tighten the belt today.

I'm such a noob at role-playing that having to interact with an NPC gives me the willies.

I'm seriously doubting I'll finish my Ravelympics shawl.

I miss my friend E who moved away.

I love my Mac.

I want to travel more.

I need a personal trainer to drag me to the gym and make me exercise. Or a serious dose of willpower.

P.S. I want a Magnificent Flying Carpet so bad that I actually dropped herbalism+alchemy on one of my active alts and learned tailoring instead.

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Pratchghan

New day, new week and I am feeling better. I've rang to book a time with a doctor, but I haven't heard back yet. I want to know what the hell happened and how can I avoid it in the future.

I've mentioned Pratchghan before, I made two squares, one representing Death's realm and an 'I' for the phrase I aten't dead. The Pratchghan was presented to Terry Pratchett on Saturday at the Edinburgh International Book Festival. I'm still a bit stunned that my favourite author actually owns something that I made. (Insert starstruck expression here.)

Shirley (cherryred on Ravelry) who presented the Pratchghan was the one who collected all the squares, sewed them together and added the backing. She did an amazing job and it was really fitting that she got to meet Terry in person. She has written about the progress on her blog, go check it out for the whole story.

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This Has Not Been a Good Week

This week sucks. I usually don't post any negative things that happen because I figure no-one wants to read bad stuff. Whinging is boring. Today I am making an exception because this week has been ridiculous.

Monday: my heart was broken. Remember those exiting developments in my life I hinted at? Gone.

Tuesday: almost threw up at T-Centralen on my way to work. The nausea passed and I made it to the commuter train station, but decided that perhaps I should go home instead. So I did.

Wednesday: I'm staying home, someone wakes me up by knocking at the door and says that he needs to come in and check my drainage pipes. They are renovating the space below and will need to shut down the water on Thursday. He leaves promising to post a note with the time when the water will be shut.

Thursday: still home because the stomach is giving me trouble although I am eating only the most boring foods imaginable, like boiled rice, pasta with cheese and oatmeal. There is no note and the water hasn't been shut off. By late evening I am freaking out because I'm convinced I let a thief scout in. Rang my friend S who had some good ideas. Can't sleep because I'm worrying.

Today: I haven't gone out since Tuesday morning. Have a massive headache and no pills to take for it.

On the positive side: my weight is 69.1 kilos and the management replied that the guy on Wednesday was legit. I hope that the weekend will be better than the week has been.

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More Finished Projects

I've finished another languishing WIP: Daisy for my friends' baby. I began knitting it last year before the baby was born and put it aside to deal with the aftermath of the breakup.

I picked it up this spring, but the baby had outgrown it by then. Now they have another baby in the way and this time, with the help of Ravelympics, I've actually finished.

I went to shop for the buttons with S and she spotted the shiny fish ones. They are absolutely perfect!

There's another project I finished earlier for the baby #2:

A lacy crib blanket made with the same yarn as the Lemon/Lime Blanket. The colour is a bit untraditional, but it was OK with the parents.

Here's a detail of the colour gradation and the lace.

I had to shoo off the cats to take the above pictures. They absolutely must check out whatever I am doing and obstruct any pictures I am attempting to take.

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Ravelympics 2008

There is an event on Ravelry called Ravelympics. It lasts for the duration of Summer Olympic Games and we are supposed to knit/crochet/spin/etc. something challenging. Participants can belong to a team and take part in events if they so choose. It's great fun.

I belong to two teams: Team Ankh-Morpork Knitters Guild and Team LSG. I chose to take part in WIPs Wrestling for Team LSG and events Shawl Relay and Laceweight Longjump for Team A-M Knitters. The shawl I chose for these events is Seafoam Shawl, a free pattern accessible on Ravelry only at the moment.

I must have cast on for that shawl at least 7 times before I got it right. It's not that the pattern is complicated, but it does not have a diagram. I am very visual and need to "see" how it's supposed to look. I graphed the pattern yesterday and have made some progress.

I finished two of my WIPs (works in progress) for Team LSG when I took breaks from starting and ripping out the shawl. The first one finished is a baby raglan sweater for my friends' baby.

The light was fading and the photo came out worse than usual.

Here's a detail of the sleeve, the colour is more accurate, it is dark chocolate brown.

For each completed item the participant gets a special Ravelry avatar and a medal. Here's mine:

I finished seaming and weaving in the ends of the green baby jumper after the sun had gone down, so there are no pictures yet. I also need to find buttons for it before officially crossing the finish line with it.

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Weight Stuff

The result of this weeks weigh-in is 70.5 kilos. Yay! Progress!

I've been skipping breakfast these past three weeks and I'm wondering if it's wise. I am hungry all the time and I've noticed that the portion size for dinner has increased a bit. I've heard that it's not healthy to skip breakfast, but I am afraid that if I start eating it again, I'll stop losing weight.

The problem is that I'm not a morning person and rather sleep than eat before running out the door. I used to buy a portion of Greek yoghurt with honey on my way to work, but then the company moved and that's not an option any more. There is a bakery/café at the new place and I buy an espresso for breakfast and a small rye bun with cheese for lunch. They also have smoothies, but only one kind and not very good (raw bananas, blech!).

I like the idea of a smoothie for breakfast, but not the idea of cleaning up every morning or the extra time spent making it. I don't own any kitchen appliances with smoothie-making capabilities at the moment, so it's a moot point anyway. Should I buy a hand blender and make my own? How long does it take to make a smoothie? I'm clueless. And rambling, so I'd better stop.

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I love my iMac!

I spent yesterday evening organising and arranging my files. So far they have been on my external hard drive which was meant for backups, but I outgrew my notebook's hard drive and have been using that as main storage.

It's been scary because I have a nice little archive of the research materials I've gathered over the years and sizeable music collection. I'd be devastated if I'd lose either of them. Sure, I could rip the 300+ CD's again, but it would take forever. Again. And I'd never be able to replace the whole research archive.

I thought that it would be as simple as just copy the folders over to the Mac, but I've apparently stored things in duplicate or even triplicate. I need to weed out the extras or copy them to appropriate places more than once.

Having file formats that only Windows can read and not being able delete anything on the external HDD complicates things further. But never mind, I made the mess and I'll clean it up. When I'm done I'll have a kick-ass research archive, well organised music collection and the ability to actually take regular backups!

The Mac OS has features that are absolutely fabulous: Dashboard, Finder and Dock to start with. What I love most is that, as picky I am about how things work, I haven't needed to tweak the user interface much. Just a little. Installing software is a snap, in fact, it's brilliant!

Much love to Apple for designing such a beautiful OS.

Once I'm done organising I'll wipe the notebook and install Ubuntu. The Windows installation is about three years old and it's in dire need of re-install. Except that I never got any install disks from the store so I can't do that legally. It pisses me off that I've paid for it and can't re-install unless I buy another copy. MS won't be getting any more of my money if I can help it.

Besides, it's silly to spend money on a laptop that could have a meltdown at any moment. Maybe it'll last through the winter as the weather cools, maybe not. It's a perfect opportunity to mess around with Linux. I've been curious to try different versions of it for a while now.

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Monday, Monday

The summer vacations have begun to be over, there were more people at the tube and the commuter train this morning. The after-vacation schedule of the tube was supposed to start, but didn't. I was not amused to miss my commuter train today because of it. Fortunately the next train was already at the station when I got there so I didn't loose much time.

The reason why I wanted to get to work earlier today was that I was going to visit a knitting group in Uppsala after work and didn't want to miss that train. I'd exchanged some mails with a girl on Ravelry who was interested in lace knitting, but didn't know how to read the charts. I'd offered to go to Uppsala and show her.

She was very kind to come meet me at the station, take me to the café and walk me back to the station afterwards. I had a very good time, met very nice people, including one reader of this blog. *Waves* It was a pleasure to meet you. I was also introduced to rooibos tea, which was delicious.

I think it is awesome that one can visit another town and meet knitters that way. Made me feel a little guilty of not going to Stockholm knitting café. I should find out if Stockholm knitters still meet and where.

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Vacation -- Epilogue. Mum's Visit

My Mum came to visit me for the last days of my vacation. I'm glad that she had the opportunity because we hadn't done Mum-Daughter type things for a long while.

We visited Old Town, Chaikhana, a garden centre, IKEA, Vetekatten and shopped a lot.

She was looking for specific things and it just so happened that I found a skirt (finally!) and a hoodie. Mum didn't find everything she wanted but found other things instead.

I'd planned to take the gifts I bought for everyone in Scotland with me to Tallinn some other time, but Mum took them instead. I also gave her and brother's birthday gifts to her, that way they got there in time for the birthday.

We visited IKEA because we were in the area anyway and I'd decided to buy a new bed with the tax return money. The model I'd chosen was not available in the width I wanted, so we chose Malm bed instead. It was cheaper than the original choice, fits the room perfectly and does not take up a lot of visual space. In fact, the Malm footprint is bigger than the old bed, but it takes less visual space than the old bed. Love it!

I also bought a bedspread and some other small stuff from IKEA. So did Mum. It is next to impossible to walk out of there with just the items on the shopping list. In the end, Mum's suitcase was heavier when she left on Sunday, than when she came. She'd hoped it to be otherwise.

We had a really good time together and I'm lucky to have such an excellent Mother.

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