So, I haven’t shown a picture of my shawl in a while, but I’ve been making progress.

Of course, I’m well aware that the picture is a pretty lousy one. We’re at that awkward stage where it’s too bulky to spread the stitches out along the length of the needle . . . or, you know, even half the stitches.

I left out two of the pattern repeats because I didn’t want the shawl to be too huge to wear and at this point, I have 26 rows to go, which assuming I were to work on this every night without being distracted (or tired), means there’s about two weeks to go. I’m only getting through two rows a night–one pattern row and the purl-back row.

It’s looking pretty, though. Even if it is Zephyr. Because still, no, not really loving working with Zephyr.

In other news? Our “new” dishwasher that we got in January and that Mom and I have always hated? Well, the little “wand” on the top broke off last week. Fridgidare sent a repair person who popped it back on, went on his way and . . . two days later . . . yep. Off again. Another repair person came on Monday said he’d have to order a part, but that the problems we were having closing the door was because of the installation. So, Mom called PC Richards and their repair person came today and very helpfully told Mom that he couldn’t help her. When she started to get upset, “What am I going to do?” he kind of leaned in and quietly said, “I’m trying to help you get a new dishwasher.” Oh, she blinked. ‘Well, then, whatever shall I do?” He said to call PC Richards, ask for H. and tell them that F. said he couldn’t fix it. She did and when she told H, he asked, “Which Frank?” So Mom described him and said that the man’s voice immediately changed–”Oh, that’s the good Frank. How can I help you?”

So . . . we went to PC Richards tonight and picked out a new G.E. dishwasher which will be installed on Friday. It was only an extra $21, too, so . . . our fingers are crossed. It can’t be worse than the one we’ve hated for the last 11 months, right? Although, to be fair, it has done a decent job washing . . . it’s just all the other stuff that’s been annoying (grin).

Chappy just wants all the chaos in his house to settle down . . . all these dishwasher people, then there was the Cablevision guy yesterday, and the leaf-cleaners . . . he’s just exhausted.

Can I just say how much I dislike the haircut I got a couple weeks ago? If I had mostly-straight hair, it would be a perfectly adequate cut. I mean, the girl wasn’t completely incompetent. However, I had specifically asked for a stylist with curly-hair skills and when I got there, she told me, “I had a class on curly hair once.” Which inspired great confidence, as you can imagine. She gave me what’s basically a bob with almost no shaping at all–which means the curl is pulled straight down, flat on the top, and slightly pyramidal at the bottom. It’s not, to be fair, an awful haircut, but it’s only been, what, two weeks? And it’s already looking over-grown. It’s not so bad that I’m hiding under hats and feeling mortified to be seen in public–as I said, if my hair were straighter, it would be a fine cut, but since my hair is NOT, it’s completely not suited to my hair which, you know, I believe was her job?

I so miss my old stylist! And the one I tried in August who gave me what was a much better cut than this one was still $15 more than the stylist I was going to, and that’s just such a huge jump, especially when we’re having such money troubles these days. But this cut, which cost me $45 is lousy for my hair. Would it have been worth the extra $15 to go back to the salon I tried in August? I don’t know. All I DO know, though, is that this haircut is not going to last past January without looking awful, so instead of 4 months between haircuts, it’ll only be two. Which isn’t exactly economical, either. Stupid, stupid girl–I TOLD her I like my haircuts to last as long as possible. Sigh.

Oh, and I have a toothache which I’m hoping will go away overnight.

Nope. 41 really hasn’t been fun so far…. I keep telling myself that things are going to turn around so spectacularly that, in years to come, I’m going to look back at 41 as one of the best years of my life. Thinking positive is a good thing, right?

Tags: General, Hair, Knitting/Spinning // 13 Comments »