First up was Tethys which was entered for Shawl Sailing and Cable Steeplechase:
Now if I can just get started on my gift knitting for the year I'll be doing really well!
Wednesday, 15 August 2012
Ravellenic Games Success!
I medaled! Several times!
First up was Tethys which was entered for Shawl Sailing and Cable Steeplechase:
I did then have to reality check my other plans slightly when it became obvious at the end of the first In and Out sock, that I wasn't going to get two of them done, never mind two pairs! Cue a slight change of plan, and casting on Sake in the hopes that I'd get 2/3 of the way through one of them, making both socks eligible for the Cast On Trapshoot.
Sake has been an utter nightmare it has to be said. 2" in and I realised the gauge was way too tight. Change up from 2.25mm needles to 2.75mm needles and 5 attempts (I have no idea what I was doing wrong that night!!) to cast it on and I'm now just finishing off the toe.
Now if I can just get started on my gift knitting for the year I'll be doing really well!
First up was Tethys which was entered for Shawl Sailing and Cable Steeplechase:
Now if I can just get started on my gift knitting for the year I'll be doing really well!
Posted with Blogsy
Sunday, 5 August 2012
Some days just don't work out how you expect!
Ok so I've had a fairly lousy week at work, following on from a less than stellar previous couple of weeks, so the plan this weekend was a lot of chilling out and general TLC. Best laid plans and all!
One longish lie in achieved, hurrah! A bit of knitting and spinning before lunch, brilliant. Managed to find my new rifle club, hurrah (I shoot small-bore rifle - I get to lie down for an hour, shoot at bits of paper and can still call it sport!), then headed off to a local craft fair, and that was the point at which it started to go a little down hill.
Now I've seen road kill on the road plenty of times before, and thanks to a previous occupation have ended up turning the same into a very welcome dinner on one occasion. That said, this was the first time that I saw a deer jump directly in front of a car! There was nothing the driver could have done, and in many ways things turned out as well as they could have in the circumstances. I was about three cars behind, but sadly only one of two (the other was passing the opposite direction) that stopped to help the driver. Given there was a deer prone on the road, a driver blatantly in shock, and a car with obvious damage I was kinda shocked by the lack of help offered. As it happens the other driver that stopped and myself managed to get the deer to onto the verge (it had evidently been killed outright which is a small mercy) allowing the traffic to pass safely, and I gave the driver a hand checking his car for damage before a police office turned up by chance. We think he'd cracked something as the car was leaking a fluid of some description but other than that he was just a little shaken.
It sounds funny but I always wonder how I'd cope in a crisis but today taught me a couple of things. Firstly, my reactions are pretty ok. Having seen this happen just in front of me I was one of only two that stopped to help (shame on those who drove straight on by!). My first thought was to put my car somewhere safe, grab my phone and assess the situation. Secondly, it seems like my instinct is to care. While the others wanted to just move the deer, I wanted to check if there was a chance of saving its life first. Maybe daft in the circumstances, but I'd rather check before we cause more damage though just moving it. I doubt any of the cars backing up had something so urgent to get to that they couldn't wait a couple of minutes on the off chance we could save a life! Thirdly, I'm pretty practical :) The deer might have been a write off but the driver that hit it was evidently in shock and not really thinking completely straight. Ok so I'm no car mechanic but even I can do a quick once over to check for the most blatant damage, and can spot a blatent leak. It wasn't much but the guy decided to head to the nearest garage to get it looked at before jumping on the motorway, hopefully saving him some bigger problems further down the road.
All in all a bit on the exciting side, which meant turning up to the craft fair to find that the advertised spinning stuff wasn't there was even more disappointing. What there was though was a group of wood turners giving demonstrations. Now, I will talk to anyone pretty much, and I love crafts of all descriptions. Anyway I jokingly asked if they were taking requests. PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT, if you are demoing in public and someone asks that, check what they want before saying yes :) Believe me this is something I learnt myself the hard way! Anyway Gordon who was on the lathe at the time said yes, what would I like. A wraps per inch gauge please? A what? Turns out this rather brave gentleman usually turns much much larger pieces of wood, playing to the unique fissures etc in each piece. So not so much with the small accurate work then :) Anyway a bit of description later, a trip over the field to another turner who had some rosewood scraps and he agreed to give it a go. I think you'll agree they really are pretty good for something he'd never done before, with people watching and making it up on the fly!
The rest of the day though has proved as relaxing as I'd hoped, finishing one WIP, getting the last bits of a bobbin spun up and learning how to make a new cocktail, oh and watching Team GB win a bunch of gold medals was pretty darned cool too :)
It might not have been the day I was planning but you know what, I got a lot of crafting done, I did a good deed, and I have some cool stuff to show for it :)
One longish lie in achieved, hurrah! A bit of knitting and spinning before lunch, brilliant. Managed to find my new rifle club, hurrah (I shoot small-bore rifle - I get to lie down for an hour, shoot at bits of paper and can still call it sport!), then headed off to a local craft fair, and that was the point at which it started to go a little down hill.
Now I've seen road kill on the road plenty of times before, and thanks to a previous occupation have ended up turning the same into a very welcome dinner on one occasion. That said, this was the first time that I saw a deer jump directly in front of a car! There was nothing the driver could have done, and in many ways things turned out as well as they could have in the circumstances. I was about three cars behind, but sadly only one of two (the other was passing the opposite direction) that stopped to help the driver. Given there was a deer prone on the road, a driver blatantly in shock, and a car with obvious damage I was kinda shocked by the lack of help offered. As it happens the other driver that stopped and myself managed to get the deer to onto the verge (it had evidently been killed outright which is a small mercy) allowing the traffic to pass safely, and I gave the driver a hand checking his car for damage before a police office turned up by chance. We think he'd cracked something as the car was leaking a fluid of some description but other than that he was just a little shaken.
It sounds funny but I always wonder how I'd cope in a crisis but today taught me a couple of things. Firstly, my reactions are pretty ok. Having seen this happen just in front of me I was one of only two that stopped to help (shame on those who drove straight on by!). My first thought was to put my car somewhere safe, grab my phone and assess the situation. Secondly, it seems like my instinct is to care. While the others wanted to just move the deer, I wanted to check if there was a chance of saving its life first. Maybe daft in the circumstances, but I'd rather check before we cause more damage though just moving it. I doubt any of the cars backing up had something so urgent to get to that they couldn't wait a couple of minutes on the off chance we could save a life! Thirdly, I'm pretty practical :) The deer might have been a write off but the driver that hit it was evidently in shock and not really thinking completely straight. Ok so I'm no car mechanic but even I can do a quick once over to check for the most blatant damage, and can spot a blatent leak. It wasn't much but the guy decided to head to the nearest garage to get it looked at before jumping on the motorway, hopefully saving him some bigger problems further down the road.
All in all a bit on the exciting side, which meant turning up to the craft fair to find that the advertised spinning stuff wasn't there was even more disappointing. What there was though was a group of wood turners giving demonstrations. Now, I will talk to anyone pretty much, and I love crafts of all descriptions. Anyway I jokingly asked if they were taking requests. PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT, if you are demoing in public and someone asks that, check what they want before saying yes :) Believe me this is something I learnt myself the hard way! Anyway Gordon who was on the lathe at the time said yes, what would I like. A wraps per inch gauge please? A what? Turns out this rather brave gentleman usually turns much much larger pieces of wood, playing to the unique fissures etc in each piece. So not so much with the small accurate work then :) Anyway a bit of description later, a trip over the field to another turner who had some rosewood scraps and he agreed to give it a go. I think you'll agree they really are pretty good for something he'd never done before, with people watching and making it up on the fly!
It might not have been the day I was planning but you know what, I got a lot of crafting done, I did a good deed, and I have some cool stuff to show for it :)
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