Ooh, that new Australian YARN Magazine has finally launched! The first issue is just online but they even provide a PDF so you can print it out if you want. I like that look of that felted mitered bag…

I think the next time we’re in Indiana we’re going to have to take a trip north to Snook’s Butcher Shoppe…!

The BBC warns of the dangers of Australia’s national footwear. I guess that’s good news for the Crocs people!

Give a Little

Man, I nearly forgot the folks back home were having a holiday weekend. End of summer, huh? I celebrated the start of Spring this past week by putting away the heaters and the thick duvet… only to drag them back out in the middle of a single night as the temperature suddenly dropped. It rained all day and it’s frickin’ freezing here, Mr. Bigglesworth.

Anyhoo, the Snook had Friday off so we decided to check out the lunchtime “Kickboxing Cardio” class. This was our first official visit since our Beginner’s Pass expired and I decided to celebrate the occasion by buying my own pair of gloves. Check out K-How’s new mitts over there on DeskCam. Pretty sweet, huh? My hands are still gonna smell but at least now they’ll smell like ME. The class was totally killer. The Snook and I ended up taking turns holding a big round pad while the other wailed on it with punches and kicks. I was heartened to see some very big girls in the group and I’m proud to say we both kept up with everybody else. I was having some hair-related difficulty though: Despite wearing a ball cap and pulling my hair into pigtails, my bright pink sweat still flew all over the place, discolouring my own sports bra and the T-shirts of some of my classmates. (It always runs a lot right after I get it redone.) I looked like I really had gone ten rounds in a fight. We felt energized and excited afterwards, but as you might imagine, we pulled up pretty damn sore on Saturday. The Snook was feeling it in his abs and calves, while I felt like my ass had been sprained. (Damn squats.)

After the class we headed to the George Street cinemas to catch Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, which has FINALLY opened in Australia. I felt sorta conflicted at first, like I was trying to reconcile my professional critique with my personal opinion, but in the end I decided they were the same. I absolutely loved… 95% of it. The sets, the Bucket family, the music, the acting, even Helena frickin’ Bonham-Carter-Burton… They all rocked. I was blown away by the Oompa-Loompas, and I even liked the scenes in Loompaland. (I especially thought it was interesting that Burton went back to the original conception of the Oompa-Loompas as pygmies from the jungles of Africa and didn’t feel required to make some sort of modern PC apology for it.) I LOVED that Burton put Prince Pondicherry back in. That chapter is entirely pointless but it was still always one of my favorite chapters of the book, and it definitely made me feel like he was being true to Dahl’s original work. The look of Wonka’s boat… That was 100% Joseph Schindelman’s illustration. The Nut Room! Hair cream! Fudge mountain! It was all just too cool. The four kids were really great and I liked that they believably updated the characters without changing them too much (though I didn’t quite get the bit about Mike Teevee “hacking” the contest). The songs were wonderful; I just bought “Veruca Salt” (my personal favorite) from the iTMS. As for the new additions to the story (and the re-written ending), I’ve decided to make my peace with it. Burton had to do something; the original has no dramatic arc whatsoever. Nobody learns or changes. So I even grudgingly like those bits (and I’m still giggling whenever I think of the “Puppet Hospital and Burns Unit… It’s a recent addition” line). So what didn’t I like? Willy goddamn Wonka. As much as it pains me to say it, Depp really missed the mark with that one. I just don’t see why they had to make him creepy. Why did he talk like that? What was with the hair? What was with the crazy frock coats? The only explanation is the one everyone else jumped to – they were consciously mimicking Michael Jackson. Otherwise there’s just no point. There’s no explanation in the movie plot, and there’s certainly none in the book. He just weirded me out every time he spoke. So there, that’s the bit I didn’t like. And now you know.

After the movie, the Snook and I joined his co-workers for beers before heading over to Wagamama for dinner with none other than Miss Alison Kriegel, fellow Domer and Purple Weasel. Kriegel’s been living in Sydney all year but this is the first time we’ve gotten to catch up. And catch up we did, over many, many beers. It’s so fun (and yet so weird) to meet somebody from my old life back home. It feels so far away sometimes.

And that’s not even the whole weekend! Saturday we headed across town to check on Amy’s cat Sparky while they were away and ended up spending the afternoon in Chatswood picking out a kegerator for the Snook. Plus I’ve spent every spare minute finishing a pair of gloves for a nice old man named Bruce who visits our shop. I need a vacation…

Wisdom Schmisdom…
I had a consultation with an oral surgeon this morning, and good ol’ Dr. Wong’s expert opinion is that I need to have all four wisdom teeth extracted. Fun! Apparently it’s really close; I only need like 3mm more to be able to fit them in. Damn! So then we had the discussion about whether I’d have it done in the chair (with a local anesthetic, i.e. needles) or in the hospital (with a general anesthetic, i.e. unconscious). I was wavering. I’m not a big baby or anything, and I can take my fair share of pain… but somehow I’m not sure I like the idea of watching as they remove bits from my head. He gave me the difference in cost though, and that pretty much settled it. The chair will run me $200 total; the hospital would be more like $700. So I’m booked in. Now I just have to wait four months til my appointment. (I’ve been happy with our HCF coverage so far, but these long waits are getting a bit ridiculous. I guess it’s only fair given that I’m not really in an emergency situation or anything.)

I give up. I’ve spent three days ransacking my photo collection in search of a particular picture… and I can’t find it. See, it was just about nine years ago that I arrived at Notre Dame and met a goofy blonde who was destined to become my Roomater. We quickly got bored with Orientation Weekend activities but Eileen had an idea: “Let’s teepee Jon Ford!” Jon Ford was a guy from her high school that was also starting at ND, and his family had driven down some of Eileen’s crap in their car. She’d been given his room key to go pick it up. Together with Erin Fair, we nabbed a couple industrial-size rolls of toilet paper from PW and headed over to Stanford. (Or was it Keenan?) We nonchalantly strolled into the dorm and oh-so-casually ascertained that neither he or his roommate were in their room. Then we went nuts. We completely swathed that room in toilet paper. (And as we’d all only just moved in, there wasn’t a lot else in there.) Giggling like mad, I turned to snap a picture of Reen and Fair amidst the TP just before we left. Later that night, we came home from the dining hall to discover our first official dormroom voicemail message: “Eileen: YOU’RE DEAD.” And thus was my introduction to Jon Ford*… who has recently joined Reen and I as a blogger. And that’s why I was looking for the picture. I figured, what better way to welcome him to the “blogsphere” than to virtually teepee him with a momento of our first college prank?

* For some reason, Jon Ford was nearly always addressed by my acquaintance with his full name, much like “Dawson Leery.” I have no idea why. Seriously, you guys, that photo has to be around here somewhere. Or maybe it’s still in Mom’s basement? This is gonna drive me nuts.

Somebody called us late last night. I remember hearing the phone ring in my dream and then suddenly being aware that I wasn’t dreaming, and that it was definitely ringing. So I leapt to my feet – scaring the crap out of the cat – and rushed to the office, banging into walls and knocking stuff off shelves (I didn’t think to grab my glasses)… only to miss the call. They didn’t leave a message. Middle of the night calls always make me think somebody has died. I rang my Mom right away but she said it wasn’t her, and there are only so many members of my family who know how to dial internationally. DID YOU CALL ME? IDENTIFY YOURSELF.

While I’m still definitely in the camp of Those Who Scoff at the Current Ridiculously Popular Knitting Trend for Stupid Boleros, Capelets, and Shrugs… I could almost see myself wearing this. Almost.