Week Twenty: Cars I Have Known

Last weekend I got a new car. Okay, a new old car. Okay, a new old minivan. But it got me thinking about all the different cars I’ve owned. Of course, every one has a story. And I think that, somewhere, I have pictures of each of them — but I’ll never find them tonight. For illustrative purposes I’ll throw in some stock photography, then update this post as I locate and scan photos of my own cars.

1. 1981 Buick Skylark

Your first car should be special; I’m sure my Dad intended it to be. I was working at my first real full-time job and it was time for a dependable car of my own, not the 1981 Buick Skylark I was borrowing from my parents. I went to several dealerships with Dad and looked at several cars. I wasn’t impressed with any of them, but I did remember that he had me set the parking brake on one car, then he physically pushed it forward several feet. “Nope.” Finally we looked at a 1983 Buick Century. It was a four-door sedan and I hated it on sight. I didn’t like the color, the fit, the feel, or anything else about it. But Dad was in love, utterly smitten. “Maybe,” he finally said, “we could get this car for your mother and you could have the Skylark.”

“I’ll take the Skylark,” I said.

My Buick, parked at my Grove City apartment in a 1992 summer thunderstorm.

The transaction was sealed when Mom handed me the keys to the Skylark and said, “Pop the hood.” She then proceeded to show me how to properly apply Gum-Out.

I was happy with the Skylark for a while, but eventually I realized that it was starting to fall apart. I was spending as much each month on repair bills as I would have on a car payment. One day I was making the one-mile drive between work and home when green fluid started pouring into the cabin from somewhere on the other side of the dashboard. When I turned left towards the Shell service station instead of right for home, I had already decided that this car’s days were numbered.

2. 1990 Honda Civic EX

Not my car… but a twin!

The first car I actually bought was the car I should have been warned about, but I never blamed the car. I loved that little thing. But I’m jumping ahead. Let’s go back to when I was taking cars on test drives.

One finalist was the local mega-dealer. If you are now, or have ever been, from Columbus, Ohio, you know who I’m talking about already. I knew I wouldn’t actually buy a car from them, but I was curious about the process. It was even worse than I had expected. I wasn’t allowed to drive the car on their lot because of liability. I asked to see a manual-transmission car and was shown an automatic in shocking pink. The salesman, while driving, tried to sell the car to me based on the fact that the passenger visor had a mirror on it. When I was finally in the salesman’s cubicle and he asked, “What can I do to get you into this car today?” I could honestly say, “Nothing. I told you I was only looking, and you showed me nothing I wanted to see.” And I left.

Another finalist was the Saturn, which at that time was the new kid in town. There were only a couple of dealerships, so I drove north of Worthington to test one out. The people were very nice, and I liked the “no game playing” aspect of the Saturn experience, but the car itself didn’t impress me very much.

Honorable mention goes to a Subaru XT I drove. This is the car that doesn’t have a steering wheel — it has a yoke like you’d see in a fighter jet. A Google search is failing me now, but I think this is the car I drove. It was really unusual looking, and I remember thinking I’d never get used to that yoke instead of a wheel.

I ended up test driving the Honda Civic at a respectable Honda dealership on the north side, near Westerville. The staff members were very casual about the test drive process; they threw me the keys and said, “Bring it back whenever.” Nobody rode with me to do a hard sell. And I really liked the car. I traded in the Skylark, which probably showed up somewhere on the south side at a pay-to-own lot, and purchased my first car.

After I bought the car, its history gradually emerged. It was a dealer loaner, meaning that customers drove it when their cars were in the shop at the dealership. That wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, but when the transmission started giving me problems and they recommended replacing it, the service history of my car really started to emerge. Turns out there wasn’t much of one; even though the car had spent most of its two years right there on the lot, they hadn’t actually bothered to hit its service marks with much accuracy. And this was the second time the transmission had been replaced. Let me repeat: a two-year-old car was now on its third transmission!

The EX model, too, was very “special.” Every time I took the car somewhere for a change or a part, I heard, “OH. You have the EX.” I once spent a whole work day driving across Columbus and back in a raging blizzard to find the proper set of tires for it, only to get stuck in the snow at the entrance to my condo community at the end of the day.

But I didn’t blame the car. It was surprisingly spacious inside — once I managed to fit four Windsor chairs and a king-size waterbed mattress in it. I bolted a roof rack on it and hauled a canoe all over central Ohio. This person had a similar experience with their (also blue) Civic EX.

Yes, the original photo was taken in black and white with a manually operated SLR. The location is actually Sunset Cemetery near Alton, Ohio.

When I got a job in Wisconsin, though, and it was time to move, I had the chance to accept a used Audi from my father-in-law, who was buying a brand new Jetta. I sold the Civic to my brother for a dollar, thinking he’d be able to fill it to the brim with band equipment. And as it went with many things I gave or loaned to my brother, I never inquired as to its final disposition.

3. 1988 Audi 80

Not my car, or my wheels. The rest is similar.

This car always had the biggest snob appeal for me. It was tiny and it was eleven years old, but it was cute. And it was an AUDI dammit. We took delivery of it somehow, and I packed it to the moon with everything I could get in it when we moved to Wisconsin — my newborn in the center. I’ll never forget driving on the Chicago Tollway at 65mph with one hand, using the other to position a baby bottle for a freeway feeding as we passed the O’Hare exit. Fast times!

It was a wonderful little car. Like the Civic, the Audi was also pressed into service as a canoe hauler… but only once or twice. Its only liability was that this shade of grey blended perfectly with things like, oh, asphalt. When it was on the road, it was almost invisible. People pulled out in front of me, or nearly did, countless times. For a while I contemplated having the car repainted Tornado Red just so someone might see it. But it wouldn’t have been right. It was a modest, unassuming car.

I had the car for three years, putting on miles via longer and longer trips, and one day on the expressway I heard a blood-chilling THUNK from somewhere below me. Transmission. Almost gone. I saved the car for only necessary trips and started taking the bus to work instead. When I moved to Indiana, we towed the car behind us. After I parked it in my new town, it never started again. When we moved back to Wisconsin three months later, my only option was to sell it for salvage.

I still have the key.

4. 1986 Ford Crown Victoria Wagon

I have a panoramic photo that does justice to my Crown Vic. Until I scan it in, this car from “Tremors” will have to do.

We were the third owners of this car, which we bought in about 2003 from an engineer in Wausau. He had installed air shocks in the back, which were worked by a rocker switch under the dash. It was in wonderful shape for its age, and when the air shocks were pumped up it had a terrific “stance” to it. It also featured a third seat that opened like a cellar door — the riders faced each other.

The Crown Vic was impressive enough, but one day we were getting some sort of service done, and when they ran the VIN the car was identified as a Mustang! What an engine that car had. Amazingly, nobody got a speeding ticket with it.

I don’t remember what started going south on this car, but when it did come to the end of its service life it was sold for salvage, all 46 tons of it.

5. 2000 Chevy Venture

You’ve seen this van everywhere before.

This minivan puts the “us” in “ubiquitous.” When my oldest son was in second grade, and I drove him to an elementary school that housed only about three grades, this minivan was one of about SIX matching minivans. And I don’t mean that there were six Chevy Ventures. I mean that there were six Chevy Ventures in this exact same shade of red. Just at that small Catholic elementary school in a relatively small town in Wisconsin. The way we spotted ours was to note the broken left taillight casing. This vehicle was so common that the kids and I played a spy game with it, calling out “imposter!” when we spotted yet another twin. It had dual power doors, which eventually failed; other than that its two best features were the electronic compass and the “info” feature on the radio.

I have to admit that it was great for long road trips, and it could haul a lot. But it didn’t really have a distinct personality, being the member of the Clone Army that it surely was.

6. 1994 Buick Roadmaster Estate Wagon

Not my car, but it could be, down to the trim FAIL on the driver’s side.

Now we’re talking CAR! This car puts a smile on the face of everyone who sees it. I’ve lost count of how many times middle-aged men have approached me at the gas pumps to tell me about their memories of family vacations as seen from the third seat (a location we refer to as the “Wayback”). Sunroof. Cruise Control. Hydraglide. A tailgate that opens down… or to the side. And a Corvette engine.

The Really Wide Buick. Really!

7. 1997 VW Passat (“Helga”)

Wait a minute… Triforce Motors???

This is the car my husband Peter bought with the insurance settlement money after his beloved VW GTI was destroyed, along with his legs, in a car accident in which we were hit by a pickup truck. His quick reflexes saved both our lives, but broke both his legs. I sustained minor injuries, but he earned himself a free (?) helicopter ride to Grant Hospital and was in a wheelchair for weeks. After that trauma, he couldn’t bring himself to buy a little car again. When he was ready to get behind the wheel again, he chose a manual-transmission Passat sedan with a VR6 engine. He named this one “Helga the Barge.” (The GTI had been “Gertrudis.”) He gave me driving lessons in it in 1999, but I was still under the impression you couldn’t hold down the clutch and the accelerator at the same time, so I was striving for an almost impossible timing, and I never drove it after my lessons were over.

After he suddenly passed away in 2011, I asked to have it. It has some bodywork issues, but I’m gradually restoring it to its glory as a touring sedan and hope to make it my primary car within the next five years.

8. 1999 VW Jetta (“Trixie”)

As tested by Motor Trend magazine!

Peter’s father Clayton bought this Jetta in 1999 and passed along his Audi 80 to me. He passed away in 2009, and Peter made sure to drive it at least once a month and keep it in good condition. After Peter himself died, I asked for this car, too. It’s jointly titled to me and to my son James Clayton, Clayton’s only grandchild. When he’s old enough to own his own car, it’s his. Right now it makes a marvelous commuter car (and takes 87 octane!), but it’s a little small for my family of five unless it’s a short trip.

9. 2002 Dodge Caravan

Not my TARDIS… but almost.

The Roadmaster is now falling apart one piece at a time, and when I realized I shouldn’t try to take it on one more round trip to Ohio (and I have at least two such trips planned for this summer), I started searching online for my next car. I was looking more at Subarus (i.e. a vehicle that would hold all of us, but be short enough that I could get a canoe on the roof rack), but the kids begged, “Please, Mom. Get a minivan, and one made in this century.” I thought that was fine, but really hoped I could find a dark blue van that looked like a TARDIS.

One peek at Craigslist Madison, and there it was, in my price range. Hello sweetie! I’m not done geeking it up yet, but all the kids already refer to it as the TARDIS. (JC is still holding out to name it Eccleston, since it’s a TARDIS and my 9th car. Get it??? Well, if it had black leather seats I think it would be an easier sell. But it doesn’t.)

Allons-y!

And it really does feel bigger on the inside.

Week Seventeen: Needs More Macintosh

I’m not a person who tends to throw things out. (Michael, I can hear you laughing from all the way over here. Please pick yourself off the floor. You’re excused.) But lately I have had the need and the opportunity to go through my possessions and decide what truly needs to stay and what can go on its merry way to the trash bin (broken toys), the recycling pile (six-year-old shredded utility bills), or a new happy home (so long, dear Olympia manual typewriter!).

Now my surroundings are becoming more of a reflection of all my interests, and I’ve decided to enhance one of those interests with a conscious effort towards a minor-league collection of Macintoshes.

In 1988 I bought (with the assistance of my then-future-mother-in-law’s signature on the Apple Credit application) a Macintosh SE. It was a thing of glory that came with System 6.0.7, and I souped it up as much as I could. It had a whole 1 megabyte of RAM. Instead of a standard Apple 20 megabyte hard drive, it had a 45 megabyte hard drive shoehorned in there. Instead of the standard keyboard, I bought a DataDesk extended keyboard that had the same layout as the IBM PC with which everyone was familiar. (My roommate, a paper science and engineering major, especially liked this whenever she needed to borrow it to write up a report.) I had planned to buy an optical mouse (it worked via a special reflective mouse pad), but the store was out of those when I went shopping, so I had the standard mouse. And I bought the first of many Hewlett-Packard printers to go with it, a DeskJet whose model number I don’t remember. Somewhere along the line I picked up a 1200 baud modem, and I was good to go. No, there was no Internet yet, not that I knew how to get to — but there were university bulletin boards where we hacked into each others’ secret forums, moderated discussion groups of all flavors, and generally had fun outgeeking each other.

Somebody else’s Datadesk keyboard.

Several Macs later, one stupid day I sold that SE back to a computer store. I don’t know what brought me to that day, why I thought it was a good idea for even a second, or even how much money I made on the deal. It couldn’t have been much at all. But I must have been convinced that since I couldn’t upgrade it and keep it current, it wasn’t worth keeping around. WHAT was I thinking? I should have kept it. It was a fine computer and I had many good memories associated with it.

Since then I’ve hung on to each old Macintosh (my mother once chided me, saying there was no such thing as an “old” computer), each tired printer, each set of power cords and A/V cables, every mouse. Michael once teased me (don’t think I can’t HEAR you back there. I said you were EXCUSED) that I had a “Macseum” in the making. And now that I have cleared a little bit of space, I’m starting to develop that Mac Museum concept a bit. Thoughtfully this time.

Last weekend I was killing time by trolling eBay in the “vintage computers” category. The existence of this category on eBay is what makes it an extremely good thing that I can never remember my eBay account name and password, or I would have already purchased a somewhat random nameplate from a UNIVAC. (Just $7.50! It’s a piece of history!)

The UNIVAC operator console, with operator Joneal Williams-Daw .

Thinking locally, in large measure because of the shipping charges needed to make sure a $75 computer could make it to me all the way from Texas, or Florida, or [gulp] California, I turned to Craigslist and found such a deal. Within an hour’s drive was a Macintosh Plus that needed a new home. It worked, and it came with all the parts, plus software (on 3.5-inch diskette) and manuals. And… the seller would throw in a Macintosh Performa 6300 as a bonus. It worked too, and also came with software (on CD-ROM) and manuals.

I went with my teenage son to pick it up, and we were both thrilled. I can’t quite put words to why he was so excited to ride along with his mother to go pick up a couple of old computers, but for me it was a rediscovery of my original love for the Macintosh. Macs were not the first computers I had ever used or owned, but they were the first ones that worked intuitively for me, and the first ones that seemed to have personalities. I wrote on them, tried to teach composition on them, and eventually learned to fix them.

I set up the new computers and took a look around. In one room I had three Macs. In other I had seven. And upstairs…. four iMacs, donated by a friend? I had lost count. They were buried in the closet of a room shared by two very untidy boys, and I’d have to step on quite a few Legos to verify that number. Better keep it vague.

Mind you, other folks have significantly more money, time, and space invested in their Macintosh collections than I ever will. I have seen pictures of racks and racks full of computers that would give you chills. Full garages. Full basements. I’m personally hoping to have working Macs that serve as 90 percent décor, 10 percent “It’s time to play Duck Hunt!” And some of the models on my to-find list are rare enough that I wouldn’t insist they be anything better than a clean doorstop. That includes the original 128K Mac, as well as items like the Mac XL, the Lisa, and the Macintosh Portable, a 16-pound shoulder-stretcher from 1987. They would just be cool to have.

The Mac XL, or “Hackintosh” — Lisa’s body and the Mac’s brains.

And look at this SE — a one-of-eight prototype in a clear plastic case, designed for airflow studies!

While I was researching the technical specifications on the new Macs I’d brought home, I noticed a value called the “Gestalt ID.” This is a whole-number ID given to each distinct release of Macintosh. The original 128K Macintosh has a Gestalt ID = 1. My new old Mac Plus has a Gestalt ID = 4. The Performa 6300 has a Gestalt ID = 42. In real life, it was used to call certain sets of programming functions. For my purposes, it’s like a checklist that writes itself. And no, I don’t feel a need to collect them all. But a showcase of good examples of each of the early Compact Macs would be something to see. I might even sell off some of the mid-range Macs to fund the quest for the early survivors.

So Friday afternoon, I have a date. A date to drive to Monona and purchase a Macintosh SE FDHD. Three down, ten to go.

The first Mac to offer the 1.44 megabyte “SuperDrive.”

Week Eleven: This Thursday Intentionally Left Blank

Did you miss me yesterday? Sorry, I’m transitioning (temporarily) to Friday posts so that I won’t miss a week when I’m on Spring Break in a couple of weeks with the kidlets.

Someone asked me this week, “So, where are you going for Spring Break?” Of course I answered “OHIO!” with a big fistpump. Even when I was in college in Ohio I took my Spring Breaks in Ohio. And it was usually in the middle of March, so even if you felt springlike, there was no getting around the fact that it was NOT a good time to start your own personal cycling season; the temperatures were usually in the range of 40 to 50°F. If I got any riding done when I was home on break, I usually had a sore throat and a cold by the next week. It… wasn’t exactly a vacation at the beach.

Okay, time for progress reports!

Last Sunday I was enjoying the lack of need to go anywhere since the weather was crappy. I sat on the couch and knitted on my Wingspan shawl until I ran out of yarn near the end of the 8th triangle. Lo and behold, the second skein of yarn for it arrived on Monday afternoon. YESSSSS. It is a different dye lot and looks a bit darker to me, but I really don’t mind or care. I get to keep knitting.

In the meantime I have pulled out a pair of socks I started knitting last October or so, on yarn that has been languishing in my stash for years. (How many years? Well, I stopped in at Ruhama’s in Milwaukee [all right, really Whitefish Bay] before I saw “Mean Girls” in the theater. Which came out in 2004. That’s a pretty long time for a skein of fine-looking German sock yarn to make up its mind about what it wants to be. And who would have guessed it would actually want to be socks?) They’re intended for someone whose feet I don’t have immediate access to, so I really hope they’re going to fit. Knitting fitted items to spec is not one of my natural gifts, so while I can knit socks, they usually go to someone whose feet happen to be the right size. Locating people whose feet fit my socks is also a gift.

And…. drum roll…. tomorrow I shall knit the Very Last Piece for the project-which-will-soon-be-unveiled. I cannot tell you how hard it has been this week to only knit one piece per day for this project, with the end so near in sight. There was such a temptation to hole up and crank out the knitting and finish early. I decided to join the resistance and maintain the pace, despite how eager I was to get the whole thing “done.”

In non-knitting news, the kidlets really did a lot of stuff since my last post. Middle Son won a trophy in a spelling bee, Youngest Son earned a ribbon in the same bee and then proceeded to lose his two front teeth over the weekend. Eldest Son went and turned 14, putting a real cramp in my tendency to still think of my inner self as 22. He’s almost taller than I am, and his feet are already bigger than mine (though we can still trade shoes in an emergency). And I went ahead with my valiant weight-loss plan, did two Jillian Michaels workouts in two consecutive days, and completely wrecked myself. I took Thursday off from programmed exercise, and by the end of the day I was able to go both up and down the stairs without screaming involuntarily. I’m calling that a victory and will strive to make progress from there.

Back to knitting news! Due to an unexpectedly favorable alignment of circumstances, I will be able to attend Late Night Knitting tonight for the first time in more than a year. It takes me an hour to drive there (and there might be freezing rain in the early evening), but I can stay until they kick me out at 11pm. Then (sigh) I have to drive homeward for another hour (and there might be snow in the late evening). On Saturday there is a rummage sale/bake sale at my kids’ school (for which I will be baking) from 8 until noon, so I’ll need to be there at least at the beginning of that. Then I think there’s a Pokémon tournament somewhere that needs to be Hung Out At with Eldest Son. Then there will be a Batman movie to watch, Doctor Who to view, and some test knitting for Phase Two of the Ginormous Secret Project. Then…. ah, how I like being busy.

From the bucket to the sprout

I swear, I had the beginnings of a terrific blog post all drafted and ready. All I had to do was add some images of album covers and it was all set.

Last night I was supposed to be seeing Barry Manilow in concert at the Chicago Theatre, performing from his 2011 concept album 15 Minutes. Barry’s been a bucket-list item for me since I imprinted on him at the age of 12, he wasn’t getting any younger, and I wasn’t getting any closer to Las Vegas. So I was excited to hear my husband had gotten us tickets to his sold-out Friday night show, even though it made for a super-hectic Friday of work, classes, an eye exam, picking up the kids from school, and rushing them to their grandparents’ house before switching cars and driving (him) / riding (me) to downtown Chicago. Also on the agenda was brunch at Rick Bayless’s restaurant Xoco the next morning. We’re big Top Chef fans and although he’s eaten at two other Top Chef restaurants (run by Harold Dieterle, winner of Season 1, and Wylie Defresne, Top Chef Master), this would be my first Top Chef meal.

But at about noon on Friday, he texted me with the news that Barry was still not recovered from recent hip surgery, and the show was cancelled. And then another text: we couldn’t get out of the hotel reservation, so we were going to take the trip anyway and have dinner at a Top Chef restaurant.

The hotel, Sax, was literally next door to the House of Blues. Which we didn’t enter, have a drink at, or hear anyone play at. Next slide, please!

The unvisited House of Blues

With the Jetta safely valet-parked somewhere in Chicago, and trying not to think of Cameron’s dad’s Ferrari, we took a cab a little ways north to Sprout, which is run by Season Three Top Cheffer Dale Levitski. Now, I was being a happy little tourist taking pictures outside, but I wasn’t about to take any pictures of the restaurant interior, the menus, or the food — although I was tempted to do so at certain points in the meal.

I was going to try to link you to the menus at the Sprout website, but they are not the same menus we saw last night. I have a feeling they change very frequently. Instead, you’ll have to trust my descriptions as I, in turn, will have to trust my memory. (Buckle up.)

Before dinner I had a cocktail that was basically a lime fizz with ginger. It was served with a tiny wedge of lime on the glass and had a very dry finish.

For dinner you could order a la carte from the menu or choose, as we did, the prix fixe. We chose an appetizer, an entree, and a dessert from the menu and would also receive a soup course and a cheese course along the way.

The appetizer I chose was a curried shrimp, which was cooked to perfection on a square of puff pastry and accompanied with a mildly sweet sauce the color of butternut squash, sprinkled with pistachios, and next to a small salad of baby turnip greens, radishes, and dark cherries. It was amazing, and our server indicated that things would only get better from there.

Oh, yes — I was also having a lovely glass of wine with dinner. I usually prefer a white wine on the sweet side, but having picked spicy shrimp to start with and a game meat as the center of my meal, I ended up with a full-bodied red wine that would go pretty well with everything. I do not by any means have an expert palate (though I was, um, coached in the drinking arts by a pair of sophisticated drinkers who shall remain un-named), so when the server described Wine One as “all right” and Wine Two as something that would “provide better structure for my meal,” I decided to trust his authority and didn’t regret it.

Next came the soup course, a tiny taste of a butternut-and-something soup garnished with baby greens and served in a small white cylinder of a “bowl.” The total volume of soup, velvety on the tongue, couldn’t have been two tablespoons, which was good because it was terribly rich, and having any more would have ruined my appetite for the….

Venison, crusted with black pepper, with rustic mashed potatoes and a dark-cherry-and-something demiglaze. I have never had venison before, but tonight seemed the night to try it. The slices appeared rare in the middle, but were actually cooked perfectly and just melted in my mouth. And the wine was perfect with it, strong enough to handle the black pepper (which I barely noticed) yet add some sweetness.

It was around this time that Chef Dale (actually, Executive Chef Dale) came out of the kitchen to talk with the Annoying Couple at the table next to ours. They had been a little too loud all evening, casually dismissive of almost everything on their plates, and basically a pair of local nitwits for whom requesting an audience with the chef was standard operating procedure. Dale stood between our tables and chatted amiably with them, so close to me that I could have goosed him. (I didn’t.) I guess part of a chef’s image is the ability to interact politely with anybody who wants to interact with you, and Dale does that very well. When he was done with them, Brendan caught his eye, and Dale asked about our meal, so we chatted him up for a couple of minutes, asking a bit about behind-the-scenes Top Chef stuff (judges’ table can last up to FOUR HOURS) and trying to spend more time than that in praising his food to high heaven.

Dale retreated to the kitchen, and our cheese course came out. I was expecting a plate with cheese on it, but what we got was a “grilled cheese sandwich” that was more like a wedge of a quesadilla, with aged Wisconsin white cheddar and thin slices of roasted apple inside. This is the only item I ordered that is pictured on the Sprout website; go to the Gallery and click once on “back” to see it.

Then it was time for dessert, and I had picked “chocolate.” (Why would I not?) I remember a chocolate mousse with shaved chocolate, and some creme anglaise, and a very very rich dark-chocolate-and-something sauce beneath it all, but my stomach was filling and now my memory is fading. Everything was wonderful, and I don’t remember sharing a bit of it. I did make a bit of a mistake with this course by not finishing my wine before I started eating it — it was a clash. I remedied that as soon as I could (bottoms up!), and enjoyed the chocolate very much. We finished with a cup of coffee (sweetened with raw-sugar cubes and can’t-say-”lightened” with some thickness of cream) and cabbed it back to the hotel.

Gene Siskel Film Center

On Saturday morning we took a walk around the area before heading back to Milwaukee to get the kids. We went down State Street and passed the Chicago Theatre, which did NOT list Barry Manilow on the marquee. We saw the Gene Siskel Film center (miss you, Gene). We wandered around a bit, then saw something very familiar — a huge Picasso sculpture I’ve seen dozens of times in The Blues Brothers, and a signal that we were at Richard J. Daley Plaza and “on set” for the culminating scenes of The Blues Brothers. I was a very happy little tourist here, and scurried around to find just the right angles for my pictures. They’re also in a Facebook photo album titled “Blues Brothers Walking Tour.

Chicago Theatre

National Radio Hall of Fame

Does anybody know whose these fellows are, on the side of the Cook County Municipal Building? Boy, would I like to tag them on Facebook.

Mystery Man 1

Mystery Man 2

All in all, it was a fun trip even though I didn’t get to see Barry (yet). Chicago itself was my eye candy, from architecture to cuisine to walking through scenes from one of my favorite movies.

So. Resolution update? A little knitting, great work in my classes (I was even the first to turn in my Astronomy homework online), no getting rid of anything, and I don’t dare step on a scale after eating and drinking as I did. I didn’t even tell you about the espresso/Tia Maria/vodka cocktail I had this morning with a three-egg spinach and feta omelet, with perfect hash browns and wheat toast on the side. That omelet might feed me at every breakfast for a week!

Christmas with the Doctor

I won’t have everything done in time for the perfect Christmas this year… but I’m coming to terms with it. I’ll enjoy mine if you enjoy yours!

What a couple of weeks!

Wow, I can’t believe I’ve been back home for almost a whole week. It was kind of crazy there for a while, driving to the lower U.P., then “up and over” and down to near-Detroit to stay with a friend on the way to my parents’ house, then a Rav meetup with two previously-met knitting friends, then a meetup in Fort Wayne on the way home.

During the whole trip I only had two knitting projects with me, and I finished one and cranked on the other (despite leaving the lace pattern at home). I felt like such a Knitter.

Here’s the project I finished: Those Noro Socks!

Since then I’ve started and finished a book (“The Wednesday Sisters”) and taken an Aran knitting class at Irish Fest Summer School.

If you’re going to Milwaukee’s Irish Fest on Sunday, leave a comment and I will get back to you — I’d love to meet you there. I will wear my Ravelry button (I’m “chocolatesheep”) so you know who to say Hi to.

More later!

You know what?

Cleveland is surprisingly pretty.

More details later, after I’ve had time to recover. Ten hours of driving on Saturday, ten hours of driving on Sunday — eventually that adds up.

Xtra pictures of the SOMA cube

Well, you did guess that starting a post title with X was going to be tricky, didn’t you? I can’t believe I got this far and nobody commented on it. Almost all the ways through my ABCs, and it’s only mid-July. That degree in English Literature is sure coming in handy!

I got the game pieces assembled, but I need to do a lot of sanding before I can call them done. Right now they’re more like portable splinter dispensers.

The seven SOMA pieces

Now, let’s make a cube.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

You can also place the last piece differently and make this pretty configuration.

The Crystal

And here are all four cubes, assembled. Sanding is next.

Four cubes

Whew! I don’t know when I’ll get to do the sanding. We have seen a couple of yucky bugs and it’s time to give serious attention to de-cluttering the house so we can have it sprayed.

Knitwise I haven’t done anything with the lace scarf in a few days. I guess I got tired of being so good at un-knitting it. But I have added two stripes to the current Doctor Who Scarf, and Fringed the second Pinstripe TenScarf on the 11th.

Next to get attention: Casting on for the second Noro sock, or attacking Tyrone. Maybe with scissors.

Vultures!

I’m getting really tired of this. Poor Farrah Fawcett, can we let her rest in peace?

Quite some time ago I wrote a post that included a head shot of Ms. Fawcett with that famous hair, which all of us “of a certain age” were trying to re-create on our own heads many years ago.

The post has taken on a life of its own, and most of the people who find my blog via search terms have been using phrases like “Farrah Fawcett” but most often “fara faucet” or some even more misspelled variation. Every time poor Farrah’s cancer flared up in the last two years, I’d get a spike of hits. (That post is responsible for 10 percent of the total hits on my blog. I Am Not Making This Up.)

So. I was away around the time of my birthday, and didn’t have access to wifi. When I got back I noticed this tremendous spike of views on and just before my birthday. In fact, June 25 set a new one-day record, topping the day I wrote about the Blue Moon Fiber Arts sock club debacle. Wow, I thought, did people really come by to say Happy Birthday in those kind of numbers?

Nope. Farrah Fawcett died of cancer and my blog must have hopped to the top of the search-engine list.

Sorry folks, nothing to see here. Just one thumbnail headshot of Farrah from the 1970s, a few chocolate bars, and a lot of procrastinated knitting. You vultures can move along.

But you yarnies can stay! I’m making a lace scarf, and finishing socks, and all kinds of exciting things.

Here’s the first clown Noro sock. I haven’t cast on for the second one yet.

Currently I’m working on the lace scarf (the pattern is called “Moon River” but my project is named “Fire River” because of the yarn colorway) and fixing Tyrone and wishing Tyrone were already fixed. I did finish a second Pinstripe TenScarf, but haven’t added any fringe yet. (And holy moley, I got a Rav PM from the pattern designer saying she hadn’t had time to fringe the one she made since it was for a gift, but she liked the fringe I put on mine. Wowzers!)

This one’s a giftknit, and I want to get another one on the needles ASAP for another Whovian friend. Who knows, I may start cranking these out like some people make touques. I’m not naming any names.

The Deer of the Day

Up until the last couple of days, it’s been unseasonably cool for Wisconsin in June. For goodness’ sake, the ten year old wanted to know if he needed to wear a hooded jacket to the first day of summer school.

It was so cool that the deer, which are typically all but invisible during the summer, have been venturing out in broad daylight to graze and do whatever else they feel like doing. A few days ago I spotted some less than 100 yards away from the road at 2:45 in the afternoon.

Yesterday it started getting hot. The heat index got up to 100°F in our county and is at the same level today. This seems to tell the deer that now they need to hide in the forests during the heat of the day — then go adventuring right at dusk.

Last night I was coming back from Knit Night and being cautious, scanning the roadsides and the treelines for deer. There was a car behind me that clearly felt I was worth passing, but just as he was getting ready to make his liberatory move, I saw an odd line up ahead and started to tap the brakes. Sure enough, it was a yearling between the shoulder and the ditch, looking quite astonished at me as I crawled by.

The guy behind me didn’t pass me after that. I wonder why?

I had to drop off my van this morning to get the brakes and air conditioning fixed before going to Ohio for the weekend, and I spotted another deer (much further away from the road this time) at about 8:15 in the morning. So maybe I’ve made quota early.

Here’s what I’ll be working on this weekend in the car:

Sorry the photo is so bad. Who knew it would be difficult to hold yarn down to show off a lace pattern while the project was still on the needles, and take a digital picture with no flash with your non-dominant (LEFT) hand?