Fibery goodness!

No, sisters dear, I'm not talking about that kind of fiber. It's all about yarn. Inexpensive yarn. Silk/cashmere (55/45) yarn, lace weight, as light as a cobweb but much more durable, about 500 yards at $5.99 a hank. I have never ever seen anything with cashmere in it this cheap.

If I can remember and have the energy, I'll take photos of it tonight.

I also received today (beside the drugs we'd ordered) three other hanks of yarn, wool I think, maybe some silk in one of them, that I'd ordered last week while trying to decide what yarn to use for Joan's mother-of-the-bride (after all, it IS her day) shawl. I ended up starting it with some beautiful mohair laceweight yarn that I found 50% off in my LYS, but I'm rethinking that mistake. As much as I have to rip out, mohair ain't gonna cut it. Silk adds such nice shine to yarn, really dresses it up.

And it should be easier to frog.

OMFG

This is why I don't like permanent hair color.

I know better. But once a year I get the bug to color my gray at home, since I've had so many haircolor disasters from professionals.

I chickened out of taking a photo; it's that bad. My hair used to be medium to dark brown; now most of the front is very gray. I can't even tell what color it's supposed to be.

I've been using semipermanent color, but I haven't done well with that, either. So a few weeks ago I bought some medium brown permanent and finally tonight got the courage to try it.

After 10 minutes it wasn't coloring the front white very well, so against my better instincts, I left it on the full 25 minutes. I should have listened to the voices in my head.

It's almost black! I love black hair, but not with my skin coloring. And age. It looks so obviously, badly fake.

Guess I'll get my hair cut really short tomorrow.

Now I'll go to the contest post and see what I have to deal with! This may take a while......

Big Trouble in Little Burg

It seems that the link a couple of posts below doesn't work, so I'll copy and paste the info from the paper, with names and places removed:

"Some members of the xxxxxxxxxx High School football team are accused of armed robbery and distributing prescription pain pills. Information came out Wednesday afternoon concerning star players who are allegedly involved with the drugs, as well as allegations that the coaches knew what was going on but turned a blind eye to any illegal activity.

Investigators from the xxxxxxxxxxxxx Police Department signed search warrants to access records at the high school. An affidavit filed with the clerk of court Wednesday alleges nine current memebrs of the school's football team, one former student, the team's head coach and two assistant coaches were involved in, or had knowledge of, the distribution of prescription pills in the school's locker room before games. Many of the pills are believed to have been Oxycontin.
Investigators say some of the football players may have also been involved in an armed robbery of rival high school students on Halloween 2007. One of the students allegedly involved is the football team's star player. Ten other xxxxxxxxx High School students' names are also listed in the affidavit.

Police executed a search warrnant at the high school Wednesday morning and got all the documents they needed. Although no arrests have been made in this case (note from me: two kids have been arrested for the robbery since then), investigators want to know how many players and coaches knew about this alleged prescription drug distribution, but who also failed to tell police.

The biggest name on the list junior xxxxx xxxxx, a star running back on the football team. Police talked to xxxx more than once during this investigation. According to the affidavit, on January 23, 2008, xxxx admitted to being part of an armed robbery which included other xxxxxxxx School students xxxx xxxx and xxxx xxxx. Xxxx said he only helped plan the robbery.

On March 28, xxxx was questioned again and investigators asked about his knowledge of xxxx dealing prescription pain pills before football games while in the locker room of xxxxxxx High School. In the affadavit, xxxx states he was aware that xxxx had been both selling and giving away pills since the 2006-2007 football season and that xxxx had told him the pills would make it so players would feel no pain during games, even from hits by other players. Xxxx verbally committed to UVA in December.

The Xxxxxxx City School Superintendent says since this matter deals with students and personnel, he cannot comment on the matter at this time.

Along with alleging that some of the coaches knew about the drugs, police also allege some of the assistant coaches may have known about the armed robbery. However, the coaches did not report it to the police.

In the affidavit released Wednesday, HPD Sgt. Xxxx Xxxx, Xxxx Criminal Investigations Gang Unit, says it was "very apparent that there was an overwhelming amount of information and knowledge about the use and distribution of pain pills by football players of the xxxx High School football team." Police Guy also says that not only did the players know about this themselves, but several coaches also had this information and knowledge. In the affidavit, Police Guy talked with head football coach Xxxx Xxxx.

He says, "Xxxx stated he had heard of Xxxx Xxxx selling drugs on one occasion and on another occasion received an anonymous note that his football players were selling drugs." Xxxx also says he approached Drug Guy about it in the spring of 2007, but that Xxxx denied any involvement or knowledge.

In the affidavit, Xxxx goes on to say that "Head Coach stated that even though he had received information about Drug Guy selling drugs and received a follow-up anonymous letter about it, he never reported this information to police." The affidavit also alleges that two assistant coaches, Xxxx Xxxx and Xxxx Xxxx, had knowledge of some of these reports. Police Guy says Xxxx told him he had no knowledge of of the drug dealing, but did know about the armed robbery, which he allegedly never told police about.

Police Guy adds Xxxx coach guy said he had heard about the allegations and had questioned Drug Kid, but he "did not know where to draw the line between what was rumor and what was real." "

And so it begins--or maybe ends?

Something I'd rather not blog about directly. I suspect that there's going to be a big shake-up here.

Going public

Okay, people, this is it. This can go on no longer.

No more buttered popcorn. I weigh more than I've ever weighed, and I don't like it. I bought a cute pair of shoes last week that have buckles, and I almost cannot reach around my gut to buckle them.

So, in front of God and you guys, I'm vowing to lose weight. 30 pounds. Then I'll look at "things" and rethink it all. By the end of the year. (I vowed in January--not a resolution, since I don't keep those hahahahahahahahaha!--that I'd lose 24 pounds by July. That's only 4 pounds a month, totally doable, but only if you don't sink into a deep dark pit that's only scaled by mounds of buttered popcorn and lots of medications.)

I just weighed myself here at school (my skinny boss keeps them here, damn her skinny ass) and it's appalling. I'll write down the amount and hide it in my desk drawer, and I'll keep track of it and share it with you (if it happens. Yeah, yeah, think positively and all that.) I'd post a photo but it would scare the children and animals.

So, keep me on my toes, will you? I'll need all the help I can get.

Today's short story or: The Stupids Hit Again

There's a friendly local high school here, Fictitious High. They haven't had any problems with violence, other than the usual fist fight or name-calling, some gang grafitti in the bathrooms, cat fights, a kid who's wearing colors and won't take them off (come on, it's a bandana tied around his wrist, and the dummy knows that gang colors/bandanas/headbands in any shape or form are not allowed there).

So, this afternoon, two young women came into the main office, the only way to enter the school unless some moron kid lets someone in through one of the side doors. The young women were there to take pizza to some group of troubled youths in the school. They do this every week. Those of us who work in the main office are never offered any pizza. We They just get to smell it for the rest of the afternoon.

Fictitious High, like the other Fictitious City schools, has a police resource office in full uniform stationed at the school. She was in the office today, getting ready to sign out for lunch, when a call came into the office that a young man refused to take off his gang colors bandana tied around his wrist, so she went upstairs to take care of the problem. After she came back to the office, the pizza was delivered and the delivery man left.

Several minutes later, Fictitious I answered the phone. In response to "Good afternoon, Fictitious High School," a male voice said, "Good afternoon, this is 911, I'm calling in response to a call from a pizza delivery man who said that two suspicious-looking young men wearing black hoodies were going into to the school as he left. Are you aware of any problems of this nature?" Uh, no. Fictitious I was not aware of any such thing. The office was rather full at the time, what with me Fictitious I, the resource officer, two rather large young women carting off pizzas and a cooler (what is in that thing? Shouldn't it be searched?), and six loud teenagers carrying on conversations unrelated to anything else, along with three kids asking for headache meds.

Fictitious I alerted the resource officer, who was again trying to leave for lunch, and the building's administrators of this development. The resource officer told the officer on the phone that as far as we Fictitious High's administration knew, there was no danger, but they would search the building to be sure. No need to send reinforcements.

Approximately 30 seconds later, two police cars rushed to the front of the school and four officers ran inside. Might as well fan out and check things. So here we have 1/3 of the students at lunch in the cafeteria, 2/3 of them in classrooms, possibly two dangerous men, and five people known to be carrying weapons legally. They searched the school as quickly and efficiently as possible, then determined after talking to Pizza Delivery Man that the suspects had been about 200 feet away from the building, at the transit stop, waiting for the bus. They had not been near the building when PDM called 911. The bus had already picked them up so it wasn't known who they were.

By this time, the resource office was rather pissed off that PDM hadn't bothered to call the school after he called 911. It would have been nice if someone inside (and the main office is the only yadda yadda yadda) (which is where I Fictitious I works 1/4 of every school day) had known about this before a bunch of officers came rushing in and there'd been a lot of yelling on the walkie talkies that all administrators and the resource office carry. Everyone in the school was aware of what was going on. It's one of those things that the administration tries to keep quiet, but it never happens that way.

So. No danger. Police officers ready to leave. A fifth one came in at this time. Time to arrest a fine, upstanding young man young hoodlum and cart him off to jail. Not that this is anything new; there's no violence at Fictitious High, but there are plenty of small time hoods. So Alleged Perpetrator (of what this time? Don't know yet. I Fictitious I will find out.) was called to the office, warrant was served on him, and off he went with his escorts.

Fictitious High's resource office never got her lunch today.

Fictitious I knows where she will hide if any suspicious people make their way into the school. Fictitious I knows all the good places. She has a plan.


P. S. Three kids trashed a boy's bathroom this afternoon, too. The fun never ends.

I've got the stupids again

Sometimes the simplest knitting pattern just won't make it through my gooey brain cells to the knitting neuron. Sometimes I just get stupid and knit purl knit purl--and nothing else--suddenly is Russian.



Okay, this pattern is not a difficult one, if my assessment of it is correct. There are no stitches other than knits and purls, no yos, no ssks, no cables. But my knitting neuron was evidentally turned off yesterday.



Hmmmm, that doesn't look quite right, does it? So let's rip it out to the ribbing and try again.



If I remember correctly, there are only 12 rows to the pattern. Most are simply "knit" or simply "purl". There are two that say "*k 12, turn, p6, turn, k6, turn, p6, turn, k6 p6, turn, k6* and repeat from *", and the other row is reversed with k6 at the start and k12 at the end.

From what I can sort of understand, this one row takes a while to knit, what with all those turns and going back over what was already knitted on that needle, but should almost all of the actual knitting end up on one needle? No. It means I made a mistake. Twice.

Patience at an end, several hours of prime knitting time wasted, sock frogged. Twice. And I'm looking for another "simple" pattern. It's starting to look like a ribbed sock is all I can manage. I'm afraid to even think of Pomatomus. The words might leap off the page and clog up that knitting neuron and kill me.

And that nice dark Santa Fe colorway isn't looking too good to me right now, either.

Get me out of here, con't

Remember the nasty kid who was in here on Thursday spreading Germs of Doom? He's back. Leaving class again because he's too sick to be here, but for some reason this morning he decided it was the Right Thing to come on in and share more Germs of Doom with the rest of us.

Some of us would like to avoid catching anything more than we already have, thankyouverymuch, Nasty Kid.

Perfect Storm (stupid title, came from this article)

Posted 2007-12-06 on http://www.dnronline.com/

Open Schools, Slick Roads Upset Parents In City

By Jeff Mellott

HARRISONBURG - Some parents questioned Harrisonburg School Superintendent Donald Ford's decision Wednesday not to delay or call off school because of snow- and iced-covered streets.

Speaking Wednesday afternoon, Ford said he regretted his decision.

"For those parents who were not only inconvenienced, but actually experienced genuine concern about the safety of their children, I am really sorry that happened," he said.

Angry Parent

City resident and parent Sid Caplan was angry about his experience.

First, Caplan said had to pick his son up after his school bus became stuck on Smithland Road early Wednesday morning. Then, after dropping his son off at Harrisonburg High School, Caplan's car slid down the driveway and struck a curb, damaging a wheel rim.

Caplan said he was frustrated trying to get news from city and school officials about his son's bus.

"I got more information from my son stuck on the bus on his cell phone - that he is not supposed to have. I am glad he had it [Wednesday]," said Caplan, who happened to have the day off from his job at Augusta Medical Center. (note from me: Kids aren't allowed to have their cell phones turned on during the school day, but they may have them on the bus or anywhere else up until the time they walk through the school doors.)

Caplan, who recently was hired by the city as a part-time bus driver, went to the scene.
"There were kids walking away. Some parents were coming to pick them up. At least three parents' cars got stuck," Caplan said.

Road Conditions

Smithland was not the only place where city streets were treacherous.

"Slick," said Harrisonburg Police Department spokesmen Lt. Kurt Boshart in describing road conditions.

Boshart reported that a car slid into a parked police cruiser on Central Avenue. No injuries resulted from that incident or from numerous others around the city, he said. (note from me: That police officer is my nephew. Good reflexes, Steven!)

Another car also slid into a city transit bus on Pear Street but did no damage, reported City Transportation Director Reggie Smith.
"We had numerous incidents this morning. I would dare say every bus slid or spun at one time or another," Smith said.

Tough Going

Two school buses needed assistance on Wednesday morning, he said, including the bus on Smithland Road around 7 a.m. The other bus was on Kelley Street at 8:15 a.m., Smith reported.

Drivers did not attempt several inclines to pick up students, he said. Some school buses kept their schedule but others were more than half an hour late, he said. "All in all," Smith said, "our drivers did an excellent job, and we were lucky considering the conditions."

Making The Call

Anticipating the storm, Ford said he checked the weather at 5 a.m. and detected nothing. Ford saw snow at 6 a.m., but he still had no indication that road conditions would deteriorate so rapidly, he said. (note from me: Bull hockey. Check the Weather Channel. It clearly showed the bands of snow coming across, not to mention the "snow advisory" in effect from 6 a.m. until 6 p.m.)

With bus drivers getting ready to start, Ford decided school could open.

Ford, who says he received about 10 calls about his decision, said he returned telephone messages to those who left contact numbers. "Going to school is never going to be a top priority to me over the safety of children," Ford said.

By Wednesday evening, only the city school system had announced delays. Due to inclement weather, Harrisonburg's schools will open two hours late today.

Mothertrucker

The roads were wet last night as we headed home around 6 p.m. It's about a 30-mile drive over a two-lane road through a national forest along a river, gorgeous in daylight no matter what time of year it is. After dark, though, it's just a two-lane road that we have to drive twice a day; this time of year, both drives are in the dark.

We were behind a couple of slower vehicles, not unusual in this part of the county. There are three nice long straight stretches, though, where it's usually easy to pass someone who wants to take his/her time. Last night we passed these slower vehicles, legally, I might add, on the broken line, with no oncoming cars in sight. Those are much easier to see at night (as long as they have their lights on, of course).

At that first straight stretch, after we passed the cars and were back in our own lane, the passing lane ended. There was a car coming toward us in the other lane. So, naturally, the tractor-trailer that suddenly appeared behind us, bearing down on us at about 80 mph (the speed limit is 55) decided that it was the perfect time to pass us. On the solid, non-passing-lane line. With a car rapidly heading toward us.

Tom could see that the truck couldn't possibly safely pass us and get back in the right-hand lane before the car hit it, but the trucker didn't care. Horn blaring, he sped up and continued to try to pass us. With a car rapidly heading toward us. Tom sped up so the truck could get back into the lane behind us before he hit the car head-on. Mr. Big Trucker didn't appreciate the gesture; he swerved behind us and turned on his high-beams, sped up, and stayed right on our tail for several miles until we hit the mountain. (Not literally, of course.) Several times he tried to pass us, but by that time we were both kind of irritated with him (I was much more irritated than Tom, and much more vocal. And louder.) and didn't allow him to do so.

The trailer must have been empty, because I figured that we'd lose him after the first or second curve on the mountain. Those curves are short and sharp on the Virginia side. Trucks (and cars) have to slow down.

Nope. Mr. Big Trucker was right on our tail halfway up that mountain, full-beams on the whole way. I'm proud to admit that I flipped him the bird.

I was almost hoping he'd pass us illegally so I could get his license number and any identifying marks on the truck. At that point it occurred to me that he had plenty of time to memorize our license, too. Whoops.

On the West Virginia side of the mountain, just over the top, there's a pull-over for trucks. All trucks are required to stop there to check their brakes (evidentally Virginia isn't as interested in her drivers'/passengers' safety, as there isn't anything like that on that side), and often slower cars will pull over to allow more impatient drivers to pass, even though farther down the mountain there are a couple of legal passing lanes.

Last night we left Mr. Big Truck behind before we could see if he stopped to check those brakes which he obviously hadn't used too much on the way up. I'm betting he didn't stop. But there was a small car in the pull-over area, inside light on, doing something, trying to find something, I don't know. But it took so long for Mr. Big Truck's lights to appear on the WV side that I'm thinking that Mr. Little Car pulled out before he came around the curve, slowing him down. Because driving down a mountain certainly wouldn't have slowed him down any.

Didn't matter. As soon as he could, he passed the car and the milk truck that was ahead of us, which meant that Mr. Big Trucker was right behind us when we pulled into our driveway in the middle of a sharp, long curve a couple of miles (by road) from the bottom of the mountain. He barely slowed down.

Mothertrucker.

Poor choices

One of my high school's former football players yesterday shot and killed a man. This kid (now almost 20) was just plain dumb. He was in SpEd, so that's how I knew him. Not a mean bone in his body, but if provoked he would fight.

This is a kid who was almost never in class. He was one of the elite, a football player, an athlete, so he could pretty much write his own ticket in school. He roamed the halls and dropped in here and there to talk to people. He was pretty much untouchable. Agreeable for the most part, always smiling, but dumb as dirt, did very little work, but was scooted along and tolerated in class because he was a football player.

He lives in the worst possible part of town on a street that no one in their right mind would walk down after dark. Crowds of angry young men (why are they always angry? Upset about not having the advantages of other people? Then for God's sake, quit whining about it and do something about it--WORK!!!) congregate on the corners all night long. The police department is making an effort to let their presence be known there during the night, parking at one end and slowly making their way to the other. People will come outside--at 3 a.m.--to thank them for being there. But the angry young men will either bolt, confront them ("I didn't do nuthin" without being accused of anything), or just stand and watch.

This kid was given every possible chance by the school's principal (a lady who cares about these troubled kids as if they were her own); his SpEd teacher took him to the doctor (and paid the bill) when he was sick, fed him, took him to football practice, things which his crack-ho of a mother (okay, she was on crack, I'm not sure about the ho part) couldn't be bothered to do. His father is in prison and has been most of the kid's life. He had at least two prior felonies (relatively minor assault and battery--at least, minor when compared to cold-blooded murder) and the teacher's husband, a criminal defense attorney, had defended him (taking payments because the family couldn't pay it all at once). He is livid; he's worked with this kid for years, seeing another side of him (the big, dumb, lazy, easy-going athlete), but the man who was killed was the attorney's friend. This man heard the fight building steam, at 1 a.m. (and it's freezing here at night, literally, so what are these dumb asses doing outside at that hour anyway???), and ran outside to break it up. The newpaper says that several 911 calls were made about the fight, but by the time the first police arrived, shots had already been fired.

You've heard, "I've got your back, man"? Well, yesterday I found out what that means. It means that if you're dissed, your "man" will fight for you. The kid who was dissed is a total waste of carbon and oxygen, a lazy, whiny bastard (he wasn't in SpEd, but I worked with him in a class three years ago), was afraid that he was going to get hurt, so he ran and got this kid, who had his back. And who will now spend the rest of his life in prison, because he was stupid enough to have a gun and bring it outside with him, so he could have that bastard's back.

My God.