Ch Ch Changes...

Well, this could be embarrassing... (how is it that focusing has one 's' and embarrassing has two?).  Oh yes, where was I?  Embarrassing.  I added a new widget to the bottom of my blog from a site called "BlogFrog" - with a name like that, how could I resist?  It's supposed to be a form of social networking for bloggers, which might be nice, for those of us who can't go to things like "BlogHer" (but, I have to say, why would you want to?  Isn't cybercontact enough, already?)  Ooops, I digress again... and of course it's supposed to show you when people have read your blog.  I could be sitting there waiting for the pot to boil for a long long time.  


No, I know there are a few hardy souls who read this drivel through thick & thin, which is encouraging...


Did you also note I'd changed the banner?  I think sometimes a new look is good, even though none of my gentle readers could tell me how to add a background to my blog... I found instructions, I read them, I tried, I really did.. but some things just elude me - it's like long division, algebra and programming in C++, you know, they just go in one end and out the other.   Mr Golightly was no help either, even though he's the compleat geek, he was too busy fixing his toilet.  That's a whole other story I'm not telling. 


Weather-wise, it was nice having a day of 40C/104F yesterday, because it reminds us all how lovely it is to have a day of 29C/84F.  I was out west yesterday, and ventured out only once, to buy lunch, then returned to the slightly overheated damp cave I work in... no wonder I feel a bit odd today.


Oh yes, did I mention?  I feel a bit odd today.  Sore throat, sore ears, glands are up, eyes feel very sticky, head feels very cotton-woolly.  It's 10.50AM & I'm still in my PJs.  Not at work, in case you were worried.  


And on the supplies side, these arrived yesterday:

And these:

I loved the red and blue so much I thought I'd give the turquoise and coral a burl - they are very nice, I must say.  What a talent that nice Mr Dewberry is.

And in other news just to hand, I've been invited by my lovely friend Fluid Pudding to join her Flickr Group "Tide Whiff Wise", which is another way of saying 2010 is "The Year During Which I Finish What I’ve Started (TYDWIFWIS).  As the proud owner of many UFO's*, I'm determined to finish the lace scarf I started for my lovely SIL** two (at least) years ago, before her birthday.  When is that, I hear you saying?  Oh, if you must know, it's in October.  But that doesn't mean it'll be done in time - I just can't knit in summer because it's too hot, we're away for all of April, May, June, July & August are prime sewing months because its cool, so it'll have to be September.  Don't expect to hear from me then!

And now, back to bed.  I've exhausted myself with all this typing and I need to rest.  I'm so precious :-)

*Un-Finished Object

**Sister-in-Law

All right, crisis averted!

Boy, when I get my knickers into a twist, they really do get twisted, don't they?  I must admit to being really pissed off with Vodafone AND Google, for making what appear to be some fairly arbitrary decisions about the way the bundled phone is going to work, because, no matter how good Google, Gmail etc etc are, the fact remains that occasionally, people will want to synch their PCs with their phones.


Anyway, I found something called 'eReader', via the Android Forums, which has been put together by those clever people at Barnes and Noble.  It's great, because it allows you to download the eBooks you might previously have bought at Fictionwise, which is an eBookstore I've used since I had my Palm, way back in the dim distant dark ages.   So, the good news, gentle reader, is that I can stop spending hours of my *free* time looking for drivers, .exe files and hints hidden in the dark corners of the HTC universe, and concentrate on the really important things, like, sewing!


Because MWH also got a new geeky toy for his Big Birthday, I thought I would be nice and make him a case for it.  Well.  Talk about fussy!  Had I but known... (it was really a case of "but I want the caramel on the inside, which some of you may remember).  He wanted a clip, not a nice, easy to use lobster, of which there are plenty in the drawer, but one of those fairly horrible 'push to open' jobbies which I find very hard to use (and which, to be fair, is probably the point, hard to open, hard to get lost, yes, yes, I get it), and he wanted it sewn on *here*, not a millimetre lower, and yes, that's lovely, but could I have some velcro on it too?  So I took it all apart, added the velcro, discarded the original (now too short) lining, ripped, stitched, swore a bit and came up with this:

Anyway, after two weeks of use, His Nibs advises me that he wants to be able to use the silicon condom that came with said geeky toy, and could I make him another one, a bit bigger, and also could it have space to stuff the headphones into as well?  Honest, the man thinks I can work miracles.  Well, he's only partly right, of course.  Sadly, I didn't have any more of the robot fabric, but I did have baby-poo brown dinosaurs, of course I did...

Note it's all one piece, and I did a clever thing with the ribbon this time, stitching it into the top seam when I joined the inner & outer fabrics.  Looks much nicer, and, best of all, the geeky toy, silicon condom and earphones all stuff very nicely into the pouch, which seals up securely with Velcro.


So, I'm thinking, I should make myself a better one, with some o' that magic velcro stuff on the top to stop yon geeky device sliding onto the floor, something that happened quite a lot last week!


So, using some of this absolutely gorgeous french linen from here, I made this, lined with this:

And then I made this for a colleague, who borrowed mine in the week to go out powerwalking, and who raved about it!    Fabric also from Whipstitch Fabrics - gorgeous, isn't it?  Any excuse to spread the love.

I think I need a tutorial on how to make those lovely handles I see on Etsy, which look a lot more sophisticated than my 3" cut & folded - any suggestions?


Now, I'm off to enjoy the eReader on my geeky toy... ciao!

Please!

Can some clever person tell me how to put a spiffy background onto my blog?  I've spent a fruitless morning (well 28 minutes, anyway) listening to next door-but-one's absolute crap music, & trying to read-and-think, think-and-read, and it's all too hard!


Help!





Oh this?  Completely unrelated, but very nice & available from here!

Rule One: Never post when angry

Rule Two:  Always read everything twice before posting.
Rule Three:  Always read the entire contract from end to end before purchasing.
Rule Four:  Re-read Rules One-Three before posting.


I bought a new geeky toy.  Love it.  Sleek, slender, light, powerful.  Fun.  Convenient, easy to use.  Nice customisable features.... (plus, I got the black one, waaay more sexy than underpants white, right?)

Hmmm.  But wait... My new geeky toy appears to have a major design, ummmm, limitation.


Apparently the Vodafone Google bundled model was never designed to synch (i.e., talk to) a PC 'as a device', so any Apps (little programs that run on your phone) that depend on your synching your PC to your device, won't work.  For somebody like me who reads a lot of e-books, that is a seriously seriously poor piece of design.  Because this is 'new tech', there are only a couple of Apps on the market which will supply the required e-book reader, and the chosen App (which I might add is completely blameless in all this mess) just can't talk to 'temporary drive x:', it needs to talk to 'the device'.


And so, I have to say, I'm very cross.  Nobody from Vodafone bothered to tell me when I signed up for the damn plan that the phone couldn't synch with a PC 'as a device'.  They told me all about the good stuff, like Google Maps, Gmail, Synching your calender & contacts with Gmail, yes, indeedy, but did they mention it couldn't talk to a PC 'as a device'?  NosireeeBob.


Am I cross?  Very.  Did I mention that?  Oh yes.


So, I hear you say from the non-geek corner of the world, what's the big deal?  The PC will still see the device as a 'temporary drive x:, and you can load files to the drive for things like music.  Fine, but if the App requires the device to synch as 'a device', forget it, it just can't do it.


And the other thing that has really got me riled is that Google, whose big idea this all was, has about as much help as John Howard has heart - practically none.  Their website is as much use as a chocolate teapot, glass door in a toilet, screen door on a submarine*, [insert own 'useless' metaphor here].  It doesn't even mention that the HTC Magic is out on the market, branded Google, with all these Google apps 'bundled', as they say, and the help is non-existent.





C'mon, people, lift your game.  This is serious!

*Image & metaphor courtesy of here, thanks Baino.

Some kind of irony

Does anybody but me see some kind of weird irony in being asked to make a toy dog, less than a week after The Best Dog In The World has gone to Doggy Heaven?  Goodness me but life is weird.


Anyway, Mr Golightly's nephew, Master E, has a friend, Master L, who is having a birthday, and "could Aunty Golightly make a dog like mine, only for the Cronulla Sharks?"... Last year I made a dog for Master E in the colours of his favourite Football team (or a close, Joel Dewberry-type approximation thereof).  

For those of you out there not completely au fait with the NRL (oh, you too?), the colours are apparently blue, grey and white.  So, one did ones best, as they say somewhere else:

To be named, somewhat appropriately, "Sharkey".  I'm a bit cross with myself because I forgot to make him a collar, but as Master E's mother so wisely said "he'll never know".  Well, yes, but I will.  Next time, too, I will dig out the florist's wire & make the ears a bit more standy-uppy, but I quite like floppy-eared dogs.  Why wouldn't you?


And now, back to the disaster that is Australia Vs Pakistan.  Mr Golightly is off getting wet & miserable at the Cricket Ground today and very shortly I'm going to do the good wifey thing & make spaghetti for dinner.  He'll need something to cheer him up after Australia's performance today! 

Best Dog in the world... gone to Dog Heaven

My good friend Zeb.B.Dog has swum off to Dog Heaven, where, if there are any rewards for good behaviour in Doggy Life, there should be an endless supply of golf balls, tennis balls, soccer balls, hard rubber balls, soft stress balls, frisbees, sticks of all shapes and sizes, bread rolls to be eaten only on the carpet, raw turkey necks and bowls of other doggie's food, just waiting for her. No arthritis, no pain, no competition from the owners of that food, just lots of big fluffy dog beds, big dams full of warm water, birds to chase, passing walkers and joggers to bark at, and nobody to stop her, an endless supply of people to throw those sticks and balls and hand out the turkey necks on demand.

Even though she wasn't mine, she felt like mine. She loved to sneak up behind you and stick her head under your arm and toss her head, and too bad if you had a glass of wine in your hand. She loved to drop wet sticky slimey balls at your feet for you to throw, especially if you were sitting with something that needed clean hands. She loved to stand right next to you after she'd been in the dam, and shake all that lovely cold water all over you. She wanted all your attention, and she was worth it. She was smart and funny and if she loved you, you knew it.

She was my friend and I'm going to miss her.

Ham, anyone?

Not to be too 'scroogely' about it, but this year we didn't inflate the tree.  We didn't spend money on a real tree, we didn't go to the shops & buy a fake one.  We didn't string tinsel or lights, or sparkly baubles.  I did put two holly leaves & a berry onto the leg of the froggie doorknocker, just to get into the spirit of the thing, and I made these


[insert picture here].


Damn, the pictures are still on the camera.  Which is at the Boxes.  Where we were on Boxes Day, and where we will be on Friday night to celebrate NYE, very quietly.  Our tradition, for at least the last five years, has been to spend the evening with Dr & Mrs Box, eating, drinking & playing something wild like Scrabble, or Monopoly, or even Anti-Monopoly, having a 'relatively' early night, then going out somewhere really nice for lunch the next day:

And so it shall be in 2010.


Also, I can't believe we're still eating ham.  And we weren't even the originators of the ham.  That privilege went to my lovely SIL, who certainly made the business requirement of 'supply too much ham at Christmas' achievable.


I got some lovely gifts, MWH* outdid himself this year, aided by the wonderful 'wish list' facilities at various online retailers.  This particular gift has been pilloried by friends and family alike, and I can't work out why - it's fantastic for people who travel a lot, and who don't want to drag phone and camera battery chargers around with them wherever they go:

And then there were the books:

  

All guaranteed to keep me busy for a while... but I have made a solemn vow that I am doing absolutely no sewing of any kind until I go through the small but perfectly formed room and find some things to put into the 'Destash Sale from Hell (IIBIHWID*) - the sight of piles of fabric on the floor of the SBPFR have made me realise that, sadly, it's not like the TARDIS, and I can't keep shoving fabric in it without it starting to bulge at the seams... so, the sale.

I'm only going to get rid of dress-making fabric, though, I have no desire to make clothes for myself anymore - I'd be happy to make stuff for the little kids though, although Miss A is now 12 & no longer interested in homemade anything - although she's not actually overt about it, she was quite happy that the pencil case I gave her for Christmas came from Kinokuniya, and not from my own fair hands... 

Master E, on the other hand, was quite happy to finally get his hands on these:

 

which is pretty good, considering he also had one of those new-fangled skateboards with only two wheels to occupy him for most of the day!

And now, gentle reader, the cricket has adjourned for tea, and I am off to make myself a ham-free lunch!

*If I believed in Hell, which I don't