The 'bent Needle

At least, not where it used to be. Well, you might be able to, but I can't. At least not for a L O N G time from now at least...

What am I babbling on about now, you ask? Well, give me a minute and I'll tell ya... ;-)

Anyway, on the way home from work tonight I am listening to the Talk Radio program that is on the radio and trying not to doze off (my rider would be VERY upset with me if I did that; I drove today) when all of a sudden I catch a snippet of an advert that is talking about the place where I used to live when I first moved out on my own. Something or the other about condominiums. "Huh?!? That can't be right." is the first thing to come to mind, so I listen a little more carefully. Sure enough, the Radio Announcer Person is talking something or the other about condos in my old apartment building. Hmm... So I make a point to listen to the rest of the advert -heckling it all the while- and make note of the website mentioned in the ad. Okay, that will give me something to do when I get home...

Fast forward to home. I get all settled in, realize that it is TONIGHT that Kim is getting her hair done (need to work on that memory stuff) and get some stuff started for dinner. After that, I go online and look to see what this condo business is all about. Well, the first few attempts at to find the website failed miserably. Methinks I mis-heard the name or something... Oh well, it isn't like I don't know the name of the place. Check, check, check... Hmm... That doesn't work either... Oh well, so I plug in a search for "condos" and "Rorick" (the name of the old apartment) and lo and behold! I find this site. HOLY HANNAH ON A HOT POGO STICK!!! Ahem... sorry, but that is about what I was thinking.

Anyway, if you click on the link you can see what look like some pretty nice condos. To me, I see my old apartments (I lived in a couple of the units a couple different times.) as the models in the 360* tours. I kid you not! I mean, the 1 bedroom one shown is -more or less- the same as the apartment that I originally moved into when I moved into the place all those years ago. (Talking about a major league freak out!)

AND THEN... I clicked on the mortgage calculator. Just to see what they were asking for them and H O L Y H O P P I NG H I P P O SPIT!!! (I cleaned that up, by the way...) Now if you are condo savvy, you might not think that the price was too much. Well let me tell ya... Up until a couple three years ago, this whole area was a Low Rent District. (Oh yeah, Capital Letters all around...) Example: the apartment that I had when Kim and I got together cost me about $380 +/- a month. Well... If you look at the mortgage calculator, you can see that they cost a little bit more than that now. (Now you can see why I made the hippo spit comment.) The only thing that I can think of for the EXTREME price hike is the fact that a Big New School was built in the area and The City Fathers decided that it would be a good idea to encourage Businesses to come in and renovate all the old apartment buildings. Translation: newly remodeled apartment buildings = higher rent and 'nicer' residents. ...orsomethinglikethat...

Anyway... methinks you can see why I titled this post the way I did. (Still shaking about the whole condo thing here...) I am -more or less- over the seeming unfairness of the whole deal. It is amazing how much things change over time, even though they seem to stay the same.

Okay, enough of that type of stuff. Here is a little bit of something that may pull you all out of the hum-drum feeling that the above story may have created:

This little cutey was milling about outside our window. He/she was just sitting there... munching on the grass... looking into the window... munching more grass... and NOT MOVING! I am not kidding one little bit. I swear, he/she just sat there... and sat there... and sat there... At least 5 minutes, easy. And then... one of the neighbor dogs and his/her owner walked by and scared him/her off. Methinks the dog just wanted to say Hi! but the bunny thought differently. The dog was a bit bigger than the bunny, after all. ;-)

Okay, what else? Um... Oh! Thank you to all and everybody else who have come to take a look at what I have to say. Makes all the typing worth it. ;-p Just kidding... I seriously do appreciate all the visitors.

And with that... Farewell, auf wiedersehen, adieu... you know... all that international 'see you later' type stuff... ;-)

Hello again all and everyone else too! (I told you all I would try harder to make more posts...) Anyway... Here is an update pic of the Wolf that I am working on now:

Okay, above are the 2 sides of the completed project. (I am surprised that I was able to get the pics to cooperate...) As you can see, it turned out pretty good. The 'signatures' under each rider and the little road sign are cute little touches. I hate to say it, but I think that the title was one of the hardest parts of this project. Let's just say that -like Lance and the Tour de France- 7th time's the charm. ;-) And below, you can see what it looks like along with the Arc de Triomphe plaque that inspired the whole thing...



Since I have been suffering the blahs, I haven't yet hung these both up on the wall. But I think that once everything is up and in place, they should all look pretty good.

As to what I am working on now, well it is a UFO (I think that is the stitching term) that I started... well, quite a while ago. It is the "Native Wolf" kit from Dimensions' Creative Accents collection. (The 'site is down now, else I would get you a picture...) I decided to do it on a piece of Kim's hand dyed blue fabric. This is going to be another gift project for one of the folks at work. Now that I am back on it, it is going fairly quickly. I hope it goes over well...

Once this one is done, I have a couple of othergift projects that I am looking to be doing as well. One will be an inexpensive Mickey Mouse project from Janlynn. I am planning on making it into a refrigerator magnet. It will probably take me a couple of days at the most to finish. The other will be a deer project that is from the same book as the turkey project I did for Kim's mom. It will probably take a little more than a couple of days to complete, but once it is done and in the frame that I picked out for it, it should be pretty spiffy once it is done. Beyond that... Well, I have plenty of stash to work off of...

In regards to the Lavender and Lace "Evangeline" well... I've gotten a copy of the pattern made! And it looks like this:

Kinko's is a wonderful place, let me tell ya! The pattern for this project is almost 24 inches to a side. That is the beauty of Kinko's: they are able to make B I G copies. As to the rest of it, I now have all the bits and pieces to get started. I just have to get to that point is all. Be patient with me. It will happen... I am kind of hesitant to be getting started on this one, (Big Project Nerves, most likely) but I am sure that once the first few stitches are on the fabric the rest will go just swimmingly! (Crosses fingers and toes and eyes and...)

Oh, and speaking of swimmingly, Kim and I now have a pass card to the pool at our apartment. It is nice to have access to the pool. It is rather calming, when things aren't too crowded. Granted, we don't actually swim at the pool -that would require the knowledge of how to swim- but we really enjoy the whole 'lazing around the pool' thing. And it is a nice way to relax too. That may explain how I was able to break down my blahs... Hard to say for sure.

What else...? Well, the weather is staying fairly well. Work is stressful but consistent. (Consistently stressful?!? Just kidding... lol) Stitching is going along well. Slow, but well. Kim and I went for a ride today. That was nice. We both got a good work-out and Kim surprised herself by going further than she originally thought she would. I hate to say it, but I was more worn out than she was when we got home. (Shows how much better shape she is in than I am... lol)

Well, I just ran out of words. Well, more or less... I have one last pic though. This one goes out to FLYBYU:

The other day the weather was nice but overcast in the morning. I had taken a quick look out the window and saw that the clouds were in a nifty formation behind the apartments across the creek. The above picture is an example of how they looked. I thought this would be a good one to post. If you haven't looked at FLYBYU's blog, I would suggest you do. If for no other reason as to look at some of the -imho- best scenic photos you can ever hope to look at. (But that is just my opinion...)

Alrightythen! Methinks that I have bolgged enough to last a little while. Hopefully not as little as the last time, but you get the idea.

And with that, I wish you all a good night, good stitching, a good commute to and from work tomorrow (we can all use that...), and an all around good time.

Keep smiling!