I dream of angels but I live with demons

Today's SVU quote. From a schizophrenic suspect who refuses his medication. Which, incidentally, drove me crazy about this episode because, seriously, we force meds on people who aren't sane enough to want them all the damn time.

But I do feel like this is a nice summation of the struggle that is mental illness, regardless of whether it's schizophrenia, bipolar, depression, trauma, eating disorders...no matter if you actually hear voices, or just deal with the voices in your head.

I feel like this a lot myself, actually.

Today was...not a good day. Got some bad news. My dog ran away when I opened the door to clip her out (she's back, but not before she got about a hundred feet from the big major street by our complex, which is on the other side of an on ramp for the highway. I was already getting a little screechy, I was a hair's breadth from hysterics when she finally turned and came back over to me). It turns out we lost in not-court, despite the fact that the plaintiff has NO EFFING CASE. I tried to redo my nails and got smeary goop all over everywhere. Blogger freakin' refuses to upload my pictures.

I'm not pleased with today.

I did go to the yarn store, though, and got replacement yarn for a new shawl. I spent about twenty minutes picking up the same three balls of Encore and being displeased with my choice of the same three balls of Encore when I finally spotted this hand painted yarn called Elaine by Schaefer Yarns. I'd show you a picture, but.... I also got more Lamb's Pride for my friend's baby blanket. I'm going to be doing an awful lot of garter stitch in the next few weeks...

Home sweet mess

I'm back in NC. And it appears that someone broke in and messed up my house while I was gone. I swear, when I left here, it was clean...

My flight was relatively uneventful. I had two little kids sitting with me in my row - a nine year old and his three year old sister. The nine year old was actually very articulate. We had a great conversation about the presidential election. They were very cute.

So, tomorrow, back to Crisis. I have one patient left that I had before, which means that all my patients pretty much will be new. And I'm on call. At least I still have a shadow.

Oy, I think it's time to go to bed....

Not as cute as my nephew, but...

...I can finally show you pictures of my latest FO. This is my mom's Christmas present (you know, because it's only February).


It's a very simple, basic felted bag that I kind of made up as I went. We finished it off today with a thin black drapery cord handle (much like the one on my sheep tote, for those who know it. I have a tendency to prefer drapery cord to I-cord, mostly because I HATE knitting I-cord. I let my mom pick out the cord, for length and design and whatnot). I'm very pleased with how it turned out.

The Greek key design is more or less pilfered from a little booklet I got free with some knitting magazine containing a few teaser patterns from one of Vogue Knitting's little tiny knitting books (possibly Felted Bags Two. Or maybe just Bags Two. Something with a "two"). This pattern was part of an overall motif on the Weekender.

The yarn is Mauch Chunky, out of my stash, nearly three balls' worth. The bottom was black, worked doubled for strength and/or durability, and then after I picked up the stitches around the base I just kind of kept going until I ran out. I had a little bit of each of the blue colors left over. So, you know, it took about that much yardage (great pattern notes, huh?).


And then here's the picture of the bag with my awesome new felting majig. Love that thing, even if (especially because?) Maggie never found it at all interesting.

My mom really liked it. She even made sure she took it to dinner with us tonight to show off to my (actual) aunt and uncle and my younger cousin. My dad wore his socks, too. My uncle was very impressed. Dinner was nice - we went to the Rock Bottom Brewery, which is a chain, but the food was decent and the beer was awesome. I had the Lumpy Dog Brown. Ha!

My older cousin couldn't join us for dinner because his band - the coolest indie rock band ever - is playing in the city tonight. I'm a little bummed that it wasn't a) closer, or b) that they weren't headlining, because I've been dying to go to one of their shows. And they have a new album coming out in a couple of weeks, on which my cousin wrote FOUR of the songs. Wicked.



Dimitri plays bass, and in the pic in the banner he's the one on the right. The handsome one. It runs in the family, obviously.

They so need to come play in NC.

So tomorrow morning I get back on the big blue avion and head back to Carolina. And then pick Mags up, and then I'm on call Monday night. Ahhh, back to reality, and so soon....

What a big boy!

I am way too tired and had far too long a day to actually write a substantive post tonight. Suffice it to say not-court went well enough, I'm considering a vendetta against my former realtor (who fucking perjured himself in arbitration today, the corrupt, lying rat that he is), and then on the way out of not-court I fell down again. I think it's the Danskos, I really do. But the evening was so much better. And so I leave you with a gratuitous cute picture of the world's cutest little boy, my 17 month old nephew, Basil.


This is actually my favorite shot we took tonight...


Shortly after I met Bianca, his mom, my freshman year of high school, her mom - who also worked at our high school - offered me a ride home. And as we walked to their car, I commented on the peculiar combination of numbers and letters that was their license plate. "My father's a HAM," she said, and was then quick to explain, "You know, like, a HAM radio operator."

"Right," I told her. "I didn't think your dad was a pork product."

Hey, Bei? I hate to tell you this (okay, no I don't), but I think there's another little ham in the family....

Northern Rain

I'm in Chicago, of course. My father picked me up from the airport, we had lunch, we killed time, I went into the yarn store by my lawyer's office (Malabrigo makes laceweight now! In Velvet Grapes! And many other fine colors that do not happen to be my favorite color of Malabrigo. I almost squealed out loud right there in the shop. I'm sure they would've understood. Alas, though, I left empty-handed. Because they did not have the bag handles for which I sought, nor did I have an actual need for laceweight Malabrigo. Because truth be told, I don't have a lot of patience for knitting lace these days). I lost my cellphone, and also found it (it was at the Starbucks. Where else? It's possible that I didn't actually lose it there, I think, it just instinctively found the nearest Starbucks and waited for me). And in the midst of all this it started snowing. And I (very sarcastically) said to my father, "What's with all this falling white stuff? What is that, again?" And he said, "That's Northern rain."

He he.

So begins, as my best friend has suggested calling it, the whirlwind of Kate's Litigation Tour, 2008. I flew in today. I have court (which is not actually court, but mandatory arbitration, which is in the "arbitration center" and not actually a court. Darn it, because I like courts) tomorrow. Then I'm meeting said best friend (the lawyer, although not my lawyer, at least not for this. I do have her on retainer, though, in case I ever need her services. I gave her a dollar right after she passed the bar) and we're then going to drop my parents off at the train station and high-tail it (read: sit in Chicago traffic for a couple hours) to the western 'burbs, where I get to see my nephew Basil and the now-very-pregnant Original Robin and the rest of my high school crew. Then I have family plans on Saturday, and fly back Sunday to go home, pick up the dog, and straighten out the paperwork that Medical Records is about to suspend me over, despite the fact that the "delinquent" notes all seem to have been signed and done with weeks ago.

I'm also getting a manicure and a haircut before not-court tomorrow. Because I may not have to wear a suit (and in point of fact, I'm going to show up in my day-to-day work clothes - the stuff I wear on the wards, not in scrubs - right down to my Danskos), but I still don't want to look like a schmuck.

Alright, I'm going to bed, because I was up late last night (one of these days, I will tell y'all about my call) and it's been a long day. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

Oh, and in the spirit of Love Thursday, here's five things I love today:

5. Undercrowded flights. Although I have to say I think Southwest's new number system is way more complicated than it needs to be. But I definitely enjoyed having the whole back of the plane to myself.
4. The smell when I got off the plane at Midway. It was some combination of deep dish pizza and hot pretzels and Kosher dogs. But mostly Chicago style (read: real) pizza.
3. My dad for picking me up from the airport and then putting up with me for several hours (he gets bonus points for taking me to the yarn store, even if he didn't go in) before ferrying me to the lawyer's office. And then my mom for being home from work when we got back and feeding me really good home cooked food and also chocolate.
2. My aunt in NC for letting me call her at 10:30 pm last night when I got out of the hospital to tell her that I needed to leave for the airport at 8am, and then she brought me cookies and a muffin for the trip.
1. That THE BLOGGER SPELLCHECK LIVES!!!!!!!!