Lack of focus

Yeah, I know, it has been a while since I wrote here. The holidays are making it harder for me to focus than I thought they would. And it’s not because of holiday-related activity. I am eschewing all decorating and card-writing, etc., and even all baking although I still might make my Stollen. I did do some visiting over Thanksgiving, saw Mr. MmmYarn’s mom and stepdad and then my mom and stepdad. Decided to stay home for Christmas. I spent Christmas Eve watching a Star Wars movie and sipping Glühwein. Christmas Day I took advantage of the uncharacteristically warm and sunny weather and took a long walk in the park before going home and concocting a butternut squash soup with chestnuts and orange juice (so very good!) and marmitako, a Basque tuna dish. Then I watched the latest Harry Potter movie and had more Glühwein (sensing a theme here?).

It’s cold and rainy again today and I’ve been holed up since running morning errands, getting some stuff in order around here. So today I’m catching up. And the first thing to catch you up on is some weaving. I finally finished the scarf Mr. MmmYarn helped me warp on back in May:

Pattern: plain weave
Warp: stripes of Cascade 220, 100% wool, .85 skein in color 4010 (mustard yellow) and .75 skein color 9463 (orange)
Weft: 1 2/3 skeins Artful Yarns Portrait, 70% mohair, 25% viscose, 5% polyester, color 104
Loom: Schacht Flip rigid heddle
Sett: 10 dent reed
Finished size: 8.5″ wide x 68″ long without fringe or 78″ with fringe
Started 5/16 and finished 11/7/2009 — and sold it 11/20!

It’s so big it obliterates a dinosaur footprint:

And I like how it looks almost plaid but it isn’t:

Work was busy here and there. We did some software upgrades and had one colossal hardware failure. We also decorated my boss’ office the last week of November because he went away on vacation for 10 days. He came back from vacation to find a sign on his door:

And when he opened it, found his office gift-wrapped:

Click a photo to go to my Flickr photostream to see more photos

Hahaha! He appreciated how much we like him. :)  We in my department were briefly famous at work and even on Twitter, once my work’s blog writers got the photos up there. I usually don’t participate in the pranks; this time I can proudly say not only did I participate, I was the mastermind. Well, I guess the writers of “The Office” were the masterminds because I saw this recently (Jim’s prank on Dwight) but I suggested it and the others went with it. I also donated 6 rolls of Christmas paper that I moved to S.F. 7 years ago and never used: it’s sun-faded and so cheap that crease lines rub ink on your hands and it’s hard to cut in straight lines. I thought this was a great use for it. It certainly wasn’t fit for wrapping gifts. It’s amazing how quickly this kind of project goes when four sets of hands are involved. We could have been more thorough: we should have done the ceiling and/or floor, too.

Knitting update to follow in the next few days, I hope. I have next week off work so I had better find some time to blog in my busy schedule. Bread machine just beeped that it’s done (San Diego Sunshine bread today, a whole-wheat loaf with bits of orange zest in it) so that’s it for this post.