The strange irony of employment

I, my dear and lovely reader, have a job.

It would seem that, just as the wonderful knittyheads predicted, there was a delay in contacting me following my interview a week and a half ago, and the people at Citizens for Public Justice think I'm the best candidate for the position! Yay!! I'll be working in the fundraising department, doing some data entry and some correspondence drafting. Might be a little boring at times, but I will always be doing something that will be helping other people, worthy people, refugee people! So I will be able to forebear. I am very excited! I baked some celebratory cookies, thus successfully gaining back, in one day, four of the six pounds I had lost. Well done. Oh, and if the dough looks weird, it's because it was weird. That reduced-fat, non-hydrogenated margarine may be good for reducing guilt when making good, stove-top popcorn (with an old-timey crank!) but it is not good for making cookies. Use butter. Or heart-stopping, artery-destroying hydrogenated Crisco. They're cookies, for goodness sake; they aren't supposed to be healthy!



Do you know what this whole job thing means? Ok, it means a lot of things, but do you know what small list of incredibly fabulous things it means?! Let me tell you (in no particular order; I'm honestly not sure which excites me most):

1. We can pay off our debts, including my moderately-giant student loans! No more collection agents' letters or calls!

2. I can look forward to seeing friends from university without having to anticipate how best to phrase "teaching dance classes and seamstressing" so it sounds impressive and not entirely sad.

3. I can buy YARN. And actually pay for patterns, rather than only relying on what I can find on the inter-web and what I try to cook up in my wacky brain.

4. We can pay off our maxed-out credit card (calm down, our limit is a grand, but we maxed it out in wedding business two and a half years ago, and have barely touched the principle since. Boo) and then, with my new employment, can use it for moderate purchases online (read: fancy schmancy yarn from far away! And cheap online deals! Elann, here I come!) which we can then immediately pay off. I'm not sure which excites me more: the prospect of a growing stash (well, actually having a stash) or being able to pay for things outright, rather than constantly juggling payments. Both are so attractive!

All that said, I'm mostly looking forward to getting the monkey named Ontario Government Student Loan off my back, and putting some money away. Maybe an RRSP, which we can then put toward the down-payment on a house. Or just rent someplace downtown. Because let me tell you, I have had enough with the suburbs. Am I old? Am I boring? Have I given up on life? No, to all of the above. So what am I doing surrounded by people who are all of those things, I ask you?

For this summer, at least, we are staying here. I've finished most of the work on the backyard; let's see if it actually sprouts! We pulled that damned dogwood stump out of the top left corner on Saturday (huzzah!) and regraded the whole yard, then seeded. Hopefully the grass will grow soon. I'd like to use my little yard! I have designs on getting two cedar lounge chairs, and a little bistro table for the corner. Maybe I'll hang some flower boxes from the fence, and maybe some sort of outdoor art on the side "walls". Ooh, maybe some pretty outdoor lights! I love Christmas lights; I'd leave them up in the house all year if I could. Hey, why not? I'm artsy; shouldn't I be eclectic and strange sometimes?

Since the last few/bunch of posts have been image-less, I am remedying that error today. Here we have the backyard, pre-stump-removal, and post-stump-removal. Wembley has inserted herself into both pictures, attempting to make herself as filthy as possible. This dog loves to hang around in dirt more than I can tell you. She is a white dog. She gets very, very grimy.


On to the subject of knitting, and the strange irony of employment. Now that I will (soon) be able to afford to buy yarn, I will have a greatly reduced quantity of time in which to play with my yarn. Boo to that, but yay to the yarn - hence the irony. My LYS - which I adore - always has yarn at a much-reduced price in baskets on the floor. And lookey what I found yesterday!



Yup, Rowan! For $5 a skein! I bought two skeins (Mum helped me ball one yesterday afternoon, the other is waiting patiently) with which to knit a teeny shoulder shrug. My thought is this: I live waaaay out in Orleans (suck!) but my office will be downtown in the core (right near Elgin! And my friend Katie! And her daughter Isla! And their church with the fabulous acoustic! And the possibility of noon-hour rehearsals if the church will let me!). Long bus-rides are in the offing, in the heat of the summer. So light summer tops and dresses are in my future, but I feel very strongly about greatly exposed shoulders in the office (id est, they are generally rather inappropriate), hence the shrugs. I'll knit various little shrugs to wear in the morning when it's brisk-er and in the office, and then at noon and in the afternoon on my way home from work, I can take the shrug off to bear (bare!) the heat. Lovely, cheap Rowan yarn, small, transportable, practical project for the bus...it's heaven.



I picked up some - four balls! - of el-cheapo sock yarn for the FBIL's wedding kilt hose. I really need to get started on those, pronto. I have another ball or two in the same colour, but possibly a different dye-lot. No problem: I can use them for the turn-down cuff, so any slight difference won't be an issue. I'll keep you posted on how they go. I'm a little terrified...but reassured. They are just socks, just cabled socks. Besides, he has these skinny little legs; I won't need to do much shaping on the calf at all to have them fit.

Oh, yeah, the concert. It went well! I finished the blue satin in time (phew!) and sounded pretty good. I was sick, and I definitely noticed the difference between singing healthy and singing feeling the way I did, but it was still pretty good. Nah, it was awesome! Papagena was so much fun! Getting to really play a part, not just sing it, was super, and my baritone, Thomas, who sang Papageno was superb. We got an ovation as we went scampering out of the hall at the end of our duet: very cool. Carmen was a blast. I did my best to really 'sell' it, and my acting friend with the college diploma in theatre said I did well, which I take as a very high compliment. She's fabulously honest. The other duet and trio I did were...alright. Not perfect, but not bad. All in all, I'm proud of myself, and really looking forward to singing again, soon. Maybe this summer. Ooh, now I can actually bankroll my own project! Exciting!

We close with a Wembley-pic. It was her birthday on Thursday. She's a big girl of two. I am going to miss my long days at home with her when I start my job. Maybe, when we move downtown and I can walk to work, she can be the office dog and come with me! Here, she is in one of her favourite hangouts: 'daddy's' knee. Such a snuggler...