11.15.07
Posted in Anything goes, Uncategorized, cooking, knitting and crocheting at 8:23 pm by Administrator
Yesterday Brian was in the mood to bake. Oh boy, oh boy! Aside from the mess he makes when he takes over the kitchen, I love it when he’s in the mood to cook because he’s actually pretty good at it. Yesterday he cooked pumpkin pie! Which reminded me that there was a guy we met at the market who asked us what we were going to do with the pumpkins. . . Eh, make pie? He seemed surprised that we were actually using real pumpkins, ha ha! It dawned on me that some people don’t make their own pies, and some that say they make their own pies only buy the ready made pie crusts and pumpkin filling from a can. Basically, they open a can, dump the contents into the ready-made crust, then bake. Instant pie! So, since I got to sit back and fool around while he cooked, I took some pictures of his ingredients:
We prefer to make things from scratch if possible, including the pie crusts. Usually we use whole wheat for the crust, but this time Brian wanted to try buckwheat. The first step is to bake the pumpkins. We cut them open and scrape out the seeds. We bake the seeds in a separate dish so that we can eat them later. This is what the pumpkins looked like after they were baked. The baked seeds are in the dish off to the left.
After the pumpkins are baked, they are blended up with the ingredients to make the filling. This is what Brian’s pies looked like after they came out of the oven:
I know we had more pie dishes, but they seem to disappear. I’m thinking we leave them at other places like my mom’s house when we take stuff over there. Sometimes I end up with some of her dishes, and she ends up with some of our dishes, ha ha! So Brian used one of our rectangular dishes to use make up the rest of the pies. While Brian was working on those, I decided to continue working on the gansey I was making for Matthew. This is how it looked:
I was able to get the second arm on. I thought I was done, but I’m thinking that I want to add a few more inches at the bottom. It turned out a tad shorter than I would like, so after I get that one, I’ll take another picture. But in the meantime, it’s pretty much done! My very first full-sized gansey! AND it is my very own design, too! The pattern on the table was my guide, but I had to change most of the pattern due to the gauge of yarn. Then I found that the pattern actually has two mistakes! I worked it out after much frustration, but now I know better. Anyway, here’s what it looks like now.
I didn’t even finish the gansey before Brian already put in a request for me to knit up for him. This is what it looked like when I got started on it.
Can’t tell what it is? How ’bout now?
Well that’s what it looked like last night. Below is what it looks like now. But Brian hasn’t seen it, yet. Shhhhhh.
It’s a knitted dickey that he requested. I saw a picture of one like on the net, and made my own pattern. I hope he likes it. It’s still sitting on the table, so he should see it when he gets in. I’ve actually never owned one of these before, but it’s what he wanted, ha!–A knitted dickey to keep his neck warm when he goes out at night. It’s made of organic merino wool from Treliske in New Zealand. It’s not dyed, so that’s the natural wool color. I guess here in LA a full sweater is just too hot! Matthew’s gonna burn up in his new gansey. . . But he asked for it! And I sure had fun knitting it up, heheh. So now I’m off to work on my other projects. I’ve got a few going on right now. Will report back on those later.
Okay, time for dinner!
Marlakins 
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11.06.07
Posted in Anything goes, History, Uncategorized at 1:08 pm by Administrator
Last night Brian and I went to see American Gangster starring Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe. Wow, what a story! I realize Hollywood must have embellished or Hollywood-ized the story, but it was based on a true story. True stories always catch my eye.
I’m assuming many people have already heard or read about the drug involvement with our military during the Vietnam war. Some go so far as to say that a lot of the Vietnam war was about drugs (the Golden Triangle stuff and all). But this American Gangster story puts in another angle to how big the drug business has been and likely still is right here in the United States. After all, anyone who has been exposed to world history is somewhat familiar with the Opium War between the British and the Chinese. Basically the story goes that the British wanted to do trade with China in the 1700s and China wasn’t interested. China felt that they had all they needed and did not care for the goods that the British wanted to trade. However, the British still wanted to trade with China and what opened the door for trade was opium. The British found that the Chinese wanted opium. According to some history books, the British started out in 1736 with exporting about 400 chests (which contained about 45 pounds or 100 kilograms of opium) into China, but eventually worked their way up to 30,000 chests by 1850. That’s a lot of opium! And I bet they were making mega bucks. I think that’s an amazing story in itself, but history tends to repeat itself and human nature appears to have remained the same through the centuries. Namely, many people were corrupt and corruptible.
As in the opium trades between Britain and China had corrupt officials, so did Americans and the southeast Asians. According to movie, Frank Lucas employed military personnel to transport his heroin from Southeast Asia into the United States. This article even states that, “the CIA knew all about his shipments and even made it possible for Lucas to bring the dope to America. Lucas was such an astute businessman that he even had the mob, the Sicilians and Mexicans as clients. Everybody wanted what Lucas was peddling.” Frank Lucas was in the business of selling pure heroin which became known on the streets as “blue magic.” He was eventually caught, but not without exposing many, many corrupt NY nacrotics police personel in the process. It is said that during his conviction, 3/4ths of the NYPD Narcotics division was found to be corrupt and involved with drug dealings. Wow! That’s more than half of their division! Just goes to show that people will succumb to temptations. If 3/4ths of the NYPD Narcotics division was corrupt back then in the 1960 and 1970s, what’s to stop them today? Even after a 100 years after the opium wars, it appears that human nature has not changed. Corruption and greed are likely still alive and well.
This movie made me think more about all these businesses I see one after the other as I drive around Los Angeles. I look inside and lots of them seem to have no customers inside. How do they stay in business like that? Are they all legit? Or are some of these businesses fronts for more clandestine dealings? Not long ago I was looking at these buildings in a different light when I was reading about “human body parts for transplantation.” What strange things are going on right in my neighborhood? Now I look at these buildings and wonder which ones are dealing in drugs, ha ha! I shouldn’t laugh at that, but I think it’s part of what my sons say about me, that at times I have dark humor. My take is that learning about some of these things makes me cynical. For instance, I know that there must be some legit businesses. Yet, the other side of me wonders every so often as I drive by some of the incredible mansions that are in Los Angeles and Beverly Hills, what business are these people in to have such opulence? Who are they stealing from or hurting? Or screwing? Ha! Normal comforts I can see are many times earned honestly, but I wonder what percentage of the ultra wealthy acquire their money through corruption and extortion?
Okay, so really quickly back to the movie, American Gangster, I think Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe did a great job. Who ever directed it or wrote the scripts also did well. The movie turned out not to be as violent as I was afraid it might have been, but just enough to give you an idea of what was going on (which I appreciate because while I don’t like to watch violence, I am also disturbed at times when terrible events are watered down. Catch 22, I know). Basically, it had a real story to tell, and it was told well.
Okay, I’m off to make myself useful.
Toodles!
Marlakins
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11.04.07
Posted in Anything goes, Uncategorized, knitting and crocheting at 9:51 pm by Administrator
My sister called me this morning to go shopping at the Grove. First we had lunch, and then we hit the stores. They were already setting up Christmas decorations, and this time one of my mysteries finally got solved. . . How or where do they get such HUGE Christmas trees? The trees are real for sure. Not only are they huge, they are perfectly formed and taller than the two story department stores. I have always wondered, “where do they get those trees?” Well, today I found out. I’m sure other people have known this secret, but I’m slow, ha! This is what I saw. . .
Notice the crane. The tree was too tall to get the top in the picture. Uh, notice the “bottom” of the tree. Looks a little sparse, huh? Just to get a better idea of the size of this tree, take a look at the size of the man in the crane.
What’s he doing in there? I didn’t see any Christmas tree decorations. But what I did see were lots of these on the ground. I drew in a red arrow to show the base of the tree with no branches or needles.
And more stacked up here.
Cripes! It finally dawned on me that they were “assembling” the Christmas tree! First they plant a big tree “trunk” in the ground. Then they nail in live branches. Talk about living in fairytale land. We city folks aren’t only removed from where food comes from and where it’s processed, but even our Christmas trees are not what they seem, ha ha! And here I thought they find just the right tree and just decorate it, ha ha ha!
Okay, so moving along to something I know a little more about. . . yarn. . . My mom called me the other day and told me that she found some of my old yarn stash in her garage, ack! So I went down to visit her and sure enough, she had bags of more of my old yarn. One bag contained crocheted sampler squares that I was working on to make an afghan. I had completely forgotten about those squares! The receipt in the bag was dated January 1990, ha ha! But I couldn’t have found those squares at a better time. The ladies at my knit group informed me that they are giving away some knitted items for charity and wanted to know if I had anything to give. This particular group is for babies (oh, I love those little tykes!). But I really wanted to start my Christmas gift knitting instead of working for charity at this moment. Soooo,
now that I found those old squares which were kept clean in plastic bags, I decided to just sew a few of them up and “bingo!” instant baby afghan, ha ha! So fate has been on my side since not only did I find those made squares, today was the time change! One hour extra! Perfect! This morning while all were still asleep in my house, I picked out a few squares and started to assemble. Here’s what I decided to put together.
I know they’re not the best baby colors, but oh well, they should keep a little baby warm. Here’s what it looked like after I assembled it and put a border around it. Nine Lives and Clarence, my new knitting mascot, came to make an inspection.
Clarence is standing on top of the pile of the other squares that I can assemble for another blanket. But I think the nine squares makes a good size for a newborn or a stroller afghan. Nine Lives and Clarence decided to try out the afghan to see if it was warm and comfy enough. . .
Looks like I’ve got their approval! Yay! Now I can continue with my other projects, yet still be able to contribute with the other ladies AND put those squares to good use! 
Okay, I’m off to try to be more productive. Oh boy, oh boy, I love this time of year!
Marlakins
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11.03.07
Posted in Historical Trivia, Uncategorized, knitting and crocheting at 7:22 pm by Administrator
Halloween is past. I didn’t find any goblins to chase, heheh. My birthday was the next day, Nov 1. It was a pretty good day. All the people who “forgot” my birthday and trickled in belated birthday wishes last year “remembered” this year. I guess I made a big enough stink last year that they remembered this year and were timely and even early, ha ha ha! But it was so sweet especially since I honestly don’t make that big a deal of my birthday. Just fun to tease. . . But this year was nice from birthday wishes from family and friends, to shopping for yarn sales, to even getting a free video rental at the video store because they just like to give free rentals on your birthday. Thanks Hollywood Video!
I got a cute little stuffed Manx Loaghtan sheep as a present! I love him, but still have not come up with a name. I’ve decided he will be my official knitting mascot. He’s already doing a fine job keeping my newly acquired rug yarn in order(as well as a few balls of sock yarn that I’m hoping to knit up for Christmas presents).
I’ve been wanting to make rugs for my bathrooms for soooo long, but have not found suitable yarn until now. Thank you Nettie’s Needlecraft! I know I’ll have to wait until after Christmas to start working on it, but I couldn’t pass up the yarn sale and all those colors!
Another thing I had been wanting to work on for a while now is a full-sized gansey. I have not had a chance to get the right gauge and fiber yarn for the pattern I have, so decided to just find a yarn my son likes and adjust the pattern to the gauge of yarn I have. He’s very picky with what fibers he wears against his skin, so I decided to let him pick the yarn and just knit him one and see how it goes. So here’s a picture of it in the works with my new pal (mascot) inspecting my work, heheheh.
Since I was already altering the pattern in terms of gauge, I decided to also alter the pattern above the gusset because I wanted the sweater to be original for my son, and also because I wanted to have a little more fun stitching than just doing plain ribs throughout the whole thing. I hope it comes out right. . . So far, so good. . . The yarn I’m using for this is 100% Peruvian Highland Wool. It’s distributed by Cascade Yarns and is one of their ecological wools. I like how it’s a nice big hank, too. It comes in 8.75oz with approximately 478 yards. The whole portion pictured above is knit with just one skein. There is just a little left over one the side left loose. I’ve knit in the round, so it also has a back, but only half way up. Since I have two more full hanks, I should have some left over yarn when I’m done with the sweater. The yarn instructions suggests using a size 10 needles(my Gansey pattern calls for size 2, ha ha!), but I’m using size 8. I hope I didn’t shoot myself in the foot doing that when I get to the neckline. Well see.
I do have some other projects I’m working on as well that I didn’t take pictures of. Maybe next blog entry for those.
Looking back at other Nov 1st, I recall 1999 when I had my very first red blood cell transfusion. Yep, that was “not” a happy birthday. Thank God this year was much, much more pleasant!
This year a bit of news caught my eye for Nov 1. Evidently, the pilot for the Enola Gay died. My feelings on that are mixed. I know everyone has a purpose in life just like Judas Iscariot. And while I don’t think that we should necessarily badger him and his family for dropping the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and killing literally thousands of people (after all why should we be surprised about that in wartime? He was following higher orders. . . ), neither do I think he should be idolized or held up in high honor. This reminds me that there are some hard concepts in the Bible to understand. One particular concept that had me bothered in the past was God’s feels for Esau and Jacob. Particularly the portion in the Bible which reads, “As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.” I used to feel sad that God hated Esau. It made me realize that God does hate some people, but why? My thoughts are that God knew what kind of a man Esau was going to be since God is, was, and will be. Esau was a man who did not value his birthright and forfeited it for a mere bowl of soup. But even so he had a purpose in life, as did Judas, Pilot, Herod, etc, and even Paul Tibbets, the pilot for the Enola Gay.
The full article for the passing of Paul Tibbets can be read here. Interestingly, Tibbets requested no headstone, so that dissenters would not have his grave site as a meeting place for protest. The article stated that he wanted his ashes to be spread across the English Channel where he loved to fly during the war. Also, I didn’t know that there was controversy when part of the Enola Gay was displayed at the Smithsonian Institute in 1995. I actually visited the museum at that time and have some pictures next to it in my photo albums. It was around this time of year that I visited it, too. That was sometime in October 1995.
Okay, I started out writing feeling upbeat, but now feel down, ack! So will stop here and get on with my other projects. Better buckle down before I end up not finishing in time for Christmas. Just a couple more weeks and Thanksgiving will be here, yikes! That just reminds me that I have to place my order for a whole organic turkey now!
Marlakins
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