WIP Wrestling and Shawl Crawling

falkenberg2
Originally uploaded by BerlinerBabe

I'm signed up for 2 events on the Ravelrympics which is to be honest, a bit over ambitious for me. I've also signed up for the group 'over committed' which appears to reflect my knitting character extremely accurately. Actually not just knitting. I'm over committed to all of my craft projects. At least the ravelympics is kind of keeping me on the straight and narrow for a change although I am still project, social life and gym juggling but hey that's what makes life interesting.

The blue thing in the photo is where I'd got to with the Hanne Falkenberg I bought a while ago before getting annoyed with the german instructions and bannishing it to the naughty corner. Its now decided to behave and now that I've read the instructions about 40, I'm begining to get used to them the jacket is knitting up quite nicely now. I'm on the increases for he back and collar. Looooooong rows of plain knitting which is fairly useful when you're watching the olympics. Its also my WIP Wrestling team project. I've still to start the shawl crawl project but I'm saving that for the final stretch.

My favorite event so far is the swimming. I keep hoping that big headed American, what's his name, no not Bush, Phelps. That's it. That he'll get beaten by some obscure swimmer from a tiny wee country but he keeps winning. I suppose its swings and round-a-bouts. I mean last time round it was the dutch and the aussies who cleaned the medal cupboard out. This time round its the U.S.
I'm quite glad that van der Hoogenband isnt' swiming this year. In 2004 I was geting earache from all of the mispronounciactions of his name. That and Inge de Bruijn. Actually the dutch swimmers should just change there name to something everyone can pronounce. It would make the life of the commentators a lot easier.

I've also been on my travels again and brought back loads of goodies from Liberty's. I managed to get 20 balls of Rowan damask for 20 quid and 10 balls of kid silk night for 18.75 or something equally as ridiculous in price. If that's not enough to make the average knitter jealous as hell. I'm off to Bayern in October for.... well for work really but I managed to plan it so that it coincided with the Wollfest again. Sneaky or what? I've already e-mailed the Wollmeise to warn her of the Berlin sacking of her stall. Well maybe not quite but I do expect to be coming back to Berlin with a trolley case full to bursting and yes I will be bringing back goodies for the stricktreffers so don't worry.

Then to really rub salt into the wounds. I'm off to the big craft fair in Brimingham in November. It should be good. Last time I went in Scotland I came out with nothing. I was really dissapointed so went on a spending spree at John Lewis to cheer me up. The rowan rep there is really nice and she told me about the big fair in Birmingham and that a lot of wool suppliers only go there and don't bother with the Scottish one. Well if Mohamed won't come to the mountain then this Scottish Ben (Scottish for mountain) will go there. Hmph.

Chrismitts

I've finished my first pair of Chrismitts. That's my christmas mittens project. Okay I know that its July and that the temperatures are in the 30's but who cares. If I want to knit everyone mittens for christmas 2008 then quite honestly, I should have started in July 2007. Anyway. I'm well chuffed with the result of these ones. The pattern is from the Selbuvotter book and I really like it. These are knitted in Lang's sock wool and Wollmeise's rhubarb (rabarber in german I think). I like the colour change of the contrast colour. It makes the knitting interesting.

I think the next ones will be gloves and at the same time I still need to get Frank's NEC/St Pauli mittens finished. Well I've always got a million projects on at the same time so another one won't make any difference. I know that once I've done those then there will more than likely be a request for another pair for a couple of his friends who are die hard NEC and StPauli fans but they can wait till everyone else has their mittens, socks, jumpers, shawls and a few things which I would like to knit for me.

I've not yet added piccies from our holiday on the bikes but I will try and remember to do that tonight or tomorrow. I also need to update ravelry with some project, stash and other stuff photies. I'm diversing again. We didn't quite make it back to Berlin on the bikes but we did get to the old east/west border and then got the train back from Hizenacker or whatever its called. my achillies got rather sore which is why we stopped there. Otherwise it was straight up the Elbe and then onto the Havel and futher to Berlin but I suppose these things happen. I would still like to do the rest of the journey. Maybe do Berlin Hizenacker or something.

I'm off to Stricktreff now as its Wednesday and its stricktreff and that's what I like to do on Wednesday's.

Kip day

Me on ameland knitting in my rugby gear. Playing again tomorrow and knitting too probably.

Schlepping Projects

I thought I would post my latest schlepping (carry round) WIP. Its waving lace socks from the favorite socks book and its in wollmeise Storm. I frogged the waving lace in wollery dopio (rusty red colour) as I've heard that it shrinks in the wash and I'm a 'if the socks can't get washed in the washing machine then I'm not knitting them' kind of girl so off to the frog pond they went. I think the wool is much more suited to a shawl or even the colour bits in my mittens and gloves for everyone's christmas project. I've still to start that but I intend to while I'm on my hollibags. The holiday knitting should be the above mentioned socks and mittens and maybe if I'm lucky, I might pick up something along the way.

Also I've kind of split my knitting into types of project. Home projects and Schlepping round with me projects. At home there are various things OTN and the little amount of time I've been spending at home lately I've been working on that Anne Falkenberg thing. Its easy knitting especially with the loooooooong rows of knit stitch. I don' t have to concentrate too much. Not like in the begining. And to break up the monotony, I have my schlepping projects.

I know that most folks will be meeting up and knitting somewhere in the sun this weekend however, I'll be on a beach in the middle of a rugby tournament knitting in between games. Should be fun and I will try to keep the sand out of the wool although since I can't keep the sand out of my bag usually I've not got much chance. After that we're off on our bikes again. This time from NL back to Berlin. Should be fun and not very hilly so we might have a chance of actually reaching our destination. We won't be doing the direct route which is a bit boring but the coastal route and well, if we get bored or saddle sore, we can always jump on a train back to Berlin or to somewhere sunny.

I'm still gym bunnying away but the numbers on the scales keep going up the way. Hoping that's to do with the weather and not the increased consumption of ice-cream. Well it is hot

I'm back

Yep its me, in my motorhead baseball hat and the vertrans 10's trophy. I am actually old enough to play the vets rugby now (yes but I look like a wee spring chicken and no arguments about that)but for our tournament I'm the wrong sex so I just got to pretend for a bit.
The tournament went really well. I got 20 womens teams in so I was really chuffed and top notch teams they were too. I got to go on a boat trip with the Mens South African national 7's team which was excellent fun and the lads were really really nice. I also managed to do the announcements for the Women's European Championship games which kicked off on the Saturday night. By the time it had all finished on Sunday I was so tired, i couldn't even drink beer. Actually that's not entirely true. I could drink beer, just not Heineken. I hate the stuff now. I think my tastebuds are now in tune with the more refined german stuff. Anyway, everyone worked really hard and my mates Tessa and Sarah are stars :o) coz they ran me around, put me up and generally just helped me out loads.

I got absolutely no knitting done almost the whole time I was in A'dam. I did knit on the way there though. I started a sock which I had to frog as it was too big but that was it. Before I went I finished the swallow tail shawl in KSN purple stuff with glitter. Photo will follow when I get around to blocking it. I slept near enough the whole way back on the train so no knitting done there but since I've been back I've done 1.5 socks. I've had visitors as well and I do feel that I'm not paying them enough attention if I sit and knit while they're here. This weekend I have some more visitors and I need to get 0.5 of the other sock finished before they arrive as the socks are a sort of belated b'day pressie for one of them. Hopefully I'll get the top part of the sock finished tonight.

My wish to turn into a gym bunny is slowly working, I'm just trying now to work up the courage to get my knitting out while on the exercise bike as I feel it cuts down on my hobby time. I mean I don't mind reading while I'm on the bike but I'm not sure about knitting yet. I have read knitting books and patterns while cycling to nowhere so the next logical step would be to whip out the pins and knit in time to the pedals. We'll see.

Book Quiz and stuff.

Was at stricktreff last night and it was great fun. I did more treffing than stricking as I made a mistake with the swallowtail shawl. Yes I've moved on already. The other stuff has not been forgotten but I'd been sorting out my stash when I came across some lovely kid silk night in a purpley plum colour. It was there sparkling and blinking at me saying 'knit me please' so i did. I'm on the 2nd graph of lilly of the valley lace and I don't like it. I'm glad that there is only a few more rows to go before that stops. I think its the yarn and the needles that makes it all the more difficult to purl 5 together on the return rows.

I'm also turning into a gym bunny (Well I'm trying) I went last night before stricktreff and got myself a new training schedule. This one involves coming to the gym 5 times per week and bouncing around on the cross trainer rather a lot. I did 30 mins on the cross trainer and 30 mins on the bike, sweated like a pig and felt great afterwards. Although my toes did go slightly numb. Maybe once some kilos have gone, they won't go as numb. Also I need to be perfectly honest with myself. I DO have time to go 5 times per week. I mean what else do I do apart from sit at home and knit? And to make it less tedious - yes bouncing around on the cross trainer can be very tedious - I've to break up the training days, so 2 days off per week and not one after the other. This does mean that I have to go to the gym at some point over the weekend. Fingers crossed that I manage to keep it up.

I got this from SaRi's blog and thought that it would be fun. Quite appropriate book concidering the gym bunny stuff and the fact that I do talk about rabbits :o)

You're Watership Down!

by Richard Adams

Though many think of you as a bit young, even childish, you're
actually incredibly deep and complex. You show people the need to rethink their
assumptions, and confront them on everything from how they think to where they
build their houses. You might be one of the greatest people of all time. You'd
be recognized as such if you weren't always talking about talking rabbits.


Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

Wips

This is my current WIP. Its Laminaria from knitty. I'm not putting in the link coz the blog police always think that I'm a spam blogger and cut me off for weeks at a time. Okay so that was a slight exaggeration and its normally only for a couple of days at a time but its a pain especially when you're an infrequent blogger like myself. The wool is from Wollmeise in deepest darkest Bayern and the colour is Pfauen fädern I think. They are really pretty colours when in the skein but I'm not so sure about them now that they're knitted. I think this might be a present for someone. We'll see.
I've also decided I like the term Work in Progress or WIP much better than UFO. In that case I have tonnes of them. Another WIP (started yesterday) is the Hanna Valkenberg or however you spell her name's Gloria. Its kind of petroly blue colours and very nice. Its kind of wierd to knit and they didn't have the english pattern so I'm knitting auf deutsch but its going okay so far. Its quite complicated but the woman in the shop was right. Just follow the instructions to the letter and it works. Because I'm having to concentrate on the german thing, I'm not making as many mistakes as I normally would with a new style of knitting so I would strike the 'its going okay' and change it to ' I'm quite pleased so far'. We'll see how far I get with it before i get bored again.
Fank's boat warmers are finished. Well his feet are the size of boats so the socks can be classed as boat warmers.
Off to sort out some 7's stuff now. One cancellation and one other team from the waiting list in, Its going well.

Phone mitten

This is my new phone mit. Most folks have phone socks but not me. I've got a wee latvian mit.
Okay so it was originally knitted for neefje steefje but he won't mind coz he's too big for it already and I only knitted one. I've got a wonderful new phone and I can blog instantly from it so I might just be able to keep this up to date for a change.

What's been happening lately? Too much if truth be told. One funeral after another, one business trip after another etc and not enough time either in Berlin or with the knitting needles

On a more positive note, my Mum retired and had a great retirement party. She got some really nice presents and is so far enjoying every minute of being retired. The first official day of retirement, I dragged her into a bookies to pick up my winnings from the Scotland v England game at Murrayfield (yes I was there and Scotland won). Its the first time she'd ever been inside a bookies in her life.

AAC (my old rugby team in amsterdam) won the championships after a fantastic final against Tilburg. I even got to run out onto the pitch with the team. Okay so that was by accident and I had a couple of beers in my hand at the time. I also I got rather inebriated during the celebrations and lost my lovely pink phone, hence the reason for my new lovely phone which isn't pink but it does have a phone mitten.

Jules and the Beaniestalk

Once Upon a Time in a land far, far away lived a young (no comments on my choice of adjective here please) knitter named Julie. She loved to knit and had many, many projects on the go at one time. Some might say that she was a project butterfly as she would flit from one to the other.
One fine winter's day while cycling to work, she realised that her ears were frozen solid and decided that she would knit herself some sort of device for keeping her ears toastie warm so that they wouldn't fall off. After finishing her work for the day, she cycled home and looked up patterns on the internet and to her delight she found the pattern for Calometry.
Immediately she cast on the stitches with some very precious yarn and knitted the whole thing in one go, sewed on a button and Bob's your Auntie, she had a headthing that would keep her ears toastie warm throughout the winter. What she didn't realise is that this wonderful yarn was magic and that each time she wore the headthing, it would grow and grow and grow.
After wearing it a couple of times and having her ears kept toastie warm she noticed that she had to use the next button hole along, and then the next and the next until after StrickMittwoch at the Aurum, even though she had her head thing on, her ears were no longer toastie and there was a force 10 hurricane blowing along between the head thing and her ears. This would not do at all and she struggled home on her bike regardless of the cold wind biting at her ears.
Once home and warm she grabbed the magic headthing and wrestled with it untill it started to unravel. She wrestled and wrestled until it was neatly wound into a ball then set about designing a beanie hat with holes in it for her pigtails. That done, she cast on with the magic yarn once again but this time with only 80 stitches in a 2x2 rib in the round and once 2.5 inches (6cm) was knitted, she made 2, 1 row button holes exactly where her pigtails should go. She's now nearly finished the Beaniestalk and is looking forward to wearing it all through the winter, having toastie ears again and living happily ever after with the rest of her projects

TADAAAAA!!!!!

I did it, I got the head thingie done in a one sit knit and it fits and its warm and I've fallen in lurv with Noro Silk Garden.

I bought that skien a looooooong time ago and its been waiting for the right project to grab its attention. I think I bought the skien about 3 years ago and I just bought one for petting purposes as its kind of expensive. Anyway my ears will be toastie on the way to work. I can fit my headphones under the calorimetry thing and I can keep the pigtails. I've got a really nice baker's boy hat but I have to put my piggintails lower than usual and I don't like to. Either that I have to wear my hair down and I don't like that either. I feel already that me and my headthing are going to be very good friends this winter.

Oh and I've made a strange discovery. Well bunny has made the discovery, I just witnessed it. She likes apple and ginger tea. I had a cup of it sitting next to me on the floor which had gone cold. She stuck her head in the cup and started drinking. Strange bunny. Anyway I put some in a wee bowl for her so that she doesn't get her head stuck in the mug. It was bad enough of her doing the superman impression with the paper shopping bag, having to take her to the vet with a mug on her head would not be good.

Shopping around

It really does pay off. I know that you may wonder at the title of the book I just ordered (see photo to the left) but its one of my knitting things so don't wonder too much about it but you can guess what everyone is getting next year for christmas.

Anyway, this little piece of advice covers books and other items which you may want to purchase online. I ordered this from Amazon.com and got it including shipping for €23.35 which in comparison with what I can get it for on the Amazon.uk or .de is a complete bargin. UK want £27 (approx €34) and DE want €35 for it and that's not including shipping fees so I've managed to save myself.....think....think....think....10 beers if buying at the rugby club on a training night, 6 small beers if buying at the Village Voice and 4 large beers if buying at the Oscars.

Its stricktreff on Saturday at the Opern Café and since its like knitting at the cinema (loud and dark) I'll take along some mindless knitting. That way, when I get back home and discover all of the mistakes, I can easily correct them. I'm making it sound like torture which isn't true. The company is good, the cakes are yummy and its a lot of fun.

I've just printed out the pattern to Calorimetry which would make a good one skien wonder project for me. I'll add it to my ravelry thing and tonight I'm gonig to break my 'finish one thing before I start another' rule coz I reckon that I can knit that quite quickly and use it before my ears freeze off.

Right I'm off home to cast on.

Out of the Dumps

As opposed to down in the dumps.

Apologies to those who actually read my blog and have been getting a bit fed up with October's post. I've been a bit off colour lately but I'm now back to being freckle faced and rosie cheeked so that means more blogging.

I was going to post some piccies from France and Scotland when we were there on our delayed honeymoon but........I managed to lose all of the honeymoon photies so absolutely no piccies of Sean Lamont's bum. I will try to get a couple more close ups of it though in February when I go to see Scotland play France in the 6 nations. My camera/computer decided not to be very compatable and unformated the picture files before they could be saved. Unfortunatley nothing or no-one could re-format them and they got deleted. I was a bit upset to say the least but it was photos mostly of France and Sean Lamont's bum and he's already posed for the stad de france calander for this year and anyone can get piccies of France.

What I did manage to download onto the computer was our piccies of New Year in the middle of nowhere or Fort Augustus to be a bit more accurate. Its the southern most tip of Loch Ness and lies nestled between Fort William and Inverness. Its very picturesque and the way up is pretty spectactular too. I've got some more photies of that which I will post in a bit. The good thing about being in the middle of nowhere is that you have to chill out which I very much needed to do. We did manage to drag our lazy bones to a ceilidh (pronounced Kaylay) which is a proper scottish party on hogmanay (scottish word for new year's eve) and did a bit of hooching and chooching. Joris and Bernie had never been to or seen anything like it in their lives and were mesmerized by the traditional dancing. I even manged to drag Frank up onto the dancefloor a total of 3 times. 2 times for the Gay Gordon's and once for Strip the Willows. Oh and before I get another spam blogger ban, those are the names of 2 of the dances.

I also got some knitting done and my new year's resolution is to stick to projects and get them finished before starting new ones. Actually that resolution was already made before the new year and I've been sticking to it. So far I've finished 1.75 pairs of socks and I'm knitting a jumper for myself in the round as it's a raglan sleeve so easier to do without seams. I like it that way. I'll get round to posting photo's of them soon. My camera doesn't take very good piccies with the flash on. Yet another reason to get a new one.

Anyway here's some of the photo's from Glen Coe and the hills surrounding Loch Ness. The last one is especially for those of you who can read dutch.

Back in the BRD

I know that I've not blogged for ages and I'm firmly on my way to hell as i have been paving the way with good intentions for ages now but I'm blaming it on post-holiday-blues.

I had such a good time. I even met Andy Nichol. For those of you who don't know him. He's the next best thing to god on the rugby pitch. Well for me anyway. He played for Scotland for years and is an incredibly nice man. Does more commentating than playing now but he's still wonderful.

The World Cup is now over and the only consolation about South Africa winning is that England didn't (sorry to all my english friends out there)



I've been knitting like a fiend too however I don't appear to be finishing anything. I'm a project buterfly. Well I could thing of other adjectives to describe this sort of behavior but I won't go into that just now as I've already offended half of my friends with england rugby comment. I've got socks, mittens, jackets, shawls and everything else imaginable on the needles and nothing appears to be getting finished. That's not entirely ture as Frank's mittens are doing okay and Its almost 1 down and start on the 2nd asap as he's now wearing socks over his hands on the way to work. (yes ladies and gents, its that cold in Berlin) I on the other hand (pardon the pun) have been wearing an odd glove/mitten combination so I will need to be knitting some mittens for myself too.



Regarding rugby, things are going okay. So far we've lost all of our games and I've had various injuries, including some stud shaped bruising under my chin. Don't ask me how that happened, I don't know. The girls are getting better though and even though the last score doesn't reflect how we played, it was still an improvement. Last night we worked on aggression at the training. It went quite well and all the old excercises which Eric taught us at AAC are coming out of the closet. Game experience comes into it too and some of them are chalking up a lot of experience. Oh and I've been invited to the national selections - now don't go getting any ideas. I've not lost 20kg, and gained mega fitness in 2 months. There's a trainers workshop there too and I'll be going to that.

I'm off out now. Goning out to celebrate Happy Pay Day to me but will need to go somewhere where they do nice salads. I'm back on the diet and 3.5kg lighter than I was at the begining of the week. I also want to go to the flicks but know that I will be tempted by the popcorn. I know that there is not many calories in popcorn. Calories are not the problem. Carbohydrates are.

Will post piccies tomorrow if I get the chance

Honeymoon

Its a bit unusual to be blogging from one's honeymoon but since I forgot to post a message before I left, I thought I might post one now. I'm about half way through my holibags and I'm having a great time. Took the night train to Basel, got on another 3 trains in total to get to St Etienne and watched Scotland beat Portugal.
We then got on our bikes and started the journey to Paris. We're not talking motorbikes here so it goes a bit slower than on the back of a kaiwasaki, honda or harley. The first day cycling was mostly down hill and we stayed a a lovey wee camping a ferme in Feurs. The 2nd day was probably the hardest and we managed 4 very steep hills. Going up wasn't so much fun but coming down was excellent. There are however some disadvantages to coming down hill at very high speeds when you're all hot and sweaty from cycling up hill. I manged not to think about what all those tour de france guys do on decents, did not wrap up warm and ended up with a throat infection or mal de gore as they call it in France. Sounds much more serious in french I think. runing out of time at the internet cafe will post more later

Homesick?

The simple answer to that is NO. All I have to do is look out of the window at all that lovely rain and the homesick feeling dissappears fast. Just now the rain is bouncing almost up to the windowsill here at work and that's pretty high up off of the ground. The lighting and the thunder haven't stopped for the last 30 mins and light outside would suggest that its midnight not midday. In fact its so dark out there, the streetlights have come on. At least its better at this time of day. 2 nights ago it was between 3am and 5.30am and even with earplugs in I could still hear it so you can guess who arrvied at work with a sunny outlook. Well it wasn't me so don't look at me with that tone of voice.

On the knitting front, I've done a few things. I've knitting 1.5 pairs of Obelix socks. That's Frank's old old rugby club in NL. They have one yellow sock and one green. Mr Obelix (Patrick) will be a daddy very soon so I've knitted baby's first obelix socks. The pair that are finished are newborn size and the 0.5 of the pair is a few months old size. Just one green one to do and I'll send them off. I'm also still working on the cable rib socks but I think I'll have to rip out a bit as my gauge is a bit tight. Might have to go up a needle size if it continues.

Only 2.5 weeks to go till we're off on our honeymoon. I know its a year after the big event but timing isn't everything. We've decided to cycle from St Etienne to Paris before picking up our train to London and then Glasgow. At the moment all I can think of is 'ouch' my bum is going to hurt but it should be a load of fun. Its mostly downhill so it won't be too much work on the legs and I'm hoping that France in September will not be as wet as Berlin in August. If it is then we'll camp out at hotel and jump on a train.

Rugby wise I've not been doing much. I will be going training on Thrusday though as I like the ground better when its a bit wet and muddy. Makes sliding tackles all the more fun. I've also agreed to take on the position of forwards trainer after my holiday so that should be fun. I've never done that before so it will be something new for all of us.

Too hot to knit?

I know that the title might raise some eyebrows as there are knitters is far hotter places than Berlin however, yesterday was sooo hot and sticky even after the thunder storms that it really was too hot to knit. I went along to stricktreff taking along my embossed leaves socks to play with and ended up knitting about 5 rows and making 50 mistakes.

I wasn't the only one. Most of the srticktreff maedels felt the same way and we ended up packing up our stuff early and just chitchatting for a while before heading home a whole hour before normal. Still I did come home with the new filati book thanks to Bettina (thank you) Its got some really nice designs in it which I quite fancy knitting up soon.

When I came home I ripped out the embossed leaves and started designing my skull and crossbones for the st pauli argyle socks which I want to knit. As Im not working this morming (still a bit woozy from yesterday's migrane) and its no longer so hot and sticky. I knitted a swatch. Yes me readers, ME. I actually knitted a swatch. Now normally I never swatch for socks. I do occassionally for other projects but for socks.....well....this is the first time. Okay so the colours are not what I'll be using but it will be the same make of yarn. However before I go out and get the other colours I need I think I'll make a very loud pair of argyles just for fun and to practice. Glad I've got the jolly roger all sorted though. I'think they will make very fun socks when I get around to knitting them.

Beerfested

On Friday evening I went to heaven. Don't worry, I didn't get knocked off my bike again, I went to the beermeile in Berlin. 2.2km of beer and crap music. Well some folks liked the music but I tend to think of german Schlagermusik as something I have to put up with if I want to enjoy beer festivals in Germany. I enjoyed the beer so much that I spend most of saturday and sunday on the couch finishing these. That's Frank modeling them for me. As you can see, they're very short but that's what he wanted, so that's what he got. The yarn is a bamboo mix which his nibbs loves. He swears that they make his feet less smelly and I tend to agree with him so I'll keep making them until his entire sock drawer is full of them. These are knitted up on 2mm's as the yarn is very thin and on the 2.5mm's the stitches were just too loose. The yarn is by Online and was half the price of the Regia Bamboo but we'll see if its any different in wearability, washability and general comfyness. Actually its tough if he likes the Regia better coz I've got another ball of the Online stuff and some left over from the ball that I made these out of. I tend to have these type of socks as an ongoing project for when I don't need to concentrate too much on what I'm knitting. You see his feet are huge and especially with the 2mm needles, it seems to take forever to get a foot done.

I've also had loads of mails from people concerned about my friend Jeroen. He's doing better now. The collar will be coming off soon and he's moving around quite the thing. He says himself that it looks a lot worse than it was but still, its a bit of a shocker. Its making me seriously concider buying one of those really ugly but very safe cycling helmets. When I think of the amount of times I've been nearly knocked off my bike or actually knocked off my bike here in Berlin, I think that it might actually be useful to have and to wear one. I might look daft but at least I've got less chance of having my brains splattered across the pavement or road. Just wonder if they do them in Frank's size. He's got a rather large head as well as feet.

I'm now on another 2 pairs of socks. Still finishing the jitterbug socks. They have just not turned out the way I wanted them to but they'll keep my feet warm in my blundstone boots this winter. I've also started a pair of socks in the flaemschen muster from the genial sockenworkshop book. I don't think pattern looks like flames at all. It looks more like the eye in a peacock feather to me so I'm knitting them up in a nice turquoise colour. Will take photo when I get good light again which is usually in the morning.

Not for the faint hearted

Dear Hit and Run driver,

I understand that last week Thursday may have been a bit of a stressful day for you and that you couldn't hang around to see the damage you caused to my friend Jeroen so I thought I would show you.

Just to jog your memory; you were driving along De Clerqstraat in Amsterdam on Thursday evening around 11.30 pm and hit someone who was cycling along minding their own business. You didn't stop to see what had happenend but kept driving like the arrogant swine you were probably brought up to be. Luckily for my friend, the people behind saw everything and managed to call an ambulance But fortunately for you, they didn't managage to catch your number plate. Shame really as it would have been nice for you to meet Jeroen. He's a funny guy and I'm sure he would have laughed and joked with you about the whole thing, had he been concious at the time.

This is day 1 and by the looks of things, Jereon is still out of it. Which is kind of lucky because after he smacked the ground at high speed, his eye socket and cheekbone broke. I imagine that it must have hurt a bit. Oh I nearly forgot, you managed to crack his skull too. To be quite precise the external occipital protuberance. As you will see from the next 2 photos, he's getting better however he has to wear a collar for a few weeks in order to let the various breaks heal up.

While you were racing off home, checking for bloodstains on your car and snuggling up in bed, my best friend (Jeroen's girlfriend) was pacing the floor and worrying herself sick. I don't know if you've ever worried about someone in your life but its like a very painful limbo, not knowing where someone is or what has happened to them. All sorts of thoughts fly through your head. You imagine terrible things like them lying in a ditch or a the side of a road after being knocked off of their bike by some eejit.

So Mr or Ms Hit and Run Driver, if you ever read this (or get someone who's more literate to read it for you), driving is not a game of grand theft auto. In real life the people you knock down don't get back up again so easily.

I really hope that what goes around comes around.
Groetjes
Jules

Unblogged

I'm back in the land of blogging again. It only took them over 3 days to unblock the thing and now I've got far too much to say in one post but I'll try and keep it as short as someone who's been unable to blog for the past 3 days possibly can.

Thursday night was great fun. I have been in agony for most of the weekend however it was worth it. The following photo of my arm was not caused by domestic violence but by my first rugby training in over a year. My skin will toughen up eventually. At least its better than trying to explain black eyes to the doctor. While still playing in Amsterdam I managed to get 5 black eyes in the space of 3 months. My doctor gave me domestic abuse leaflets with the first 2 and with the next one, even though I was in the emergency room in still wearing my rugby gear and covered from head to toe in mud, they wanted to call the police for me and get my gorgeous hubby (the boyfriend at the time) arrested for beating me up. Now anyone who knows Frank also knows that the concept of him giving me a smack is completely outrageous but I suppose they were only doing their job. I did have a broken cheekbone then so I can imagine that it looked quite bad from where they were standing.

We'll skip Friday's karaoke and head straight to Saturday. Went shopping, went to stricktreff and knitted away quite happily. Met up with Charlene and then went to see the 'Seamen' Frank's band. Here's a wee photo of them. The bloke in the kilt is mine :o) They were playing at a club called JWD which stands for Janz Weit Draussen. German for 'in the middle of nowhere' Well it was in the middle of nowhere but quite packed for place where the only next door neighbours are a family of ducks. They played extrememly well and got loads and loads of applause. A few of the locals even took to the dancefloor. It was a bit like the old 'dorf disco' in Attendorn but the natives were friendly, the beer was cold and the music was good. All in all it was a good night.

Back to the socks now. I'm still playing with the collinette jitterbug and on Sunday I looked at what I'd been knitting on Saturday and decided to take Gisela's advice. She reckoned that my needles were too small for the thickness of the yarn. I have to admit that she was right. I was knitting the main part of the sock up with 2.5mm's and it did look a bit to tight. I ripped back to the cuff. Knitted up with a 3mm, the bundchen is just too loose so with the 2.5's for the bundchen and then the 3mm's for the leg, its going much better and the colours are pooling in a spiral rather than the strange inkspot blob which had appeared using the 2.5's. So thanks Gisela not only for lending me 10 euries when the silly Opern Cafe wouldn't take my EC card but also for the wisedom about the needle size.

Murphy's still in town.

This post was originally supposed to be called 'return to rugby' however on trying to blog this morning I recieved a notification that my blog was locked due to the blog being a 'spam' blog. Now they're probably right about the content being rubbish, but spam? Must be the grammar police or something. So I've sent in my wee secret code or whatever its supposed to be and I'm now waiting not so patiently for them to unlock it so that I can post again. Seemingly I can save this a draft until some 'real' person reviews my blog and judges its content to be unharmful to the world. That may take some time.



I'll post my return to rugby pictures when I actually know that my blog is going to be published.



So thankyou very much Mr Spam-Prevention Robot. NOT