FO - all bundled up for 70 degree weather

Yesterday I finally finished my Irish Hiking Scarf! I wove in the ends and everything. My first cables and my first time using really wonderful, soft, high quality yarn. The scarf was inspired by An Abundance of Lisa who did a great one. I finished it on Saturday and it was a great day to do it although I should have spent more time outside enjoying said weather.

Start Date: December 24th
End Date: January 6th
Material: 2 skeins of Malabrigo in Pagoda 11092
Pattern: Irish Hiking Scarf
Other: I knitted this up on size 7 needles instead of size 8. Also, I ended up using the entire 2 skeins which got me to 65" vs the 55" in the pattern because I usually fold the scarf in two and pull it through to tie a "knot" at my neck.

So my first official week back at work was brutal and on Friday Hart and I aimed for a chill dinner at Mexicana Mama - the one on 12th and broadway (vs the sister restaurant in w. village which requires way too long a wait) and then head to Union Square for a movie. but as soon as we walked out the door we saw Soho Billiards staring at us. We see this each and every day but this time we really saw it. We ended up going east to another Mexican restaurant that Hart of course heard about from Chowhound, but which I won't list because it was not memorable. Net net, 2 margaritas later (and excessive discussion about Bush and deployment of troops*) we played pool, went to bed and woke up groggy on Saturday.

we got up and met friends for brunch, walked around Union Square a bit and headed home and watched some football and (me) finish my scarf.

I love it. Love it. I only wish it was cold enough to wear it. Did I just wish for cold weather? I sort of willed it today as I wore it today while Hart and I were running errands. We ran into our friend at a bookstore and I started sweating in doors and needed to take it off.

So up next is finishing Ms. Marigold (just got my extra skein in the mail) and getting down with my Hourglass. I actually stayed in last night and through both Kill Bill 1 and Kill Bill 2 - got about 20 rows done. This is going to take for - ev -er.

In other news, I'm getting a little ancy about my bookclub situation. It's all me - not the group. I'm simply not feeling the books we are reading. It's been less than 6 months for me and I joined the group because my reading was becoming - well becoming like nothing. I hadn't read any novels in a long time and I used to be an obsessive reader - I think I just got out of practice. When I joined the group was reading Feminine Mystique - we had a few (in my opinion, which is what this is about) great books: Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion and Dance Dance Dance by Haruki Murakami. But the last one was Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson and the current book is an Lee Miller: A Life, an autobiography by Carolyn Burke. I find all books selected to be fantastic - influential and interesting, but at this point in my game, I am really interested in reading more low-maintenance stuff. Like I just finished Kite Runner and I'm reading Atonement now. I don't know - I love the discipline that comes with book clubs and the women in my group are great. I am not reading the Lee Miller book and am telling myself to be fine with it. Our bookclub meeting is in 1 1/2 weeks and I thought I would pick it up this weekend - but a) it's not available at the two B&N near my house, nor at Strand, b) the in-store price is $35 and 450 pages and c) given the 450 pages gig, I can't order it online and read it on time. Clearly this is an internal struggle that I just needed to rant about.

*I will say this: I wouldn't call myself a liberal - I would call myself a Democrat. There are things that I lean on the side of the liberal point of view and there are things that I fall more in the moderate camp. Hart is almost a liberal. I truly believe that Bush would rather stay in Iraq until he leaves office to save face. I believe that he would rather let it go until the next President to clean up this mess than actually pull out and admit that he's wrong.