I Have A Scratch In My Record

Do you remember when records were records?  When they were flat black disks with one continuous groove that you gently set a tone-arm with a needle on (yes, kiddies, an actual metal needle) to play?  Remember how it'd skip if there was a deep enough scratch?  I realized this morning that I'm like that record needle when it meets a scratch.  I repeat things.  I get stuck in a groove and do something over and over until someone either lifts me out of the rut or puts a metal washer or a quarter on my tone-arm (that's how you dealt with that issue) to weight it down so it moved along.  (This blog comes with a complimentary lesson from the Rube Goldberg School of Obsolete Gadget Repair; not to be confused with the Hank Angermeier School of Toilet Repair, but that's a story for another time.)

I started making Too Early Birthday Preemie Hats last month--and I can't stop.  When I finish one, I cast on another.  I seem to be working my way through all the colors of Premier Yarns' Everyday Soft Worsted Prints, at least all the ones I own.  I'm up to four and number five's OTN but not pictured--yet.  Oh wait, I have it with me and I have my camera... back in a jiffy.  As you can see, I am not a champion of pastels for babies.  I like seeing the little darlings in bright colors, makes them look like people instead of dollies.


The only other crafty thing I've done in the last week is add a 14" strip onto the "blanket" of gray fleece that Durwood uses to keep warm when he's sleeping, and I won't be taking a photo of that.  Picture an bunk-bed sized piece of pale gray fleece, now with a strip up the side.  That's it.  We're the perfect couple to sleep together--not.  We keep flannel sheets on the bed year round (not my preference) and in summer have a cotton woven "thermal" blanket over them.  That's not enough for Durwood.  By the middle of the night, after his 3:33 AM cup of tea, he's got his fleece throw pulled over the top half of himself.  I, on the other hand, shove the cotton blanket down to my hips when I get into bed and usually spend at least part of the night out of the covers all together.  The older he gets, the colder he gets; the older I get, the hotter I get (and not in that way, either).  Like I said, the perfect couple.



Oh, okay, the Hank Angermeier School of Toilet Repair story...  When we moved into my folks' house when we needed more room (we swapped houses, they moved into our duplex because they wanted less room) I took the lid off the toilet tank to put in one of those 2000 Flushes things to find a black, mans' sock draped over the top of the float & fill mechanism.  I shook my head, fished it out, and tossed it into the sink, then I flushed the toilet.  It was like I'd turned on a fountain.  Water sprayed out the top of the fill tube, arcing at least a foot above the tank.  Not being a fool, I grabbed the sock and slapped it back where it had been which effectively stopped the leak.  Didn't have to buy a package of toilet guts, turn off the water supply, drain the tank, and replace the innards.  The sock was a simple fix and one of the hallmark lessons of the HASTR--be creative and work with what's at hand.  I did eventually really fix the toilet but the sock worked just fine in the interim.