Well-Cheesed & Half-Heeled

It was such a beautiful, sunny day yesterday that we hit the open road after meeting friends for brunch, tooling up north-ish to rural Spruce and downtown Lena for cheese, luckily they're only a few miles apart. When Durwood used to travel for work he'd stop at Kugel's in Lena and bring home Parmesan and other cheeses.  He'd use the Kitchen Aid attachment to grate the Parm, put it in zipper freezer bags, and we'd have real cheese to sprinkle on things.  We got spoiled.  So it's kind of a hardship when we have to get store-bought stuff (never the stuff in the green cans, ooh ick, is that even food?).  We try not to.  A knitting friend raved about the Parm she gets at Springside Cheese in rural Spruce so we went there first and got a small wedge to try, then we tooled back into "town" to Kugel's for more Parm, some Muenster, a small bag of fresh curds, and a tiny slice of cranberry cheddar that I made into a grilled cheese on rye for my lunch today.  (note to Writing Women: no, we didn't take a cooler, we weren't gone that far or that long)

On the way home we stopped at the Pig in Howard to nab some on-sale chicken breasts and fell prey to a sale on ribeye steaks.  We picked out a nice one and I fired up the grill because we're getting to the point of the year when a person can't rely on being able to grill out.  Speaking of that time of year, I saw my first Junco this morning when I was yog-ing.  Those little birds, while cute as can be, are the harbingers of winter because they summer in the Arctic and come down here where it's warm.  Foolish birds.  I don't like to see them so early.  Maybe this is just a scout or maybe it's confused?  Speaking of birds this Downy Woodpecker spent this morning landing on one of the slinkys for a little ride before hopping over to the suet for a snack.  Sparrows are scared off by the slinkys but the woodpeckers seem to land there on purpose.




I measured the leg of the Dusky Blues sock last night and realized that it was time to make the heel.  I'd searched out the directions to make a Strong heel (not particularly durable but invented by a lady whose last name is Strong) that was recommended by an avid sock knitter at Guild and got started before bedtime.  Durwood's oxygen machine started to malfunction around 4:30 this morning and he can't hear the alarm so my sleep was over.  I had to turn it off and then back on so it'd run for a while and then do it again, five times in the first hour and a half.  (don't worry, if all else fails we've got a good supply of oxygen bottles he can use if the machine's on the blink)  I waited until 8:30 to call for a replacement (because I'm a nice person) so while I waited I worked on the heel.  I'm at the halfway point, on the next row I start to decrease back to the right number of stitches and then knit the foot and toe and be done.  It won't happen quite that quickly but turning the heel's like turning the corner into the home stretch.  BTW, the new O2 machine arrived before 11 AM so he's back in business.

I need to go to Walmart because I get to work tomorrow and I need lunch-makings but I might just take a nap when I get back... or go to bed by 8:30.  Didn't write last night, so th-th-that's all folks.
--Barbara