christine-murphy dot net

Yet another thing to note for when we buy our own house and move…we NEED tankless water heaters!

The way it is now, if one of us takes a shower, the other has to wait for at least half an hour before taking a shower, because that’s how long it takes for the the hot water heater tank to generate new hot water. And it’s gotten worse since our old hot water heater died (on Christmas Day, several years back, of all times)…and when the landladies replaced it, they replaced it with the cheapest, smallest tank model they could find. But that is par for the course around here, and why we try to do our own repairs and replacements when possible. We would have gladly paid for a better hot water heating system ourselves, but sadly, they noticed the old tank leaking before we did, and there was nothing we could do once they took action.

I hate this damned place, and I can’t wait to move!

I don’t know why it is, but the crafts of knitting and crocheting have always seemed to be beyond my reach. It’s almost like chemistry class back in high school, where I could not wrap my brain around the periodic table, even if someone held a gun to my head. Just another one of those things that I will NEVER understand…and thank goodness I don’t need to in order to live my daily life.

But I have always wanted to learn to knit and crochet. My mother knew how to crochet, and she tried to teach me. But she was left-handed, and I’m a righty, and I couldn’t get the hang of it because of that.

Since then, I’ve tried to learn both knitting and crocheting, with no good results. A couple of years ago, there was an article in Martha Stewart Living magazine that had what looked like easy, step-by-step beginning knitting instructions, complete with pictures. Excited, I went to Michaels and bought knitting needles and some inexpensive yarn to practice on.

No dice. I Just Didn’t Get It. And damn, I tried, I really did.

I tried crochet again, too. I had this crochet hook that I bought because I’d read someplace that it was a good way to get the dough kneading blade out of bread made in a bread machine. Yes, it does work for that. But I decided to try to learn to actually crochet with the thing, and I bought an inexpensive instruction book, once again, at Michaels.

No dice. I Still Did Not Get It. So I gave up for a bit.

Once, when I was at the sadly defunct discount bookstore at the Kittery Outlets, I bought copies of Knitting For Dummies and The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Knitting and Crocheting Illustrated. As in, complete with pictures. And then I brought them home and they sat, collecting dust.

Until I got digital TV, and started watching a lot of the PBS Create channel. They have this knitting and crocheting show that is hosted by Kassie DePaiva. She’s a soap opera actress, she plays Blair on One Life To Live. I haven’t watched that show in years, but I still know who she is. I hadn’t known that she’s an experienced knitter and crocheter. Perhaps she does it to pass the time on the set, between times when she’s needed. That’s one of the nice things about these crafts, they are very portable.

Anyway, I have been watching this, and it’s made me dig out the idiot and dummy books, and I’m going to attempt this yet again. Maybe this time, it will take. Or maybe it won’t. But still, how nice would it be to be able to just lounge on a recliner, watch TV (preferably Kassie’s show on Create!), and knit or crochet something.

I just don’t see why I CAN’T do this. Knitting is VERY big these days, millions of people, some of who are bigger dummies than I am, can do it. Why, Oh, Why, Can’t I?

…at least I hope. I HATE being so sick! I think I am going to take some good advice that Maggie game me, and start drinking green tea. She swears by it, hasn’t caught as much as a sniffle since she started with it. So, when we go grocery shopping tomorrow, I will pick some up…both iced tea and tea bag versions. It certainly can’t hurt to try it, and besides, I like tea. I really should drink more of it, and less soda.

It’s just that I’m sick of being sick at important times…I still can’t believe that I had won a trip to Las Vegas, and when the time came, I ended up stuck in a Las Vegas hotel room, talking to Ralph on the big white phone. At least it was a nice room, but still, I hadn’t intended to go there just to hang out in a hotel room, talking to Ralph and watching TV. I did get to go to Blog World Expo a bit, as well as ride the monorail and see a bit of the infamous Strip…but that was about all I could handle.

Maybe I’ll get to go back some other time, when I’m NOT sick.

And then I got sick right before our summer vacation to Maine last year. I had so much to do before we left, but barely got any of it done. I did get better in time for the trip, but the stress of being sick just before still sucked.

Not to mention that we also had to miss a couple of ball games that we had tickets to, due to my being sick.  This was around the same time as the summer vacation thing.  Now, that REALLY sucked!

But now, I’m going to try my best to do something about it.  I’m sick and tired of being sick and tired, and I’m taking action to avoid it in the future.  There are other things I can do besides the green tea, that don’t involve doctors and hospitals…hell, they would just make me even MORE sick.  So I’ll be doing those things, and hopefully, I won’t be getting this damned stomach bug thing every few months anymore!

Okay, so I’ve been sick and watching more TV lately…been seeing those promos for “All Gnu” episodes of TV shows on CBS. Thank goodness then writers’ strike is over!

We broke down and bought a digital converter box for one of our TVs. Yea, I did request those $40 coupons that the government is giving out, but now I am almost 100% positive that we’ll NEVER get them. They were mailed out a month ago, they should have been here weeks ago. No doubt the Evil Post Office lost them. But we were getting sick of the bad over-the-air reception here, and knew that the problems would pretty much be solved if we could go digital now. Also, the appeal of extra channels, for free, was too much to resist. So we ponied up $60.00 and bought one.

VERY nice! Perfectly clear picture on all channels, even ones that got really crappy reception before, and I LOVE the extra PBS channels! My new favorite channel is Create. They have cooking shows, garden shows, as well as home decorating, craft and travel shows. Who needs expensive cable when you have something like this? And they don’t show infomercials overnight, as even most cable channels do. Just regular shows, all the time!

We’re just not ready yet to pony up for a new HDTV and all that. There’s nothing wrong with our analog TVs, and we’d like to be able to use them for the duration, while we shop around and figure out where to find the best deal on these new TVs. Perhaps one of those directbuy places might be a possibility. But not until after we move, hardly worth joining something like that just to buy one thing. When we move, we’ll need a lot more stuff.
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While I was REALLY sick, a couple of weeks ago, my new mini-stepper machine was delivered.  I was so out of it when the UPS guys showed up with it, he just brought it in, and there it sat in the box, in the middle of my living room, for almost two weeks.  I wasn’t even up to opening and assembling the thing, never mind, trying to work out on it.  I was feeling so horrible at the time, that I thought that I’d NEVER be able to work out, EVER.

I finally got around to putting it together today.  It was pretty easy, no tools are required except for the Allen wrenches that came with the thing.  It’s not a bad little machine for the money.  You can set the tension in the steps to make your workout easier or harder.  And it takes up very little floor space, so it’s good for people with small apartments.

Now, I just have to keep up with working out on it every day…that’s always the hard part!

I saw a story on the news last night about how people are using special GPS equipped cell phones to monitor their children’s comings and goings. Now, a young child does not need a full-featured cell phone, so that’s not what these are. They are programmed so that the child can only use it to call parents, 911, etc.

If the child wanders out of a certain range, the system will call the parents to notify them. So it’s a great way for parents to keep tabs on their children.

But some people are afraid that the government might try to use GPS devices to keep track of EVERYONE’s comings and goings, as yet another invasion of privacy. Now, that would be scary.

I feel that as long as you’re a law-abiding citizen, this should NEVER be allowed. It’s none of anyone’s business where I go and what I do. As long as I’m not breaking any laws, the government needs to butt out.

As GPS devices become more and more popular, I suspect that there will soon be legistation as to how the info from these things can or cannot be used.