Trenchwork

The site is in the process of a total overhaul, and this blog is now heritage material. Rather than delete five years worth of activity, however, I’ve left it here as an archive.  The new site is now at http://rhonna.net

The site has changed servers and, as you can see, things are a bit screwed up.  I’ll fix it later.

I am, believe it or not, stateside. It’s been a hectic week, and is about to get worse, but I’ve learned a few things over the past 7 days.

1. The more I fly, the less I like it. This time the turbulence crossing the pond and on all the east coast flights was pretty constant. None of those sudden drops, but lots of bumps, shimmies, and shakes. And people wonder why I travel with a bag of chips and a soda. (If you don’t know, that’s the best defense against motion sickness.)
2. I’ve spent three days frantically clicking away like a spy in fear of discovery in the depths of the Special Collections library at the University of Virginia, and I have to tell you that while I came away from the experience with a huge backache, I’m in love with their new facility. The building is simply gorgeous, and I think they’ve thought of everything you might need. It’s a lovely campus, but beware of asking directions. It doesn’t precisely help to know that the Special Collections library, for instance, is right next to the one with the white columns on a campus where 95% of the buildings have white columns. Clever, eh? To top things off, the staff were super nice, and terribly helpful. Seriously. They didn’t even laugh when they had to repeat simple instructions three times because the seemingly ditzy broad in front of them was so jet lagged she couldn’t get it the first time around.
3. Jet lag sucks. Really. It’s taken me a week to get over the worst of it, and I still want a nap at about 3pm. Personally, I’m figuring this is what 80 will feel like if I live that long.
4. I cannot knit lace when I travel. I started the Kiri shawl, and I did more ripping out—which was not fun given the mohair yarn—than moving forward. It’s a matter of focus; I have none. I kept losing track of where I was, and would have to rip back to fix the row. I know the first 10 rows of the pattern are a bit scrambled, but I have almost decided to simply let it be and continue with it on track as is. I may change my mind and frog the entire thing in a week or so when I have time to knit again. We’ll see.

In other news, the defense is next Tuesday, and I still need pin down my chair for a final meeting before then. I’m still working on revisions, and am plowing through the books which were waiting for me when I arrived.

In other words, if you don’t hear from me for a while, don’t panic; I’ve landed safely and while I’m still a bit wobbly, I’m at least moving forward.

Ok. Does anyone wanna tell me precisely why well-known and well-respected reference series such as the Columbia Literary History of the United States and The Cambridge History of American Literature do not have to cite sources? They can indicate quotes and, sometimes, who said it, but they don’t have to indicate where that quote came from?

Am I missing something here?

The weather lately has been a blend of sog and mush, but we’ve gotten snow over the past week, and today it was simply beautiful. Clear, very cold (-5F at about 7am), and brilliant.

See for yourself. This is the driveway, pointing back toward the road (which is another block away), and with the sun at your back.

Just to show you, a little snow can add up to a lot if you pile it just right. That pile is about seven feet high, which isn’t bad given that most of it is from the past couple of weeks. The sun is in the upper right corner.

And last, a rather over-exposed, poor-angle, shooting-into-the-sun shot for one purpose only. See those marks in the snow? The tracks and trails, and the stomped out portion to the lower middle right? That, dearies, is from the deer. We started throwing bread out for the birds. The birds don’t seem to care. The deer, however, think it’s a buffet. (And yes, I think this is very cool.) By the way, that big flat area covered with snow? Well, that’s frozen lake. I don’t know how frozen—I wouldn’t walk across it—but it holds the weight of a mid-sized deer.

So in the process of wandering around town, picking up a chocolate treat for Trond and pepcid for me (I think he got the better bargain), I did indeed stop in at the Garnhuset and Jens Hoff (the yarn shops). And yes, I did get a couple of things.

At the moment, I have the body of a Gjestal sweater on my needles, and it’s right in the middle of the intricate pattern (4-color) in the top five inches toward the shoulder. I can’t work on that when I’m brain dead without risking going really wrong and needing to rip it all out, so there it will continue to sit until I have more than five grey cells at a time free to think of things other than dissertation writings.

So, today I picked up yarn for a couple of simple projects, although I suspect they’ll end up as gifts later.

There were four balls of Dalegarn Free Style dark royal blue yarn and some deep pink roving to make thrummed mittens. While I’ve done mittens, I’ve never done thrummed, and doggone it, they just look fun.

Then there were four balls of Idéna Mohair Lux in fuschia. They feel wonderful, but I just love the color of this yarn and the subtle shadings. I thought I’d turn it into Polly Outhwaite’s Kiri shawl. While I’ve crocheted with mohair, I’ve never knitted with this fine a yarn, and I’ve never done this kind of scarf work. However, Polly’s pattern is very clearly written, and even if I don’t know what I’m doing, I can follow the directions.

A manufacturer’s image of the yarn may be clearer:

The photos are a bit dark, but you get the idea.

I know you may not believe it, but I’ve turned in the complete draft of the diss. Actually, there’s a conclusion left to write, but I’ll do that next week. There’s also a lot of revision work that needs doing, but I’ll do that next week, too. In the meantime, my hands are in protest, so I’m taking the next two days away from the keyboard.

Tomorrow I intend to leave the house for the first time in . . . well, aside from the last two Tuesdays, I honestly don’t know how long. I’m going wander around town, even if it’s raining, and browse through Garnhuset and Jens Hoff yarn shops just for the fun of it. I may even pick up a couple of chocolate treats for Trond.

It’s scheduled. 28 March.

(gulp!)

There are 3842+ knitters around the world, old and young, male and female, casting on like crazy at this very moment, and I simply have to giggle when I think of almost 4000 people doing this simultaneously.

I’m also jealous . . . I’m arguing with a paragraph about women’s rights in a fictional text and I’d soooooooo much rather be knitting!

Every now and then, when I go completely brain dead and can’t think my way through a coherent sentence or can’t see a way to fix the last incoherent sentence I wrote, I browse knitting blogs for a few moments. It gives me a quick break, is often entertaining, and lets me know what other folks are working on. And yes—knitting seems to have become my hobby of choice. I still crochet, but I’ve found that it’s not something I can do for long; my wrists rebel. Knitting is easier on my hands as long as I use common sense. I haven’t cross-stitched in ages (aside from cross-stitching a pattern on a crocheted panel of afghan stitch) because of a similar reason; you can only hold that needle for so long before the pinching motion really gets you. Since I still have unfinished projects sitting in the closet and patterns and threads I may never use, it’s a bit annoying.

In any event, Stephanie’s Knitting Olympics now has 3312 3649 (!!!) participants, and I was very glad to see a post about knitting safety on Beadlizard’s blog. Scroll down to the 1 Feb entry, or go directly here. Beadlizard (Sylvia?) has given some excellent tips about doing handwork for an intensive period of time.

People are accustomed to hearing about Carpal Tunnel Syndrome (CT), and it’s one of the first things they think of when they start having trouble with wrists and hands. There is at least one other, however, that they should be aware of, and that’s de Quervain’s.

de Quervain’s is a bit different than CT in that it does not usually go beyond the forearm, and in many ways is not as severe as CT. Of course, that’s also a relative issue. When DQ is at its worst, manipulating anything is out of the question. You can’t hold a pen, can’t type, can’t do buttons or zippers, can’t tie your shoelaces.

DQ’s symptoms are very similar to CT. There is a tightness in the wrist, thumb movements hurt, the wrist hurts, and the pain can radiate down the forearm. To the best of my knowledge, however, it does not go beyond the elbow; pain including the elbow may be CT or a very bad case of de Quervain’s.

Like CT, de Quervain’s is a repetitive motion injury, and for those of us who are power typists, this is sometimes where we see it first; usually in the hand we use most often for spacebar and mouse work. The problem begins just below the thumb on the inside edge of the wrist, right at the bone. There is a tendon sheath at that point—a small “tunnel” of tissue which holds the tendons together in the same way a pipe may contain a series of cables. With the repetitive motion, the sheath becomes inflamed; those “cables” pull back and forth through the “pipe” and eventually things get irritated. If it isn’t treated at the beginning, the pain can radiate all the way down to where the tendons are joined to the forearm—place your hand about two-thirds of the way up the arm, about one hand-width before the elbow, on the topside of the arm and you’ll have the idea.

The photo below is marked to show the location of the tendon sheath, and the origin of the problem.

Treatment is varied, and differs between individual cases. It can include anti-inflammatories, simple icepacks, heat massage (to get the circulation going) followed by cold treatment, cortisone injections, braces, physical therapy, and at the extreme, surgery. The scar you see in the photo above is from the surgery. The goal was to cut the tendon sheath, thereby allowing the tendons more room. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn’t. I was fortunate—it worked. I don’t know what new procedures are out, but there are some excellent online sources for both CT and de Quervain’s.

Like CT, it isn’t something that goes away, or can be truly “cured.” It’s a thing you learn to manage, and if you’re lucky and manage it well, it rarely bothers you. If you’re not, then you learn to adapt your lifestyle, change the methods in which you do things, and recognize when you may be pushing a limit. At that point, it’s always better to ice the wrist, practice with the stick and therapy putty, and take a break from the keyboard and “pinching” activities (like needlework) until it things return to normal. If you don’t, then you find you’ve lost the use of the hand almost altogether, and the return process takes much longer.

Braces for de Quervain’s are different than those for CT, and allow much more freedom. Their purpose is not to immobilize the hand or wrist, but rather to immobilize the thumb. There are several different makes, they’re all (or should be) individually fitted, come in different lengths and sizes to accommodate different arms, and have a distinct right and left. The ones I use are Air-soft braces by LMB, and since it has been about twelve years since I went through this process, there have probably been a number of technology advances which have produced better braces. These, however, work for me. The section you see is a mirror image of the underside; the brace does not go all the way around the wrist, but snugs up against the wrist and inside edge of the arm.

The moral of the story is this. If you find yourself having pain in your wrists and thumbs, don’t automatically assume you have Carpal Tunnel Syndrome, but for heaven’s sake do NOT ignore it. Get thee to thy doctor in a major hurry. For both CT and de Quervain’s, there are options and, increasingly, solutions. You simply cannot, however, afford to ignore it. After all, having to have someone else do all your buttons and zippers is no fun and no—velcro is not always the answer. It just doesn’t go with that dressy silk, ya know?

Progress at the moment is slow. I’m trying to straighten out the mess that is otherwise known as the last two chapters and the de Quervain’s is kicking in, so typing and keyboarding is a painful process at the moment. I’d planned to have the completed draft off my desk by tomorrow, but that won’t happen. I’m shooting for Wednesday. On the positive side, I sent in the first 90 pages last week rather than wait for these last two chapters, and I suspect my chair fainted.

Thanks for the encouraging words and support, folks. Keep those fingers and toes crossed; I’m getting there. I’ll resurface in a week.

(grin) I cease to be smugly amused. I am now fascinated and amazed. Stephanie’s Knitting Olympics now has some 2130 participants.

The tickets arrived today. Ready or not, I’ll be stateside between 13 March and 20 May. Trond will be along for the last three weeks of the ride.

In the meantime . . . revise, revise, revise, revise . . .

I want a genie. Really. It doesn’t even have to be a big one. Just a little guy who can handle a couple of eensy teensy wishes. Lend him to me, somebody?

I can’t help but grin smugly to myself. The number of knitters participating in the Knitting Olympics has indeed grown . . . The last time I looked, it was up to 1366, and there are still nearly three weeks before the real Olympics begin.

Very cool.

As a trivial aside, if you want to know what the weather is like at the moment, try this (if it works):
http://rhonna.net/blog-images/DSCN0144.MOV

It’s a short little seven-second video snap out the window with my digital camera.

The dark stuff? That’s frozen lake. The white stuff? That’s the little bit of snow we have at the moment. The camera shake and the moving white stuff? That’s called gale force gusts. Amazing. I’m sitting here composing text and looking out the window (I don’t need to see the keyboard or the monitor to type), and the stuff is being blown across the lake in these amazing patterns. I feel as if I’m watching time-lapse photography of fog.

And no—I did not take the shot in black and white, or change it after to monochrome. The only color at the moment is the barn-red barn across the lake, and a vanilla-yellow house a little further to the left.

Me? I’m sitting here in a turtleneck, wool blend sweater, and ice socks from Mountain Equipment Co-op, which is what you do when you don’t have time to knit your own.

I’m really not. Dead, I mean. You just think I’ve died since I haven’t answered e-mail this past month, haven’t updated the blog in ages, and haven’t phoned.

Sorry, guys–keep the faith and I’ll be back as soon as I have the diss finished. I’m down to the wire (of course) with the last pages, and then need to start a mad revision of stuff I already see. With luck and grace, the complete and semi-polished draft will be off my desk not later than next Friday.

In the meantime, I’m hibernating, the house is a disaster, people are wondering if they should send funeral wreaths, and Trond is handling the meals.

Actually, that’s not all bad. she says with a guilty smile

As a warning, this entire site—all of rhonna.net, including the blog—is going to have a major overhaul in a few months, after I get back from the trip stateside. It desperately needs a re-org and update, so don’t expect it to look the same when I finally do come up for air.

In the meantime, if you’re looking for something interesting to watch, check out one of my favorite knitting blogs, the Yarn Harlot’s blog: http://yarnharlot.ca/blog/

Stephanie Pearl-McPhee is a knitting maniac of the best sort. She’s a published writer who also actually happens to be engaging, entertaining, empathetic, and inspiring for those of you who are interested in the yarn arts. Recently she had the brilliant (and possibly quite daft) idea of having a sort of “knitting Olympics” during the real Olympics. Literally, you cast on during the opening ceremonies, and finish by the end of the closing ceremony. It may sound easy, but the idea is to challenge yourself and complete a knitting project in those 16 days, amid the rest of life’s usual insanity, then—if you can—share a photo of that work with the other participants. Those who actually accomplish the goal earn themselves a virtual gold medal, and the satisfaction of seeing themselves actually finish a project and accomplish their goal.

It’s a great idea. And she blogged the idea. And then she nearly had a heart attack when she saw the horde of other nutty knitters who thought the idea was equally brilliant and signed up. When I glanced at the list this morning, there were 561 participants from all over the world. And yes, were it not for the looming pages and revisions of my own work, I’d be right there with them.

Like blogathons, fan-fic marathons, and finish-that-book-in-ninety-days writing programs, the Internet really kicks these dugnad activities into high gear. I’m fascinated. Today is January 20, and the Olympics don’t start until February. I’ll be surprised to find that the number of participants doesn’t at least double between now and then.

In the meantime, if you want to see the list yourself, point your browser here: http://yarnharlot.ca/blog/olympics2006.html

And if you see this little temporary image on another website

you’ll know you’ve stumbled across another mad knitter.

Go, guys, go!

The folks have sold the farm and returned to Tallahassee, and yes—that’s good news. The bad news is that they have a neighbor with a lovely 6 or 7 month old Rottweiler puppy and absolutely the wrong priorities. The pup isn’t being cared for. He’s not being properly fed and watered; 1 cup of toy-breed kibble simply does not cut it for a 60-pound puppy. You should NOT be able to clearly *see* the dog’s ribs and vertebrae at this age (and note the distinction between “see” and “feel”). The pup is being turned loose to forage for himself (i.e., hop over to the next yard and eat the folks’ dog’s food). He’s receiving no attention to speak of, I doubt he’s had any shots or vet care beyond the first puppy shot he should have received at 6 or 7 weeks, and he’s certainly getting no training. He’s being carelessly tied in the back yard at night, and has been howling his unhappiness for anyone to hear. He breaks loose at very regular intervals (daily) and goes to the folks where he gets both food and attention, and the neighbor seems content to let the folks secure, feed, and water his dog. When he left for work the other morning and met the folks as they returned the dog to his own yard after finding him on their porch, he commented that he’d intended to just tie the pup up in their yard for the day—despite the fact that they’d already told him their own dog was coming home from the vet that morning. Despite the neglect, the pup is cheerful, and still has a very good disposition. He’s stopped howling at night because he’s getting a little attention from the folks (when he breaks loose and goes visit), and he actually picked up a couple of pounds from the stolen food. In other words, there’s still hope for this pup. If, however, the owner doesn’t get his act together and start properly caring for him, then his future is going to be very dark. The owner told the folks that he had not intended to get another dog after his last Rottweiler died.

I find myself grimly wondering what the other dog died of.

There’s still a chance that the unexpected will happen and the fellow will straighten out—Mom’s planning on having a serious chat with him—but I’ll be honest and say that I’m growing cynical in my old age: I don’t expect it. If he doesn’t, then the best thing for the pup would be for the owner to relinquish him to someone who can properly care for him and place him in a good Rottie home.

With that in mind, I decided to take a few minutes from the dissertation and see if I could track down Rottweiler rescue contacts for the Tallahassee area. Then, if the fellow DOES decide to give up the dog, the folks would have the information and know who to call.

I found a contact name for Tallahassee, but of three different e-mail addresses, one bounces, she’s no longer with the organization at another, and there’s no reply from the third. So I kept looking. I tracked down another in Havana (20 minutes north of Tallahassee), and picked up the phone, only to have one of the most frustrating phone conversations I’ve had in a very, very long time. I was forcibly reminded of something I tell new dog owners when they’re investigating breeders for their first puppy, or before they go to their first obedience class: Inveterate dog people far too often suck at talking to anything with less than four legs.

The woman I spoke with was rude, insulting, and downright dense. ” . . . just because someone thinks a dog is starving . . . ” Give me a break. If she’d taken two minutes to get my own story she’d have known that I’m no greenhorn, and she’d have gotten enough information to know that the dog is indeed malnourished. Instead, the woman never shut up. She determined that she knew what I was going to say before I said it, and that what I was going to say was that I wanted someone to go in and get the dog. What idiocy. If she’d taken thirty seconds to just listen, she’d have understood that I was asking for a local contact IF the fellow decided to relinquish the dog. Instead, she kept repeating that I should turn the dog over to the shelter because they knew who the Rottie people were. The logic here is underwhelming. If she thought I was saying I wanted someone to go get the dog (which, incidentally, is what Animal Control would do and what she should have recommended), why would she think I had the dog to turn over to the shelter? Even more importantly, is she not a Rottie person? Is she not a rescue contact? Is she not who the shelter would call? If she’s not interested in contacts from anyone other than the shelter, then she needs to simply say so up front. This other nonsense is sheer stupidity.

I know the Tallahassee shelter does a good job—as much as it can. I also know that they have their hands full. And with all due respect, I’d rather not put an animal through the trauma of that Ellis Island experience if I can find a more secure and personal environment for them. Particularly when that animal is a breed that far too many people don’t understand. I’d rather see this pup go directly to a foster home first, then to a proper home and totally bypass the shelter.

The moral of the story? I’m never referring anyone to the Havana crew, and I stand by my statement that far too many dog people desperately need to acquire some basic communication skills.

Now if I could just find a decent contact for the folks in case the neighbor DOES decide to relinquish the dog . . .

For those who’ve asked, here’s a glimpse of the roof. The first image is the new tile, the second is the prepared roof (ready for that new tile), the third is 2.5 tons of asbestos tile ready to be carted away and disposed of properly (sheesh!), and the last is what the roof looks like when the old ethernite (sp?) tile is removed. Of course, I’ll also be honest and admit that the main reason I took that last photo was because I couldn’t believe we were actually using that ladder!