Today was rainy and cold and it made me sleepy. I’d like to propose an employee nap time at the day job, but I’m pretty sure that’ll get tossed out the window. Still, I can dream, right?
I was feeling well enough to go to work today. Things weren’t too crazy, so I kept a handle on the to-do list. One of my friends, a field bee, knows of my geekiness and brought me a gift from a con she was recently at.
Admittedly, this reminds me that I really need to catch up on Doctor Who. Now that we have ChromeCast, I don’t think I have an excuse not to. I’m not ready to say goodbye to Matt Smith, so maybe that’s why I’m procrastinating. As long as I don’t see his regeneration, he’s still my Doctor, right?!
Remember that post where I talked about the Twitter chat that lit a blogging fire under my butt (last night)? What I failed to mention was that these chats often come with giveaways, and the giveaway for last night was the book Everything But the Posts by Becca Ludlum, who also took part in the chat.
I won! I was one of 5 winners, and I sent FitFluential my mailing address. Whenever I win something, I pretty much tell the whole world. I’ll be doing a review on the book as soon as I read it, so stay tuned.
It was Jon’s turn to feel under the weather, so it was an early night at home. We ended up watching Zack and Miri again, and I caught up on some internet things. It’ll be another early night and then…
I have officially won National Novel Writing Month.
Technically, I won it a few days ago when I broke the total word count of 50,000. However, that was split between two novels I was writing simultaneously. Today, I focused on my first one and managed to finish it completely at just over 53,000 words. I still have a few days before the official end of Nanowrimo, but since we’ll be traveling, I’m not sure how much time I’m going to be able to give to the second novel. The goal now is to try to get a high word count to at least be in the running for Marissa Meyer’s contest. However, even if I don’t make that one, I’m still pretty excited with this accomplishment.
Also, I don’t completely hate the story I wrote, and other than the fact that I’m a bit squeamish about letting my family read it, I might actually work on revising it in the coming year.
We slept in a little bit today because it was freezing and I couldn’t seem to get out from under the covers. Jon discovered that we didn’t have a great deal of hot water, so I decided I’d suck it up and take a shower at the gym after a workout. I took him to work, then decided to run errands. This turned out to be a good thing. One of my errands was to return some laundry balls to Forsh, who told me I could use her place for chilling and showering. I took her up on that offer, which meant I got a ton of writing done in a comfortable chair and got to shower without trying to maneuver around a fairly public locker room. Thanks, Forsh!
Instead of going to the gym, I ended up taking another walk around the neighborhood. It was still cold, but not as cold as it was over the weekend. I did a zombie mission and ended up making it around the big block, then making a lap around a smaller one. I had four zombie chases, and on the fourth one, I actually had to push through some leg fatigue. It was still fun.
After I picked Jon up from work, we went to the grocery store to buy some travel snacks before coming home. I broke out the snuggie right away, because even though the heat is on, the apartment is not as warm as I would like it to be. I finished my story, but I didn’t get much else accomplished. Luckily, we’re almost completely packed for tomorrow, so there’s nothing besides some last minute things to throw into the suitcase, and those can be done tomorrow morning before we leave.
I think I’m going to finish off the night with some reading. We’re off early tomorrow for St. Louis! Whoo hoo!
Specifically, I won the raffle at the Winter Woolfest. People on my Facebook already know this because I had to share the day it happened, but it’s taken me this long to actually get a blog post up about it (the new year is turning out to be a busy one already).
The day of the Woolfest, I bought six raffle tickets, figuring there was no way I was going to win. I never win raffles (I’m also fairly unlucky at the casino too). But it was supporting the local school’s Music Boosters and so I deemed it a good cause, as I still have fond memories from my own days in junior high and high school band.
Not going to lie, a little part of me spent the whole afternoon hoping I’d get a phone call or an email telling me I won, because I figured they’d draw right at the end of the event. I wasn’t surprised when I didn’t get either. Disappointed, but not surprised. A couple days later, I even checked the page to see if a winner was announced, but didn’t see anything, so I figured they just didn’t publicize it (they didn’t publicize it anyway, so that really has no bearing on the story).
Then on Wednesday, I got a call on my cell phone. It was a local number, but being at work and being in the middle of something, I let it go to voicemail. Curiosity got the better of me though, and I went ahead and checked it shortly after.
It was The Wicked Stitch telling me I’d won the raffle. And sure enough, I checked my email and it was there too.
I first proceeded to do a victory dance in my cubicle, which I later regretted partially because I looked foolish but mostly because I think it caused me to hurt my back. I then went to the hallway to call and confirm the message and that I’d be by later that day to pick up the prize. While there, I saw my boss and did another dance, just for her, to celebrate my luck.
While this was happening, I did realize that not everyone appreciates winning a brand new set of knitting needles. But that didn’t matter, because I’d won them and I was thrilled.
Sharp, shiny, and beautiful!A full set of HiyaHiya needle in pretty cases.
The two cases contain a full set of interchangeable needles from size 2 to 15 and several cords of varying sizes, including one long enough to do magic loop, which is my preferred method of small circumference knitting. I realize I could take everything out and put them all in one case, but I’ve decided just to keep them both in my larger knitting bag because they’re so cure and compact.
Having not previously knitted with HiyaHiyas, but having heard good things about them, I went ahead and found a project to take them for a spin with. So far, I love them. I like metal needles, and they’re lightweight with a nice flexible cable. They’re also slippery, which is good for fast knitting, though I have to be careful I don’t lose my stitches.
They’re also noisy. This isn’t a complaint. I love the sound of knitting needles at work. But I don’t think I’ll be taking them into a movie theater any time soon.
This might be my only “win” of the year, but if so, it was well worth it!
The Romance Factor 