Tea and Cakes

Last night Donal brought home a chocolate soya milk drink.

Which triggered a memory.

About 10 days ago, totally without registering it as something I shouldn’t have done, I bought and drank some chocolate soya milk. It was yummy. I only realised last night that I’d done it.

I’m so disappointed with myself. I don’t think it affects the migraine trigger testing, but I was hoping to have achieved a month off chocolate, and I didn’t. I don’t plan on trying again either.

In other migraine news, the drug the doctor prescribed to take when I get one seems to have worked. This is great, although expensive news. €10 per dose, 2 of which may be needed. One has set me right so far, but it may come back and I’ll need to take a second.

I don’t want to talk about the final assignment. It will all be ok in a day or so, but it’s not right now.

Why didn’t I decide to go off these things during a shorter month? Roll on Sunday, that’s all I can say. I have some Butler’s chocolates waiting for me. They’d better not bring on a migraine: If chocolate’s my trigger I will not be impressed.

I’m about half way through my assignment. I will have it finished on time, but the next few days are going to be just as study filled as the last few, so blogging will continue to be reduced. Thanks for everyone’s good wishes. I can’t wait for it to be over. 3 years of studying while working full time is a lot.

There has been some knitting, but I don’t have the time to take pictures and post them – there’ll be a bumper update early next week.

Swap pals for the Knitters Tea Swap have been allocated, and I’ve been in touch with my spoilee. Then today I received an e-card from my spoiler that brightened up my day. Thank you Tea Swap Pal – if you have any questions for me just let me know. Oh, and it is ok to buy me chocolate now!

Right, back to the grindstone.

Right. Until I’ve completed the 6000 word assignment, every evening after work I must write at least 1000 words before I pick up the knitting needles. This is very frustrating as I cast on something new and exciting (and unbloggable, as it’s going to be a present) last night. However, it’s the only way I’m going to get this done.

“So”, I hear you asking. “Why are you blogging instead of getting down to tonight’s 1000 words?”

Good question. Excuse me for a while…

Update: Gave up last night at 820 words and went to bed. No knitting. Got up early this morning to do some before work and I’m now at 1394. 600 to get done tonight. My brain is melted already.

Sorry, I’m too busy freaking out about my college deadline. Not actually doing anything about it, you understand, just freaking out. Cheryl kindly lent me her ball winder, so instead I’ve been making pretty yarn cakes. I have 2 finished objects too, but those’ll have to wait for a day or so I’m afraid.

Prior to the knitting group. It’s good, but they do great coffee here, and i’d love a cup. Have to wait for next time i guess.

I’ve been off coffee, red wine, and crucially chocolate for 21 days now. I’m supposed to be off black tea too, but that’s just insane, so I’ve just cut right down instead. And I mean right down – a cup every few days rather than 5 or so a day. I don’t think I’ve ever gone this long without chocolate before.

Last night I dreamed I ate a bag of maltesers without thinking. Then I realised I shouldn’t have had them and felt guilty. The worst thing was that I’d eaten them absentmindedly, so hadn’t savoured them in the way I would if I was eating them right now.

The best cure for a sore throat.

I woke up this morning feeling like I’d spent the night swallowing cheesegraters, so, after a day sucking furiously on strepsils and echinacea lozenges I decided that the best thing to do is round the day off with the first hot whiskey of the season. It’s been rainy, grey, windy and depressing very autumnal over the last few days so it feels like hot whiskey season is really beginning.

Anyway, we’ve run out of the breakfast whiskey. Laphrohaig isn’t really designed to be mixed with hot water, lemon and sugar/honey, and trying to wrest the Springbank from the gurrier is a feat I’m not up to in my weakened state, so we stopped off at the offie* on the way home to buy a bottle of Jameson and a lemon.

Now. I don’t think I reallly look my age. I don’t blog pictures of myself, so those of you who don’t know me in person will just have to take my word for it. I don’t think I look that young any more though. I’m not exactly over the hill, but at 28 I’ve been able to legally buy alcohol for 10 years now. I’ve been buying it for 12, but that’s not the point.

Can you guess what’s coming?

Yep. “A bottle of Jameson please” I rasped out (sore throat, remember).
“What size?” The young fella behind the counter asked.
“The bottle please.” I replied. Surely this should be some indication that I’m over 18. Splashing out on a whole bottle, safe in the knowledge that I can (a) afford it, and (b) be mature enough not to drink it all in one go.

Then he said it: “I’ll need to see some ID.”

I don’t carry ID usually. I’m 28, I don’t usually need it. I explained that, and showed him a selection of credit cards that anyone under 18 wouldn’t have access to, and he went off to check with the manager. The manager gave permission and I’ll shortly be making my cure.

I found the whole thing highly amusing. Poor kid, he was only doing his job. Perhaps I should have shown him my knitting** – I mean, only grannies sitting in rocking chairs knit, right?

*Offie means Off licence, which means shop that sells alcohol.
**There has been knitting, and I’ll get some WIP pics up soonish.

On Friday five intrepid knitters headed off to Birmingham, braving the current war on moisture* to fly there from Dublin. No problems flying out. You no longer have to take your shoes off through security in Dublin airport. Liquids and ges all fine. In fact, when we arrived we discovered that one of our group (I won’t name names) had accidentally carried a small penknife and a pair of scissors through without being stopped.

On Friday we went to Selfridges, and I shopped like crazy in Paperchase and Whittards, two of my favourite shops. In the evening we ate Japanese:

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On Saturday we headed off to the Knitting and Stitching show.

It was about twice the size of the Dublin show, and even though a very large part of it was dedicated to cross stitch there was plenty to keep us knitters occupied.

In the afternoon I went to a couple of workshops, and when I’ve finished the projects I started there I’ll post them up here, but they don’t look so good as works in progress. It was great fun doing the classes and learning new ideas, and I had excellent company.

We all did a good bit of shopping too, and after the first day this was our haul:

Yes, that’s a double bed.

A hard day’s shopping needed a good dinner, with a delicious dessert of ice cream and fresh mint tea:

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On Sunday it was back to Selfridges for breakfast and some last minute paperchase shopping, then back to the show for more.

My final knitting haul:

Not shown: Fabric, freezer paper and fabric dye, sewing stuff from the workshops, stationery from paperchase and tea from whittards.

After a fantastic weekend we had to head home, so I had to try to cram all my purchases into my rucksack. I did pretty well I thought – my rucksack acted like a tardis and a huge amount went in, but I was left with my shoulder bag and a cloth bag crammed full of yarn and my pajamas (rucksack space had to be used for knitting). With the rucksack safely checked in we braved security. This time we could only take one bag, and no liquids or gels. I had two bags. Hmmm. I spent the queuing time wisely, and crammed all the contents of my shoulder bag into the cloth bag (I have no idea how I managed this, it was jammed full already), and into my pockets (ahh, cargo pants), and voila! One bag. Between the five of us we lost one bottle of hand gel and a lip gloss to the war on moisture, but another one of each were missed**. We almost had bag-size related casualty, but the security supervisor told us that if between the five of us we could cram the extra stuff into our bags until we were round the corner, then take them out again and put them back into the original two bags, he was happy. We managed, and we were happy too.

All in all a wonderful weekend with fantastic company, and a trip that may be repeated some time in the future.

*War on moisture label stolen from BoingBoing

**Note: None of us were intentionally trying to smuggle liquids/too much stuff through – the signage about the arrangements was really inconsistent, and the increased security rules have been relaxed now (from Monday morning, 5 hours after we were going through).