Another Pyjama Saturday

My rhythm for Appleton weekends is pretty regular now, although it doesn't match up with the town's schedule very well at all. I haven't been doing well on my 10pm bedtimes and 6 o'clock starts this week, either, so today was a late arising, but otherwise it's been the same as the past three out of four weekends (and man did I make it up for it last weekend, but that's a different story...). Woke up, had a leisurely breakfast reading the latest New Yorker, did laundry, did dishes, mopped, cleaned bathrooms, dusted. That got me to about 6pm. Yes, seriously, although I did spend some time talking to my sister on the phone. She's back in this hemisphere, and now I'm in it too, which is unique and wonderful. When we first got on the phone I was trying to work out what day it was where she was, and then realised she's only an hour different - freaky and wonderful!

All the fun things to do in Appleton, though, happen on Saturday. There's a market downtown, there's music at the Harmony Cafe, the Art Center is open, all the shops downtown are open. Sunday nothing is open. But in my life I seem to require a Pyjama Saturday to recover from the week, where I do nothing but lie around and potter in the house, and don't take a shower or ever get dressed. Then resume the 6 o'clock starts on Sunday, exercise, go out, be amongst people, do stuff. But on Sunday nothing's open. I keep winding up at the Mall - the only place you can walk any distance, and the main place where people are. I will work this out. My job won't be this hard all the time.

One nice thing, a nice meditative and centering thing, is that I have got back into the knitting. The second panel of the afghan is about half done, and right now I'm working on some homework for class, a gauge swatch. For the afghan, since it's my own project, I knit my way, which is to throw the yarn. Also, the yarn is kind of cheap so when I started a new skein of grey it's quite a bit thicker than the last one, so the finished project is going to have kind of a rustic look. The only problem with throwing is it makes my left elbow hurt - an old "tennis elbow" injury from a combination of typing in a funny position at work and carrying heavy bags of groceries across the street from the Surry Hills Coles to my old apartment. In contrast, when I do homework for class I try to do Continental, like the teacher taught us. Up to now it was always really tight, and awkward to do, with my fists in little tight balls. But I think I've cracked it now, I'm relaxed and much looser, and I've noticed that my elbow doesn't hurt when doing it because you don't really move your left arm at all. Going back and forth will probably work for me. I might even one day be a 100% Continental knitter. I can't see it, at the moment, because it's not as smooth or mindless, but with practice, anything can happen, right?