Fuel pump saga, Tuesday Knitting Group, Textiles and Tea, and yay for the people

Tuesday I decided to try yet again to get the Honda dealership on board with the now two-year-old fuel pump sensor recall. I had several urgent letters from Honda America urging me to get my car in to remedy this dangerous situation. Which I tried several times to do, and nobody had the parts. Last time they said try again in the Fall. So Tuesday I did and amazingly have an appointment next Monday to get the work done.

I asked them to check fluid levels, tires, brakes, all that while it was in the shop, since it's several hours' work. It involves some prep, too -- gas tank half or less full, everything out of the back seat. Sounds eerily like medical instructions. With any luck I'll have a safe car by Monday evening.

The Tuesday Knitting Group was a great time, one new member, one returning member, three usual suspects, and work ranging from visible mending, to beginner crochet, to glove knitting, one toad and two sweaters in progress. 

Talk ranged over modern dance, MRIs, Medicare, wooden knitting needles, yarn dyeing, tech talking back, voting, bridge, dpns (see foreground, top picture, if unfamiliar), flexibility, fortune cookies and more.

Then home to Textiles and Tea with Austin Clark, an authority on Cajun brown cotton growing, spinning and weaving.  I wondered if this would be interesting, and found it was riveting.  He is not Cajun and is very respectful of the tradition, simply reproducing, not redesigning, their textiles.

Acadians originated in Nova Scotia and were expelled by the governing British when they would not take an oath of loyalty to the Crown, wild oversimplification of a complicated and cruel period. 

Known as le grand derangement, this pushed thousands of French speakers eventually  to Louisiana, where they were forced to learn how to live in a different culture and climate, though their Catholic religion was accepted. There's a further complicated history of how they came in the end to Louisiana, which you might want to check out.

The history of this brown cotton crop and the work being done to preserve the history and skills of this niche textile art, is so worth studying especially now in a time of loss and upheaval.  

This otherwise interesting presentation had a massive gap in that the speaker admitted he had not studied the important slave labor aspect of this crop, but was focussed on the fibers and techniques of spinning and weaving. 

Here he is at the loom. This weaving is simple, two harness plain weave

here he's at a  friend's house with her growing crop of brown cotton. This would eventually grow several feet higher. You can grow cotton in even small areas and that gives me an idea

here are woven pieces, very fine warps, and thick-as-a-pencil-wefts

The color palette as you see is limited, using indigo with the brown and other cottons.

Here he's holding his first full-size blanket

Tuesday came through again. Happy day everyone! Let's try to remember the significant facts adjacent to what we're focussed on. Peripheral vision is valuable. In all contexts. This is advice to self.

Coming in late to update you on the US election results: 

Dems swept every.single.election. and Prop 50. Everything. Decisively. Let's celebrate. No negative comments will be entertained anywhere! We won everything we were in for.  Two new female governors, too. Pennsylvania high court now safe.  Virginia Leg a lot bluer now. On and on. 

Everything's relative, socks, shortbread and time travel

 Just sayin

And finally despite the spazzing finger, the socks are finished. Onto gloves next

They're cheerful, large size ankle socks. I'll steam press them before I send them.

And in case Handsome Son visits this week, I'm making his favorite shortbread from my favorite YouTuber, Baking on a Budget. 

Simple recipe as you see.  Nice crisp results. I don't like making shortbread though I like eating it. It's a very dry dough you have to press together. But it came out okay.  

I tested those little pieces which broke off as I was putting the batch in the oven. With an afternoon pot of tea. Pretty good.

 

My latest library ebook arrived, another Elly, not so sure about this one. Still police mystery, but this one involves time travel. I'll see how it goes. Not my thing, a bit woowoo.

I'm still in Small Island in book form and another Elly on Hoopla.

 I'm pretty well supplied.

 

The weird thing about the hour change is that it works like jetlag. I keep waking up and falling asleep at weird times. In between, I'm getting the laundry, the bed changing, the garbage and recycle and the knitting and baking, so I'm not exactly out of action, come to think of it.  

But I did a nice workout, strength, balance and cardio

With April and Aiko. 

Happy day everyone, hoping all has gone well with the friends handling medical issues today and that travelers have had happy landings.

Still my flag dammit 

Sunday the clocks changed. Small Island. No pork chops.

 I feel disoriented when the clocks change and wish  they, whoever they are, would just make up their minds. We don't get an extra hour of anything. 

Moving on, I made it to the library

Stickers from Halloween everywhere.

 and here's today's entertainment

Book and TV series. So I'll see what they did with the novel.

And with the new month, I can resume borrowing from hoopla, starting with 

After lunch, the sun came out, the wind dropped and I walked to the pond, lovely sights today. The birds were quiet, they don't like wind, so it was the wind in the trees, fallen leaves and me.

Some oak leaves came home with me.

Beautiful day.  After a postwar WW2 childhood with air pollution from coal fires making November a dark, foggy time, I never take these clear bright days for granted. 

Happy day everyone, enjoy your day. I forgot to explain about pork chops: Gary was about to cook some for his visiting granddaughters, stopped in to ask if I'd like one, or keep one for next day. I explained thank you, but I don't eat pork, so good of you to think of me. 

Special thoughts to blogista e, please, she's got a medical/surgical appointment today, sez Ted and Big Ursy.

Also Nurse Fluffina FRN, that's Feline Registered Nurse

Yeung Man Cooking rules

Saturday was about errands, walking, sit to stands with overhead lifts, laundry and a very nice time cooking rice, lentils and chickpeas from a Yeung Man Cooking recipe. 

What I like about his approach, aside from his calm delivery and great camera work, is that despite using many ingredients, if you follow his instructions everything will be ready together.

Here's the set-up with substitutions, of course. Spinach and scallions for cucumber, red lentils for brown, peanut butter for tahini.

You spice and bake the chickpeas while the rice and lentils cook together. While that's happening you chop and dice the vegetables.

There's a dressing, here

That's the mixed dressing on the left, and the ingredients for it. I finally got to use my za'atar mix

Here's the hot rice and lentils being mixed with the vegetables

And lunch is served. It was really good, a lovely mixture of colors and spicy flavors and textures. Definitely doing this again. It made three meals. Dessert was yogurt mixed with diced mango. 

Time to do another alteration from The Box.

This time I'm shortening the pant, technical term.

Here's the progression up to where I stopped for a cup of tea 

Never mind measuring tapes, just get a pair with the length you like, and cut to match, allowing extra length for hemming. Then pin in place leaving room for the stitching without disturbing the pins.

Then after tea, stitch the hems and you have a nice outfit.  

The white shirt will go with this, too. The pants are straight leg, but the way they're lying they look like bells.  So that's a nice outcome. I think the last, side closing plaid top will go with these pants, too. 

Happy day everyone. It works for me to have a day of moving, making, cooking and as it happened on Saturday, laundry.  

Saturday, what with one thing and another also involved quite a few flights of stairs, all good. As I was coming down for the nth time, I thought grimly I'll never get bungalow legs anyway.

Me neither, sez  Esmeralda LaFluffe

A nice murder and a pot of tea

I finally found an exterminator, and to my amazement, they were able to send a technician Friday morning. 

I got up and ready early, just as well, because Joel the Exterminator texted at a bit after seven to say he was on his way. I had to dash over and let him in, Handsome Son having left for work long before.

He inspected, found no evidence of roaches or activity, did a precautionary spray of the baseboards, and was done, leaving me with a report for the HOA, by nine. Soooo I forwarded it to them, got an acknowledgement and that's done. Except they still have to invoice me, technicians not being involved with payments. Whatever it costs I expect it will be too much.

Next to get the car in to the dealer for the fuel pump sensor recall I've been trying to get done for two years,  difficult because they haven't had the parts. I want it checked over before winter anyway. Next week I'll set it up. No use asking on a Friday, I know from past experience. 

After all this, and a flying visit to the food pantry to leave canned goods, I decided reading a nice murder mystery on the sofa, cup of tea, afghan, was fine.  

The wind was shrieking round, making it feel a lot colder and I decided not a walking day. I did a bunch of sit to stands with weights, and declared myself fit enough.

Happy day everyone, I avoided Halloween,  aside from admiring the kids in costumes,  again. I really can't handle the scary images and general feeling. 

I grew up with it as a quiet day of remembering our dead, and have never made the transition to seeing it as partying.

 But if you enjoyed it I won't spoil your fun. Different strokes, folks, etc. 

And blink, October's over. How did that happen?