Pros 'n Cons

There is an upside as well as a downside to having teacher trainings during this, the second week of my summer vacation. For example, these might be considered some of the nice things:

*The upgrades to the math program are really pretty good and I'm thrilled to see that the whole system has become more user-friendly.

*I was able to bring the Socks Of Summer along with me and make half a foot happen. (that's a "person" foot not a "ruler" foot...why would I need to knit 12 inches of sock, for heavens sake? Well....I suppose if they were knee highs or if my cousin was Big Foot, then I'd need to.)

*It was eight billion degrees outside today with 3 million percent humidity. No, I am not exaggerating and it doesn't matter whether you are using a Fahrenheit or Celsius system to measure the temperature. You get the idea...it is hot!!!! But, this was bearable because:

*Most Maine schools do not come with air conditioning. But a lot of the high schools do...and my training was in the cool comfort of the high school library. Ahhhhhhhh!

*The training, which was scheduled from 8:00-4:00 was put on the fast track and we were out by 11:00.

However, there were some drawbacks:

*I brought the Socks Of Summer with me and knit half a foot...but the Monkey Socks had to be left behind.

*It was eight billion degrees today with three million percent humidity.

*The training was let out early and I had to go forth into the blazing sun, leaving behind the sweet, sweet air conditioning that was keeping my hair in a non-flat state.

*There is no way on God's green earth that I am going to remember a single darned thing that was covered today regarding the fabulous new upgrades to the math program. I will return to school in September, stare at the new teachers manuals and demand to know why no one told us about all this stuff before we had to teach it.


But when you boil it all down to the basics (which isn't too hard to do when it is eight billion degrees outside) it really comes to this: I got to come home to my Monkey Socks.

And Sheepie likes her Monkeys!

Anyone who has read this blog for more than ten minutes has probably figured out that I am not exactly an accomplished knitter. You've been looking at pair after pair of stockinette socks and wondering, "Is that all there is? Thank heavens that her truck breaks down every now and again or she gets a bee in the house...that at least makes things interesting!" And the scarves? I honestly don't know how you all managed to contain your desire to just come strangle me with one of the foolish things. You are really just so nice! I feel like my foray into something a little different is as much for you as it is for me, really. I steeled myself for the challenge in order that you might be able to look at something that might represent a change of scenery.

Now either my skills have increased tenfold over the past few months (and I have about thirty projects that are unfinished and with irreparable errors in them that never saw the light of bloglines to prove differently) or this pattern is ridiculously easy. Nothing has gone wrong. Something has to give somewhere, I'm sure. Any day now, I will surely slink back to the blog and confess to you all that there has been some horrific incident involving my inability to count or successfully include a yarnover. But, I gotta tell ya...I'm on the fourth pattern repeat of the cuff and there has been no such tragedy. Not one. I just knit them. I didn't have to use any of the bad knitting words at all! Maybe it's the heat or something. Whatever. I'm not going to question it too thoroughly. I'm just going to enjoy it.

Because I have another training on Thursday. There will be no air conditioning. And it's one of those "mandatory" trainings for which they actually pay us. Thus, no early release time on this one. I'm going to need to stock up on the happy feelings.

SA