But I want to GO!!!

*heavy, heavy sigh* 

I've been planning for months, months, people, to go to the Black Sheep Gathering in Eugene.  It is wonderful, with fabulous people, wonderful products, the best bookstore in the same city and a great drive.  I love Black Sheep.  Really, so much cool stuff it's not even funny, with a cool city to explore and everything.  And I have been planning on going for probably the last six months.  Up until about 9pm this evening, as a matter of fact, when my dad and I calculated how much it would cost me to go, not counting fiber purchases.

$60-70.

In gas alone.

Which isn't much until you realize that the next weekend I'm driving to Portland for a week, coming down for three days, and promptly heading back up for the last weekend of my church Campmeeting, during which time I will not be working and not earning money to pay bills.  And I only have about $600 to cover the gas for those trips (at least $160), my food costs (heaven only knows), bills for the latter half of the month (around $75 to $150, but did I mention Port Angeles, WA, at the end of July?), not to mention any incidentals (Portland has some sweet yarn stores.  And great restaurants.  And bakeries.  And other stores.  Like Powell's.).

So, as much as I desperately want to go, I am going to probably have to face up to the fact that.... I can't afford it.  It's my own fault for mismanaging my finances (therapy is expensive!  Who knew?!) and indulging my need for easy gratification (and this without growing up with television) and expensive food.

But, as my dad said, think how much more yarn I can buy with that money in Portland.

But there won't be Ravelers in Portland.  I mean, not in such concentrated doses.  But I can buy more yarn.  Stupid oil.  Stupid war.  Stupid people, for crying out loud.  As I have said before, why can't we all just get along????  And yes, I do know the answer to that, it was rhetorical.

Photographic Evidence

For the skeptics out there, I present:
Me With A Blackpowder Rifle
Me With My Dad (Note wonderfully dorky hat. Perfect sunshade and keeps people from getting in your face.) Me Getting Lectured On How To Not Break A Ramrod (Or Something Like That) (You can see where the targets are in the field immediately in front of the "fort.")
Me Shooting At Things On The Fort Shoot (Or being told where things are. Not quite sure which.)
Tonight I get to go Clean The Rifles. It'll be great, especially if I manage not to set fire to or explode anything.

Gah! I'm leaving for Campmeeting in a week and a half!

And I'm not even close to being ready!!! And I think I'm going to need to work some serious hours in the next two weeks to pay for everything. And I'm not packed!!!! I don't even have a list!!!!!!!!

Okay, deeeeep breaths, Mindy. Everything is going to be fine. Don't worry about it, packing is really never that bad. Except that this year half of my stuff is in storage. Gah!

No, no, it will be fine. I'm sure that less than two weeks of preparation for the concert won't result in your complete collapse during rehearsal. And the fact that you botched "Rodeo" the first time you played it years ago when you were in top form has no bearing on your ability to play it now, none at all.

Gah! I have to finish washing delicate clothing, unless I plan on doing it at Camp, but when will I have the time????? Black Sheep is this weekend.... AGH!

But do not despair, gentle reader, I am sure it will all come together and, unlike last year, I will not wind up on the brink of an utter meltdown. And really, I'm very lucky, I only have myself to pack for, thank goodness! Can you imagine if I had to pack for a husband and children?? Gah!

Mountain Man Knitting

World Wide Knit In Public Day was on Saturday an I am here to report my contribution!  I went up to the Little Butte Mountain Man Rendezvous in the lovely woods of southern Oregon to hang out with my dad for pre-Father's Day, and of course, I took my knitting along!  After all, what quasi-historical re-enactment would be complete with knitting?  I'll hopefully get some pictures, but at this point you're going to have to take my word for it.

I joined my dad, uncle and two cousins, older cousin, friend of my uncle, and a friend of my dad for the day and got to shoot a muzzleloader for the first time... and it was so much fun!!!  According to the men I work with, my coolness factor has gone up substantially since they found out I can shoot.  I sucked severely at the trail shoot (since holding up a muzzleloader is a lot harder than holder up a modern rifle) but redeemed myself on the fort shoot, where I had something to rest the barrel of the rifle on and my hand didn't start shaking after a few seconds.  I've always maintained that the ability to shoot is genetic, and events like this usually serve to confirm that, when my family takes awards in every category they enter!  I need to get Dad to let me start practicing so I can take the ladies category....

I met a lovely lady up there with a spinning wheel and we had a good long shop talk and she's going to send me a link to a roving merchant... or a merchant who sells roving.  Yeah.  Anyway, I'm thinking that it might be fun once I'm a little more proficient with the ol' wheel to take it along and get some spinning done.  That way, if we ever graduate to primitive camp (no anachronism allowed) I can knit with appropriate yarn!

Group A (not to be confused with Type A)

Andrew and I came up with a theory years ago to explain why there are some people we absolutely can never understand, like the preppies in school.  People who had no problem saying or doing whatever they felt was necessary to fit in, whether or not that person was their friend or that they were saying truly awful things.  Okay, there's a LOT more to it than that, and much less negative in some ways, but that description introduces/explains (partially) the following anecdote:

So, our insurance rep came in with his assistant one day; we'll call her Rachel.  Rachel looked really familiar and we discovered that we had been in one of our college Spanish classes together.  There was much bonding over the insanity of the professor and in the course of the conversation, Rachel gave me her email address and said that I should email her and we could get together/reminisce/whatever.  I admit that just as she was walking out I asked if she was a knitter because she really looked like someone I see on Ravelry a lot, but other than that, I was fairly normal.

A couple of weeks went by and I finally got around to emailing her only to hear.... nothing.   At all.  Not even a "hey."  After a week or so, I had to call her about something completely unrelated and when I mentioned that I hadn't meant to be so long emailing her, blah blah, she acted completely cold.  I mean, like I had somehow committed some social faux pas the size of a building.  And when she emailed the info I needed to me?  Not one word about the previous email and her message was incredibly stilted.

For several days I was actually a little upset about the whole thing, trying to figure out what I'd said or done wrong (see bit about knitting.  Some people get freaked out.  By the way, June 14th is World Wide Knit In Public Day.) until Nan-chan laid it out for me:  some people are socially superficial and in a social situation will pretend to be all manner of friendly but when you try to follow the natural progression of social interactions, will drop you like toast on fire.  Now, I've heard rumors about this kind of behavior, but apparently I hadn't really noticed when it happened before.  And for crying out loud, I didn't ask for her email address, she had offered it to me!!  Group A?  Paging Group A?

The reason this is being brought up now is that Rachel came in to the office again today, "just stopping by to see how things are going," and she was perfectly nice and made sure she said "hello" and "goodbye" to me.  Seriously, hel-lo?  "Didn't mean to cut you dead like that when I emailed you, you're just a freak, but hey!  Let's all be buddies and nicey-nice and oh!  Is that a new hair cut?  You look darling!"

PS  This isn't a plea for reassurance that I'm not a freak.  But I am wondering, have you guys had stuff like that happen??

For Heidi

Behold your castle, milady! I know I promised I'd have these up before now. I'm a dork. And it's really late for me to be doing this, but I just got home from visiting my friend Karen. No singing tonight, since my allergies have me sounding like a smoker, but we had a lot of fun with fiddle music. For once I accompanied her on the piano instead of vice versa!! Anyway, not that you care about that. So, yes, grass, apparently perfect for picnicking, has been placed outside your cabin door. As you can see in the second photo, there appears to be a basketball hoop in place as well. The downside I suspect is going to be keeping the rowdy youngsters from "playing" at all hours of the night. But that's what guards are for, right? And I am so planning on being a guard this year!! The grass (or rather, planned grass) stretches all along where the back fence used to be, in front of where the RVs are now. Okay, I must get to bad, bed, whatever. Campmeeting ahoy!!