The Great Outdoors

The weather here in KC this past week or so has been miserable - and remember, it's only early June. What are we in store for during July and August? In the mid 90's with high humidity, and no air conditioning in my car. It's an almost-10-year old car, so when we had nice Spring days in May, I hadn't yet seen the wisdom of replacing the on-the-fritz air conditioning evaportator unit. But, this past week of miserable high temps has made me re-think that position! Especially when, in my line of work (the funeral business) I have to wear a hot black business suit.

My poor daughter has been taking PE in summer school, trying to "get it over with" so she can take Theater next year as an elective. She's been baking and sweltering in this heat while they have her do outside exercise for two hours a day. Poor kid!

With these hot days, we decided to stay home and watch some movies this weekend. This "oldie but goody" has been my favorite so far - 1988 - John Candy and Dan Ackroyd.

John Candy is such a fantastic comedian! It's so sad he died at a young age. One of my all-time favorite comedies is PLANES, TRAINS AND AUTOMOBILES. In THE GREAT OUTDOORS, Candy and his family are trying to have a relaxing vacation in the North Woods of Minnesota at a cabin resort when his annoying brother-in-law and family invades their peaceful escape, creating hilarious family dysfunctional havoc. What a wonderful comedy.

Watching that movie makes me wish to escape to a northern Minnesota cabin with my family. I hate, hate, hate summer. Fall and winter are my favorites. But unfortunately, we can't escape for a real vacation because we both started new jobs this year, and alas have no vacation time. What I wouldn't give to take an autumn vacation sometime. Wishful thinking. Now enough complaining about the miserable weather.

Better to face reality - yes, it's summer. And I have the knitting attention span of a fruit fly. No big major projects being worked right now. Are you kidding? Knitting has not lost it's appeal for me, but knitting large or challenging projects definitely has! I want to work with cool, small and EASY projects. So bring on the summer socks, the afghan squares, the simple things I can theoretically complete in a few hours, or a few days.

Yesterday, I tried to work with the hat that I discovered last week. I got to thinking, "Will I look like one of those Red Hat Society ladies in this hat?" Not that I have anything against looking like an early-onset senior. Remember I said I feel like an old lady inside already? Yeah, but I'm not a Red Hatter either. Nope. I tried to start this hat yesterday and guess what? After knitting about 4 or 5 rounds of 200 stitches, I discovered that I made the ultimate "beginning knitter" mistake. The darned thing was twisted. Rip. Rip. Rip. Once again, not much accomplished. Maybe I'll start over today, or maybe switch to something else, who knows?