Finished a few things.

Here's some pictures.

Seraphina shawl. Made in Bernat Berella "4"

The waffle stitch afghan is finished.

I'm tired, so that's it for this blog post.

Check your smoke detectors

First off, to any relatives reading this. We're OK!!!

Last night, around 2am, our smoke detectors went off. Apparently the ventless gas fireplace in our basement was malfunctioning some how. Not sure exactly what was wrong, but when I ran out of my bedroom to see what was going on, there was a rather impressively scary-big flame in the fireplace.

We were thinking it was the CO detectors at first, but apparently it was the actual smoke detectors. (good thing we changed those batteries a few weeks ago!)

Since we had thought it was the CO detectors, my dad came downstairs and turned off the gas feed to that fireplace and then we'd called 911 (just in case) and sat outside in the cold (19 degrees! and this is an important detail later)

After I'd called 911, I called my aunt that lives across the street, because I didnt want her to worry when a fleet of fire engines showed up in the street. Good thing I called her. She has a brand new furnace, and apparently it was having a problem last night (she had more smoke in her house than we did!)

Her smoke detectors never went off, and she was feeling sick. So, it's probably a good thing we were having a problem too and that our alarms were blowing out our eardrums.

She told me about the problem, and the FD wasnt here yet, so I didnt even bother to call them back about her house. As soon as they got here, I asked one of the firefighters to go to my aunts house with me to check it out too. (not sure what they did find, but she's getting her furnace checked today)

The Omaha Fire Department was so cool. I had felt silly about calling them because other than the large flame in the gas fireplace that went away after we turned off the gas feed to it, we didnt see a problem. But I'm glad that I called now, since my aunt was feeling so sick. (I was dizzy in my basement for about an hour before our alarms went off)


But, we're all ok now, so I'm basically just doing this blog post to remind everyone to check their smoke detectors, and if you dont have carbon monoxide detectors, get to a store and get a couple.

and if they ever go off, dont just knock them off the wall and go back to sleep (I think my dad was considering this option. I insisted on calling 911 because I was scared to sleep in the basement after that)

Now, if I could just get the neighbors to quit parking at the t-intersection down the street (on a curve!) to actually park in their empty driveways so that when the fire engines arrive, they can actually get onto our street without having to resort to using the fire engine to push the parked cars off the roads....that didnt happen last night, but I've seen it happen in our old neighborhood once)

We're shopping for a new (vented) fireplace, or maybe another option for keeping my basement warm...and at least one of my parents will probably be getting fire extinguishers for Christmas. (no real clue what to get people this year)

At least we know the smoke detectors work! (and that there's no way in hell to sleep while one of those is rupturing your eardrums)


Oh, and one of our theories about what happened. We (parents, and my aunt across the street) all have heat pumps. In the winter, the heat pump keeps the house warm until the temperature drops below 20 degrees (remember, I mentioned a few paragraphs ago how cold it was last night?) When the temperature gets below 20 degrees the heat pump shuts off, and the gas furnace will kick on. Last night was the first time that my aunt's furnace had been on since it was installed. She and her heating company that she hired to do the install, think that her furnace was burning off some residual chemicals or dust from the manufacture of her furnace, and that's what caused the smoke in her house and was making her sick.

The gas company guy that the OFD called to our house last night thought that the fireplace was malfunctioning and that when the gas furnace in the store room came on, that it was sucking up more of the oxygen in the room, and that caused the fireplace to not burn off all the gas or something (again, I'm not sure of the physics behind all this) and the flame in the fireplace was huge because it was trying to suck up a ton of air or something and was competing with the furnace or something.

So, we're probably going to get a vented fireplace now, or a nice snazzy electric one that wont try to kill us.

EDITED TO ADD:

Ok, I checked the gas fireplace earlier, because we couldnt figure out a logical reason for what happened last night, and I think we figured out what happened.

We almost could have had a very serious fire. Apparently, a couple of weeks ago when the heating/air conditioning company came to check the furnace, we had the guy turn on the pilot to that fireplace. I told him to set the fireplace to lowest setting. (it has a knob that says "Low" and "High". He was supposed to set it to low.

I checked it earlier, and it's set to nearly the highest setting. Which I dont understand quite why that is. There's a tick-mark on the thing to show which way to turn the knob for high or low.

So, we very nearly got flash fried last night. And it's really a good thing that my dad turned off that gas before the fire department got here. I found scorch marks on the outside of the fireplace.

The fireplace is at the bottom of the stairs and the heat had gone up the stairs, and the upstairs was so hot last night, that I'd be willing to bet that it was probably in the high 80s or low 90s upstairs.

We're definitely going to be replacing this fireplace with something that's got a better set-up for a thermostat or at least an easier to get to emergency shut off of some sort.

Either that, or we'll get a nice decorative ELECTRIC fireplace in the basement. Something pretty with no real flames inside of it.

I'm going to go freak out a little bit about how scary this has gotten after the fact now...and I think I'll start pricing fire extinguishers and see if I can get enough to have one in every room of the house...

CHECK YOUR SMOKE DETECTORS!!

I like this guy!

http://www.youtube.com/user/machosauceproduction

John McCain is a Class Act!

I'm extremely impressed with John McCain. Sad that he lost the election, but impressed with him.

He didnt descend into a whiny hissy fit like the last two losers of a Presidential election. John McCain showed a lot of class, and was very dignified in how he conceded the election to Obama.

I'm not looking forward to the next four years, but at least John McCain showed us that he's a true gentleman.


I cant wait till 2012. I'm voting for Mitt Romney like I wanted to this year. (hope Mitt runs!)

I found it!

I found my missing crochet book last night.

Now I can relax and stop looking for the damn thing. I'm probably missing something else now that needs finding.

What a snob!

Isnt this a bit presumptuous?

Obama Coins Have Been Minted

The election hasnt even been held yet, and this guy is already assuming that he's going to win? Wow...he's got a huge ego!

I thought the Obama "presidential seal" was egotistical, but minting coins with his picture on it? (at least it's not legal tender here)

Ok, this is weird, and it's making me a bit obsessive.

I seem to have lost my copy of The Harmony Guide to Crocheting: Techniques and Stitches by Debra Mountford (pretty sure my copy was from 1992 or 1993)

It's driving me completely batty. Last time that I can remember seeing this book it was either with all my other crochet/knitting books in our family room, or it was in my bedroom on the shelf below my desktop computer. For awhile, I couldnt find my other books (several books that I got as presents this year) I found those books (thankgoodness!) but my Harmony Guide wasnt with them...and they were in a weird place. (in the cabinet of my dad's big screen tv, shoved in the cabinet...not a place I would have put them)

So, I'm obsessively looking around the house for my book. It's my favorite crochet book of all time. I never loan it out, and I usually keep it in my magazine totes. (already looked there) The reason it was out with my other books, was because I was trying to decide on a new project, and I was going thru my crochet and knitting books looking for inspiration. I'd left those books in our family room, but someone moved them inside that cabinet.

I just cant figure out where the book went.

The only thing I can think of is that either my dad, or the cleaning lady put the book somewhere while decluttering a room. I suspect my dad put it somewhere. Hopefully not in a pile of newspapers or magazines. He throws newspapers and magazines out without looking thru the stacks to see if there's anything he should not be throwing away.

I looked into getting a new copy of the book, but it's expensive to replace. Most copies that I found thru Google were over $100. The book is out-of-print. I hope I find my copy before I get too desperate and decide to take out a loan to get a new copy. If anyone knows of a cheaper copy, send me a message.

September 11th

Never Forget!

Ever wonder why Sioux Falls is called "Sioux Falls"?

I just got back last night from a weekend trip to Sioux Falls, SD.

I have to say it was one of my better vacations. A friend of mine and I decided to go visit it a few weeks back, mostly because we'd driven past it on our way to Rapid City last year, and decided to come back someday to check things out.

This is why Sioux Falls is called "Sioux Falls".

Yesterday, on our way home (well, not really on the way home, since we had to go the opposite direction to get there) we drove into Minnesota and went to a place called "Pipestone". It's a small town, not too far from the South Dakota/Minnesota state lines. We went there to see the Pipestone National Monument. Which is where a type of stone called "pipestone" is quarried.

Pipestone is a stone that American Indians all over North America have carved their ceremonial pipes out of. The American Indians have quarried it for several hundred years. It's a beautiful red color stone, it's a soft stone. I watched one of the craftsmen carving on one of the pipes he was making. (I didnt take pictures of that...didnt want to disturb or annoy the guy)

He was making some really beautiful stuff with it. He had one pipe that a really intricate carving of a bear on it.

The gift shop at the monument had a good number of pipes for sale, and I think the least expensive one I saw was about $60 or $75, and it was just a plain design, but still very pretty. Some of the other pipes were over $2000! It was all amazing work too.

We walked thru the quarry/park grounds on the trail. The trail was about 3/4 of a mile long, and it was hot and extremely windy. We saw the old quarries that they no longer use (or dont use very often) and all sorts of flowers, prairie grasses, a couple of deer, and a big patch of *achoo!!* Ragweed. *achoo!!!*.

I dont have those pictures uploaded yet, so I'll do another blog post later, and add those pictures.

A word of warning...

Whatever you do, dont eat the Turkey Meatloaf with Cranberry Glaze from WalMart. (in the meat section, in the case with the hamburgers of questionable origin) I'll just say that you'll feel like the character in the Alien (Aliens?) movie(s) just before the Alien crawls out of his stomach the hard way...

I feel like crap...and it's 4am and I havent slept yet and I'm just waiting for my dad to get up to go to work so he can take the trash out for me. (backup trashcan standing by)

Ewww...I think I'll be "sleeping" in the bathroom the rest of the day. I better post this before my computer gets decorated with something yucky...

Pictures of a crochet afghan that I'm working on.

I'm working on a new afghan pattern that I found on the internet. It's called "Shadow Box Throw" It's actually a very easy pattern, but looks difficult.

I'm using a different yarn than the one suggested in the pattern. I'm using Hobby Lobby's I Love This Yarn! in the Grapevine Ombre color.

I'm probably about half finished with it now. (the pictures were taken last week when it was still wasnt very big) Since it was the first time I've ever done this pattern, I chose the baby blanket size. So, I'm probably going to stop crocheting on it when I get close to the suggested dimensions. It's using up a lot of yarn. I thought I'd bought enough, but I'm probably going to have to go get a few more skeins.

I do like how heavy and warm it feels. It uses back post double crochet (BPDC) stitches and front post double crochet (FPDC) stitches. It almost looks knitted from a distance. The FPDC's on the right side (as apposed to the wrong side) of the afghan look almost like knitted cables to me. I really like this pattern. I might use the stitch pattern to crochet a poncho for myself later this fall. The afghan is going to be for my recliner chair that's in the family room. My dad gets cold in our basement (because it's freezing down here), so he'll probably be the one who uses the afghan the most when we're watching Stargate Atlantis on the big tv.

Here's a knitting project I'm doing now. It's yet another scarf, because I'm not yet ambitious enough to much more than scarves with the knitting.

The scarf is pretty much the same pattern I've used for previous scarves. Cast on 40. Slip the first stitch knitwise, purl 1, knit 1 to the end, the last stitch should be a purl stitch. I'm also using the I Love This Yarn for this scarf, it's a patriotic ombre, but I cant find the skein band right now, so I cant remember the color name.

It's easy, and feel really good and actually feels warm. This is probably the third scarf I've done with this pattern. I'm sure other people have done this pattern before, but I came up with it on my own while teaching myself how to purl. It's now my favorite stitch pattern for knitting because I love how it looks and feels. One day, when I get more ambitous with the knitting, I want to knit a sweater vest with the knit 1, purl 1 stitches. (I looked into a knitting class earlier this week, so I might be getting ambitious fairly soon)

I dont have pictures of the other scarf I'm making yet, mostly because I just started the next one last night. I'm doing it the same as the patriotic scarf, but I'm using a thicker weight yarn, and I changed the pattern. The cast on is still 40 stitches, but I knitted the first row instead of the k1, p1. The first stitch is also slipped knitwise. I really like how the way the first row looks. I'll have to add some pictures later.

Gotta go...just had a couple of lightbulbs blow on me in my room and I need to change the bulbs, it's kind of dark in here now.

Interesting...

It's only been July 1st for about 20 minutes...and there have already been 35 (thirty-five) visitors on my blog for today.

I guess someone just posted the link to the rectangle granny square somewhere new.

Mother Nature is a b!tch!

Here's a few still pictures of the damage to our front yard. Still dont know if the house or roof had any bad damage. I was able to tell that some of the paint on our house got sandblasted off by the hail.

There is another flower pot with mini yellow roses under the tree a few feet away from the flower pot that's pictured.

The wind was blowing south. The tree is pointed at my neighbor's driveway just to the south of us. It's not blocking their driveway, so that's one good thing. They can still get out.

This flag was right in front of the tree. It's a little one you can get at a grocery store for about $2. It's fabric. The tree blew down, but that little flag stayed there, got ripped up a bit tho.

The wind just blasted the tree down. I think the wind twisted the tree. Because the side that's facing up, used to face the house. One of the reasons that it makes me think that we might have had a small tornado mixed in with the straight line winds.

The roots are still underground, and we're going to have to rip out our landscaping to get down to the root bed to get the roots out before we can replace the tree. (hope we can replace it)

My dad just called me to inform me that the power came back on. It flickered right after that, but it was still on when he called me, so YAY for OPPD! (OPPD = Omaha Public Power District)

Would someone tell Mother Nature to stop hitting us with tornadoes!?!?

Ok. First off, we're ok. I took my mom to a hotel so that she wont have to sit in an un-air conditioned house with no cable or internet.

My neighborhood, on the other hand, is a bit messy right now. (I have pictures)

We had a bit of a tornado/straight-line-100mph+-winds at around 5pm tonight. (friday). The last time I was this scared, or THIS CLOSE to a storm was in May of 1975 when we had a huge tornado hit town. The jury is still out on whether this was a tornado, but I saw the trees behind my backyard swirling and spinning. Plus, just the way some of the trees look, there could have been a bit of a twister in there.

I am so pissed off that Mother Nature killed my tree in the front yard! Why couldnt the stupid storm take the big ugly one in the backyard, and leave my nice shade tree alone?!? Stupid storm! We just got that tree all grown up to where we liked it. Now we'll have to start over. Wonder if the house insurance would cover putting a tree the same size back in there. Probably not.

My aunt that lives across the street doesnt look like she had much damage. All her lawn furniture that was in the back ended up in the front yard and her neighbor's yard.

My other aunt that lives downtown had a LOT of damage to the windows of her house and she lost a lot of the siding she had on the house. Stupid storm. That house looked good when my aunt got it sided a few years back. Now she'll have to start over. I dont know for sure, but she thought that it was just the windows that broken. There's a lot of glass in her house she said. At least her kittens, Fritz and Herman were ok.


I just tried to upload some of the video, but couldnt get it to upload, so I'll try again tomorrow if I can.

I'm going to go watch Stargate SG-1 on the hotel tv now, and maybe sleep.

Edited to add pictures.

Damnit! The world doesnt seem so funny any more.

George Carlin died today of heart failure. I think I'm really going to miss him.

I saw him in the mid-90's in Omaha at the Orpheum Theatre. First and only comedy concert that I've ever been to.

I nearly died of hypoxia (lack of oxygen) from laughing so hard. He was so funny.

Here's the video...hopefully...been having technical difficulties

Here are a few videos I took before the storm got really nasty and wet. I thought the clouds looked really ominous, but I am not sure if these were wall or funnel clouds, or if they're just a harmless shelf cloud. I thought they made for good video anyways.

This last video has the tornado sirens sounding. The noise is annoying, so you might want to turn your speakers down a little bit.

I think this storm, if those were actually wall/funnel clouds, might have been the storm that hit Bennington, NE. (Bennington is a town just north of Omaha...we're about 6 miles south of there)

I'm not seeing the video working, even tho I have the video boxes in there. Could someone post a comment saying whether or not the video works??

Tornadoes. Part II

Well, we had more tornadoes tonight. Multiple tornadoes.

This time it was more than just a mile or so of town that got hit. It was extremely widespread. I still dont know if Omaha had much damage, but a Boy Scout camp that's about an hour north from Omaha, just across the river into Iowa was hit. There were about 100 people there. The news is reporting that 40 or 50 people were injured, and that four people (pretty sure they were children) were killed.

Some of the injuries were minor, and a few were really bad. The news is saying that there were serious spinal injuries and head injuries for several people.

I cant remember any tornadoes in the past decade or two near the Omaha area actually causing deaths. This is probably the first tornado event that I can remember since 1975 where anyone was killed in one of the storms. On May 6th, 1975, Omaha had a bad tornado that ripped up the city and killed 3 people...that's the last storm that I can remember where there were any deaths in the immediate vicinity of Omaha.

I'm really getting tired of all these storms. It's been going on for the last two weeks. Almost every day or every other day we've been having thunderstorms. Now we've had two damaging tornadoes in the space of four days. (ok, the storm sunday was actually two tornadoes, todays storm was so widespread that they're probably going to report that it was multiple tornadoes tomorrow)

Lincoln, the capitol city of Nebraska actually had a tornado tonight. Some friends of mine that live there tell me that Lincoln hardly ever gets bad weather like that.

There's a lot of flooding going on in Omaha and other parts of Nebraska. Iowa is pretty much a large lake right now.

I did get a few video shots tonight of what I think (but am not sure) might have been a wall cloud. I'm recharging my camera battery right now, so I probably wont upload the video until later tonight or tomorrow.

I cant wait till these storms end. Normally I really enjoy this kind of weather, but not every day for a couple of weeks. Hopefully we'll have a quieter (and cooler) summer.

We're fine, in case anyone is wondering...

We had a tornado last night about 230am. I'm pretty sure the biggest damage was south of me, in a part of town called Millard (Millard is actually Omaha. Millard was a town of it's own until the Omaha-Borg assimilated it, I think when I was a small child....-Resistance is Futile!-)

The news is saying about 100 houses in the Millard area were damaged, a few of them beyond repair. Saw an interesting picture of some beams that were imbedded in people's front yards, and one picture of what looks like a 12 foot+ long beam that's impaled in the side of a house.

The Omaha police have closed down access into Millard to keep the sightseers (ghouls, looters, YouTube video wannabees) from wandering into the neighborhoods and hurting themselves.

The tornado touched down, ripped up Millard and then went back up and probably dropped down into other parts of Omaha (central and north) to make a mess before it wandered over into Iowa. There's apparently a lot of tree damage in various parts of town.

Other than the damage in Millard, the bigger worry now is flash flooding. They're saying we got 2 or 3 inches or more of rain last night, and we're expecting some more thunderstorms later today. So, a few people may be swimming out of their neighborhoods later tonight.

I need to rent this movie.

I'm a big fan of William Shatner, and also a big fan of William Shakespeare.