Amit's blanket

I made this blanket (afghan) for Amit. i borrowed the idea from Martha (thanks, girl!!), but decided to go with shades of blue instead of a very colorful blend.

the hexagons are crocheted one by one, and then assembled together. suer, i had to improvise a lot -- that's my first ever big project like that, but that was the fun!!
ben and i call the hexagons "blenkles" - blanket elements, just like "pixels" are picture elements. they are all different, no two blenkles are the same! [theoretically, there are 7!/(7-4)!=840 possible permutations, with 7 colors and 4 rows in each blenkle, so it's not so hard to do]. i did consider writing a code for that though ;)

the hexagon pattern was easy to pick up after i looked at some pictures online (i am more experienced with web searches now -- google 'granny square' and you can find many many free patterns!)

the blanket turned out a bit too thick than i intended, probably because the only yarn that i could find wasn't thin enough. but hey, it's my first time!! i had a lot of fun making it, and i hope that it will be useful :)
now i'm thinking of making something with fall colors. i really like all that crafts-work. more fun!!

i'll see if i have any pictures of the blankles in the making.

Sushi dinner

we had some sushi, wine, beer and a baseball game with Chris a couple of days ago. Gray was sure that i'm rollong just for him. mmrrrriuoo smoked salmon!

action

one of the nice things about living up here above the street is that you can sometimes see some action.
1. cab crashes into a street light
first guy at the scene: our local homeless guy. (wearing a white cap)
2. a few seconds later, police car arrives.
3. ...followed by fire fighters...
4. ...and an ambulance.


looks like both the cabby and the passenger (!!) left the cab walking.
the street light didn't seem to be doing just as well.

new project

last night i went with Kari to an arts&crafts store in chicago. i had a lot of fun going through the colorful aisles, and left the place with two big shopping bags full of yarn. not sure what the project(s) will be (maybe throw pillows? another blanket?), but it's going to be fall colors.

hurray!

the shelf

 

Gray scrooge loves his new shelf! he can jump all the way to the top, and it seems like having the shelf there cured his habit of climbing on any open window.

 

 

hebrew

we spent lunch today speaking only hebrew (except for ordering of course). it started when i wanted to say something nasty about someone who was in hearing range from us, and the conversation had a life of its own from there... it was a lot of fun!
we mostly told each other what we did this morning. ben thought it was hilarious that in hebrew we call all types of cereal "corenflex", and that if you ask for a "soda" in you get sparkling water.

his hebrew is improving a lot. he does his homework every night (well, sometimes he falls asleep during the boring lessons...), and can now say complete sentences! i'm so proud!

work stuff

i've been working on this problem for a while now (won't bore you with details, but it has to do with this pretty picture).

many people have tackled this problem in the past, and nobody came up with a very good solution so far.

this morning i read in the most recent paper that came out about this the following line:

"a detailed model of this system, including the... and... and... and a detailed understanding of the uncertainties will be a challenge.... The record of models for this system is discouraging."

sigh.

it's a girl!

and her name is Amit. i love this name.
she is wonderful (if you believe a dad to be unbiased ;)) and her coming to the world was as normal as a delivery can be. can't wait to see pictures!

i made her a little something and i will send it tomorrow. but for now, just a virtual hug from her doda and dod in america :)

weekend

we had a lot of fun this weekend. left the scroogim at home alone (doru came to see them once though), and drove to Cadillac. it was close enough to Halloween, so the dvd player showed scary movies most of the time. ben slept a lot on the floor, Sandy and Kevin brewed beer (i hope it will be ready for next time we go up there!), and we finished some projects that we had planned to do (a scrooge rack, and some sowing)... there was also enough time to play basketball with the grim reaper. all in all, it was great. we'll show pictures.
Gary and i started working on the israel vacation documentation. there are a ton of pics to sort through, and a lot of tails to tell. i sure hope we get help from everybody, otherwise it can be pretty dull...

although Sandy kept claiming that this year wasn't very good for colors, i thought the greens and yellows and reds of the trees were very pretty, and i think i want to make something in those colors. maybe a blanket, or something. we'll see. i still need to find a nice (and cheap) crafts store nearby. my other knitting project is finished, and i'll send it on its way tomorrow. will post pictures after it had reached its destination... don't want to ruin the surprise!

fall???

it's october, so according to the calendar it's supposed to be fall.
some trees started changing here (most of them to boring yellow, but there's one at the corner of the window, that's turning red), but for most of the past week it's been a gross summer weather. hot and humid. in 25 degrees (F) above average, chicago had to cancel the chicago marathon, it was too hot and humid to run.
one of my favorite things lately is watching the news in the morning while drinking my coffee and trying to wake up (you all know that i'm not a morning person), and i especially like the weather segment. today it finally colled down to "normal".
it's weird how there's weather here to speak of. temps can go up or down by 20 degrees from day to day, so not used to that!

p.s. i jsut looked at today's weather report, and it is: "47F, Dreary". i looked up dreary: Dismal; bleak. Boring; dull: ‮קודר, משעמם, מעציב

addendum

if it's not too late, we would like to add a line to our wedding vows.

on ben's part, right after "i shall be your best friend", we would like to insert: "i shall always install software for you for as long as we both shall live".

Scrooge at the office

Garden makeover

when we came back to chicago, after three weeks away, i was very sad to find my glorious garden in this shape:


we DID ask the neighbors to water it from time to time ("what, we did water it, twice!" one of them said later...)
i gave it a week, watering it and loving it, but it seemed like garden is really dead. i saved the dried basil leaves in a container for future use, and started the garden over... i know it's unorthodox to sow seeds at the end of summer, but, what the hell- our apartment is a good enough greenhouse, i'll give it a shot.
it seems to be doing very well, especially basil, to which i designated its own pot, so that it doesn't take over everybody else.

here it is this morning, basil on the left, parsley in the middle (it took longer than the other guys to sprout...) and dill on the right.

it's kinda awesome to see it grow from day to day. i especially like those first leaves that break through the dirt, and look nothing like the ones the plant will finally grow.

Cubs and Bad Burritos

Last night, Chicago Cubs fans edured yet another disappointing end to the Cubs' season with a 5-1 drubbing at the hands of the Arizona Diamondbacks. This game was the last of the first round of the playoffs of Major League Baseball. The culmination of the playoffs is the World Series, which used to be the pinnacle of American sports, but has since been knocked of its pedastal by the Super Bowl, at least in my opinion.

We joined some friends to watch the game on TV on their deck down in Wrigleyville. They live about a block north of the stadium. Here's Wrigley Field in the picture to the right. Their house is about 100 meters from the left edge of the picture (North of the Stadium), so you can't quite see it, but it's close enough to hear the boos of the fans. [For reference, you can see the Red Line train at the top of the picture, at the Addison stop].

My impression is that it's kind of cool to be a Cubs fan, mostly because they're a hard luck case (read about their rich but sad history here). The short of it is that they haven't won a World Series since 1908; 2008 will mark the 100 year anniversary of futility. Many of the residents of Wrigleyville are young professionals with roots all over the world, but they are all united in their unconditional love of the Chicago Cubs.

[For the record, I grew up (and still am) a Detroit Tigers fan, but the Cubs were always broadcast on WGN (with Harry Carey), the Chicago superstation, which we got on cable in Michigan, so I always pulled for the Cubbies when we couldn't watch the Tigers.]

Regardless of the outcome, we had a good time watching the game on their deck, and being part of the downtrodden atmosphere that is fostered by Cubs baseball.

The brings me to part two of the night, which would break my heart more than any baseball game could ever have done. As usual, I had a craving for a burrito. Several people recommended El Burrito Mexicano (see some reviews here; maybe these folks caught Mexicano on a good day), a little joint just east of the tracks on Addison. Burritos are probably THE only food I consider myself anything of an expert in, so I'm always keen to sample something new (see my forthcoming Midwest Burrito Review).

It had the makings of a fine establishment: white, brightly-lit, mostly undecorated greasy walls, no air-conditioning, drunk baseball fans lined-up out the door, and 4 guys working their tails off behind the counter. Definitely my kind of place. In great anticipation, I ordered a pork burrito with sour cream and a pork taco with sour cream for Keren.

I would soon realize the error of my initial assessment on the first bite: the tortilla was dry and bland, and sat in my mouth like soggy cardboard. As I gnawed through it, I reached the iceberg lettuce garnish, whose flavorlessness could only be outdone by the hot, dimsal filling that could only have been the ground pork and bean-like vegetables. Because there are people starving in the world, I finished this abomination in great despair. I later expressed my displeasure to Keren in broken Hebrew (ze lo tayim. ani lo ohev ha'burrito ha'ze ha'charrahee.) I went to bed that night with a stomachache, not from undercooked meat, but from a broken heart.

I'm always ready to give a place a second chance. So many positive recommendations from so many people. Maybe I didn't ask for enough toppings. They must have hot sauce, beans, cheese, and jalapenos somewhere - many of these things are standard at most places. Maybe it was a Cubs game so they didn't have time to give their burritos enough love. I need you now more than ever Big Ten Burrito! It will be a long healing process, but someday, I will give El Burrito Mexicano a second chance.

Gray's antinomy

gray had a rough week, and it's only wednesday.

he usually knows when he's doing something wrong (like climb on the counter, or on the window), and runs away shamefully when we say "NO!" or "DOWN!". but he's also a pig, and apparently for some things he doesnt mind the punishment... as long as he gets what he wants.

for some reason, only since we came back to chicago, he's been coveting Black's food. he would finish his own dinner at the speed of light, and then start eating from Black's plate. Black, on the other hand, is truly his grandma's grandpet, he enjoys every bite, eating slowly (first he licks all the gravy off the plate, and then eats the chunks of wet food one by one). he normally takes 4 times as long to eat his dinner than Gray.
anyway, Gray's piracy is unacceptable, and since Black (for some reason) isn't being assertive (he used to hiss at him, now he doesn't anymore), we take the law into our own hands and smack Gray on the head when he's being bad like that.
he got smacked on the head so many times this week... (he must be thinking, "damn, this food gives me headache"). we know he associates it with dinner, but not sure that he understands the boundaries that well. we know he understands he's being bad. he only forgets.

last night, poor Gray was buzzing around the house pretending to be Michael Schumacher (one of his favorite time passing -- playing Nascar), and jumped all the way from the floor to the window, momentum and everything, and slipped, fell back, and while struggling to catch himself in the air his poor foot got stuck in the window frame. i ran to the rescues, but in the 2.5 seconds it took me to release him, he yelled in pain/hysteria, shooting arms and legs and claws everywhere. my heart was pounding like crazy for a long time afterwards. this is just what we were afraid of, with his eagerness to climb up those windows all the time. well, we are more afraid of what would happen if he falls to the OTHER side of the window.
it doesn't seem like he hurt his toe too bad (he lets me touch it now, nothing's broken), he limped for a while, and wanted to be left alone, but today he's back to his normal behavior.

we had already planed to build him a special shelf that he can sit on, over the opened window, and enjoy the fresh air, and not scare us to death. detailed plans will follow!

broken husband

my poor husband is broken. he helped his boss move some heavy stuff out of his apartment on sunday, and pulled something, and now he's walking like an old guy :(
i wish there was something i could do for him, seeing him in pain makes me sad :(