Liana’s green drink and why I like green

Green. The word says Life. Spring. New. Grass. Buds. Flowers. Trees.

And kale.

Big, leafy, cheap, and so-nutritious-it’s-almost-illegal, kale.

My daughter (the above mentioned Liana) has been extolling the virtues of kale for some weeks now. Evidently a college friend has turned her onto making smoothies out of vegetables.

I know. YUCK.

But get this. It’s not that bad. It’s actually good. And if you check out this nutritional calculation website, maybe you’d like to try it, too.

Liana’s Green Drink

Take one handful of kale leaves

Take another handful of spinach leaves

Wash them. Put them in the blender.

Add some water (I cheat. I add Arizona Diet Green tea. It’s really, really good.)

Whirl around.

Throw in 1/2 of an apple, skin and all. Seeds if you don’t mind them.

Ditto with 1/2 a pear, or whatever you’d like.

(I added 1/4 of an avocado here, too).

Throw in some flax seed. And some oat bran.

Toss in 3 ice cubes.

Blend. Blend. Blend. Until you get this thick green thing substance that smells like the stuff you wipe off the bottom of the lawn mower.

Then drink it. And feel good. Because there’s your vegetables/fruits for the day. That’s it. You’re done!

The drink and the girl –

Other reasons I like green

Gardening.

Yup. We even put up Tiki lights on the patio.

Cool, huh?

Knitting is socks. STR, Tlinkit, Waving lace pattern. Just ready to start the heel now.

Got to run. It’s Memorial Day, there’s a parade, and I’m told my son’s name is being put up on a veteran’s plaque of some kind at the town hall. He’s a veteran now. But he’s alive, and home. We’re so lucky. Many are not. Remember them today, okay?

Lace socks on two circulars

I have jumped on the Socks That Rock bandwagon, you see. So far, every year at Rhinebeck I have missed the booth that sells STR (The Fold). So I had no idea what I was missing.

But at the Flower City Knitting group last earlier this month, I saw some real, live, in the flesh, STR. Oh. My. Gorgeous. So I dashed off to the Blue Moon Fiber Arts website and grabbed me some Raven Clan medium weight sock yarn in Tlingit and then I ran to Village Yarn and bought me two sets of Addi circulars in Size 1’s, and then I ran home and started some socks.

I did a plain stockinette sock cuff nearly 6″ in length before I realized it was a waste of beautiful yarn. And it was boring as hell. So I frogged, and dug out my Favorite Socks book and settled on The Waving Lace socks. Never mind that I’ve never done socks on two circs before, and I’m not quite sure how to manage the gusset with this technique — I’ll figure it out. Right?

Right.

Today’s my 49th birthday. The weeks leading up to it have sucked, and in a big way. But the actual day…maybe not so bad. I took the day off from work, and I’m heading out to the yarn stores soon, and maybe Eastview for some shoes (The Walking Company!), then I have a facial scheduled for 4 PM, and dinner with the boyfriend at Dinosaur after that.

Two more days of work, then it’s a long holiday weekend for us folks in the US. My daughter’s helping me pick out flowers and tomato plants on Saturday, and (sweet girl) is buying me garden tools and gloves for my birthday, so we’ll be doing some serious planting this weekend.

It’s freezing here. Like 46 degrees. Saturday I went to the boyfriend’s graduation from SUNY Brockport and sat in the pouring, freezing rain for an hour and a half. Which I’d gladly do again to see him graduate; my point is simply the weather around here has SUCKED.

But it’s supposed to be a nice Memorial Day weekend, in the 70’s and sunny.

Oh…please remember to remember this Memorial Day.

Happy FO day

And Happy Mother’s Day, too, to all who participate.

I visited my mother this weekend, and gifted her with the Montego Bay scarf she wanted to knit for herself last year, but had to frog numerous times.

I beaded her a necklace to wear with it. The furnace glass bead in the center is the exact same color as the yarn (Handmaiden Sea Silk in periwinkle) and reminds me of a star fish or some other ocean creature, so there you have it.

My brother’s Noro striped scarf is finished. He was deeply into the Grey Goose by the time we arrived at his house, and he knew perfectly well that his picture would end up on my blog, so this is the reaction I got to my photography attempt.

And that’s all.

I’m on call AGAIN this week, so if there’s a post, it will most likely be filed under ‘bitching and moaning’.

***Edited to add.  For some reason I cannot fathom, my brother hated the idea of his actual face on my blog.  So I doctored him up.  But you saw him first…here.

I’m still here

Sort of.

Traditionally, for reasons unbeknown to me, May is a damned shitty month.  Starting sometime in mid-April, and culminating into a full-fledged funk by my birthday in May…this is my yearly pilgrimage to the dark side.

My mind.  Don’t go in there alone.

I am working, but not enjoying it in the least.  I feel myself going “terminal”, in spite of my reasonably good health status.  Like I’m waiting for the guillotine to drop.  The diagnosis to come.  The bus to hit me.  I mean, why not?  Everyday I watch people die.  Men and woman younger than I are now dead.  People who scaled ice capped mountains in Greenland a few months ago are dead, and you can bet your ass they didn’t expect that outcome when they were savoring the view up there with the musk ox.  Lesson learned.  Why plan for a future when there may not be one?

See.  I told you I am in a bad way.

If history repeats itself as expected, I can expect to feel much better towards the end of the month.  In the meantime I am trying very hard to ride the wave without going under.

There is knitting being done, and other things, but the upcoming Mother’s Day holiday prevents me from posting photographs.

That’s another thing.  Mother’s Day.

Oh, god.

All my ghosts come out in May.