25 March 2006

Stash-o-rama

There seems to be a confessional trend towards showing off the state of one's stash, so far be it from me to disappoint. At the moment mine is more or less in a state approaching some semblance of order. David deserves a lot of credit for that. This is the bulk of it.


And here's another bin of stuff doing double duty (space is at a premium in this house).


And here's yet another bin, mostly stacked up with knitting books (and a few DVD's that haven't found their way back to their drawer).


In the Works

I mentioned the other day that I was attending an alpaca seminar for veterinarians. It was led by Dr. Norm Evans, who is very well known in the industry and author of the Alpaca Field Manual. He's doing some interesting work right now evaluating skin biopsies to help determine the breeding potential of animals for better quality fiber. He's also a pretty nice guy, and I found the seminar very useful. It also got me thinking about investing in one of these:


There really are very few people (actually, only one) in this area doing ultrasound work with 'pacas, - even though it's the gold standard for doing pregnancy checks and evaluating the uterus and ovaries (That's what's shown in the photo, btw) - so I'm thinking it would be a good investment and nice little sideline to do in my free time (Who needs sleep?). I've also been bemoaning the fact that we don't have an ultrasound unit at the emergency clinic, and while a portable unit like the one in the photo won't have all the whistles and bells of a console unit, it would be a handy tool for the kinds of things I'd need it for in an emergency setting. Right now I'm just working on sorting out costs of doing something like that. The ultrasound unit itself shouldn't be too bad if I look for a decent refurbished one (not too bad meaning in the $10-15K range - it's all relative), but there's also the cost of supplies, medications, setting myself up as an LLC for solo practice, licensing fees if I want to go over the border to do this in New Hampshire....

And Just 'Cause It's Cute

I got this of Tolo as I was coming down the stairs from documenting the stash. He loves to sit on the stairs like this, mostly so he can pounce on any of the other cats (actually, mostly just Poqui - the girls will smack the hell out of him) as they try to make their way down the stairs.

2 comments:

City Wiccan said...

That's an unusual way for a cat to sit . . . however, I understand the tactical advantage.

Did I start the stash confession??? Who else confessed? At least yours looks somewhat organized . .. in bins and such :)

Mel said...

Actually, I've seen stash confessions on a lot of blogs lately. Mamacate's comes to mind first, but there have been others, including Ann of Mason-Dixon Knitting. Queer Joe commented on Franklin's blog that the transition from someone who knits to a knitter is "the same one folks in Alcoholic's Anyonymous have been trying to describe for decades." So maybe it comes from that same place.

My name is Mel, and I'm a fiberholic. :-)