Fuzzy Black Balls

I haz 'em.






A matched pair, even.






Wanna see them?








That's two super soft balls of possum-merino in black, and that long skein hanging between them is some hand-dyed superwash merino sock yarn from James in the "Highland" colorway. Or is that colourway?

Either way, the hand-dyed is James's own lovely creation, and I ordered it all from his online shop, which is right here.

More (Belated) DC Photos

I meant to go back and post pics from our Saturday trekking around to see the monuments, but I'm kind of a bad blogger these days, apparently. Anyway, we had a nice day to do it, albeit a bit on the warm side. We started out hanging with the Obamas.



For some reason, David didn't like it when I tried to nibble on his neck.



By then the Secret Service people were looking at us funny, so we went around and over to visit the National Phallic Symbol.



I'm not entirely certain why David decided to bring his rain jacket along, but it stayed tied to his waist all day. With temps up around 90F and strong sunlight filtered through hazy humidity all day, there was no way a rubberized black nylon shell was going to be a needed item. Anyway, by the time we got to the Washington Monument, they'd already handed out the last of their available tickets for the day, so we didn't get to go inside and kept on trekking around the Tidal Basin to the Jefferson Memorial.



Honestly, I think that every single teabagger and every single Republican politician who blathers on about what they think the Founding Fathers wanted for this country needs to be dragged to these monuments and made to actually read what they actually said they wanted, especially this one.



After we left there, we walked the rest of the way around the Tidal Basin, where we saw a cricket game



what I'm pretty sure had to have been the last of the cherry blossoms (look at the little green cherries!)



and the FDR Memorial (which I also think the teabaggers need to go see)



Then we got to the Korean War Memorial, which David particularly wanted to visit, since his dad is a veteran of that war. All the people in red & blue shirts in the background were part of a huge group of veterans who were there for some sort of rally.



Then it was on to my favorite of all, the Lincoln Memorial. I only learned as our plane was landing that David had never visited it before. Built to look like an ancient Greek Temple, to me it is the one monument in DC that best captures the sense of Sacred Space.



Also, by that point in the day, I really appreciated being able to slip of my sandals and feel the cool marble under my feet.

Then we visited the Vietnam Memorial, followed by the World War II Memorial, by which point our energies were seriously flagging. At the WWII Memorial, too, I had to contend with the Umbrella Lady, who was oblivious to my photo-taking attempts and just would not get out of the way. So finally, I just said to hell with it and let her be the subject as she was holding court.



I must say, though, that I was quite impressed at the coordination of her outfit.

Cherchez la Femme

A mantilla is the perfect accessory for any outfit!



"

The higher the bonnet, the closer to Gah.

Good.



Much better.



And never, ever underestimate the value of a good disco nap.



p.s., If you want to see more pics from our afternoon with VUBOQ, go see his blog post about it here.

In the D.C.

I'm going to be doing a 3-day continuing ed course in Arlington, VA, starting tomorrow, so David & I decided to take a mini-vacation and spend the weekend being tourists in DC. Not much time to write, but there has been lots of walking, lots of touristing, lots of food, and lots of fun.

I'll post a few monument photos later, but today we went to the National Gallery of Art and met up with VUBOQ, who was much better at taking photos of us all than I was and who will more than likely be blogging about it in the not-so-distant future. What I will share, though, are some interesting artworks depicting the Flying Spaghetti Monster through the ages. First are two photos from an ancient Roman mural depicting a celebration known as an FSManalia.

The God Incarnate:



And a worshipper carrying a plate of spaghetti with meatballs:



And here's one of St. Francis receiving stigmata directly from FSM. Most paintings of this event actually show them coming from a giant flame in the sky, likely meant to depict FSM covered in a spicy arrabiata sauce, but in this particular image you can actually make out his noodly appendages.



And since I have to get up super-early tomorrow, I'll end this art history lesson here. More later!