While some of you may be churning out masterpieces and others are out winning prizes, we here at PurlingSwine are winding down our summer with the Doritos&#174 of Fiber — junk food knitting.

This is a project to do on the couch, in the dark while you are watching the Olympics. It isn’t challenging, nor is it mesmerizing — it is a quick fix. Its satisfaction comes from the speed, the mind numbing quality. It is empty calories — the ones you regret the most, yet your hand keeps going into the bag.

Heck, if you’re a junk food aficionado you are well aware of the oragami move of junk food consumption – the strategic funneling of the bag into your gaping maw so that you don’t miss a single crumb on the bottom.

If there were a fiber equivalent, this would be it ……

I haven’t named this beast yet — some have suggested RoadKill Poncho, others The Yedi …. any further suggestions? I have decided to use the remaining yarn towards the length rather than fringe – does something this fuzzy need fringe? would fringe be just the icing on the tacky cake? the cheez whiz on the Tostitos&#174?

what would Marcia do?

Today I decided to make some Dilly Beans. I always get nervous when I embark on a canning expedition. I remind myself that women have been doing this for years, that I was in the kitchen many times when my Grandmother was putting jars up, that if the canning knack isn’t genetic, then I certainly must have gleaned a thing or two through osmosis. I then read every book in my possession about canning and search the internet for canning advice. Feeling sufficiently fortified, I proceed.

1. gathering ingredients

2. boiling the lids and rims

3. preparing the beans

4. daughter #1 lends a hand

5. boiling water canning

6. what’s that behind the pot? close up of scrapple pig

7. ta-da!!

so there you have it. I am waiting for the jars to cool to check the seals — I have heard some promising popping noises coming from the kitchen — perhaps these really will be good, homey beans and not Harbingers of Death.

Last night I had a dream that my girlfriends threw me a surprise baby shower. I was really surprised.

Now in the clear light of morning I am disturbed.

Everyone, don’t panic!

Here’s what I am telling myself and it’ll work for you too:

1. I was out with the girlsfriends for a late dinner last night

which means that I ate a late dinner and that can result in strange dreams

2. one girlfriend is indeed throwing a baby shower for her niece

3. we chatted with amazement about another friend who is pregnant with her 6th child and decided that she must be crazy

4. I am way too old for this, and no matter how many times I hear about so-and-so who had a midlife baby, that ain’t me

5. I think I need to have s*x to be pregnant, right?

I have lived through the campout!! And I did laugh my ass off!!

Appropriately, our girl scout reunion campout started off with a Good Deed. The girls saw a stray dog roaming around. He was very friendly. He was wearing a blue harness with a note attached, reading something along the lines “I am a nice, friendly dog, please take me in”. As most of you know, I have hit my quota with dogs (4!!) and everyone else at our campout already has a dog. So we gave him some water and called the town shelter. They were just about to close but agreed to stay open until we could deliver our new friend. Poor guy — why would someone abandon a dog like that? Especially in the heat we were having? Daughter #1 swears it was the same dog that she saw on Wednesday – so that’s at least 3 days he was roaming around. Some people are ignorant assholes.

The rest of the evening was spent grilling, eating, swimming & laughing. The bugs (slugs!) and the heat just added to our hilarity. All told we had three tents – which were like ovens. Luckily someone had brought a netted structure – the kind of thing that if you were camping for an extended time you would set up a picnic table in. The Moms decided to move our sleeping bags in there. Unfortunately, it has no bottom, the netted edges just skim the ground. This allows slugs access. eeww!

I don’t know how we couldn’t seem to outrun the slugs.(that’s a said commentary)
We ended up dragging some chaise lounge chairs inside and sleeping on those. Naturally, we had set everything up on a slope, so spent most of our sleeping hours slowly sliding off our chairs! I am posting a picture of our operation, but will not link it to a larger size — the girlfriends would kill me.

We all agreed that we should do it again next year!

Of course, I was wrecked for Saturday and spent most of the time in a stupor.