Does anyone have an opinion – I wouldn’t want to do it if it was rude or distracting for the musician or the other audience members – thoughts?

2nd -  I have a new phone number – (847) 693-7951  this number doesn’t replace any other number except that it should ring both my home and cell, and any other place I set it to as well.

3rd – As a reminder I read LJ regularly, I post at my blog which cross-posts to LJ and dreamwidth. I try to keep up on twitter, and post occasionally. But I almost never read or update at facebook, so please if you’ve mostly migrated over to FB, email me if you need me to know something, please don’t assume I’ll see it if you post it only at FB.

4th – Summer is eating me alive, I can’t figure out how it got to be late July already.

5th – I want to see harry potter, go to botanic gardens, clean house, garden, play some games, relax

6th – I am designing a pair of socks that I am very excited about.

7th – “Get dropbox” is a cool app for people using more than one computer. It creates a folder that is automagically synced to its online store of data.  You can move files to it as easy as copying or moving files on your computer, you can use the folder on multiple computers or you can access it through the web if you are on a machine that you don’t want to install their little app on.  Even better it works on all of the big three – Windows, Mac and Linux.

I figured I was escaping – I’m at OVFF, at a con, having a fun relaxing weekend with friends – or well  – I am seeing the inside of my hotel room – Food Poisoning.  Just what I always wanted while far away from home.

There I was, we had just finished a HUGE project at work and I was baked, burned out and tired but desperately wanting to see my friends. We were supposed to go over to a friends house and play games with a bunch of other friends, but I couldn’t figure out how I could think enough to play any of the games. I thought about going and knitting, but all of the projects I am working on now are on tiny needles and I don’t find tiny needles very relaxing and none of the projects are complete no-brainers. (I know Whine, Whine, Whine—wait for it there is a happy ending coming shortly)

I was sort of wandering aimlessly around the house, trying to decide if we should go or not, and what I could bring with if we went. Wandering to the stash, I realized that I mostly wanted to curl up in a pile of Grafton poofs and revel in their softness—and then I realized I could just take them and my fairly portable spinning wheel and setup in a corner do something relaxing and comforting and STILL get to socialize. It ended up that there was more than one of us who was in the same mood, so we setup a craft corner and all hung out and knit/spun/beaded/needlepointed/crocheted and relaxed while still getting a chance hang out and be social with all of the game players.
I was apparently in the perfect state of mind to spin a nice fuzzy lofty yarn, which the Grafton bats are excellent for. I had two bats that weren’t quite the same color intensity but were clearly mixed in the same batch. So I stripped each one into thick strips and then tried to even the colors out a bit. It sort of seemed to spin itself, spun on the middle ratio on my Lendrum and then plied on the loosest. The yarn is a nice worsted weight and is very soft and I really like the way the colors spread themselves out from the bat.

One thing that has become very clear is that I need a large Niddy-Noddy. The “sample” size one I bought when I was just starting, was perfect for the quantities of yarn that came off the drop spindle. Now that I have a wheel it the little guy is getting overwhelmed, and the thick short skein that comes off of the little niddy-noddy takes a *long* time to dry when I am washing and setting the twist.

More images of the yarn below the cut:

So –

I have this friend – although by the time this post is over friend might be a term that some of you might question – and at times she annoys the *!@#$@#%* out of me. I know that part of it is that we are too similar and that some of our annoying traits are expressed in just such as a way as to aggravate me. She is good friends with some of my friends, and she has also driven away many of our formerly mutual friends (including my husband) due to some of her aggravating behavior.

I have in the past tried to address things when they got uncomfortable to me – this mostly resulted in enduring months of petty barbs, and annoying condescension from her to me – I suspect due to her trying to make herself feel stronger or dominant against me. The end result being that I don’t really want to discuss things when they are a problem – it isn’t worth it for the extra months of aggravation. I even tried to discuss this tendency with her – she acknowledged that she might do it – and even to a certain extent her motivation, but it hasn’t seemed to get in the way of repeating the behavior.

I like her husband quite a bit and work with him on a daily basis. So I have no option to disengage entirely.

I seem to run into problems that cause extra friction on a regular basis.
- I am still friends with quite a few of the people who don’t want to continue being friends with her – I am not good with secrecy and don’t feel like I should never mention that I had a plan with anyone of these folks. It obviously bothers her though – I suspect my attempts to downplay my plans with them doesn’t actually help.
- Part of my tactics in the past has been to disengage for a while when it got overwhelming – I know that the disengaging bothers her and I think it just increases her petty behavior towards me. Bad cycle juju.
- She prides herself on our good communication – I haven’t had the heart to tell her that I just dread trying to have a conversation about the situation between her and I.

The most recent thing that has caused a problem –
I host a craft event every other month at my house – open invitation to anyone who wants to bring their handcraft and work on it. I also host a music event on the opposite month.
When the craft days were getting started a few months ago – she announced (not asked) that she was going to bring games – because she didn’t have enough game playing in her life and wanted to play games. I kept my mouth shut – it bothered me that it felt like she was trying to derail the event I had set up – but I wasn’t sure how to address it, so that I wouldn’t come off as an overly controlling wackjob. The end result was that she brought the games, announced that she had them – and everyone pretty much went on knitting/crocheting/etc. And so she put them away – situation solved.
2 days ago she told me that she was going to bring her mandolin as her craft – and practice. She has been playing mandolin for a little over a month now. I have not idea how good she is or isn’t. But craft day really revolves around all the folks sitting and chatting, catching up with each other while we craft. She wants to practice her musical instrument on top of this. I suggested that it would disruptive. She countered that she can practice while people are talking. I mentioned that it might be hard to talk around her practicing. She said that the mandolin wasn’t that loud. (Apparently it hasn’t occurred to her that some people might not want to listen to her practicing) She then started getting defensive and went on to say that she wanted to be there, and her mandolin was what craft she wanted to do and she was going to bring it. Her tone indicated that I wasn’t getting much choice in the deal.

Straw – Camel – Back – — – - – - AAAAARRRRRRRRRRHHHHHHHHHHHH!
So now I am stuck again feeling like if I tell her not to that I am a wacko-controlfreak. And that if I want to address it I will be party to months of shitty behavior from her – just because I don’t want her derailing my relaxing craft day.

Help!!