Recovery

Error: KnotMagick is recovering from an abnormal shutdown. Please stand by. Some stitches may be lost if you did not move them to a holder beforehand.

Continue in pattern or proceed with garter stitch? Y/N

To avoid this problem in the future, please bind off appropriately and block well.

Yes, that is my night stand right now.

Yes, the M&Ms are essential to a quick recovery. As is the Mountain Dew. (Don't worry, I'm also drinking lots and lots of water.)

Why thank you, I am doing better. (The number of medications actually means improvement, if you can believe it.)

No, I am not the only one who is ill right now. If you are the praying sort, my grandma could use it right now.

Details to follow.

Loose Ends

1. It's official: I will be attending the Steampunk Symposium in Cincinnati next month. Costumes are mandatory, and I suspect that a typewriter and possibly my spinning wheel will be tagging along.

2. I have become addicted to a Canadian series called The Murdoch Mysteries. As far as I know, it doesn't air here in the states, so I've been watching it on Netflix, but only season 1 is available on streaming. I might just break down and buy the boxed sets, though I was rather unhappy to discover that even though 6 seasons have aired, only 3 have been released on DVD and season 4, for some reason, is only being released as a region 2 DVD set. Frustrating.

3. I finished Missouri's embroidery project last night, but have not been home during daylight hours, so I haven't gotten a good picture of it yet. Maybe this weekend.

4. I really enjoyed doing that series on writing. As you might have noticed, it made it easier to for me to focus my thoughts. So if there's something else you want to hear about, let me know.

Back Again

Currently Reading: Ghost Moon
On the Netflix: Love and Other Disasters

Between a week of vacation and a week and a half of being sick, I've let a lot of good habits slide in the last month, among them blogging. However, since I've spent the majority of the last two weeks in bed or camped out in front of the TV so there hasn't been lot to blog about to begin with. Trust me, you haven't missed much.

Once I was feeling better and my eyes stopped watering long enough to read more than two or three sentences, I finished Karen Chance's Midnight's Daughter, which is the first book in her Dorina Basarab series. It runs alongside her Cassie Palmer books (reviews found here). At this point I'm not planning on reviewing the series, but I will say Dorina certainly lives up to her forerunner and I can't wait to start reading book 2. (Are you keeping up with the summer releases? I've got a list of my top picks at the end of this post)

In addition to the reading, I managed to finally finish the second sock of the pair I've had on the needles since March. That was an Event, since it started with a massive kitchner fail on the toe and ended with me realizing there was a rather massive error in the pattern that resulted in a-symmetrical socks. They fit fine, they just don't match. So once my fragile knitting ego has recovered, I'll have to rework them. At the moment, however, I can't fathom the idea of knitting those socks again. It's not that I dislike the pattern, it just took so long to work out the cables around the cuff and there was a lot of ripping back. Either way, it will have to wait about two weeks since I've got some deadline knitting on the needles right now. I need to finish a baby sweater for a coworker before A) she goes on leave; B) she goes into labor; or C) I leave for my new job.

That's right, I'll be starting a new job later this month. Same company, different location, different position. And since I like to keep my work life as separate from my online presence as possible, that's all I'm going to say on the matter.

If I fall off the blogosphere again, someone poke me. Why is it that good habits are so hard to start and bad habits are so hard to break?
---------------
(Recent and) Summer Book Releases (For the United States)
Spirit Dances by C.E. Murphy (Okay, so this one is already out, but it was just released so it counts)
Hunt the Moon by Karen Chance (Also newly released)
Spider Bones by Kathy Reichs (So May/June was an exciting time for some of my favorite authors. So sue me)
Fallen by Karin Slaughter (June 21)
Heartless by Gail Carriger (June 28, but already released in some areas)
Ghost Story by Jim Butcher (July 26)
The Son of Neptune by Rick Riordan (October 4)

If you're part of C.E. Murphy's latest crowdfunding project, she's also released three of the promised short stories thus far as well as a novella called Right Angles to Fairyland. Thus far, these are only available to her crowdfunding sponsors, but cross your fingers that they're released mass market soon!

Housekeeping

A little renovating has been going on here at Casa del KM.

•The link to the Japan Relief Giveaway is now in the header. From now on, that is where all open contests will go.
•I added my blogroll to the sidebar.
•That means there's no room for the 52/52 Book Challenge, so that can now be found in the site pages, linked below my profile.

Over the next couple of weeks, I'll be adding:
•A page for all former 52/52 Challenges, with links to all of my book reviews.
•A more in-depth bio page.
•A page with summaries of my ebooks, as well as photos of my knitting patterns as well as information on how you can purchase them.
•Updated photos (as in, with proper lighting and staging, rather than *click* "I'm done! Lookie here!") of all of my knitting and handspun (those pictures will actually go on my Devart/Ravelry pages, but some might end up here, as well).

I think that's it for the remodel, though I would like some opinions. I've had some complaints about the background on the blog (the turquoise and blue flowers) making it hard to read. Thoughts? Opinions? (Please include your OS and browser, since I know the parchment backdrop doesn't appear to load on older computers).

P.S. Are you following Jason Kelly, the sock guy's blog? You should read Wednesday's post. It made me cry.

Points

1. I've submitted my final Nerd Wars project for the month. I'll spare you my pathetic attempts at photography. You can see the Ravelry project page here.

2. I've been going through the blog trying to figure out a way to update it, and I'm actually thinking of clearing the decks and starting fresh--over on Wordpress. I've been using the side for the Nerd Wars blog (I'm the blogger for Team Enterprise; you can keep up with our progress here, as well as all of the other teams). I think the layouts just look a little fresher and cleaner, and I like the program for the posts themselves. I think the site in general just gives more options for customization.

3. I'm hesitant about moving because I've been on blogger since 2007, so you all know where to find me here. Also, I don't want to loose my posts. Anyone know of a way I could archive the blogger site into the wordpress one?

4. All of the typeblogs I follow are here, which again makes me hesitant. Not that I don't already have them in my favorites on Firefox, but still. It's community. A network. And I don't like to break the chain.

5. Also, the CFM is here, which makes the linking and updating easier, and makes the magazine more streamlined.

6. So, thoughts? Anyone want to weigh in one way or another?

Honored

Lately I've become obsessed with my stats on blogger. I check at least once a day not to see how many hits I've gotten, but to see where they're from. It boggles my mind that the current standing for this week is as follows:
United States--20
Netherlands--15
United Kingdom--8
Russia--7
Germany--4
Ukraine--4
Latvia--3
Canada--2
Denmark--1
France--1
I might not get a lot of hits on this blog, but it amazes me that there are regular readers of this blog in the Netherlands, Russia, Germany, and the Ukraine (who regularly rank in the top five, flopping back and forth with the UK). I kind of figured that the UK and Canada would be on the list, since they are also English speaking nations, but I thought they'd rank higher. Go Netherlands! You guys are my all time #2 readers.

This came partially because I discovered the stats feature when I was consumed with the travel bug, so since I can't go anywhere I'd stare at the little green bits on the blogger map and try to figure out what I was doing that would attract attention from other parts of the world (obviously, not much, but hey! I'm international now!).

The downside is that it got me kind of nervous. I know nothing about most of the countries on that list. So what do you guys find interesting? What keeps you coming back? I'm kind of blogging in a vacuum here, so if I'm not doing something you'll have to tell me.

No matter what, though, I just wanted to take a minute and say thanks for reading. It amazes me that my life (or my knitting) could be interesting enough for anyone to want to hear about it regularly, but I'm glad that you guys do. Thanks for being out there and for sticking with me.