Celtic Knots Under The Sea

I went to see 'Under The Sea 3-D' at IMAX last weekend. I've been waiting and waiting for it to get here since I saw the preview in December. I loved the other 3-D documentary I saw last year and I was not disappointed with this one. It SO ROCKED! Oh, there were a couple of uncomfortable moments when my lap was full of poisonous sea snakes, but other than that I was totally enthralled.

As an ocean lover with a healthy fear of sharks and drowning (and after this film, Garden Eels which I heretofore hadn't know existed-CREEPY!) this was the perfect way for me to scuba through coral reefs and frolic with fish, sea lions and whales. And since I am infinitely more appealing in my jeans and jacket than I am in a wet suit, it was a win-win situation. It was so realistic that at one point I was convinced that I had discovered yet another superpower; breathing under water with no gear! This, combined with my current superpowers of taking off my socks without using my hands, ability to eat tall stacks of chocolate in a single sitting and achieving complete invisibility when trying to get someone to wait on me at Shopko, had me pondering what color cape I should make myself. [Uh, that's not true. We all know it would be purple satin with copious amounts of glitter and Bedazzle gems.] At any rate, run, don't walk to this wonderful 40 minute treat. Jim Carey narrates and that concerned me at first but he was wonderful and I didn't get sick; sea, 3-d or otherwise.

I don't know if I mentioned it before, but in lieu of New Year's resolutions, I pick something to study and learn each year. This year, I am putting a concerted effort into learning to draw Celtic Knots. Must be all the cables I've been doing recently. I'm starting out with the easy ones, and I've found a new guide that actually makes sense. I've used someinstructions in the past that basically instruct you to build a time machine, go back to Celtic civilization, become a monk and learn from the originals but this new book is way better. Here is one of the first ones. Go easy, it's only been a few days....Sorry about the flash burn...

Maybe I'll get better at it by St. Patrick's Day. But if you get a wonky, lopsided Celtic Knot on your St. Paddy's card from me, you'll know I haven't quite completed my Tardis just yet.

The banana wontons met with rave reviews. They are best completely cooled thought-there is something decidedly unappealing about hot mashed bananas, even if there is chocolate involved. There were so much fun to make that now I want all of my food wrapped in tiny, tidy wonton packets. I've been thinking about several combos for the future:

• a few fresh raspberries or blueberries sprinkled with sugar
• thin diced apples drizzled with honey
• that pre-made Philly cheesecake stuff in the dairy section at the supermarket-maybe with a Hershey's Kiss in the middle

And I think glazing them with a simple powdered sugar glaze or drizzling them with melted chocolate would work well.

For you Bentley fans, he's been doing well-really enjoying the spring-like weather; so many new things to sniff, so many new things to pee on. He's made several new friends in the hood-mostly little ones. He loves all dogs but it's fun to see him so extra gentle with the wee ones. He loves to kiss them a lot, which must be like getting hit with a big, warm, Milk Bone flavored tsunami when you are a Lhasa Apso, but they tolerate it very well. And they tend to run him ragged. All that playing makes Bentley's very, very sleepy...

He likes to sleep with all of his feet on one big pile where he can see them. "Foot count. One? Here! Two? Here! Three? Here! Four? Here! Whew! Good! ZZZZzzzzz."

There has been knitting. I've been working on my sweater. I'll put another project pic up when I finish the upper back part that I'm working on now. Only about 4 more inches to go. I'll have to put it down for an hour or so to make a pair of mini mittens. I had a little cushion towards my one pair per week goal, but now that I'm obsessed with the crack sweater (which I've renamed the Sugar Camp Sweater since the snowshoe cable and the honey comb remind me of maple sugar season up in Aroostook County. That and the fact that, for me, sugar of any kind=crack...) My knit time per pair is down to a little over an hour now, but even 30 minutes without crack is painful. We are talking major cable obsession here!

I'll leave you with a couple of things I heard at work that amused me last week:

• Upon hearing that Window's Outlook was painfully slow and crashing left and right, one of the kids declared, "Outlook is grim..."
• Someone bought a new coffee bean grinder because the old one didn't pulverize. That is to say it 'didn't work for beans'....

Yeah, that's what keeps me going back to work every day...