That is the question…

I’ve added Snap previews to Persistent Illusion. To see one, just hover over any external link in a post or in the sidebars. Like this one: google.

What do you think, gentle reader? Are these a good thing? Do you like seeing where a link leads before you decide to click on it? Or is this just another annoying stupid web trick that should be banished from the internets forever?

Vote, and I will hear you! Comment, too!

[poll=2]

I was right. Today there are leaves unfurled on the trees and they are growing thickly enough to block my view of both Mt Hood and the river.

All is not lost, though. This is the view from the parking lot roof.

True, I’m not up there all that frequently during the day. And I’m seldom up there when it’s still both light enough to see and clear.

But on the infrequent occasions that I get to view Mt St Helens… what a magnificent sight. Our mountains have such presence. They just stand there against the sky, right in your face. Hills with attitude.

I finished the socks for Tangle and cast on for the Embossed Leaves Socks from the Winter ’05 Interweave Knits. Except I’m knitting them toe-up. I know someone else who also knit this pattern toe-up, and I really liked the way that the leaves grew up instead of down.

I continue to work on the lace leave scarf also.

But today I forgot to grab my knitting on the way out the door, and I’ve felt lost all day. Ack!

Yeah… OK… this is the semi-obligatory year in review thingy.

In the completed objects category (drum roll please):
— 5 pairs of socks that I will actually admit to
— 4 bags
— 3 pairs of fingerless gloves
— 3 scarves
— 2 sweaters
— 1 clapotis

That’s 18 finished objects, or about 1-1/2 per month. Not bad. I’m proud of myself. 😆

In a more traditional vein, here’s the rundown of the year by month:

January: First completed knitting project in about 30 years; new car; driving with #1 Son and his learner’s permit

February: PI’s first big hit from spam bots (may they be consigned to the lowest circle of hell!)

March: Dead water heater, dying refrigerator, leaking roof – ain’t home ownership fun! And my cousin passes away. Not one of the year’s highlights.

April: Major WordPress upgrade; John Paul II passes away and Benedict XVI is chosen; more nefarious bandwidth-sucking spam bots

May: PI’s 1st blogiversary; PI’s new look; #1 Son’s first “real” suit; Chili fingers at Wendy’s; melting destruction of #1 Son’s printer

June: #1 Son graduates from high school, becomes a licensed driver and moves out for the summer; new position; Wacko Jacko has his day in court; first ride on the Canby Ferry

July: Sandra Day O’Conner resigns; woman drives car down stairs (partially down, that is); Scotty beams up; the Viewmaster water tower comes down, PI had our 10,000th visitors

August: Knitflix; the PI FO Gallery launch; my African violet blooms for the first time in three years; PI moves to new server; #1 Son does not go camping; we visit Fort Clatsop before it burns down (no connection between those two events)

September: Katrina; #1 Son moves home; road trip through Oregon, Idaho and Washington; Myst V is released

October: Cold weather comes; distractions from Woodland Woolworks; Judy needs more time

November: Car woes of #1 Son; Westgate closes; Thanksgiving adventures at B’s house; Harry Potter with kids who shouldn’t be there

December: The local news media try to make news out of the remote possibility it might snow; new camera; Autistic Youth’s whirlwind west coast tour is a success; Christmas with grandpa and grandma; Las Vegas

And that was what I did last year! If interested, you can find the particulars on the History page.

Yesterday #1 Son and I, along with E, my brother J, sister-in-law L and niece Z, attended our traditional yearly visit to The Trail Band Christmas Show at the Aladdin Theater. This will be the ninth year that #1 Son and I have attended this concert, a benefit for Friends Of The Children, and I never get tired of it. If you live in the Portland area or will be visiting next Christmas, please consider attending.

Buy your tickets early.

Unlike me. Usually I buy my tickets as soon as they go on sale. The tickets I buy for J, L and Z are my Christmas present to them. This year I waited to get tickets until L called me one night and mentioned that she thought the tickets were almost gone.

We don’t need to mention the words that came out of my mouth after I hung up the telephone.

If you are paying careful attention, gentle reader, you will note that there are six of us that go. And, strangely enough, we sort of like to sit together. Since the tickets sell out fast, the choices can quickly be reduced to single seats in widely scattered locations.

The next day was spent tracking down tickets. I managed to get the last six ticket for the last show of the last day of the concert series. And, needless to say, they were not the best seats. But the theater is small enough that no seat is truly bad. Unless, like me, you are short and end up sitting behind my son, who has tall hair. I had a wonderful view of the back of #1 Son’s neck through most of the show. Those around me who could see the stage tell me that the view wasn’t bad. The music, as always, was wonderful!

But I digress.

Before the concert, we all had dinner at Salvador Molly’s in Hillsdale. I had a wonderful lamb curry. Those of us who are omnivorous decided I made the best entree choice. Those of us who are vegetarian voted for #1 Son’s stuffed eggplant. For dessert, J and I shared a slab (there is no other word) of pumpkin bread pudding. It was heavenly.

At dinner, J, L and Z presented me with my Christmas present: A BCD clock (that’s Binary Coded Decimal for all you geek-challenged readers out there). It tells the time in BCD using little blue LEDs. For example, the time on the clock in the picture is 07:17:27.

Of course I had to play with it a little bit to figure out how to set it, how to make it a 24-hour clock, etc.

It is now sitting on my desk at work, with the seconds flashing away in little blue dots. People walking by have said: What is that? Is that a clock? Is that a binary clock? Cool!

I work among geeky types.

On Saturday I added printer-friendly versions of the Freebies pages so that the recipes and patterns can be printed out in black and white sans sidebars, etc.

I also finally finished playing Myst V: End Of Ages, which I will review sometime later if I get around to it.

I tell you all of this, gentle reader, to explain why Sock Scarf Two remains unfinished. I only have one stripe repeat plus the ribbing left to do. That’s about 50 short rounds on whopping big needles. That’s it. Then kitchener together. And done.

But I’ve hit The Wall with this project.

You know The Wall. I hit it with every project. It’s the place where I’ve sworn to myself that I will work on no other project until Project X is finished. So I slog on, looking for distractions trying not to get distracted because I would rather be doing almost anything else just love working on Project X. I eventually (usually) get past the wall and love Project X by the time I get to finishing. But sometimes the wall is high and thick and very hard to penetrate.

Sock Scarf Two is the current Project X. I know I’m going to love this object when it’s finished. It’s cute and funny, I love the colors, etc. But right now I hate the sight of it and I’d rather be cleaning the cats’ litter boxes outside naked in the dark and freezing cold with rain dripping down the back of my neck and icicles forming on my nose than to work a round on Sock Scarf Two. I have to force myself to pick up the needles. I’m going to try really hard to get the damn thing wonderful project completed tonight.

Do you ever hit The Wall with your project, knitting or otherwise? How do you motivate yourself to keep going?

Harry Potter & The Goblet Of Fires has been reviewed extensively in the media. You have to have been living under a rock somewhere not to have run into one or two or twenty reviews. Most reviewers I’ve read have agreed that this Harry Potter is dark, scary, and no place for small kids.

The movie is often dark and foggy, and thanks to the magic of special effects, there are very realistic fire-breathing dragons, scary underwater merpeople, attacking hedges, bad wizards, monsters, huge snakes, etc.

Good guys die in this movie.

So, riddle me this Batman: Whether or not you believe that HP&TGOF deserves its PG-13 rating (and I happen to think it does), why would you take a baby to see it?

#1 Son and I went to see it on Friday. (Note: He’s 17 and I’m way more than that. Neither of us is subject to nightmares.) We went to the Oak Grove Cinema in Milwaukie. It’s a little out of our usual metro-west stomping grounds, true, but #1 Son doesn’t like the theater that’s close to our house. I didn’t really mind checking out a new theater. Since The Westgate closed there are too few theaters left that are more than a cookie-cutter, stadium-seating cinema complex. I was please to find that Oak Grove has tons of character. What’s not to like about a cinema that marks its restrooms in three-foot-tall neon “guys” and “gals” signs?

When the movie started, the theater was about two-thirds full. It was a very mixed audience. I would say that the majority were teenagers or older, with a fair representation of senior citizens. There were also a few younger kids. Behind us were a couple of children that were about 9 or 10. At the end of our row were a man and a woman with two kids: a boy who looked about 5 or 6 and a girl who was maybe 2-1/2 or 3.

The kids behind us had obviously been warned to only whisper during movies. And they did whisper. Very loudly. Through the whole movie. Whispers punctuated by flying popcorn kernels landing in our hair to the beat of chair kicks.

The little girl at the end of the row started crying after the first 15 minutes or so, and she cried and begged to go home through the rest of the movie. And they stayed until the bitter end.

So, our movie-going experience went something like this:

[whisper] Wait till you see this! mommy, I want to go home. [sob] [chair kick] Harry’s not supposed to enter because he’s not old enough but watch what happens! [patter of popcorn falling gently on hair] mommy [sob] please can I go home now? [chair kick]

Yeah, the ambiance left something to be desired.

I would have asked the kids behind us to at least stop whispering. But the last time I did that, the boy I ask to stop started crying instead. (No idea why. I wasn’t mean at all and I asked nicely.) The boy’s mother got really pissed at me, and #1 Son was embarrassed. So this time I just tried to ignore them. If I could have easily reached the couple at the other end of the row, however, I would have knocked their heads together and told them to take their baby home. And I wouldn’t have been nice about it.

Mom’s take:

Oak Grove Cinema: for character and an extra for the restroom neon.

Harry Potter & The Goblet Of Fire: This was the weakest of the books, and I think the weakest of the movies. Despite the necessary trimming to fit a 600-page book into a two-hour movie, it was still too long.

People (of any age) who whisper in movies: for trying, but some whispers can be just as loud as a normal speaking voice and more penetrating. A movie theater is not your family room. Keep your lips zipped.

Parents who take their babies to anything other than G-rated movies: minus 5 Parenting means you get to miss out on things you would like to do but that are inappropriate for your children. Wait until it comes out on DVD or cable.

Parents who refuse to remove a crying baby or child: Minus 5 The rest of us brought kids who could behave appropriately or left them at home. We paid good money to see this movie. Be a lamb and don’t ruin it for us.

OK. I’ll admit it. I’m a Lost addict. So of course I skipped the finale of American Idol in favor of the Lost season ender.

So… Just who are The Others and why have they taken the boy? Will the raft guys make it back to the island? What the heck is that monster? A Morlock, maybe? eeewwwww How did the French woman’s ship get so far inland? What does Lock know that he’s not telling? And what is at the bottom of that shaft…

It’s going to be a long time ’til fall.