Day in the Life of an Idiot

Image: Octoquilt! A quilt with lots of octopuses interspersed with colored squares.

I am finally working though all of the leftover sea-themed fabric from Mason's quilt. (A quilt that I still need to finish actually QUILTING, but it is now fully pieced, at least.) Several weeks ago I posted a picture of the colors I was thinking about for this quilt on Facebook and did my usual, "Anyone I know need an octopus quilt?" and I got a shocking number of "Oh! Pick me!" The first person was Nisi Shawl--someone I didn't even realized followed me, though I have admired their work from a distance. So, this is Nisi's quilt.

I am in the process of finishing it. I got it all quilted last night (while finishing a weird donghua called Link Click on Crunchyroll and catching up on the final season of Star Trek: Discovery before my Paramount+ subscription runs out.)  Now I am having a small conundrum. I had planned to sew the edges over the back, but when I do that, I lose a whole octopus. No one wants to lose a whole octopus!  So now I'm trying to decide if I have enough odds and ends of the fabric swatches to build an edge the I can fold over the front.  I may try that?  I also have a coral reef motif fabric in very similar greens to the ones I used that I might just add as an edging. 

Anyway, you will see it again once it's all the way finished. 

The only other excitement around here is that Mason is building a retaining wall (of sorts for our hill). 


Image: Me showing off Mason's handiwork, while Mason stands around looking tired.

After finishing this, he and Shawn decided that it actually might need a couple of more rows, so there is a palate of bricks on my boulevard right now waiting for his return from his uncle Keven's.  Given that our across the street neighbor is having their house painted, the street was really congested this morning when the Home Depot people needed to get in. I would have them deliver in the alley, but 1) I doubt they could get out, once they got in (we have a very sharp, hard T-section at the end of our alley) and 2) we have no place for them to put them because our back is basically a berm and a tiny space next to the garage where our garbage can sits. 

Oh yeah. 

Other fun news. Someone stole our recycling bin. I am extra impressed because it's actually missing its wheels. So someone was really determined when they hauled that away.  I put in a call to the city, so hopefully we will get one soon. We are a big recycling family so it will pile up in the meantime. 

The only other thing is that I attended my friend Ember's funeral on Sunday. It wasn't the official funeral. That will be in her hometown of Ironton in Ohio, but there are a bunch of us who can't make the drive, so we organized (actually Mel, another friend of mine, organized) one for here. It was held at the Loft, which is where I met Ember. She was a student of mine over a decade ago. Mmm, well over a decade at this point. At any rate, that one probably deserves its own post.  The only other thing I will say about that is that Ember's death has me thinking about a lot of people with who I feel close enough to call friends, but yet aren't really ALL THAT close? This may be a Midwestern problem, but I have a large number of people in a kind of close inner ring that I absolutely adore, right? I know them well enough to have maybe been to their house a couple of times, enjoy going places with them, but like there's this weird distance--like, maybe we're just not quite close enough to actually have contact information saved on speed dial.  Someone I can direct message for a get together, but in an emergency couldn't call. Ember was in this class of people for me. I have some really fond, personal memories of her, but we drifted apart when she married and moved to Owatonna, Minnesota.  And, so, I don't know. 

Let's not lose touch, okay??