Running
The past several days I’ve apparently been fighting off an infection of some sort.  My lymph nodes in my neck on the right side hurt so bad that it actually kept waking me up through the night!  Weird.  I never did get any other symptoms – perhaps because I decided not to push it & tried to rest up as best as I could.

I did get out for a 2 mile run this morning & it was excruciatingly slow.  Ah well – they can’t all be PRs, right?  And it’s still better than sitting on the sofa instead, so all in all, it’s a win, be it however small.  ;)

My Yule Gift
So I picked up a Sony Reader Touch Edition (yes, in that color, too!) for a Yule gift (for myself, I admit – I’m calling it the perfect gift from my manlets to their geeky reader Mom).  I was going to wrap it & tag it to me from them for when we opened our gifts.  Hee!  When I placed the order, the website AND all my confirmation emails all stated that it would arrive by the 23rd or the 24th.  Awesome!  I had briefly considered paying an additional fee to make sure that it did…  but the 3 day expedited selection on the website assured me that it would still arrive then.  Imagine my surprise when UPS sent me a shipping notice stating that it would not arrive until the 28th!

I immediately sent an email to the seller, asking what we needed to do to insure that it actually did arrive when the website stated it would…  and they did not respond to me for another 36 hours.

The very brief email I finally received told me it was my fault for ordering it as late as I had.  Needless to say, I will not be ordering from them again.  I would have been happier had the “customer experience manager” not been so rude in her email AND if they had bothered to respond to me in a timely fashion.  A 36 hour delay is simply unacceptable from a retailer at this time of the year, to my thinking.  Especially when you consider the state of the economy – don’t retailers want our business??  :)

It finally arrived this afternoon.  Of course, it’s still charging, so I haven’t been able to play with it yet!  I’m really looking forward to it, though.  I had tried the Kobo and I loved reading books on it, but I couldn’t adjust to the navigation button on it – I’ve been spoiled by my old school pocket PC, which is touch screen page turning.  :D

Reading
So I really don’t watch television.  It’s never been something I’ve been interested in much, with the clear exception of Doctor Who, of course.  I will admit, I am rather partial to British shows (Misfits, Being Human, Doctor Who, Torchwood).  Anyway – I’d never seen an episode of Dexter until just recently.  I had read the book, Darkly Dreaming Dexter, that spawned the series & totally loved it.  When I watched the first episode of the show, I was disappointed…  it just didn’t quite seem to be as good as the book (movies/tv shows never are!).  I thought the manlets would love it, though – so I got them to give it a go on Netflix.  I was right, they love it!  :)

• Dearly Devoted Dexter by Jeff Lindsay – read by Nick Landrum
  It’s a bit slow going while Doakes is Dexter’s shadow – so much so that I was a bit worried that the story was never going to end that plot point.  Once you get to the first victim of this book’s bad guy, though, the slowness comes to an abrupt end.  From that point on, it’s just as excellent as the first book was – gripping, funny, horrifying and leaving you wanting to find out whether Dexter goes ahead with marrying Rita or not after you are done.  A definite win!
• A Christmas Story by Jean Shepard – read by Dick Cavett
  I bought & downloaded the audiobook for the manlets & I to listen to on our drive to see family for the holiday.  I knew it wasn’t quite the same as the movie, but as much as we adore the movie, I knew we’d still enjoy the book.  We did, very much – they made some changes to the movie that weren’t in the book, but I’d have to say that in this case, the movie truly is as good as the book.  I will admit to being a bit disappointed that I couldn’t find the version where the author himself was reading it, but Cavett still did a fine job.  One just seriously expects the same voice as the one from the movie, ya know?  ;)

Knitting
My knitting mojo seriously went on vacation too.  I didn’t finish the manlets’ Smittens in time, but I just reused the mittens that were already finished to leave their daily little gifts.  :)  I’m still working on them here & there, though!  It’s just been difficult – the holidays are always tough, but this year was downright painful without Dad here.

Today’s Ravelry Search
An eclectic collection because I searched on something relevant to the post, but it’s not the subject of the patterns (well, except for one!).  ;)  As always, none of these are mine – just click the picture to go right to the Ravelry page.

* Free pattern!

Such a cute idea! I love their patterns so much.

* Spring fever, anyone? ;)

* The pattern is in Japanese, but includes charts. Very cute!

* ZOMG!!! Seriously, how freaking cute is this????

* Really cute idea for your favorite Slytherin or snake lover!

* This pattern is a cute idea for stashbusting, I like it!

I really like the look of this bag - and it's available in both knit and crochet! Kewl!

I might have mentioned it a time or two before, but I adore her patterns! Look at the wee scarves - how can you not love 'em? LOL

Woo HOO! A cover for your eReader! ;) One of the super awesome $1.99 patterns over on Knit Picks!

Cute enough I want a baby of my own so I can make one. Bwaa-haaaa-haa-ha-ha!! Ok, not really - but it IS awful cute. ;)

Speaking of utterly adorable...!

A really cute sweater for those with an hourglass figure!

Happy Tuesday, everyone!