best day ever

Today Matt and I road our bikes the almost 7 miles from our house to Miller Park, the home of the Milwaukee Brewers to tailgate with my mom and her husband before they went to the Brewers final with the Cubs. It was not only the last game of the season, it was do or die for the Brew Crew. They had to win (and the Mets had to loose) for them to cinch their first play-off birth in 26 years.

The ride to Miller Park was super nice, with great bike paths and an easy go of it. By the time we got there we decided we couldn't live with just listening to the game from the parking lot and visited a nice scalper man who sold us two seats in the bleachers for well above face value (it would prove to be worth every penny, and then some). The picture above is of me and my mom before the game. The one below is of Matthew and I after Ryan Braun came through in the clutch to put the Brewers ahead, and shut up the a-hole Cub fans who insist on coming to our stadium and shooting their mouths off. That was the first time the stadium went nuts.

The picture above was taken after the Brewers won and the place went nuts a second time. But, we still had to wait to celebrate because the Mets game hadn't finished. They put up the Mets-Marlins game on the big screen and we all held our breath while the Marlins held onto a 4-2 lead. When the last out was made Miller Park went nuts for the third time. There was screaming, yelling, hugging of total strangers, singing, dancing, in two words: pure joy:

Our hero, CC, on the big screen:
The players come back out with the champagne:
We pretty much moved back to Milwaukee in the most perfect September we could have. To have missed this would have broken our hearts. Now, it's onto Philly! (for the brewers, not us, we're staying in Milwaukee)

Why Sarah Palin is a bitch

It was brought to my attention that in her interview with Katie Couric Sarah Palin insulted every person who ever worked hard to take a vacation abroad, especially college students who work two jobs to study abroad or take internships in other countries.

Quoted from this latimes blog:

In her second "CBS Evening News" interview with Katie Couric, Sarah Palin was asked why she didn't get a passport until 2006. Did it, as some of her viewers wonder, show a lack of curiousity and interest about the world and other cultures?

She told the CBS newsperson that she had to work, sometimes two jobs, and that's why she didn't backpack around Europe like privileged kids do.

"I'm not one of those who maybe come from a background of, you know, kids who perhaps graduated college and their parents get them a passport and a backpack and say, 'Go off and travel the world.' Noooo. I worked all my life. In fact, I usually had two jobs all my life, until I had kids. ... I was not part of, I guess, that culture."

Look, bitch, I graduated from college in three and a half years so that I could spend four months living at home with my mother, working full time, and saving money so that I could experience other cultures so that I wouldn't become a xenophobic idiot like you! Let's not forget my husband and cousin who participated in study abroad and internship programs in other countries. And what about those who volunteer their time to help those in the developing world? Snobby rich kids, I'm sure. And what about all of my students who work two or three jobs to save money to participate in study abroad programs, all the while going to school full time? I don't judge the average person who's never been out of the country, because many people just don't have that desire, but I just think that if you're going to be next in line to be comander in chief of the united states, you should probably not be that kind of person. Furthermore, I really don't appreciate her passing judgment on those who do enjoy traveling abroad and characterizing anyone with a passport as an elitest.

Okay, that's enough political rant on my otherwise knitting and cute dog focussed blog.

Please, VOTE FOR OBAMA!

once in a life time

I just witnessed one of twenty six walk-off-grand slams in the history of baseball. I rock and so does my team. Go Brewers!

vogue

I just noticed that on this here blog that purports to be a knitting blog, I have not blogged about knitting since July. For shame.
Right before we left Santa Fe I headed over to the Borders to work on the old dissertation as I did a couple of times a week. On the way out I decided to pick up a copy of the fall issue of Vogue knitting, because I had seen a few patterns over on ravelry that looked intriguing. Now, I'm a devoted Interweave subscriber. It has good articles and elegant and inspiring designs (most of the time). When I first started knitting Matthew bought me a Vogue knitting (the one with the twinkle shopping tunic, before it was the shopping tunic, on the cover) for Christmas, but at the time my lack of skills made me wary of the magazine. Now, I think maybe I'm ready for it. I like that it has some very fashion forward designs and present a way to own afordable designer clothing. However, it is vogue and as such it has some really crazy crap as well, things no real person would ever wear or knit, but with over thirty patterns to choose from there is bound to be stuff I like. So, I am seriously considering getting a subscription to another knitting magazine. Here are the patterns I am planning to knit from the fall vogue (patterns 10,18,23):
The Nordic Traditions sweater above would not be worn with a belt by the philosoknitter.

oh puppypants, you are so cute

I have yet to take pictures of the new place, which we love (it is small, but so cute!), but I thought I'd share a couple of pictures of our favorite pooch lounging in the new house.
And no, she's not drunk, she's just silly, and adorable. Scarlett is in seventh heaven at our new location. We are living just a half of a block from the Urban Ecology Center in Riverside Park. The park is a bit of wilderness right in the middle of the city. She loves frolicking in the woods and the oak forest surrounded fields, and occasionally takes a dip in the Milwaukee River (yes, it's gross, but she's a dog). More often than not she runs into another dog, or two, or five and runs around playing with her new friends. We could not have moved our little family to a better location if we had tried.

bridal bonanza (and a baby to be too!)

Two weeks ago we had a bridal shower for my cousin Terri, who's soon to be all growed up and married. She got lots of good loot and we all had a nice time:Last weekend I headed to Chicago for Terri's bachelorette party. We went out for a very nice dinner, and out for a few drinks afterward. It was lots of fun. Terri and I:
On my way back from Chicago I stopped in Lake Bluff to see my old friend Meryl, who, as you can see, is about to have her first little baby. I had brunch with her and her adorable husband and had fun catching up.

brew crew

We went to a brewers game a couple of weeks ago for a Wednesday day game. At the time they were still leading the wild card race, but things were not looking so good. However, the game we saw was awesome, with the brewers pulling out a win in the 8th inning. Now we are just holding our breath and hoping for the mets to fall on their face over the next five games. The ability to go to brewers games is one of our many reasons for returning to the land of beer, cheese, and bad weather.

go east young man

After nearly a month, here are pictures of our trip from Santa Fe to Milwaukee. My husband the trucker:A stop in Tulsa to see our favorite niece, Evelyn, and all of our lovely Tulsa family.
Dunkers:
Next, it was on to the St. Louis suburbs to see Charlie Chinnici and his family:
Scarlett and Matthew with the whole Chinnici gang (yes, I know she's on a couch, but it was like 4 a.m. and everyone else was doing it, how could we say no?):
Our good little traveler:

home again

We're officially moved in to the new place in Milwaukee. The trip from Santa Fe to MKE was great, we saw friends and family along the way. My first day of teaching at UWM went well, and we're working on unpacking and settling in. I want to post pictures of our trip and the new place, but unfortunately we have no interwebs at home yet, because AT&T sucks. I'll update just as soon as I can.