T-day

Chris and I are having people over for Thanksgiving this year, like last year. It's pretty much graduate students and their significant others (or sig. figs, as I like to nerdily refer to them in my mind). While Chris and I are providing the turkey, roast veggies, sweet potatoes, and apple and pumpkin pies, there are now 9 (!!!) people attending (4 more than last year), so other people are definitely bringing more food and wine and such. In fact, we have now gone beyond the capacity of our plates (8) and way beyond our wine glasses (4, we're not really wine drinkers), and we definitely don't have enough chairs either. I am trying not to freak out, as there's just too much to be done to have time for that. Geographically, we at least span the country: there is a big mid-Atlantic contingent (me from WV, Chris from MD, and two/maybe three others from VA), a smaller mid-western group (two from Kansas/Wisconsin), a south-westerner (AZ), and a European (Germany). While slightly stressful, I so much prefer hosting Thanksgiving than traveling, as we rarely travel close but almost always do things like drive from DC to WV or from Seattle to Oakland.

On another holiday note, I've been knitting off presents like clockwork. I've made 5 hats so far and one scarf. I need to make a bag, probably redo one of the hats because it looks stupid, and make at least 2 more hats and maybe a pair of mittens. This has been a fun way to try out different yarns (like Noro and some hand-painted stuff). I re-worked the design from the cabled hat that I had made for myself to make one for someone else, and it turned out so much better. I'm probably going to post pictures and the pattern because it's really cool looking, and I absolutely love my decrease. I've been figuring out how to make 2x2 rib tubular cast-ons, which I now absolutely adore, and I finished off one hat with grafting at the top instead of pulling through the loops (looks very good, actually, and it gives the hat a front and back). If this doesn't make any sense to you, just bear in mind that it probably doesn't make sense to 99% of the population.

And this weekend is the last cross race of the season! It's over so early this year, which is actually great because that gives me plenty of time to prepare for AGU. I'm thinking I'll get either 4th or 5th place overall, so that's good (and way, way better than last year). This previous race didn't go that well for me. I got taken out at the beginning of the first lap, ended up going from about 3rd/4th wheel to dead last, and spent the rest of the race making my way up past most of the field to the 6th/7th/8th place group. I wasn't able to get past 6th and 7th, so I ended in 8th, which is my worst finish this year. This race really mixed up a lot of the placings, though, so I wasn't the only one. Hopefully, I can get somewhere in the top 5 for the last race.