I Was Attacked By a Four Ft. Long Monster With Huge Yellow Teeth

Things are rarely dull around here. Last night (or rather, early this morning around 7:00 a.m.), I was attacked.

More about that later.

First, here is today's offering of yarny goodness. Enjoy! (Especially you, Anni.)



The yarns on the left are from White Willow in "Dark Autumn Oak" and "Rock Candy". Her colorways are heartbreakingly beautiful, and the yarn is as soft as a baby's bottom (after its been cleaned). If you haven't tried her yarn, you must. The other two skeins are from Halftone (yes, I've recently shown her yarns before), and as usual, there are no color names. The larger skein (the green and blue one) is for two pairs of socks or a large stole - it has 1,120 yards in it. Her yarns are the softest things on the face of the earth and a terrific bargain. This is another must-try for the uninitiated. You won't be sorry and will probably spend the day petting it.

The little purple pouch in the center is a sachet of lavender provided by White Willow. She ships all her yarn with them. It smells just heavenly. I put them in the bins, and the lavender scent permeates all the yarn. Delightful.

The happy stuff out of the way, allow me to pontificate upon last night's joys and horrors.

Hubster and I went out on some errands (and failed, for the most part, to find what we were looking for). In particular, I was looking for Crazy Aunt Purl's new book. I know that Barnes & Noble has it, so we went over there. We couldn't find it in the yarn, crafts, knitting, crocheting, drunks, divorce, or self-improvement sections, so Hubster asked the lady at the help desk if they had any. She ran it up on the computer and discovered that yes, they had three copies. Oh happy day! She said that perhaps they were in the back, so off she went to bring me my coveted copy. We waited. And waited. Finally, she returned with no book in hand. I looked at her rather quizzically, because I knew they had some. So she went back to the desk to call the next closest store to see if they had any. While she was on hold, I asked her why, if the computer said they had three, she couldn't find them. She told me that there are huge stacks of books in the back, and that she took a quick look at the titles. If she had to pull out a book from towards the bottom of a stack, all the others would come crashing down on her, and she didn't want that. I just looked at her with her dirty blond hair, her blank eyes, and her stupid bovine face (no offense meant towards our cow friends) and said, "Aren't you supposed to provide customer service? Isn't this what you do for a living?" To which she replied, "Oh, I work in the children's book section. This isn't my job." I wanted to lean over the counter and strangle her, but I would have gotten hair ick all over my hands. Sigh. So we left with no book and before I committed some heinous act. Clownbitch. (Thank you to the lady who provided the world with that word. And you know who you are.)

Next was the usual question: "What do you want to do for dinner?" This simple question has stymied us for almost 20 years. I used to make a menu for the week and stick to it, but after our daughter left, it sort of took the ambition out of me. Then I got sick and just sort of stopped cooking altogether. Now we eat out a lot or have the English muffin sandwiches. It's a lot cheaper for us to do that because with the way I cook, it costs some major change. During the summer, Hubster BBQ's, but now it's cold at night.

We went to one place which was closed (on a Sunday night??), to Olive Garden (which had a line out the door - I'm not standing in line for bad Italian food), and were heading down the street when inspiration struck. I told Hubster which way to turn and, lo and behold, we wound up at a place called Banchero's. Those of you in the Bay Area near San Leandro will know whereof I speak. It's been there since 1948, and as soon as we got out of the car, the aroma of good, genuine Italian food wafted over us. We saw a lot of elderly people carrying very large doggie bags out of the place. Good sign. I had heard that their food was incredible and the portions huge. So in we went and were seated.

It was immediately clear that the people working there had been there since the place opened. The first thing that caught my eye was an Elvis impersonator who came out of the bar. He was waiting for his take-out order. When he turned around, there was an Oakland Raiders patch sewn smack in the middle of his jeweled cape. I guess he goes to the games and sings for the crowd when the Raiders screw up (which means he puts on an entire show at every game). Anyway, as soon as we were seated our waitress appeared, handed us our menus, and brought us something to drink. Then she immediately began to compliment me on my ring. I had to show it to her, front and back, and then the entire wait staff (the women, anyway) were brought over by her to see it. I spent the next 15 minutes having a bunch of Italian ladies ooh and aah and shower me with compliments. Good way to start dinner.

Hubster ordered the lasagna (full dinner, which came with soup, salad, antipasto, bread, and dessert). I ordered the stuffed prawns (stuffed with cheese and crab, and then deep-fried) a la carte with a side of spaghetti and meatballs (just a small side, mind you). I was brought an enormous plate overflowing with pasta and a delicious meat sauce before my dinner so I would have something to eat while Hubster plowed through his food. I ate enough garlic bread to sink a ship and mopped up the sauce with it as well. Then the main courses arrived. Holy shit! Hubster's lasagna was the size of a brick (no exaggeration), and I had four extremely large, fat prawns. They were incredible. You'd think I could eat four prawns, but no. Not only were they huge, they were filling. I had to leave one (to my great sadness), and I covered it with a napkin so the waitress didn't try to send it home with us like she did the garlic bread (they brought almost an entire loaf). Hubster had spumoni for dessert, and I had some orange sherbet. Again, I couldn't finish it. All the years I lived down here, I never ate there. Why, I don't know. I certainly knew about it. I just never got over there. We'll be going back, however. The entire thing cost us $38 including tax. We spend more than that buying shit to make hamburgers with.

So home we came, and I changed into my jammies and sat down at the computer to take care of some things. I awoke having turned on the volume, almost canceling myself out of one of my groups, and having done some other strange things. I'm a very talented typist, especially with my nose. I finally woke up sufficiently to really take care of my stuff, and then I sat down in the Monster to knit. I actually got through about two rounds before I fell asleep.

After a couple of hours, I woke up, talked to Hubster while I knit, and then he went to bed around 4:00 a.m. I continued to knit, trucking right along and watching Divorce Court, People's Court, Judge Mathis (do you see a theme developing here?), and a bunch of other TIVO'ed stuff. And then it happened.

I heard a noise over by the slider that allows entry into the backyard and figured it was the cat. I yelled at her (she gets cat hair all over the drapes, and it drives me nuts), and continued on with my knitting. About an hour later, I heard the same noise. I looked up to see one of the drapes moving. Definitely the cat. I didn't yell, but then I saw the feather duster move a little. Then I realized that there wasn't a feather duster by the door, and we certainly don't own one that tall. I squinted so I could see better, and there it was. It was an enormous rat mouse draped over the handle of the slider. And it was headed down to the floor, certainly on its' way to attack me.

I'm terrified of mice, rats, rat mice, mice rats, and anything even closely resembling them. So I screamed. Loudly. Hubster came running into the front room to see what the matter was. I was blubbering in terror, my legs pulled up under me as far as they would bend (and when you have thunder thighs, that sort of inhibits bending much). I cried out to him what the problem was, and he grabbed a broom and headed over to the drapes. Of course he didn't find it, which terrified me even more. I sat there curled up in a huge ball with my knitting clutched firmly in my hands (no rat mouse was going to attack my yarn to make a nest with), smoking away like a chimney in sheer and abject terror. He sat up with me for about a half-hour to see if the creature came out. The cat even came out. Nobody seemed to be able to find the beast from hell. It had fangs the length of my arm, a nasty yellow color, which I'm sure would have gnawed off my feet had I had them on the floor. It was huge and fat and hideous, and I know it was on the hunt. I'm shocked that the cat didn't even go sniffing at the drapes. So much for using the bathroom this morning. I wasn't going anywhere near the drapes, even to walk past them. So I spent the rest of the night/morning curled up in the Monster with the foot rest up (so it couldn't climb up to my feet), and fell asleep shortly after Hubster went back to bed. That much stress does that to me. I figure that if I sleep through it, I won't see it, it won't be real, and it can't hurt me. Sure enough, when I woke up this morning, I was intact. There were no dead rat mice lying around the floor. And the cat was asleep in the bedroom. Hubster has a theory that it escaped back outside through a little hole where the screen meets the door frame. I hope he's right.

I'd hate to lose one of my needles trying to stab the devil incarnate through the pentagram on it's enormous, bulbous head.