the mighty momogus

Oh dear - no posts for 10 days. Since I last posted, the Patrick McDermott Plastering Orioles (let's call them the PMP Orioles from now on) worked another tie, this time with hitting, against the Keswick Tavern Indians. Gus Born caught 2/3rds of the game.

He's got that Varitek-esque saltiness going on, even at 9.

I've been chugging away at my February Lady Sweater, but it's not very exciting, photographically. I also finished this:

which IS exciting photographically (or more exciting, anyway). This is a little shrug for my friend Lucia's granddaughter, due in a few weeks. Blue Sky Dyed Cotton in orange and pink, because it's a girl, and knitters with sons need to knit crazy-girly stuff for baby girls.

Popular culture-wise, Gus and I have been watching "American Idol" religiously for a couple of months now. I've never watched it before (and was admittedly a little scornful of it), but I see why people get hooked. It's great to watch with a kid - we have very serious debates about the contestants and Gus also fields the phone calls from his Aunt Laura during commercial breaks. It's all good!

I hit another gap at Barnes & Noble in my Patrick O'Brian series, so I was poking around the house for something to read in the meantime. I came upon a copy of The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman that I must have bought for Gus but of course had never been cracked. I finished it in like AN HOUR because it was so exciting and interesting and then read The Subtle Knife and am in the middle of Book 3, The Amber Spyglass. As I recall, the Catholic Church had some difficulties with this series, and boy can I see why!! I'm not religious at all, and I have to admit that these books raised some very serious questions for me, especially this last one. I guess kids will gloss over the meaty stuff and enjoy the fantasy and the amazingly imaginative worlds. It's never occurred to me to censor anything Gus would read (other than the obvious stuff), but I think this is a book for a much older child - like a teen. Even then I'm not sure - the questions it raised have made me uneasy - and I'm an old lady!! But my parents never censored what I read, and I read some inappropriate stuff, and it didn't affect me......

Oy vey - parenting...

Yep, it's that time of year again! It's GYAC Opening Day, complete with parade (with fire engine, Mummers, State Representative extraordinaire Josh Shapiro!), photos, game, and post-game festivities. This year is extra-special because Matthew is coaching. Here is Coach Matt (in his GYAC regalia) and Gus on the way to the Parade:

For God's sakes, McDonald's - for shame:

Think of the layers and layers of departments this cup went through, and NO ONE caught the very egregious and very obvious grammatical error. It made me not enjoy my soda!! I tried to complain here, but they kept asking for a valid email address, which I kept providing but it would not take it. Par for the course. Or "Par 'o the course".

On to less irritating subjects!!

If it's April, it must be GYAC Baseball Season!! This year, Matthew valiantly volunteered to fill in as a coach (they were one coach short, and we bore the brunt of that situation horribly last season). He was originally assigned the GYAC PHILLIES!!! But then the uniform company ran out of uniforms, so they are the Orioles again. Hearkens back to the '07 season! We had first choice of uniforms, so I made Gus take #5, which is of course the number of the second-best 3rd baseman of all time. (Debate and discuss....). They also didn't get the mighty Cork Tavern as a sponsor - they will be the "Patrick McDermott Plastering" Orioles this year. Every year, I dream of sponsoring a team. The "Momogus Knits Patterns" Orioles!!! How hilarious would that be?? Well, once I build up the old bank account.....A girl can dream, can't she?

Gus will be catching this season - check out how awesome he looks!!

I've always had a soft spot for catchers - Boonie, Tony Pena, Bench, Dutch, Sandy Alomar (there's no rhyme or reason). Opening Day is this Saturday, for which they close down all of Glenside, which is the best thing in the world. More pictures then.

I jumped onto the February Lady Sweater bandwagon. We're doing a Knit-Along next month and I thought I'd knock one out, so I could help people out. Here it is in all its halfway-done, sleeve-stitches-on-holders glory:


I'm also frantically trying to get my Easy Shell patterns finished, so we can start selling them. The samples are in the window at the store, and people have started inquiring about them....

Spotted in my neighbor's back yard the other day, either forgotten from last Easter or an early visit from the Bunny this year:


First daffodil (thank you, Cousin Beth!)


Time to dye Easter eggs!!


The Master at work:


As happens every Easter, the siren song of all that leftover dye calls out to me and makes me unearth yarn to dye. Here is my assistant, supervising some undyed yarn in a bath of leftover orange-pink-red Easter egg dye:


The MM Hand-Dyed Yarn Drying Station (some would call it a pitchback....):


Egg-y goodness:

Who knew that the bases-loaded walk would be the offensive weapon of choice for our 2009 Phillies? Well, they won and that's what counts.

I wish I could have seen the pre-game ceremonies, but here's a nice picture. In my opinion, this guy is why they went as far as they did:

I love that Pat Burrell came back and was wildly cheered [Question to Ponder: Why did Adam Eaton come back to receive his ring? Did he think he would be cheered? I'm sorry he got booed, no matter how little I think of his on- and off-field performance last year, but still...] I love that Burrell and Mitch Williams are the Most Beloved Ex-Phillies Of All Time. Phillies fans are weird.

I couldn't pull a picture of the 2009 Phillies ring close-up, but here is the 1980 ring, which is quaint in its smallness and relative good-taste-ness:


This was good to see:

I thought he was at death's door at the Inauguration, but look how great he looks!!

And now, finally, this. This is Johan Santana on Opening Day. No matter how he pitches this year, this will be his most impressive performance in my opinion. And as much as it kills me to say it, I love this:

I know I started a draft for a new post, but it has disappeared into the Blogger cosmos....And of course, as I remember it, it was the pithiest and smartest and wittiest post EVER!