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What a week. Mostly bad news, but with a few good things mixed in. The hard drive on the iMac went belly up Wednesday, and rebooting proved to be futile. Took the computer to the Apple Store Thursday, and was told it would take about a week to repair, but the good news was that there were 47 days left on a three year warranty. How often does that happen? I mean, it's usually the day or week after the warrant expires that the appliance or gadget does, too. The store called me Sunday to say that the iMac was good to go, so I flew there since I had been jonesin' bad for the innertubes. My only cost was the gas for two trips to the other side of Louisville and back. Well, since I never back up anything, (it's a Mac! I've never had one go bad before!) I lost a lot of my unpublished writing and photos and videos. On the plus side, my blogs and YouTube do contain the best of my work.

Without the distraction of the internet, I watched TV and finished the socks and started another pair, this time out of Kaffe Fasset Regia. You can see how the patterning almost evened out at the inelegant, common heel. I knit the last half or so of the flap in garter stitch, as this is where my foot will go through a sock, and that little corner rounds out with the wearing. (Oh, and? TV is mostly so awful. Even IFC has commercial breaks anymore.)

Sweetie limped home late Wednesday evening; the water pump on his car was on its last legs. Unfortunately, there was no warranty of any kind on the 1990 Mercedes, but Dutch at River City Imports was able to get her fixed up quickly, if not cheaply.

Friday night, we had the coldest temperatures of the season, and our water pipes froze. We opened wide all the faucets and waited and borrowed water for the toilet from Good Neighbor Nancy, and they thawed by mid-afternoon. Later that evening, I noticed that the kitchen sink was dripping and the harder I tried to turn it off, the more it dripped. The cut offs under the sink didn't work, either, do I turned the water off at the meter. I'm not sure if we need a new faucet or what, but that will be something for Sweetie to deal with this weekend. Being married to a maintenance man has its benefits.

Amid all that hubbub, I neglected to close up the chicken coop, and some critter took little Peg Leg and Wing Man. I'm thinking cat, because Henny was not harmed. I should feel bad, but since they were both little roosters, that will be two fewer problems for my friend to deal with in the future. I hope to get Henny over to her this week.

And lastly, Howard died. He had ceased to eat and then drink, and grew weaker and weaker over a couple of days. I had put down towels and given him the run of the bathroom, but Thursday morning he was leaning up against the tub with his little tail feathers drooping, and I knew he was dying. By the time we got back from dropping off Sweetie's car, he was dead, just as we'd left him, as though he'd just fallen asleep. I will miss you, Howard my Duck.