Done, done, and started

Done #1: I'm done with my second general exam! Yay!!! Friday came and went in a flurry of typing, and I was finished! There are still 2 papers left that count as exams, but I'm done with the 8-hour, slogging through it, type of exam! Woo-hoo! I think it went about as well as the last one (which means I think I passed). Yay! I am a bit nervous because, well, one prof asked for "bolder claims and statements" so I pretty mucg finished off one essay with a few "what the field needs is this" statements that read rather obviously as loose dissertation thoughts. This makes me nervous, especially when I don't know when I'll hear back about the exam.

Done #2: I also finished ths socks I mentioned in the last post:

Yarn: Opal something or other
Needles: Knitpicks 0s with magic loop
Time: oh, too long (you can tell I really keep track of these things, can't you)
Thoughts: This self-patterning yarn knits up strangely. I have no idea if the yarn was supposed to knit up like this, but it does, and it's rather odd. I think the recipient - who so far as I know doesn't read this blog - will like them, though. I still have yarn, so I'm considering making some very basic ribbed fingerless mitts to go with the socks. A big *thank you!* for all the suggestions about what to do with the too-tight gauge. I appreciate all the support, and meant to write something in response sooner, but obviously, there was the test. Also, I was at the toe (so, the end) of sock #2, so there was really little point in measuring, and I just wanted them done. In retrospect, I think that mindset was inspired by my exam; had I not been working on them right before the exam, I might have frogged the foot and knit it differently. Oh well. They've been blocked, and I think they will fit. If anything, they'll start out tight and then loosen up over the course of a day.

Started: What have I been doing to relax now that my exam is done? Knitting, of course, and a good bit of sleeping! Besides finishing those socks above, I started these, a vaguely-secret sock project:

I knit a couple more inches beyond that earlier tonight, sitting by a fire while Coffeeboy and his brother watched football. We've done a lot of playing games (mostly Starfarers of Catan) since the BIL came into town yesterday afternoon; while we played, I did a bit of easy knitting, finally finishing up my Fuzzy Feet! Now, all they need is felting. But I'll save the details for another post.

I'll also save the details (ie, pictures) of how the cats clawed a hole in the boxspring of our bed, started hanging out inside it, and needed the vacuum to scare them out of it, and of what we did to keep them from getting in there, for another post, too. In other words, I'm playing blog- catch-up. Yay!