Relaxation of sorts

Throughout my life (I know, I make it sound like I'm fast approaching my retirement here, but I just liked that beginning, so there) I've had hobbies of many different kinds, few of which I have really stuck by. Reading books is one shining example of the opposite, but I hardly count that as a hobby anymore since it's more or less a necessity for life and sanity. *grins*
My mother has always been a keen knitter/crocheter/needleworker and I have since I was a little girl looked at what she produced in awe. From time to time I tried it a bit myself with the guidance from her. Neither needlework nor crocheting really caught on, but knitting on the other hand did. I never made anything big or fancy when I was younger, mostly because of my impatience, but the fascination for knitting remained unbroken.
Summer 2004 I found an old scarf project that I had abandoned at only 30 or something rows. I remembered that the aim had been to create a striped scarf with bright colours and so with a few potentially cold winter and spring months in Melbourne in mind I happily took up the task of knitting my multicoloured scarf. It turned out a lot longer than I had originally planned as I kept finding more and more nice colours to add but it came in very handy as I could wrap it around me and almost use it as a blanket at times.
Last summer I suddenly felt the urge come over me again - I just had to find something to knit! I went to the craft store in town and bought a pattern, yarn, and needles for making a poncho and over the next couple of months I made ponchos left and right for myself, mother, friend, sister. Next I got my friend in Iceland to start knitting and we inspired each other to find new and fun patterns online. Now came the task of understanding a pattern in English. Before I thought it hard enough to decipher all the abbreviations into something that made sense in Swedish, but joy and surprise, it wasn't as hard as I had imagined doing it in English. Internet is quite a help there I must admit but now I happily search English as well as Swedish sites for new patterns.
To connect all this to my headline I have come to the conclusion that I love knitting! It is really rewarding to see something grow from the mere twiddling of your fingers. *grins* And while it is relaxing to do things with your hands and let your mind rest it tends to grow into an obsession with me and I can sit for whole days knitting and just stopping for food once in a while. This makes both my hands and shoulders sore and forces me to stop and listen to my body. Body vs mind... *ponders* I think I'll take my knitting and go watch tv now.

*grins*

keah

TV

The last week or so I've been thinking a lot about how addicted to TV one can get... MIL in particular gets very hooked and sees (or tapes if they are on in the middle of the night) almost every american police/crime/hospital/whatever show on air in Sweden. But she can't keep them apart, which is sort of funny and tragic at the same time. Without badmouthing my MIL any more I readily admit to beeing easily hooked on tv shows myself. I really like British shows but they only find their way to Sweden every so often, especially in comparison to their American equivalent. When we lived in the flat and had 10 channels (5 of which I actually watched on a regular basis) I got caught watching disgustingly many shows. Half of them I began following "in training" of my procrastinatory skills more than actually seeking them out, but once hooked it's hard to stop. Also in Melbourne I daily turned to the tv for entertainment since a lot of the shows I was used to watching were shown there as well and in addition to that I got acquainted to a number of new ones.
I feel this is slowly turning into a rant, not really what I had in mind so I'll stop now and get on with my train of thought from these past few days.
TV is fun, entertaining, relaxing, thrilling, educational, informative, and more. I, however, have to learn to cut down. There is absolutely nothing with tv that you can't do without. As long as you have access to other sources of news, such as papers, radio, and of course the Internet, being without tv would only result in you having a few less clues at the coffee table at work.

That said, I don't plan on totally giving up tv. There are three shows that I really care to follow these days: The West Wing, Commander in Chief, and Desperate Housewives. Those three and the occasional high quality investigative news programme are enough for me to want a tv.

Hope/motto for days to come (kind of like a late new years resolution I guess...):
Cut down on tv watching time, go rent a movie that you really want to see instead of just landing on the sofa watching to waste time. Or even better put on some music and read a book or just sit and relax.

:)

keah

Wheee!

I've been fiddling with the css to customize the template. It was fun! I usually don't mess around with coding but I feel rather pleased with myself for having done it. I realise that it's not the least bit complicated, but it's just not anything I usually do.

*grins*

keah

Starting off new...

I felt the need to create a hideout of my own, so here I am. :) I'm not sure how much will actually be written here, but here's a start anyway.

Hugs

keah