Our long weekend in Tucson was lovely. We soaked up the warmth and sunshine and were lucky enough to come home to a mini heat-wave hear as today was quite warm and sunny as well. A little breather before the next snow I suppose.
Very little was accomplished on the knitting front however. Usually I get a lot of knitting done on the plane, and although I did not anticipate knitting on the flight home (we took the red-eye, leaving Tucson at midnight and arriving at Newark at 6 AM), as I have no trouble sleeping on planes, and I knew I would be driving home when we landed, I fully expected several hours of uninterrupted knitting time on the flight to Arizona.
Instead I slept. I will probably never know what happened on the NJ Turnpike Friday afternoon, but this was one of the worst drives to Newark I can remember. We left early, as G was a little worried about rush hour traffic, leaving at 3:00 for a 7:40 flight. In normal conditions it takes 2 hours to get to Newark from my house, maybe 2 1/2 in heavy traffic. Not so Friday. We got to the NJ Turnpike exit off of I80 in good time but then the world stopped. It took us over two hours to go the five or six miles from the I80 exit to the toll gates on the Jersey Turnpike. We were stopped in traffic as we received several phone calls confirming our flight and later informing us that the flight was delayed. We were grateful for the delays, but our airline, Continental told us we still had to check in by the original final check in time of 7:10 or we would not be allowed on the flight. At 6:50 we were just barreling toward the Newark Airport exit off the turnpike. Then the parking lot was backed up, with people lined up blocking the street and no one moving. Another half hour later our car is finally at the front of the queue and we wait for the shuttle bus, and waited, and waited, with a bus load of people all worrying about whether they will make their flights. Our flight was delayed until 9:30, but we had no idea if Continental would let us on and in fact, when we finally got to check in, at 8:10 we were refused. Insistence and friendly staff got us around that obstacle and we were very glad to be on that packed airplane to Tucson. We finally took off by 10, and I, tired and stressed, having been the anxious driver on this trip, fell promptly asleep.
Luckily the rest of the trip more than made up for the inauspicious beginning. While we were there we saw butterflies:
These were in a special exhibit at the Tucson Botanical Garden and I did not manage pictures of most of the butterflies, but apparently several other people got photos of a lovely specimen that decided to ride around on my backside. Too bad I missed it.
And I love the texture of this cactus:
Now that I am home, and caught up on sleep, knitting resumes. Hopefully I will have some progress to show soon.
I would try to procure the extra yarn in the same dye lot and then if I couldn't then I would decide to either make the vest or a different sweater altogether but if you're not a vest person then an expensive cashmere vest might just sit in your closet.
Posted by: Kathy | Tuesday, February 27, 2007 at 09:28 AM
Wow! Great photos. Welcome back.
Posted by: Gina | Thursday, February 22, 2007 at 08:54 PM