Treasures in bowls, sidelined

The chickens are returning to full production; Sunday they gave us five beautiful eggs, which I thought deserved to be equally beautifully displayed:

By Sunday afternoon I felt able to return to "full production" too, so I got busy with things other than blogging and sleeping. We visited some friends (the husband is Rick's woodturning mentor and the wife is a fellow spinner/knitter) and I got to see a WIP and an FO that both had intriguing stitch patterns. My fingers have been itching since I finished my February/March Ravelry challenge spinning project which I plan(ned) to ply for my April Ravelry challenge, but what I've really been jonesing to knit is my "Skittles" yarn spun and plied for an earlier Ravelry challenge. So after the visit I searched Ravelry and found the pattern for it, which motivated me to wash the yarn (I don't enjoy washing handspun yarn or knitting projects so they wait . . . and wait . . . and wait). Here it is washed and ready to wind into a ball,

which I planned to do yesterday after work. But while I was meeting with a student I mentored for his senior photography project, Rick texted that he was picking me up for a surprise outing. Eep! No time to wind the yarn and collect the tools, so I grabbed what I had set aside – the two smaller balls of the February/March singles and my big, elegant Birch Egret Jenkins spindle. And off we went to a Blazers game in Portland, me happily occupying my fingers during the drive with plying purple yarn.

The game was long and exciting. Our team struggled to get and maintain the lead. A tie at the end of the game sent us into overtime – then a tie at the end of overtime sent them into double overtime!

But minutes into the second overtime, tragedy struck. The Blazers' talented star center, Jusuf Nurkic, went down with a compound fracture of his left tibia and fibula, and although Portland ended up winning the game and securing a play-off berth, the mood in the Moda Center was hardly celebratory.

Fortunately, Nurkic has and will continue to receive the best of medical and rehab care, should make a full recovery, and will hopefully return to his career of choice. Those blessings had me pondering the more serious challenges faced by Blazers teammate Enes Kanter. I appreciate Senator Wyden's actions on Kanter's behalf, but given our current administration's love affair with autocratic rulers and the fate of dissidents around the world, I have shaky confidence at best that Kanter and his family back in Turkey will be protected.

This morning I got busy and vacuumed my filthy floors (having failed in my usual Friday chores due to vertigo) and enjoyed a ride on my mental health mustang. I figured I might not feel up to vigorous activities this afternoon after a tooth extraction. My neighbor was kind enough to drive me so I could take a prescribed oral sedative to take the edge of my anxiety, and it worked well – so well, in fact, that I came home and slept three hours!

More necessary appointments the rest of this week; have to take care of these things when I have scheduling freedom to do them, even if they aren't "fun."

That's the start of this week at . . .