Decisions, Decisions

Simple Decisions

When I moved into my first apartment, my parents and a couple of friends came along to help me move. We packed up most of the stuff I had accumulated in the first 22 years of my life into two vehicles and trundled southward to a teeny tiny town in southwestern Ohio. Along the way we stopped for lunch. It may have been Arby's, but you can substitute your favorite fast food place and it works just as well. My father (always generous when it comes to eating out) was buying, it was only up to us to decide what we wanted. It seemed to take an awfully long time for one of my friends, and I remember my dad getting very impatient with her. He may have said something like, "It's not like you've never been here before."

I think of this little happening just about every time I'm faced with a simple (or not-so-simple) decision that I have trouble with. So... I think about it a lot.

When it comes to these simplistic decisions, the difficulty of the decision is inversely related to the affect it has on other people. I have an incredibly wonderful problem. Anthony loves to cook for me. If he had his way (and lots of cash and energy), he'd cook for me three meals a day. If it weren't for Chipotle (and maybe Smokey Bones), he would probably never want to eat out. Where's the problem in that, you say? The problem is that I have to decide what I want him to cook. I'm not allowed to ask for his input. I have to come up with it all by myself. This is a blessing and a curse. Why is it so incredibly difficult to come up with what I want? Partly because I want to make sure it's something he'll eat, too (not often a problem), but also because I think there are just way too many choices.

Same with choosing where to go out to eat. I love going out to lunch with coworkers, but sometimes it takes us half of our lunch hour to decide where we're going to go. Why? Well, we want everybody to be happy, but there are more than 20 restaurants within a half-mile radius from where we work. Too many choices.

I'm going to be more diligent about making decisions. It's starting to annoy me as much as it annoyed my father that day. And depending on the situation, sometimes it's okay to make the decision that makes you happy, rather than worrying about every little thing that someone else might say as a result. So keep me accountable on this decision-making thing. I don't want to be the pansy that defers to someone else every single time.

Not-So-Simple Decisions

Now on to something tougher. Struggle on with a troublesome project or cast on with the next thing that catches my fancy? I sucked it up this weekend and continued on with the fair isle earflap monster. Check it out:
(Nice volleyball, don't you think? The sad thing is, I doubt this hat will fit on my head when all is said and done. That's okay. It's not for me.) This hat doesn't scare me any more! Okay, so it's not a ton of progress, but I'm still impressed. Sure, the pattern says to cast on 168 stitches, and sure, I somehow started with 169, but I caught it and decreased before it started to matter. And sure, I did the first row of the rose pattern COMPLETELY WRONG and had to tink back 168 stitches to start over, but I did it. I didn't even put it down and console myself with another work-in-progress, and I certainly didn't cast on for anything new. Even when the 7th or 8th row tried to mess me up again, I only had to tink back about 20 stitches and resolve the problem. There's no way I'll finish the hat by Tuesday (tomorrow!!), but maybe by Saturday. If not, it will be a good project to work on in the store. Maybe I can entice some potential class members.
Here's another photo for your viewing pleasure. I might even end up liking it when it's done. I still think the weight is a little light for a winter hat, but I'm starting to see some potential.

This is all I worked on this weekend so I could give Anthony some quality time and check out Wallace & Gromit in the theater. I'm a big fan of Wallace and Gromit anyway, and this was well worth the wait. You should go.


Tomorrow: My brush with fame.