Ah, the joys of boys..!

Boy lizards, that is.

Here I am, kicked back in my chair, working on a sock, when what does my eye spy?



If you don't see what I see, on the edge of the green leaf, then you clearly don't live with boy lizards. Large boy lizards. Here's a close up:



Ah! Now you see it! A fresh (well, as of this afternoon) seminal plug!

(Hey! Did you know that when you Google "seminal plug" my page on seminal plugs comes up? Cool.)

(Of such little things are my days made.)

Mike is the only Cyclura iguana I have ever lived with. I have lived with many, many male lizards, including green iguanas, savannah monitors, Uromastyx, blue-tongue skink, bearded dragons, even a water dragon.

I have seen the occasional seminal plug from most of them, especially green iguanas during breeding season. But never, ever, have I cleaned up as many seminal plugs from any one lizard as I do from Mike. He produces two of them on average every two-three weeks. All large, fully formed.

Along with leaving me plugs, Mike does something else really well: Sleep. Apparently my monthly cycle has finally moved on, as he hasn't headed for my bed in the last couple fo days. I put together a little photo album of him sleeping and basking, in case you want to ogle.

Mike has been having a better month than I have. About the only thing I've been able to do is knit a couple of socks. Big whoop (other than the fact that I really like knitting socks and would go crazy(er) if I couldn't even do that.

Here's one knit in KnitPick's Dancing (cotton/wool/nylon/elastic, and it looks like they're out of the color I have, 23590). At the top of the photo you can see the Eye of Partridge Heel cheat sheet I made for myself (if you'd like a copy of the chart as a Word or PDF file, lemme know), and my new favorite sock needles, KnitPick's nickle-plated doublepoints.




I started the mate to the Dancing sock, but am taking it with me when I go out. At home, I'm working on my first pair of solid color socks (unless you count the little red ones I knit for some friends' cats last Christmas, which I filled with catnip for them). I thought I might get bored, but so far, not. Maybe because the pattern stitch (yes, Jaywalker again) is keeping me entertained just enough without being all absorbing. Or maybe it is the yarn: Regia Silk (55% merino/25% polymid/20% silk - and it's machine washable!), which feels very yummy as it moves through my hands.



This yarn comes mostly in neutral solids (I do have a skein of the blue waiting in my stash). They now have some 'prints' - self-striping - yarns in their Silk line, but none I particularly like. Ah, well, when I next need an 'amazing hand' fix, I have some Classic Elite's Inca Alpaca waiting to be made into winter sleep socks. Mmmmmmmm....