Make sure you wish Grey Kitten a happy birthday by visiting his website. He is the co-creator and the artist for Intrepid Adventure, which he assures me makes more sense if you understand live-action role playing games.

In addition to being a talented artist and writer, he is one of my two bestest friends in the whole wide world. I’ve now known him for nearly half my years and it would be impossible to imagine my life without him in it.

Happy Birthday, Grey Kitten!

After a start-and-stop work week, I’m ready for two consecutive days off. I’m hopeful this weekend’s activities will include:

• Finishing the Knitting World Cup tank top before the end of the France-Italy game — and enjoying some soccer as I do
• Attending Phillip’s “I’m headed to Iraq for two months” be-back-soon party
• Making it down to the Mall for the Smithsonian Folklife Festival
• Baking cherry cobbler
• Hitting the farmers’ market for more berries and for the first corn on the cob
• Watching Pirates of the Caribbean
• Fitting in a bike ride
• Visiting Politics and Prose to do some more shopping

I might try to fit in Butterstick’s birthday party at the National Zoo on Sunday as well, but I haven’t yet made up my mind. It probably depends on how many tourists I have to battle down on the Mall tomorrow.

Three beautiful things from the last week:

1. Rudi and I are going to see a baseball game this afternoon, so I took today off from work. I intended this morning to be spent ultra-productively with knitting, a bike ride, shopping, cleaning, and perhaps some baking. My body, on the other hand, seems to have had other ideas, and I slept until 11. With the game starting at 1, it seems much more reasonable in retrospect to spend the intervening time lounging. Maybe I’ll fit some more productive work in between the game and the movie tonight.

2. In the last week, I’ve been to the library once and bookstores twice. I’ve come home with some books for me and some for others. I do love books — and so do my friends.

3. Summer fruit has arrived with a vengeance! In addition to the raspberries I picked while on the bike ride Saturday morning, we also brought home a big haul from the market. The market basket overfloweth with blueberries, gooseberries, black currants, peaches, nectarines, apricots, and methany plums. On Tuesday, I cut up three pints of cherries that had been sitting in the fridge from before the California trip and hope to make a cobbler as soon as I get to the store to buy sugar.

We took the afternoon off yesterday from the heat and humidity and escaped to the cold quietness of the Uptown, where we saw Superman Returns, the latest movie in the Man of Steel’s franchise.

By and large I agreed with the critics who, in the reviews I’ve seen, have described the movie as “sweet.” Superman has been gone for six years and the world has moved on. Lex Luthor is out of prison but has been keeping a low profile. Lois Lane has moved on with her life and has a long-time fiancé, a son, and a Pulitzer for her editorial, “Why the World Doesn’t Need Superman.”

But when Superman flies back into all their lives, there still seems to be a need for his services. And Lois will be forced to come to terms with whether it was the world who could do without him or whether she was trying to convince herself.

The actors did an terrific job. Brendon Rauch made a worthy successor to Christopher Reeve (although I found myself oddly distracted by his eyebrows). Kevin Spacey was convincingly creepy. Kate Bosworth was excellent in a movie where Lois was really Superman’s equal in many regards. And the supporting cast did a great job of portraying their characters.

I liked the movie. But I was surprised by the strong Christian element it drew upon. If ever a director thought to himself, I’d like to make a superhero movie that centers around John 3:16 without it actually starring Jesus flying around in a cape (which sounds rather like fodder for a South Park story arc), this is the movie. Combining the father’s benevolent voiceover talking about how he was sending his only son down to save earth by serving as a role model for humankind and the talk about how Superman recharges by using the light of the Sun with the climax of the movie, it’s hard not to see some parallels. (I’m not saying it’s out of place. The whole Superman creation is based on a sort of Jesus mythos, in which of course we substitute “the American way” for God’s will. And it’s been successful for three-quarters of a century. I was just surprised the its overt overtone in this undertaking.)

I would definitely say the movie is worth the cost of admission and it definitely has the potential to wind up on my top 10 list at the end of the year.

As the real World Cup revs up toward the final three games (the semi between France and Portugal tomorrow, the consolation match between tomorrow’s loser and Germany on Saturday, and the final domination game between tomorrow’s winner (come on France!) and Italy on Sunday), knitters around the world are loosening up their fingers and clicking their needles together in speed drills for the final stretch.

On the home front, the tank top is going to fit. My first fitting was so discouraging, that I really thought this might all have been in vain. But I just tried it on again and was so delighted that I showed it off to Posey (who looked hopefully at the dangling pieces of yarn), danced a jig, and then awoke Rudi so he could look at me bleary-eyed and smile pleasedly (let’s see if he remembers that on his own or if he has to read this entry to jog his memory).

The front right strap has been bound off and the left front strap just needs a few more inches to go (but we’d reached that dangerous 1 a.m. time when knitters still feel confident but shouldn’t). The back neck and straps will be started tomorrow. And then after I seam the straps, the last thing will be to go back to the bottom and deal with the provisional cast-on. I need to put 140 (or so) stitches back onto the US9 circulars, which will be tricky. If I have enough yarn, I may try to add another row or two to the bottom to even out the spacing between the decorative purl rows and then I will bind off in a ruffly fashion.

With more than a full skein and nearly five complete days remaining in the project, I feel confident that (barring catastrophe) I will finish by the time the final whistle blows to mark the end of the contest.

Instead of heading down to the Mall and battling the tourists to see the national fireworks from the Lincoln Memorial, we took a friend up on his offer to let us watch from the luxury of his apartment across from Malcolm X Park.

Phillip has panoramic views that stretch from Capitol Hill to past the Cathedral and we were treated to hours of fireworks — from as far away as NoVa and as close as across the street. Fireworks and firecrackers exploded from all sides and gave us quite a show.

We missed the camaraderie that the Mall offers, as well as the feeling of the noise echoing inside you. Phillip’s show, on the other hand, did afford us the luxury of watching the man-made light show against a backdrop of natural fireworks as lightning bounced from cloud to cloud and periodically touched down.

It was a nice change of pace and fun, laid-back way to spend time with a friend, but I suspect next year we may find ourselves back along the reflecting pool in the midst of the action.