It is with immense satisfaction that I share Snorkelling Cat in its final form:
The frame turned out exactly as envisioned. As far as cross stitch projects go, this one is on the simple side. The handmade frame elevates the finished piece as a whole. It now hangs before the room known as the pain/crafting nook.
I started my day with toast. I love toast. But an hour post-toast, I found myself in the saddle with my shoebox-mounted laptop in front of me and a pool of sweat below. It was the last race of Zwift Racing League: City Showdown, and the final time I’d race with the RIOT ladies this year. This week, we raced in a world that serves as New York City, but with a futuristic touch. A part of the course takes you over the city on glass pathways. Or maybe it’s plexiglass. I don’t know what the material is meant to be, but the point is:
We won the overall series.
We also won today’s race. By one point. Unlike last week, the team needed me, and I delivered. It was a scratch race, which is the most recognizable race format eg. the first across the finish line is, indeed, first.
I almost sat this one out because I hurt my back while taking my bike off the trainer on Saturday night, which caused me to miss Sunday’s team recon ride. I went into this race not knowing much more than the general feel of the New York City courses, which have shorter but steeper hills than those in Watopia, Scotland, Makuri Islands, etc.
The start of the race seemed suspiciously easy. I could see the elevation profile of the entire route displayed at the top right of my monitor. One big hill awaited us at the end, which suited my style of road riding well. My avatar’s highlighted head bobbed among the cluster of 24 other women for the first 38 minutes of the race. Then, I took off with the leader’s group and held on until the last 200m when I dropped from 4th to 8th. I looked down at my phone, which had the Zwift app open: a power-up sat unused in its slot. Essentially, I shat the bed, but only a little bit. 8th is still wonderful and takes me back to my horseback-riding days, when even this placement was worthy of a ribbon. All the ribbons I won were blue, but I could never forget the cut-off placement for being awarded a ribbon.
Why? The 8th place ribbon was brown. I shit you not.
Famous Jeffs’ poop run has come to an end. The final boss was Jeff Koons, which I highly doubt is a Jeff the roomie is familiar with. Koons is best known for his giant mirror-finish balloon animal sculptures, which the roomie has likely seen. But fewer people have committed the artist’s name to memory.
Even fewer people know that Koons once put too much emphasis on the exhibition part of the Art Exhibition with a series of romance novel cover-inspired pictures of him having sex with his then-wife, Hungarian porn star/politician Illona Staller. Here’s a link to the exhibition , so you don’t forget to Google it later.
I continue to get my fix of obscenity from Murakami, who continues to introduce mental images of women’s pubes to me as I read through 1Q84.
Page 386: “..he would have searched Snow White down to the hairs of her crotch.”
Page 478: “Where there should have been pubic hair there was only smooth, bare white skin, its whiteness giving emphasis to its utter defenselessness.”
Page 519: “Confirming in the mirror that the size of her breasts and the shape of her pubic hair had not changed.”
I’ve stopped at page 599 as of this writing.
My crocheting progression has involved a lot of regression. The Shroom Guy pattern I’m following isn’t meant for beginner crocheters, but none of the beginner projects excited me. I would be prouder of a slightly lopsided Shroom Guy than of a Wooble, which look like hacky sacks with ears. To Woobles’ credit, they have the best YouTube tutorials for different crochet stitches.
Their videos have none of that, “Hi, I’m Squaremeat. Today we are going to learn the crochet stitch. Here are the materials you need…” intro that nearly every other tutorial has. Their videos are professionally shot, with good lighting, and they found someone with nice hands to demonstrate the stitches.
The Woobles’ crocheting kits are $43, but their YouTube tutorials are free AND ad-free.
Anyway, my nipple warmer has since evolved into a tiny bikini.
And has progressed into something resembling the legs one would find on a crocheted mushroom amigurumi.
…and then it began to deform as I worked up to its belly. All the stitch increases/decreases are happening on one side of the legs, potentially giving the shroom guy a single bow leg. While I await advice from more experienced crocheters, I’ve moved on to the arms.
In the time I’ve crocheted these pieces of my Shroom Guy, I also designed a restaurant:
It’s called The Dumpster Dive. I wanted to create a laid back restaurant where patrons could feel comfortable enough to enjoy their cocktail while on the toilet in a doorless restroom.
Now, it’s time for me to start on page 600 of my book and then get some sleep. Tomorrow is another big day of doing whatever I want.
squaremeat.com 