Today has been an awesome making stuff day. I started out this morning making a dress out of a Men's XL dress shirt - which is incomplete because I predictably became frustrated (because mornings after poor nights of sleep are not awesome for thinking) and my bobbin suddenly ran out and I decided to abandon the project for the moment. Plus there were more important things to be doing today.
Like finishing my Secret Santa present. Which, by the way, isn't complete yet. The hippo part is done. I need to knit up some antlers. Then I need to fabricate a muumuu out of the lovely (and by lovely I mean absolutely butt ugly) orange paisley flannel that I found at Walmart. Then I need to work up some hot pink fishnet fingerless gloves. Then I'm done, damnit.
I finished the hippo around three today, then I promptly became distracted. When I become distracted, it's always by the most ridiculous things. I was stumbling over the internet while eating lunch and came across a youtube video of some bitchin' hula hooping skillz.
Problem: I have never in my life been able to operate a hula hoop. Ever. As in I have had a dozen people try to teach me, and I fail. Miserably. Repeatedly.
I put it on the list of things that my brain can't learn. Along with Medicinal Chemistry II. But that's a different story entirely.
When I say that I can't hula hoop, I mean that I can't keep a hula hoop going around my waist. I can do really cool things with my arms and I can keep it going around my neck and throw them and catch them while keeping them spinning. I had to compensate for my grade school recess hooping failures somehow.
So, I'm watching this video and I realize that I've learned how to do a lot of things from the internet that I never thought I'd be able to learn.
Problem. I don't own a hoop.
On a lark, I googled how to make one, and wouldn't you know that there are free instructions online. They seemed easy, so I went out to the Home Depot and did some shopping and came home and set to work.
Here's where I got the instructions: http://www.hooping.org/archives/000359.html
I used 180 psi 3/4" polyethylene tubing and a suitable connector. Getting the tube into a loop was the hardest part. The hairdryer mentioned in the tutorial did not work nearly fast enough to suit me, so I poured some boiling water over the tubing and man-handled it together.
I wrapped it first with black electrical tape to cover the numbers and letters printed on the tube. Then I wrapped it closely with purple then topped with a looser wrap of green. I love purple and green together, and my hoop came out looking pretty.
So I picked the thing up, stood in the middle of my kitchen, and gave it one final shot.
And wouldn't you fucking know, I finally figured it out. I was so stunned when it didn't fall to the ground that I forgot what I was doing and dropped the damn thing anyway. I don't know what planets aligned for that to work, but it totally did and I'm kind of excited about it.
Lee can't make fun of me for not being able to hula hoop now. :)
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