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Tag Archives: secretive

How to cut a really large circle from cloth without a pattern

Have you ever found yourself in a position where you needed a really large circle (or several really large circles) of cloth and yet the pattern you had just been using to make these circles inexplicably disappears?  No?  Well, I have.  And should you ever find yourself in a situation requiring a large cloth circle and you have nary a pattern around with which to make it, you can be thankful that you’ve read this tutorial on how to cut a very large circle out of cloth without a preset pattern.

Materials:

  • enough cloth for your really large circle
  • tape measure
  • scissors
  • straight pins
  • iron/ironing board

Procedure:

  1. Determine how large you need your circle to be.  I needed a circle that was 20″ in diameter.  That means the circle has a radius of 10″.  (You know, d=2r.)
  2. Fold your cloth into quarters, making sure that each side is at least the length of the radius of your circle.  This way you only need to draw out a nice arc that is a quarter of the circle, instead of drawing four nice, perfectly matched arcs to make a circle.
  3. Iron down the creases.  You’ll want nice, sharp creases to get a cleaner, circle-ier circle.
  4. With the beginning of your tape measure firmly fixed on the corner of the single fold, mark out the radius along the cloth.  The more marks you make, the more accurate your circle will be.  Also, be sure that the beginning of your tape measure is in the correct corner!  You want all the loose edges away from the beginning of the tape measure.
  5. Connect all your marks in an arc.  Or don’t if you think you can eyeball it.
  6. Pin all layers of the cloth together near the edge, making sure that everything is smooth and even, and cut along your mark.  If you don’t pin, you may get a very strange looking circle indeed.
  7. Unfold your freshly crafted circle and iron out the creases, if so desired.

I had actually doubled up the cloth and made two 20″ diameter circles at the same time.  This is really thin cotton though.  I wouldn’t recommend doing that if you’re working with heftier cloth.  Your circles will come out slightly oblong and be different sizes.

Incidentally, right after I took all the pictures for the tutorial, I found the pattern I made for 20″ circles.  It was sitting smugly on my bookshelf the entire time.  So annoying.  Also, you could do this with basically anything out of which you need to make a large circle.  You might want to leave the ironing steps out for things like paper and stuff, though.

Why do I need such large cloth circles, you ask?  It’s a secret.  But my secretive projects are nearly finished.  So…soon…soon shall be the reveal…

Magic ring powers

Recently, an online acquaintance of mine was married and joined the ranks of the League of Married Gentlemen.  Soon after getting married, he inquired after how long it takes before his ring would start manifesting its magical powers.  Now, being neither married nor a gentleman, this was a great revelation to me.  I never knew there was such a phenomenon as to one’s wedding ring unlocking one’s latent magical powers or granting one some powers if one didn’t already have latent magical powers.  But if you consider it, even briefly, you’ll realize that this makes sense.  There is plenty of precedent to rings unlocking or granting magical powers.  Wikipedia mentions that there are instances of magic rings in folklore of every country where there are rings.  And how about the Green Lantern Corps?  Granted, they don’t just have rings but also lanterns, but the ring is integral to the Corps and how members wield their powers.  Surely you know about the Green Lantern Corps.  Didn’t a movie just come out about them?  (I am not a movie person.)

But wait, you say, surely you can’t base all of your speculation off comics and folklore!  Pff.  Sure I can.  Comics are a very good source of information.  Need I remind you of Dr. McNinja or Axe Cop?  All very good and trustworthy sources of information.  But seeing as how you are not satisfied, I will also tell you that I have found a real life instance in which one of my married, male friends (who is arguably a gentleman) has unlocked his ring powers.

I kid you not.  I was as shocked and taken aback as you are.  I have known him for many years now and we are pretty good friends.  He did not have any interesting powers when we first met, through college, and beyond.  He was a fairly typical gEEky guy.  So, I couldn’t believe that he would and could hide something like that from me.  But it’s true.  I asked him directly and he confirmed it.  Of course, he started being very evasive and wouldn’t answer any more of my questions after my initial one.  I guess there’s some kind of League of Married Gentlemen code to not give out too much information after one’s ring powers have been unlocked.  But another (mutual) friend and I have talked it over and here’s what we believe happened.

So, the first step to shamanism is that you need to do the dance of the vegetables.  I have this on very good authority.  However, I regret that I cannot inform you as to who my source is.  Sorry.  You’ll just have to take my word for it.

Anyway, the first step to shamanism is that you need to do the dance of the vegetables.  The dance of the vegetables is led by the king of the vegetables.  The king of the vegetables is the garlic.  Before learning about shamanism and the dance of the vegetables, my aforementioned “another friend” and I realized our friend, who is the king of the vegetables, bears an amazing resemblance to the garlic plant in Plants vs Zombies (which is on sale for 75% off at the writing of this post).  The resemblance actually has been getting stronger with each passing year.

Yes, he really does resemble the garlic. He has better teeth though.

So, you see?  The garlic is the king of the vegetables.  The king of the vegetables leads the dance of the vegetables.  The dance of the vegetables is the first step to shamanism.  My friend is really a top notch shaman!  That’s his ring power!  He also has the ability to unlock the way of shamanism for others if they seek him out and convince him to lead the dance of the vegetables for them.  Or maybe with them.  I’m not too clear on that point.  And I know that he has done this at least once because I asked him if had led the dance of the vegetables and he affirmed it.

I am so amazed.  AMAZED!  My friend is actually a part of the League of Married Gentlemen and has unlocked his ring power!  I was trying to pinpoint when he unlocked this power so I could maybe relay some useful information back to my online acquaintance about what he might expect for his ring power.  But alas, I cannot.  All I know is that my garlic friend has been married for about four years now.  I’m not sure if his case is typical or not.  I have asked another one of my married, male friends who has been married for about two years or so about his ring powers.  He has not answered thus far.  His wife has though and she’s convinced that some of that ring power should be hers.  I…don’t know about that.  I don’t know if there’s a League of Married Gentleladies or anything, as 1) I am not married and 2) I am arguably not a lady, as I have neither the grace nor bearing of a lady.  I suppose I could fake being a lady if I had to, but I probably couldn’t sustain it for long periods of time and that doesn’t really help with the not being married thing anyway.  I’m ok with that because I would prefer to be a villain.  Mwaahahahhahaha!  Ahem…