Tinkering and tailoring

This evening's plan was going to be to contrive some sort of toe covers for my cycling shoes for the wet and muddy winter rides.  I once read about making an exact sewing pattern by wrapping your subject in clingfilm and wrapping the clingfilm with duct tape, then cutting the duct tape in strategic places to make the pattern (minus allowances for hems and stitching and things, I suppose).  Maybe I could just not bother with the cutting part, and tie them on somehow.

The thing is, I hate these shoes.  I hate their hard soles and the way the cleat plates dimple and bulge under the balls of my feet.  I hate that they look warm but aren't.  I hate the way they seem to be refusing to fall to bits so that I can replace them.  Most of all, I hate their incredible brownness.  I would've bought black, or black and pink, or black and red, but no, the only colour they made in my size was brown.  I like brown when it's light, like the colour of maple or beech or ash, or indeed my kitchen units, but not that deep, teaky, walnutty brown that reminds me of 1970s furniture that charity shops are full of.  Even my carpet is brown for crying out loud, and I hate it too.

I didn't get around to making any toe covers, because I got preoccupied instead with tinkering with the riding position on my bike.  I've had it nearly 20 years and have never really enjoyed the ergonomics.  In its time I've played with two different handlebars, four different stems, two different pairs of handlebar grips, two different kinds of brake levers, and four different saddles.  But today I remembered I had a stem riser lying around from a previous exercise so I started experimenting.  The riser meant I had to install a new, longer brake cable, but that was only five minutes' work using the cast-off spare from my other bike that now has disc brakes.  Once the weather stops being horrible – Alexa tells me it's meant to be 8ºC tomorrow – I can give it a whirl.