We have an annual family & friends curling tradition called the Can/Am Cup, which takes place in Powassan, Ontario. We've had to cancel the last two years because of stupid COVID, but this year it is finally back on. And the tournament has been renamed, largely in tribute to my knack for finishing in second place year after year.

I've been so excited about it finally happening again, that I had some custom Yeti ramblers made for prizes. Stickers, too.

I also contemplated ordering a bunch of custom-made T-shirts for everyone. But I quickly realized I didn't want to get into the business of guessing sizes, colors, and how many people would even want one. So I decided to set up a shop on Threadless instead, and sell the shirts basically at cost (with any proceeds going to fund the event). I made the standard shirt, as well as a couple of made-up events, in a "local curling" collection:

Why is this relevant here?

Yeah, not very technical, so far. But I realized once I had that shop in place that it would be easy to create T-shirts for any occasion. Even one-offs for myself. Since it's a produce-on-demand model, it doesn't matter if I'm the only who ever buys a shirt I create, or if nobody ever buys one.

And when I realized I could automatically donate part of the proceeds to important causes, like The Trevor Project and Black Lives Matter, I got to work on some other designs, too. Specifically, SQLBlog.org branding.

I have some other nerd and SQL joke shirts in mind, too, and will get to those as time allows.

Am I changing careers?

Hahaha, gosh, no. I'm not trying to get rich here. I'm providing some event shirts for friends at very close to cost, getting some shirts for myself that nobody else was ever going to make for me, and hopefully contributing a bit to a couple of great causes.