In the Palm of Your Sand

Like all red-blooded American males, I look to the swimsuit issue for one thing: tips on using coconut oil in my day-to-day life. Swim Daily came through with recommended products for hair care, skin care, and, um, lube.

So let us celebrate that most platonic ideal of tropical fruit, the coconut, which obviously makes several appearances in our favorite magazine. In fact, I bet there are lots more examples I’ve missed.

And just for the obligatory “Put the Lime in the Coconut” reference…

Jojo Nabbed It

Josephine Skriver is 2020’s Rookie of the Year.

I don’t think it’s a surprise, as she came in with a pretty solid built-in fan base.

I do wish they’d selected someone a bit more dynamic. The models who grabbed me were Hyunjoo Hwang …

… and Lorena Duran.

Valentina Sampaio looks gorgeous. SI would have gotten a tidal wave of internet backlash from idiots, but it would have been a brave and strong stance.

Josephine is beautiful, but I find her to be a bit of a straightforward, thin, white model who — once again — is captured better by our friends at Victoria’s Secret.

But here’s a nice thumb-hook from her, in honor of the day.

Thumb-Hook Thursday: Carol Alt, 1989

Not just a thumb-hook, but a whole-hand-hook.

Carol looks stunning here.

One-Piece Wednesday: Renee Simonsen, 1987

Topless Tuesday: Mallory Snyder, 2006

Turning to the past this Tuesday.

Mallory was a sleek and pillow-lipped beauty, a two-year girl who hasn't been on this blog as often as she should have been.

This year's swimsuit issue isn't the complete trainwreck a lot of folks say it is. But it's still a bit of a letdown.

I honestly think part of the problem is the flaccid unveiling of it. There wasn't a sense of excitement leading up to it. I'm not sure if that's some sort of underbudgeting or understaffing problem or what. But it arrived with a whimper, all things told.

I'm also bummed that we lost the three models I considered to be tentpoles. Obviously, Barbara and Hailey and Lais had to stop appearing eventually. But all three of them at once? That sucks.

Not to mention the weirdness of the magazine being an uneasy straddle between the sexiness of a girlie magazine and the self-esteem-and-fashion extravaganza of a women's magazine. I don't think it's hitting either target very well. I don't know much about modeling or photography, but a lot of the photos seem uninspired somehow, even of the models I'm excited about.

Also, July? Come on.

There are some nice photos, but 2020 was less like Christmas for me than any previous year.

So here's more topless Mallory.

Underboob Monday: Kelsey Merritt, 2020

So Blogger has updated the interface so that every step of posting and editing this blog is a bit more difficult.

And if you're looking at this on an iPhone, for example, you might have noticed that the larger vertical photos (like this one, maybe?) that look fine on a desktop are stretched and squooshed on your phone.

If so, I apologize. Blogger let us choose the "classic" interface for a while, but that's not available anymore...

In any case, Kelsey looks pretty!

Craig’s List

Two more additions to Ashley Richardson’s web of influence were hiding in plain sight on my blog.

The photo I shared here, in my exposé on SI’s Kenya obsession, puts Charissa Craig with Carol Alt in 1982.

Carol posed with Kelly Emberg in 1983.

Kelly posed with Kathy Ireland in 1989.

Kathy posed with Rachel Hunter on the cover in 1994.

And of course Rachel ran on the beach with Ashley in 1990.

This gives Charissa an “Ashley Number” of 5. She’s the only model with that number of steps.

I also already posted this 1990 photo of Sabrina Barnett back in 2015, when Swim Daily posted its first (and only) entry in their “It Takes Two” series.

This photo with Rachel gives Sabrina an Ashley Number of 2.

These two girls, along with Frankie Rayder from 2005, bring the number of Ashley-connected models to 43.