Intersection Logs

This spring, being down to my last pair of serviceable sandals from the three I bought at Payless around 2005, I bought three new pairs -- two of everyday Clarks and one of slightly fancier Hush Puppies -- confidently expecting them to last me a few years, considering that they cost at least twice as much as the Payless ones. (Payless doesn't seem to do leather any more, sadly, and plastic shoes have never worked for me.)

This lunchtime, I noticed that the (hollow synthetic rubber) soles of one of the everyday pairs were shredding and collapsing -- which didn't do much for my knees, walking in them. The other pair isn't far behind, either, though they might hold up for another day or two's wear. Which leaves me with the tail-end of the last Payless pair, the pretty but rather unsupportive peeptoe wedges I got at BHS last summer or the summer before, and the fancy Hush Puppies to get through the last two months of summer, I suppose.

I made pomegranate chicken tonight, fairly successfully.

My new cords are nice and warm for a chilly, windy day. On the other hand, the color is distracting: is it a very very dark brown, or a slightly rusty black? The shoes I was wearing weren't really the right style to go with them, if indeed there is a right style to go with pants that are (horrors!) slightly tapered in the leg and about ankle-length.

Vista on the desktop seems to think that the Appdata folder contains about 150Gb of stuff, and that it will take upwards of all night to copy it to an external drive. I'm not sure whether those really count as "my files", though, given that they're supposed to be in a hidden folder. (I routinely unhide the system folders and poke around in them; I have just about enough confidence left over from the simpler days of yore to feel comfortable doing that.)

HP claims I should expect my copy of 7 for the laptop by Thanksgiving or so.

The Gathering Storm is now the thickest book on my to-read shelf; the Erikson has more, but thinner, pages.

The feeds on LJ seem to be working again -- and for once without blurping a week's pent-up content all over my flist.

On the other hand, my bathtub drain is still blurping away, despite Maintenance's ministrations yesterday. (I've been having trouble with it for a while; after a month or so of blissful free-draining peace in the summer, it started gurgling again, and eventually spitting up, at intervals seemingly unconnected to any water-running activities of mine, quantities of dirty water into the tub.) This time the ticket left on the door has checked boxes for "Unable to complete job because" and "Contractor called."

I think I'm going to Florida in February, to see the SDO launch. If it actually gets launched this time ...

According to two of the weather sites I consulted, the high temperatures in Stanford this week are going to be well into the 90s on some days -- not a whole lot cooler than Tucson, and without Tucson-strength a/c, presumably. The other sites put it at high-80s. Maybe I need to start over with the packing, or at least throw in a lightweight dress on top of the slightly heavier skirts I was hoping to get a chance to show off. As usual at this time of year, I'm getting rather weary of living in lightweight dresses all the time. (Well, skirt and short-sleeved top today, but I've barely been out except for trapeseing over to the laundry room.)