Chez Shoes

I was browsing the Comfortable Walking Shoes section of Altrec.com the other day, and discovered they have Doc Martens. (And, also surprising but for different reasons, Ed Hardy for Skechers. Eeeeew. But I digress.) Doc Martens at an outdoor store?! That’s like finding Docs at REI or something.

Anyway. I have a couple of discount coupons for Altrec, and am pondering a couple of options. I haven’t worn Docs since I waitressed at Millie’s in Silver Lake back, oh, a couple of lifetimes ago, but they were my go-to waitressing shoes back then and I loved them. Once they were broken in, that is.

I’ve never had a pair of the Double Strap Mary Jane, but always wanted a pair. And these are on sale! So they are at the top of my list.

I did wear the Gibson Classic when I waitressed. I never got the red ones; only black – perhaps now that I’m all grown up I can get one of each.

I really like the simplicity of the Iconic Mary Jane. If this one came in red, I’d be even more tempted.

So what say you, my fellow shoe experts? (I’m looking at you, Ugly Green Chair, since I know you have something to say on this subject!) Am I just hopelessly stricken by a case of 1980s nostalgia, or are these actually cute, comfortable shoes that would make my feet happy as I walk the mean streets of Santa Monica?

I’ve never been to New York City. But recently the Farm Chicks went, and they hit all kinds of fun places like Purl Soho and Fish’s Eddy and Kate’s Paperie, which are exactly the kinds of places I’d go too. And they’re giving away some nice little souvenirs over on their blog, so go take a peek!

Here’s a little food meme that I found via Hey Lucy. Since moving to my new place, I’ve been a little bit obsessed with the concept of cooking – I say the concept, because I haven’t actually done a whole lot of it in reality. I’m a little deficient in the kitchen utensils and pantry staples departments, but am working on remedying this soon.

Sweet or salty?

Salty. As many of you know, I can’t eat sweets because of fructose intolerance. Ingesting even the tiniest bit of fructose – found in table sugar, honey, most fruits, and many vegetables – makes me feel like I want to die.

Chocolate or vanilla?

Vanilla.

Hot or mild?

Hot oh yes please!!! Except when it comes to weather.

What won’t you eat?

Besides the sugar/sweets/starchy veggies that I can’t eat because of fructose intolerance, there are a few things that I can’t stand because of texture: tomatoes, runny eggs, most forms of tofu. For that matter, I’m terrified of most soy products in general and tend to avoid them, because I truly believe the plant estrogens mess up our endocrine systems. I was a soy formula baby, and I turned out to be insulin resistant – an endocrine system disorder – so there you go.

Most memorable meal?

Hmmmm. Three stand out: chicken-fried chicken on a cold winter’s night at Hattie’s Hat; the Rita Omelette (ortega chiles, bacon and cheese) at the late lamented Pines Cafe; and the first time I ate at Naan ‘n’ Curry in the Sunset – I don’t even remember what we ordered, but I do know I ate way too much of it, and now I always insist on going there when I’m in the Bay Area. As you can see, my tastes are not very highbrow – no French Laundry or AOC or Lucques for this girl.

Favorite object in your kitchen?

My coffee cone. Or my Le Creuset French oven, which doesn’t get nearly enough use but is oh so pretty to look at.

What are you scared of in the kitchen?

Salmonella and other ickies. I know far too much, and at the same time far too little, about food safety.

Do you prefer to cook alone or with others?

So much more fun with others! Or at least, for others.

What country would you move to for the food?

Mmmmm, somewhere Middle Eastern where they sell skewers of grilled lamb on the streets. Or maybe Mexico.

If you were to come back as a fruit or vegetable, what would you be?

An avocado. I believe they are the perfect food, and heck, in my next life I want to come back perfect, dang it.

What’s for dinner?

Probably a spinach salad with salmon.

After I moved, I started walking to work. It’s not a long walk – a little under a mile – but it’s summer and it’s hot and it can get a little hard on the feet.

I’ve found that my Danskos are the best thing for walking in, in terms of comfort. However, I’m a little clumsy and the streets and sidewalks are really poorly paved, so I feel like bad sidewalks + clumsy me + heel height = accident waiting to happen.

So, I’m trying to find something a little lower to the ground, good for long-ish walks, that is a little less sporty than Keens, which are my default long-walking shoes. Today I’m giving my Gentle Souls a try, but I don’t think they are going to be supportive enough.

So I’m putting this out there to your collective knowledge: what shoes would you wear to work if you were faced with a long-ish walk on poorly paved streets? I know you know the answer, so tell me!

Please, and thank you.

I’m not sure I needed to know about this: Chat Noir.

So far, it’s Le Chat 5, Chez Shoes 0. It’s trickier than it looks!

This week has been a full-on mixed bag of really good (walking to work! I love it so much!) and really bad (coming home to find that my landlord had not only ENTERED MY APARTMENT without telling me, but left the front door wide open after he was done – yikes!). I’m a little frazzled by it all, but hey, it’s Friday and I’ve got a weekend to look forward to.  So I’m going to leave the bad stuff behind and talk about the good stuff instead.

Five things making me happy this week:

1. I’m getting my hair cut tomorrow. Finally. You have no idea how overdue I am for this. Really, until tomorrow I should not be allowed out in public, it’s that bad.
2. Crocheting. Starting it up again this weekend. I’m hoping to make it to the Fairview Knitters on Saturday, if my haircut doesn’t run too late. Then on Sunday, Crochet 101 at the Little Knittery. I’ve been crocheting since I was like five years old, but I’m really not very good at it. I want to get better, and I want to make little lacy things.
3. Exene Cervenka reading poetry at the Craft and Folk Art Museum on Sunday. Exene has been my hero since I was a teenage punkette, and many many years ago she used to do readings pretty often, but it’s been a very long time. I’m so excited that she’s doing this again.
4. I discovered the CD Lady Day and Prez this week, and it is so so great. Billie Holiday’s story is pretty well known, but I never knew much about Lester Young before other than that I liked him. Like Billie, he had a rather tragic life and death. So much great music came out of that time, but sometimes it’s hard to ignore the undercurrent of racism that was always there. So I guess this makes me both happy and sad at the same time, but regardless, it’s beautiful.
5. Charm magazine from the 1940s. I learned about it from Sarai’s blog and within days, snapped up three issues from eBay for a bargain price. This is so much fun to look at and so full of fashion inspiration that it makes me want to dust off my sewing machine and make dresses!

What about you – what is making you happy this week?

~ ~ ~

Oh and – take a look at the pretty bracelet giveaway over at Grosgrain. Winning that would certainly make me happy!

I am so in love with the Fluevog Malibrans that have been making the rounds through the blogosphere. And now that I’ve learned from Catiecake that they come in shiny red patent, well – I’m a goner. I mean, who wouldn’t be – these are beautiful!

Sadly, the one time I went in a Fluevog store, in Seattle some years back, their size 6 – more or less my normal size – was HUGE on me. I left empty handed and sad, as at the time they did not stock any smaller sizes. These, however, also come in size 5 and 5.5, so I’m sure that I could work something out.

So tell me, my fellow shoe-lovin’ girls – do you own these? Or other Fluevogs? How is the sizing these days?

As you all probably know by now, I moved to a little apartment with a sleeping loft a couple weeks back. As you also already know, I have a rather senior cat who tends toward the scaredy side. Generally, Mischa just wants to be wherever I am when I’m home – preferably on me, but he’ll settle for near me if that’s the best he can do.

This presented a problem with the sleeping loft. He couldn’t climb the ladder, and I couldn’t easily carry him up and down without having to use a separate stepladder with a solid platform to stand on. I tried not bringing him up to the loft when I went to bed, but he would cry. And cry. And cry.

So my pal Blurrylens and I devised a cat ladder that even scaredy senior cats can use. It consists of two Ikea Tryggve shelves, cut in half, each held up with an Ikea Valter bracket. Total cost for this project was around twenty bucks. Oh, and the cost of getting my hair colored next weekend, because my walls are scary thin and the whole time I kept thinking everything was going to collapse, resulting in a new outcropping of grey hair!

Mr. Blurrylens did the carpentry, I handed the spatial relations. The project took about an hour and a half. We finished up around 1pm yesterday, and I tried to introduce Mischa to the shelves. He was, of course, a scaredy cat. At bedtime, I carried him up the stepladder, feeling a bit defeated.

This morning, though, around 5:30,  I awakened to the sound of little footsteps. I thought it might be a mouse – I suspect I have one in this 1920s house, not surprisingly. Then I realized it was Mischa, hopping up and down the cat shelves! Turns out he had to discover them in his own time. Now, he loves them – he’s been going up and down all morning.

You can watch the video of the cat shelves in action here.

I’m spending a good part of my time off getting fully settled into my new place, but still plan to make time for fireworks tomorrow night.

Wishing you all a safe and happy 4th – unlike those children above, who look like they are going to meet with disaster any second now. Yikes!