fflo | the last time I bought new sneakers

The last time I bought new sneakers was in 1999 or 2000, at an outlet shopping center on I-70 between Columbia, MO and Kansas City. I was with my boss at the time, whose Grand Cherokee was providing our transportation home from a nuthin' conference on a lousy computer system the bookstore has since scrapped. I was delighted that she was willing to shop separately, if we had to stop (and we did); I ended up in a discount shoe place and came away with a pair of Reebox walking shoes for about 30 bucks. Turned out one of them had a flaw in the heel; that shoe made a popping, squeaky sound whenever you took pressure back off of its heel. So for a good deal of the rest of the time I worked at Varney's, you could hear me squeaking when I walked around the warehouse.

Last week

squirrelykat and I were at the discount shoe place up here, and I musta tried on 15 pairs of sneakers that I could find in my size---surprisingly many choices in a women's 11, so most of 'em were even women's shoes. Sadly, only one pair seemed to fit right and feel good, and they were the most expensive. So expensive I wouldn't have even put 'em in the stack to try on if I'd seen the price correctly. I hemmed and hawed and decided to come back another time and try to find more options.

A few days later I returned, tried on at least 20 pairs, and was waffling, on the verge of buying none at all, when I noticed that the expensive ones came with a keychain bearing a little cast iron replica of the shoe---complete with the orange and black paint job this very model of shoe had. That finally made it okay, and in a light-hearted way; so, thanks to my love of gee-gaws, I went a little further into debt and now have my first new pair of sneakers this millenium.

I just wore 'em to traipse down to the park with the basketball I bought at a yard sale in Ypsi in the spring. No, they're not "court" shoes, but I made a few baskets anyway. And did a lot of dribbling.

Dribbling is good for the soul.

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I used to have lots of cool shoes, as comfy feet are essential to me. But sometime in the last few years, my feet went from regular to wide, and none of my shoes fit right anymore. Then I lost a bunch in last years move.

So in short, your post reminded me that I need to go to DSW.

Hey, they've got lots of boxes with "W"s on 'em now. Go crazy!

I would totally go with you to shoot some hoops sometime, that sounds so fun. Did you ever play a basketball game called pig? Onstar says she played horse because pig made the game too short. I would play either. I would play elephant. And all the other outside/park/yard things, like throwing footballs and playing catch and frisbee and badminton, etc. I love doing all that stuff.

I was just talking, earlier tonight, about having played horse and finding the game too short, so playing longer things---we played elephant! We even played antidisestablishmentarianism a coupla times. Mostly me and the neighbor kid in Kansas, Brad Eads. I just can't remember exactly how it worked. There were set places you had to take shots from, right? Make it and you get to take the next one, miss it and you get a letter, and you don't want to "spell" out?

One shot I used to like---that didn't work too well today cuz the sun was in my face---was from standing directly under the basket. You have to arch your back, reach yer arms out, and loop it back up. Hey, my hook shot still has a little accuracy! As long as I'm not more than 3 or 4 feet away, I've got a shot at it (right arm only, at this point).

Today I remembered in an all-body kind of way how much I used to love to play ball, almost any kind of ball, and catch and stuff like that. Yeah, let's hit the playground/park soon! It's not winter yet! I have a kite, too, that I haven't flown in Michigan...

We have a kite, too, although I find it rather pesky. Not too easy to get those things in the air sometimes, but ours looks rather queer and festive, and I'm sure it would enjoy coming out for a good fly. Usually I only try that in the spring. I guess I buy into the whole March winds and April showers thing.
Sadly, I seem to have forgotten how to get a good spin on a football. Any chance you remember and can show me? As you may know, I've become a real lover of the game and would really enjoy passing the ball around with someone. When I was a kid, we used to play football in my front yard. That was the whole length of the football field, one side of the yard to the other. But I was always so much bigger and stronger than my friends that I would just keep on going, dragging them into the "endzone" as they futilely wrapped themselves around my waist and ankles. Now, of course, I'm only looking to throw and especially to catch some passes. For me, as indicated by my calendar pose, football is quite the celebration of fall.

I believe I do remember how to make it spin. Fingertips, and laces, and hand position... yeah. We can do that! I assume you still have a football? (I have a Nerf one I won at Home Depot last Super Bowl day by throwing it through the second-hardest target, of three. Couldn't get it in the tiny target, for $10 offa somethin'.)

As a group my old neighborhood in KS played kickball more than football, and then when we moved to Maryland we never knew enough kids for a pick-up game in the neighborhood. They weren't football kids, anyway. My brother was quite the Joe Namath fan, though, and we did throw that ball around. He would size up a yard by whether it would be good for football---I still think of that sometimes when I see a yard.

I love the picture in my mind of you dragging all the kids across the goal line.

One of my favorite simple ball activities is playing catch with a baseball---not a softball, which is way to big to enjoy grabbing in yer hand and throwing, and which doesn't make the same satisfying grabbable in the glove, either. And that's not just gender constriction jealousy, either.

The day after my mother's memorial service, Holly and I went to the kite shop in Ocean City, MD (half an hour away) and bought Amelia, a very easy-to-fly kite, and a good string reeler-inner, and a LONG thing of kite string for her. Like her namesake, she's just dying to get up into the air. We were going to make a custom tail for her out of some highly-mom-identifiable pieces of clothing, for color and character, and to make her even more of a memorial kite. Still could do that, I guess; the clothing, particularly one colorful-patterned shirt, is still in the basement somewhere.

Holly was a pretty wonderful girlfriend, in so many ways. I worried for a while that I'd forget about those, what with the horror and ultimately inexplicable nature of the schism and its long, slow, painful and soul-boggling (my latest word for't) aftermath. But it seems there are a damned lotta things about her I loved that I'm not going to forget.

Much more painful to remember, yes, but worse for the soul to forget. Yes? The clean-slate types---they do trade off something for it, right? Something big & vital?

---Hey, I thought I was writing about a kite here... ! sheesh. geez, ann-louise.

"Much more painful to remember, yes, but worse for the soul to forget. Yes? The clean-slate types---they do trade off something for it, right? Something big & vital?"

that's what that movie "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" was about. Did you see it? really good.

Didn't see it! Started to a couple of times---suspicious of it, somehow. The Jim Carrey factor is not a positive in my book, fer instance.

OK. Sit down, honey. Let me tell you. I _despise_ Jim Carrey. But some Washington Post reviews convinced me to go, and I was glad I did. I wasn;t what I expected-- that extreme, physical humor (not funny to me) that gets annoying the first moment you see him. He was an actor. A damn good one. With good but not overdone facial expressions and this perfect, unshaven, hangdog look. You could totally see this movie.

Shootin' hoops sounded like fun. Good to talk with ya yesterday. New comfy shoes, always good.

the last time I bought new sneakers

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