The Enrico Antinori boots I bought on sale from Zomp in King St on the 4th of July have been interesting.

3" heel, no platform, fairly classic style¹, calf length. They're comfortable and conservative enough² that I've been wearing them a lot.³


Firstly an observation..

Four or five half days a week of continuous low level exercise is a fantastic way of firming your glutes, and your thighs, and your hamstrings. I've been doing a lot of stretching just to avoid losing any flexibility, and also doing a bit of pilates and cycling, but I think the sore muscles I had for most of last week was basically from a change of footwear. I'm liking my legs at the moment :)


..and secondly a little story.

My cousin's 18th birthday was on Sunday, so there was a moderate sized gathering of my (very dress conscious) mother's side of the family at my cousins house. The boots in question are a perfect fit for how dressy I thought the occasion was, but I wavered because I didn't really want to make a fuss, and I wasn't sure how they'd go down. I mentioned this on my FB status, and a friend just came back with the suggestion that I should wear a skirt..

So anyway, I wore the boots. Arrived at the house, not planning on drawing any attention to them. We let ourselves in the front door, then discovered that everyone was in a sunken lounge area, so basically we were going to be greeting everyone from the top of a small flight of stairs. So much for being subtle.

Imagine my surprise when the first thing my ultra-conservative Grandmother (the one always on at me to cut my hair) says is "Those are nice shoes, Christopher".
me: *thanks her, and comments about the sales assistant being a friend of my sisters*⁴
g: "Are they women's boots?"
me: *umms and pauses while panicking about how much of an answer to give*
g: "Oh, they're unisex?"
me: (firmly) "Yes."

Now at the time I just didn't want to launch into a political speech at a family gathering, but thinking about it the following day, that was exactly the right answer. If one of my aims is to reject the division of clothing along gender lines, then I should be treating my attire as unisex, and part of that is describing it as such. Go me :)


They went down pretty well at _fnkymnky's gig at Double Lucky on Thursday night, too.


¹Think mid-heeled black leather go-go boots, in the original 60's sense of a mainstream fashion street boot.
²by my standards!
³It also helps that I now have enough pairs of plain skinny black pants that I don't need to worry about wearing out the one pair I had before - picked up some more lip-service at clearance prices from MAME a little while back.
⁴..though I found out later she was actually more a friend of my cousin.

Somewhat belated post, just for completeness really.

As I already mentioned on twitter and stalkbook, I made another acquisition three weeks ago (5th of June), some 'Fancy's from Zu. (rabbit1080 got some shiny shoes that day too :) )

Anyhoo, these ones:

Probably a bit too flimsy for much in the way of stomping, but very comfy for sitting around in (nice soft PU), and I'm liking having a a pair that are somewhat lower key than my taboo-2021s while still being a tad more elegant than most of my collection. They're a better fit around my scrawny ankles than anything else I own, too. Most excellent for cocktail parties and the like :)

(oh, and in hunting for the images I just found out that Zu are now having an online-only end of season 40% off sale on those ones. Bastards! I'm used to dealing with that for laptops &c, but not shoes..)

I usually only drive in flats or bare feet, but I tried driving back from Karrinyup in my Filippo Raphaels today - they're a lot lower than anything else I've got, and I'd tried using toes only on my way out in socks.

Right foot I barely noticed the difference, but lost a lot of finesse on my clutch foot, so I lost that one the second traffic lights I got to. Still less hassle than changing altogether on arrival and departure.

(oh, and lol at current music - totally unplanned! Better not be prophetic :-P )

I picked up my new boots today - thanks gotica :-)

One pair each in Sky-2020 and Taboo-2021; pretty much identical (black, shiny, calf length, stilletto heel, chunky platforms) except the for the latter being stretch and 2cm taller (7½" vs 6¾"), and the former having ski-hook style lacing.

Trying my Sky-2020s at the moment. Much nicer shaped heel than my Candy-2021s (and more stable! - much more solid construction), though it's going to take some getting used to them not being stretch. They creak :)

ETA - Also, more room for my toes than in my Candys :-) And I can not only see the top of the fridge, but I can see the shelf in the glasses cupboard over the fridge :-) :-) Oh, and they're verah verah shiny! (the boots that is, I already knew the glasses were shiny).

Thanks rabbit1080 for keeping me company on trip out and back!

Ladytron at the Bakery on the 5th was good - but not as awesome as I'd hoped. It may have been faux detachment, but I missed the strong connection with the crowd that had been such a feature of the last few live acts I've seen. Still fun to see them live with rabbit1080 and friends, and will have to look out for the support act (The Voltaire Twins), 'cause they were fun.

Had an excellent day out with rabbit1080 on Saturday - starting with a fun trip into Freo for coffee and to check out a watercolour exhibition and to buy some strips of surface mounted LEDs, then home to watch the rest of Blade Runner over lunch. A nap and a snuggle and an hour or so's cycling round King's Park and UWA in the afternoon, and then a quiet early evening.

Then 10pm Saturday night was off to sIn for Destroid/Diary of Dreams/Covenant. A good review from cytribe9a here, though I personally preferred Diary of Dreams to Destroid. (*dons asbestos suit*). Covenant were fabulous, and it was good to catch up with some old friends and new. Gave Phil and Lisa a lift home and dropped in for a bit, then home at a little after 4am.

Electra 1020's that night - none of my other boots are comfortable enough for six hours on my feet. :)

You know that thing where you suddenly wake up and shift position because your body feels like it's falling? No imagined circumstances, just the sensation.

I had one of those the other morning, only I was correcting for my ankle going sideways while wearing heels. Right down to noticing my foot twist back to vertical as I gained consciousness. I was amused..


Had some successful cooking experiments over the last week. On Saturday I made some Armagnac cupcakes from the 500 Cupcakes book (first cupcakes I've made in a looooong time). Main excuse was my dad's 65th birthday , but I also snuck one in evilelvis777's direction. Thanks rabbit1080 for answering all my dumb questions.

They were goood :)

Finally got around to checking out Dan Murphy's after failing to find Armagnac at the first three local places we tried. The prices and variety are good, easily enough to make up for driving time and petrol costs, though I feel little evil about supporting the interloper. I was entertained by the additional security devices on the Jägermeister bottles. Apparently nothing else is quite so attractive to shoplifters :)

I also bought some schnitzel beef on Sunday(ish) and J & I collaborated on inventing a parmigiana like thing. (um, egg and breadcrumb the beef, spread with tomato paste, add grated feta and parmesan, then sprinkle with oregano and bake in a moderate oven). That worked, too.

Other highlights of the last several days were evilelvis777's birthday at sIn, an excellent panel on Clarion at the KSP minicon from the Battersbys and some other people, wildflowers at John Forrest shortly after that, bumping into Quinn Pendragon on his wedding day, and getting to meet the lovely bryberry at her 'I can has mortgage now?' drinks :)

I got some shiny new boots a couple of weeks ago, and promptly wore them to four social events in five days, including chatting and dancing for several hours on Saturday night, and standing around in a pub on Tuesday, before going to Jedi Bootcamp and jumping around in ballet slippers on a non-sprung floor doing drama exercises (long story).

Somewhere along the way I did something bad to my right toe and the pad of flesh just behind it. By Wednesday morning I had a not quite stabbing pain every time I put weight on either. So I've spent the last nine days wearing thick socks and my most sensible old sneakers with orthotics in, and the six days of that period either avoiding walking altogether or putting any weight on my right foot onto its outside edge.

By Sunday night I'd decided that if things didn't improve markedly in the next couple of days I'd go and see a doctor about it. Monday morning things had improved markedly :) Threats can be good like that..

I've spent half of this week retraining my body into spreading my weight across the width of my feet (walking on the side was starting to do odd things to my tendons, but had also become habitual), and really appreciating the sensation of my foot pads squishing with every step. I'm actually conscious of that in both feet now, and it feels good.

I think going rollerblading with rabbit1080 near Herdsman Lake a few days ago was useful, too, as well as fun. Low impact, slight rumbly foot massage, and my rollerblades have ankle support second only to my hiking boots.

If I wear any heels at all tomorrow night they'll be my Electras (see icon). They're a lot more comfortable than they look :)

I had a good day yesterday

In the morning I bought some new boots from alibaster (pictured right). Always a pleasure doing business with her. She still has a few pairs to sell - check it out if you're an 11 in Pleaser :) I also tried on the Sky 333 shoes she was selling; not that those particular shoes are remotely my style, but they've got the same heel and platform as the Sky 2020s I've been thinking about acquiring sometime. And now I really want some...

Ran away for the afternoon to hide out at a shopping centre - far from the distractions of housework and internet access. Sorted through some old files from 2006, and tried to gather some brainspace for things I'm meant to be doing next.

GiP at Durty's was good - arrived at around 5pm to catch the after-work crowd. On my way in to the pub my new boots earned me a wolfwhistle from one of the suits :) rabbit1080 and I ordered a Magners at the bar, and soon found a table crowded with roc_rocky, fipuss, snuck, skwerlie, anonymous_bunny. Got to meet the charming deathnightshade, and crankynick dropped by for a bit. I had a pleasant surprise when I bumped into Elizabeth and Jared at the bar - they and a bunch of others were having their own gawth invasion out the front. Too much inertia from both parties for any kind of merger though.

Headed home at half six for some healthier and cheaper food than could be found at the pub.

I pan fried some roo-kebabs! Unassisted! I used some leftover oil from the jar of fetta cheese we finished yesterday. They were yummy :) J made a delicious cauliflower & potato bake to go with it, and rounded it off with some green beans and red wine.

According to the propaganda on the 'roo packaging, 15% of Australia's greenhouse gas emissions is methane from flatulent sheep and cows. Roos produce a lot less, do a lot less damage to topsoil, and are a leaner meat. Also? Only $12 a kilo. $5 was enough for two kebabs each last night, and one for me to snack on today. Mmmm, meat..

That was quite a busy weekend. I think today will be quieter - biggest thing on the agenda is a project post-mortem with rabbit1080 to swap notes on how exhibition planning could be improved in the future.

( Opening, quiet, Hedwig, Rosemount, sIn, quiet, snuggles, Rosemount, snuggles, Double Lucky, *breathe*  )

Yesterday afternoon I acquired some considerably more violent green hair extensions from Wildilocks - just clip ins this time, as they're a bit bright for everyday for me at the moment.

I headed south with rabbit1080 in the evening to drop in to justadecoy's 29th for an hour, then went home for a bit while she crocheted some fluorescent green netting into one side of my pants.

Yes, I was off to sIn to catch Sydney band Angelspit, followed by Japanese industrial metal act Baal. (I gather these two were preceded by a local act, but I arrived too late for them).

Angelspit. Fabulous outfits, great sound, and a bunch of us squeezed up against the stage bouncing along. There was something of a false start due to some broken mikes, but anyone who ran away at that point missed out on an excellent set. Oh, and a little while before they went on ZooG complimented my boots =) =)

Baal were f'ing rock. Near androgenous lead singer with latex claws, an aggressive guitarist and crazy drummer, zombie makeup and an absolute wall of sound. Nothing else for it - let my hair down and headbanged with kittensoda's boy :) And I touched the claws :-)

Early teasers from the official photographer here, and a heap of Baal pics from solkana here, and cytribe9a's review here.

aka 'out of practice'

Having dressed relatively conservatively during May Detox, sIn on Saturday night was the first time in about six weeks that I've been out in my 6.5" heels.

That was more challenging than I expected. The extra inch and a bit makes quite a difference - and they're also noticeably less solid than anything else I've been wearing. I only lasted about an hour before my feet were killing me (admittedly I'd already spent a few hours on my feet in my ankle boots at an earlier engagement), so it's probably as well that I was only ever planning on dropping in in the first place.

Think I'll be wearing my Electra's to Angelspit. Besides, they go better with the pants I didn't steal from chaoticlusts.

I also need to be more strong minded about keeping up with my ballet exercises..

( To cut a long story short.. ) I have some new boots :) And J's comment was that the thing she likes least about them is that she'd quite like to get some shoes with a similar heel at some point, but I got there first >:-)

I've really enjoyed sharing their debut with rabbit1080, first at FP drinks, then showing them off at Exomod this afternoon to kae_dash and Nina. And doing the vacuuming, but I need to tread carefully around our wooden floorboards :p.

On Tuesday they didn't seem as sane for standing around in as some of my other boots, but they were fine today - not sure if I'm standing differently or just growing into them.


I failed to find any catalogue pages to link to (limited edition! Go me!), so I did some photography experiments on Wednesday to try to emulate that which I could not find. The somewhat photoshopped result may be found to the right, though in reality they're already a little shop worn, and I don't intend to be overly precious with them; these boots were made for walking :) Indeed, J & I have already gone for a stroll around Hyde Park while I was wearing them - those autumn leaves didn't stand a chance.

Went to sIn last night to catch Black Lung, David Thrussell's solo project (yes, it's the second time he's visited Perth this month), and had an excellent time. I danced for all but five minutes of the one hour set (had to rehydrate), and spent most of the rest of the evening catching up with people and putting a few more names to faces.

I'm crap at describing music, so I'm just going to quote cytribe9a's lable of "Break-beat/Glitch/Trance a-la Scorn/Autechre/Siechtum et al." Not everyone's cup of tea, so there were only a couple of dozen of us on the dance floor for much of the set, but a few of the non-dancers said it was a still a great atmosphere for generally hanging around :)

What's that you say? What was I doing dancing on my sore foot? Well, sticking to my second least sensible boots, adding some gel inserts and thick socks, avoiding doing anything too stompy (I fled the room when someone put Blue Monday on) and generally keeping most of my weight to my heels and the ball of my left foot has actually left me feeling better today than I did yesterday. Win! :-)

At some point earlier this month - I suspect the week starting on the 7th of April - there were a few days where I kept feeling like there was something stuck to the soles of the (flat but hard soled) shoes I was wearing to work. I would check the underside, nothing there, feel inside, and assume the lining had gone funny.

I eventually realised that it wasn't the shoe that was the problem - I've actually injured my right foot. It seems moderately likely that I've inflamed the head of one my metatarsals.

Four or five days ago I did a bit of googling and stuck a likely sounding lable on it, but I'd by then I'd already had discussions with several other people who'd had similar problems, whose combined advice pretty much matched what I was already doing. Stay off the ball of that foot as much as possible, wear sensible shoes, see a doctor if it doesn't improve, but don't expect it to take less than about six weeks. At this point I'll probably see a decent physio quite soon anyway, but I'm not too concerned. My moderately extensive but highly informal research is more a part of my reflection on my new found obssession.

The long version is behind a cut - I've mostly assembled this timeline for my own reference purposes, but it also contains comments from various friends. If you are skipping the long version, you may still want check out the included illustration for some Family Fun.

( history )

Which brings us to today. It's getting better, but only by being Very Nice to my feet.

Tomorrow night I'm off to see Black Lung, and will want to be dancing. Obviously my shiniest pair of boots would be Unwise, but I'm tempted to wear my Electras. I can wear thick socks with those, and probably some gel inserts too. I just need to remember to listen to my feet while I'm out, avoid stomping, and not dance if it hurts is remotely uncomfortable :-/


I'd love to hear from anyone else who has suffered for the sake of shiny shoes - what they've experienced, whether it was for work or for pleasure, and how it panned out for them.

While rabbit1080 and I were in Melbourne (more on that later), we went shoe shopping together. I didn't get as many shiny things as she did, but I did manage to acquire these gorgeous Filippo Raphael patent leather ankle boots.



I could talk about about how they're a lot saner to wear with my new pants with all the d-rings than my knee highs are, but to be honest I mostly bought them because they're shiny, and it's hard to find their like in Perth.

If I do my hair in several fine braids when it's still wet, and leave them in for a day, my hair goes all springy.

Gathering it into a ponytail now feels like how I'd imagine gathering theprettypoison's hair would feel.

Cocktails and sIn last night were good :)

I wore my new boots for seven or eight hours without hassles; they're definitely a bit easier on my feet than my other Pleasers.

I think I will like my new laptop, once I've got everything set up how I like it.

Surprise laptop death, cocktails and dancing, five or six hours sleep, and another longish day make me tired. Had a nice bike ride with rabbit1080 out to the bell tower and around Kings Park though.

I've been thinking it'd be nice to have something somewhere between my purple-laces and my Candy-2021s; taller than the former and a little more casual than the latter.

Last night alibaster put some Electra 1020s up for sale:

( pic )(5" heel, mid calf, matt finish).

Thank you!

Mine :)

These size 11s are a much looser fit than my other size 11s from the same company. This is good - I can use thicker socks, and I can wear them for longer.

My boots are back, and just about as shiny as new.

They've been crucified now (a couple of rows of black-lacquered nails under each sole), and are feeling pretty damn solid.

Thanks, tiberius_n!


(J and I just got home from sIn. *waves at everybody who was there*)

This year I'm going to attempt to actually make note of what I read.

It says something that the first post of this nature is in February despite missing none, but I'm not sure whether that's more about how little time I'm devoting to reading at the moment, or about how I found Raymond E. Feist's "Magician." I'm told it's a classic. It's in various top 100 lists, and comes highly recommended (indeed, it was after a week that included two recs from respected people of my acquaintance that I finally got around to obtaining a copy). I was curious as to how I'd go with 'fat fantasy' these days, and thought if I go for what is by all reports the shiniest thing since Tolkein that if I can't get into that then the entire genre is likely dead to me.

I think I left this one too late by over a decade. I would have really enjoyed it back when I was reading the likes of Eddings, Donaldson and Brooks (hey, despite preferring Thomas Covenant to the Belgariad, I still got through the Malloreon, and enjoyed it). And it did indeed have much that was shiny about it. Once upon a time I would have identified with young Pug, and I did enjoy the even handed description of the cultural clash between Midkemia and Kelewan. But there was much that was unevenly edited (the few passages that shone just intensified that impression), and the boast on the back cover that this edition was "Now with 15,000 Extra Words!" should have been a warning to me. Much as I have enjoyed recent epic trilogies on the hard SF side of the fence, a certain economy of words still appeals to me. And it seems that I've had my fill of books filled with mediæval magic, fair maidens and battles, at least for the time being. Not to mention ones that declare "Oh noes! The protagonists are forced to take the dangerous route under the mountains, in the mines that have been recently abandoned by the Dwarves, for reasons soon to be revealed!" I may yet revisit Donaldson - we'll see.

I'm now rewarding myself with Reynolds' "Galactic North," which I purchased some weeks ago as something to look forward to. It's been a little while since I read anything from the Revelation Space universe, so I'd actually forgotten the ending of the first short story, despite it just being an expansion of some events that were briefly referred to in one of the other novels. More on these when I've finished them :)


In other news, my Pleasers are ready for collection, albeit with a warning that they will fail again at some point in the future. I'll be happy to get them back, and with care they should easily tide me through beyond my next acquisition :)