Yesterday was an interesting day. Pancake Land submitted herself to one of her biggest fears, the dentist. She has been having a pain in the back of her jaw for a couple of weeks now, and the other night, when it was particularly painful, she reached into your mouth to feel around for an answer. She got it. It is a wisdom tooth. And it has broken the skin and is coming on strong. Awesome. So, she decided to suck it up and go to the dentist. She hates the dentist. I don’t think that I can emphasize this enough. Maybe if I make it bold it will get the point across. She hates the dentist. She has never had a good experience in a dentist’s chair, and true to form, yesterday was no exception. I feel partially to blame for this, because in my attempt to be the ever-so-helpful-loving-man, I sent her to my dentist, who has always been good to me (for the past 22 years). To make it up to her, I picked up Chinese food for dinner. Lots of cream cheese wontons makes everything okay.

Maybe it was her agitated state, or maybe it was her longing for Test Subjects #1, whatever it was, come 6pm, Pancake Land had had enough. She voiced that she was tired of these new kittens not being brave/smart enough to climb over the fence of the Kitten Concentration Camp and she was determined to teach them. And this, she did. She said that they would probably forget how to climb again by this morning. This comes to mind as I watch Frank climbing over the fence and scampering off into freedom. Awesome, looks like I get to wrangle some kittens this morning.

Well, I managed to clean and ship my Chacos yesterday. Whoo! And now we wait around in our crappy WalMart* sandals until our good sandals get back. Chaco has changed the repair process, and it seems less friendly and personal. Chaco used to be a company of people making shoes for other people. Like your friendly neighborhood cobbler. But now, they outsourced production to China and outsourced repairs to Wolverine. Maybe they were bought by Wolverine. Whatever it is, I don’t like it. I bet if I called them the phones would be answered by a robot that directs calls. The phone used to be answered by a person. I remember the shock and surprise I felt when I called and a person answered the phone. It was like:

“Chacos, this is Jim.”

Not a press 2 for Spanish, or a dial your extension at any time, but a guy/gal answering the phone and asking you what they could do for you. I am afraid to call them now, because I don’t want the disappointment of them being less awesome than they used to be. I want them to be a small Mom & Pop shoe company in the Hippie state of Colorado, who gives bonuses to their employees for riding a bike to work and for volunteering in the community. Not a company that outsources its labor or has a robot answer the phone.

This ranting is making feel all icky. Enough of that. Did I mention that there is a distinct possibility that I scored a whole metric shitload of free ice cream? Well, odds are that I did. I’ll let you know. Well, I’ve got to get to work before it gets balls hot outside. More soon. ~SC