That's really lovely about your family, ita !. And I'm glad your cousin is doing so well. I'm very impressed by her!

Actually, when I look around my house, I have lots of valuable stuff. I just didn't pay jack for any of it. Like the vessel sinks and the twin subzeros. But of course it's instantly clear where the money goes in this house, which is to say, all musical gear.

Speaking of which, I did the mix stems and not the admin work after my bath. <hangs head> I feel shame. Tomorrow, I swear. Along with dishes, putting away laundry and house hugging. But lots of admin the next few days.

Although I do have some troubleshooting I need to do for some of the routings I changed tonight. Also I should probably come up with a startup profile that loads nothing but audio. Although I think I can't use User access controls? Hmm. Have to figure that out in the morning.

Oh, and see if the MIDI syncing is working. Oh, and try the score output to Sibelius. But then laundry, I swears.

The one label item I have is a Burberry trench

JZ got a Burberry coat from her Dad for xmas. Really nice.

Some things I think are worth the investment because you tend to wear them every day: coat, glasses, haircut.

You immediately upgrade most of your appearance when you get quality there.

It took me a week.

Compared to Tommy, that's just: [link]

I feel like I never know what will be worth the investment and what will end up being "dang I spent all that money and never use/wear that". It never seems to correlate with anything I can figure out.

I saw bald eagles today! And did not spend $300 (well, minus 30 percent!) on a super adorable Kate Spade dress that probably would have been awesome on me (I did not even try it on for fear I would like it).

And did not spend $300 (well, minus 30 percent!) on a super adorable Kate Spade dress that probably would have been awesome on me

I've seen you look pretty great in $10 thrift shop dress.

I've seen you look pretty great in $10 thrift shop dress.

Thanks David! Also a reason not to buy a $300 dress.

That's awesome about the bald eagles!

Technology is one of the things I spend money on and then regret. Phones and stuff that quickly slips into planned obsolescence.

But then there are things like the Nook, which I have been using daily for years now. So I wonder about tablets and whatnot.

The Vimes theory of boots has really been true for me. But I think it's time to realize that the last pair of Docs I bought is super lovely but is never going to fit me right or "break in" and I should probably just acknowledge that the uk sizing without halves just doesn't fit me. But it's sad because I have had Docs that were comfortable or that I could work with insoles and stuff. Dunno if it's the zipper on this one or what, but it just doesn't work.

I bought a new pair of slip on shoes to replace the Earth shoes and they're nice but not quite as comfy as the Earths.

I just remembered another rule of thumb for quality from my friend Claudine, who used to be a buyer for Gap.

I asked her to breakdown the difference between Old Navy, Gap and Banana Republic and she could cite exactly how many stitches per inch there was for each brand.

Another example was that for assembly line production on clothes they cut out all the pieces on a big machine. The bigger the stack of fabric that the machine is cutting through the more it would get slightly off-register from the top piece to the bottom piece.

So Banana Republic wouldn't cut more than twelve pieces at a time, whereas Old Navy would stack it one hundred high. So the fit would be more variable.

Things like that.

I have a jacket that cost my parents s fortune in 1991 but I still wear it ever winter. It was made by Pategonia and was worth it.