Does the company that bought Osprey still honor the warranty?

Keen Newports have the finger loops on tongue and heel. I think Blundstone boots do, too? I’m sure someone with Blundstones can confirm or refute that.

Those loops are so handy, I agree.

Bicycle. No gas expenses, no tabs, no loan, free parking. I understand how it works and can mostly fix it myself for very little money. I can take quiet side streets and arrive in a much better mood, plus my fat lazy ass gets some exercise.

Coffee makes me incredibly hungry (any caffeine does). This would backfire on me soooooo bad.

I have to wonder if an extra cup of any liquid per day would help avoid weight gain. You hear so much about people misinterpreting thirst as hunger - they eat instead of drinking.

I’m finding the opposite. Books that I loved when younger are even better as I re-read them now. Ursula le Guin, Terry Pratchett (their YA and their adult books) have so much more nuance and subtlety than I was aware of when I just read them for the adventure and story. There are some profound bits of wisdom and wry observation tucked in those books.

The old “divide and conquer” works remarkably well.

Keep the poor fighting each other, so they don’t start toppling the extremely wealthy and powerful who are feeding off them.

You can add pockets to the pants you buy, too. This video by Morgan Donner is adding several examples of types of pockets to skirts, but the process is the same. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pE_nrHKd58

And there’s this one by Bernadette Banner https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thlzJj1EHiY

Thigh pockets are really great for phones. You can make visible patch pockets or subtle welt pockets and you can customize to the size of your phone.

Billy Connolly

For t shirts I always sing the praises of Gettees. Tiny “factory” of half a dozen people making extraordinarily high quality and durable shirts in Detroit. Most of the people doing the sewing are former auto upholstery stitchers from the car factories. The quality is truly the best I’ve ever encountered. https://gettees.us/

Side note about pockets: Duluth Trading women’s pants have multiple ginormous pockets, and about half have crotch gussets or anterior inseams to avoid chub-rub destroying the pants.

A “final solution”, as it were.

This is cool. I always wondered why I can instantly grasp 1 through 4, but 5 and up become abstract. Thank you for posting this!

A good place to start on YouTube is Bernadette Banner’s channel. She is a clothing historian, so there’s a lot of historical and historical recreation stuff, but she also has a few basic repair and tailoring techniques videos. She wrote a mending book that I hear is much more in-depth than her videos (I haven’t read it). https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/make-sew-and-mend-bernadette-banner/1139915226

Patagonia Wornwear has a lot of repair instructions for outdoor gear (you don’t have to buy their repair materials). https://wornwear.patagonia.com/repairs

Reddit “visiblemending” and “invisiblemending” are also very good resources.

There is a generation of little old ladies who are passionate about sewing, but have no-one to sew for. Their kids are grown, and their grandkids don’t want handmade clothes. Ask at a senior center or at a local (not chain) fabric shop, seek out one of these ladies and hire her to sew for you. Or barter: help her around the house or garden or drive her to appointments or to get groceries, and in exchange she sews clothes from fabrics and patterns you choose. Or tailors used clothes to make them fit you better, or mends your worn clothes, etc.

Here’s an excellent place to start: https://tincanknits.com/collection/the-simple-collection

And “run” the heels and ball of the foot so they felt down and last longer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fKKLOUNOHU

I did a deep-dive reading and watching videos learning about sturdy and long-lasting fabrics and materials. Learned a bit about tailoring for durability, too. (For example, Duluth Trading shifted the inseams on their Firehose pants forward. The forward seams don’t rub on each other when you walk, and so the inner thighs don’t self-destruct as quickly.)

There are also a ton of excellent resources on how to mend clothing and properly care for it. And it doesn’t take much effort, really.

So now I have a bunch of older clothes, with subtle repairs, still in good shape. Sure, I’d like some sexy new trendy disposable stuff so I can be one of the cool kids - but that’s how fast fashion gets its claws into you. Preying on our magpie-like desires for shiny new things makes somebody big bucks. (And creates huge waste and exploits desperate workers.)

Buy sturdy “classic” clothes. Keep them in good repair. Fight the system.

I used to make big platters of deviled eggs for afternoon seminars. The grad students descended upon them like ravening wolves.

The “Cheap Old Houses” website is reassuring. It’s not a McMansion in the tony suburbia of a large popular city, but there are small reasonably priced houses in smaller cities and towns. https://www.cheapoldhouses.com/

I have two friends from high school who found houses under $100k within driving distance of larger cities ($60k in Kansas, $32k in Illinois)

At least, not yet…