Louisiana
Ecco Shoes
A few years back Carolyn bought me a pair of Ecco shoes to replace my old New Balance trail shoes, which I had been wearing as long as she knew me. I had two pair of those that are still marginally serviceable but, after 15 years or so, are starting to fail visibly.
They were extremely comfortable, look very nice, and seemed to wear well. Until their first winter, in Guelph, in the snow, the soles just started to disintegrate. A hole broke through the ball of one foot and snow came in–cold, cold snow. Apparently this is a fairly common problem with (old) Ecco shoes. I went to the local late-night shoe store (there is one in Guelph) and got a pair of Rockports. They’re very nice as well, though a bit less comfortable. I selected them because they could be resoled, and I did so after about two years of daily wear when the sole got so grip-less I started to slip on rainy sidewalks. Now they have a nice Vibram sole and should be good for another 3-5 years.
In the mean time, Ecco called me to ask if I wanted to return the shoes for possible warranty service. I told the nice woman that I wasn’t asking for that, but I would if they wanted to examine the failure, and that I wasn’t happy with the disintegrating sole material and I went with Rockport, but let me know if they ever change the sole material to something more durable.
A week or two later a pre-paid return mailer showed up in my mailbox. It sat on my kitchen table for about a year or so with other urgent matters. The dead Ecco’s were left behind in my Canadian office, then got mailed with my stuff to my LA office, then finally came back with my stuff from LA to Oakland. Not too many months later, off to Ecco-land they went.
About a month after I sent them in I was informed that Ecco had warranty replaced my shoes and sent me a new pair. They have latex soles, which may well be more durable and they feel, if anything, more comfortable than my first pair.
If I ever need another pair of shoes, I’ll buy another pair of Eccos.
A week of tweets: 2010-07-11
- Breakfast at the big table: heath bar ice cream with espresso. #toscanini #039;s #
- Dear boston pops, please, please spare us the misery of the WBZ color commentary on the PA. #shutup #
- Mass ave taken over by peds leaving fireworks. Police asking people to move to sidewalk not helping… #
- It is 60F here in LA and it Rained this morning. WTF? #
- RT @akieffer: Agave Lab Releases New iPhone App – Tastebud for Open Source Food #
- No power, no network in santa monica and AT&T screwed up my WWAN account. Work FAIL. Thanks PG&E. Sprinkle shorted it out I guess. #
- Wow, nice earthquake. My monitor was wiggling http://ova.st/5 #
- RT @dvrogers: Niki de Saint Phalle + Jean Tinguely The world began to blowup + shooting paintings via @christinamcphee http://is.gd/djcm4 #
- Off to oakland. Fruitvale is our closest BART stop, but we’re on the coliseum side, so it was quiet last time and I hear is so far tonight. #
- Quiet in east oakland now #
A week of tweets: 2010-05-30
- Enough with the rain. Going to LA, better be sunny. #
A Week of SUV Rentals
First, in Canada, I got a GMC Acadia, a moderately stupid SUV with seating for 7. It was snowing and so I suppose AWD was useful, but the only really good part about it was the heated seats. The gas expense was not so great…
The Acadia was fine as far as it went, but then my next rental, in Las Vegas, was a Lincoln Navigator. I’ve not run across one of these before (though not much different than the Escalade). It wasn’t horrible as a driving experience, though I was happy enough not to have to take it through any urban areas as I would have needed to upgrade the wheels. I mean stock rims… Seriously.
The heated seats worked fine in that one too, but the backup camera that emerged from behind a half-silvered rear-view mirror was pretty cool. Especially as looking back is pretty useless through a forest of headrests.
In both cases I was the only passenger. This added to the value of the experience.
At least in LA at the end of the week, Hertz gave me a lovely C300. I think the exact same one I had rented earlier. A lovely car that seems far less silly.
Pontiac G6 with Retractable Roof
Rental car review
