Saturday, 7/20/2019
At 5am I woke up and had a hard time going back to sleep from fretting about my painting. Where could it be? I finally got up at 5:30. Coffee. An hour later the paper comes. An hour later the dining room opens for breakfast. On my way down I decide to just have a wee peek into some of the common rooms which this past week were shut off so their renovation can start. I opened the door into the former 6th floor lounge, and found: a big empty room and a bunch of framed artwork leaning against the wall, some wrapped in paper as for storage. And my painting in the middle. This is a serious mix-up by somebody; that painting (and I think, some of the others) was marked with colored dot stickers indicating it was to remain hung until it could be moved to my new unit.
Well, all’s well that ends well; I picked up the painting and moved it back to my room.
I was scheduled for the 2pm tour at the Museum today so I had a couple of hours, and I went to Stanford Shopping Center to resume my search for trousers and a blazer. Last evening I had found what looked like a nice pair of pants on the Nordstrom website, on sale marked down from $200 to $130. Since a pair of Levi’s costs circa $90, I feel like $200 is more or less in line for a pair of wool trousers.
It took a while to find the right size of these; the very helpful clerk assured me that this brand tended to run large, so I started with 34″. Way too tight. 35″. Nope. Each time, going into the fitting room, taking off my pants, putting on the trial pair, taking them off, folding them, putting my own back on… The 36″ size was really too tight (so much for running large, since 36″ Levi’s are a bit loose on me) but close enough to a fit that I could close them and put on my belt and look in the mirror and… I didn’t like they way they draped. Bloused out to the side like jhodpurs almost. Nothing like the picture on the website. I snuck out past the very helpful clerk while he was on the phone so I wouldn’t have to endure any more suggestions.
I dropped in to Wilkes Bashford and was almost ready to try on a pair of their pants when I noticed the price tag, $475. Nope. I mentioned to the very helpful clerk that I was also interested in a blazer and he mentioned that their blazers started at $2200. “I’m sure they are lovely; thank you so much for your time.” “You have a nice day, sir.”
Nieman Marcus. Very helpful clerk. But I just can’t swallow $300 for a pair of slacks. Wondering if I was totally out of touch (it has been a long time since I shopped for clothes), I wandered on down the concourse. Took a look in Banana Republic (from the sublime to the ridiculous, right?) who actually have blazers but not in any color I wanted to try. Had a smoothie at Jamba Juice and thought it over. Yesterday at Nordstrom I had started with the Bonobo display. They had nice looking blazers, I might have bought one except they didn’t have the combination of size and color I wanted. But the Bonobo line is, if not exactly cheap, reasonable. Sucking my smoothie I opened their website on my phone and saw that they have their own store on Santana Row. I decided heck, I’m going there. Tomorrow.
Went to the Museum, led a tour, people liked it. Came home, ate a quick supper at 5:30, then walked the mile down Middlefield to Rinconada park where there was a free concert, part of Palo Alto’s summer series, at 6:30. A band that alternates Creedence Clearwater and Bob Seeger numbers. They weren’t that good but the songs were great (Stuck in Lodi Again, Born on the Bayou, etc.) and I listened for an hour and walked back.
Codgerville 