Well, of course Neville is a full-blood wizard. Silly old me. I don't know what I could have been thinking.The foot/shoe advice is much appreciated; I'm pretty sure that what I've got -- which matches the description in the book and on the website of "shin splints", which sounds terrible -- was caused by my trying new shoes last week on Thursday and Friday, and I've only made it worse by continuing to walk. I've got excellent shoes now (bottom row, second from the left; when I wake up and my legs are sore I put them on and they feel better. I'll avoid the power walking for a few days and see how that goes.
Although I did end up walking more today than I had planned because R and I went, finally, to see the Traveling Pants movie (which we enjoyed) but the only place it was still playing during the day was at the Palisades Mall. This is the biggest mall in this area, and certainly the biggest I have ever seen (until I make the pilgrimage one day to the Mall of America.) We also had to return something at an Old Navy and look for the craft store (and of course, what's a trip without a DSW) and so we ended up walking a mile or two, but leisurely. More rest would have been better for me, but this was okay, too.
Speaking of large corporations, I'm finding T-Mobile very weird, in case you're looking for a cell phone company. They have wonderful phones, and as I have mentioned, I got a very cool phone for literally less than no money because of a good rebate from Amazon. But the phone stopped working, and they said they would send a replacement. Just this morning, I spoke to them again -- fourth call -- and they apologized, because they are very nice to deal with, and said that the order had never gone through and they would re-order it, but that they were still out-of-stock on that phone and didn't know when they would get them. Then, when we got back from the aforementioned movie and mall, the new phone was waiting for me on the front porch. Hmmm. So it's a very nice phone, and now I've got it, but the reception is still terrible only in my house and where I work. I have to sit on the front or back porch to use the phone, including mailing all those pictures of my cats to Buzznet, which we all know is the most important thing you can have a cell phone for.
Fi wrote this morning about the second amendment to the Constitution, really as a semantic issue since I don't suppose they have quite the same thing in Australia, but of course it made me think about it some, and I believe that her dad was not quite on target with his interpretation. His take on it was that "arms" meant heraldic arms, a privilege previously denied to ordinary folk. But I think it was this: that the colonies were not even a country, and so had no facility for raising, let alone supporting, a standing army in which the soldiers were paid for their service, as was done in the countries of Europe. If defense against an outside invader became necessary, ordinary citizens would have to be called into a regulated (probably by the individual states) militia service, and so would need to provide their own weapons, or arms. This particular tactic had made the recent Revolutionary War victory possible: ordinary people owned guns, and would use them to defend the state when called into service. To deny such a right would mean sure victory for any invader. But the Constitution made it clear that such rightfully-owned weapons were necessary because they might be called into use for militia service, not for blowing away someone on the street who looked at you funny. Where's the regulation in that?
Which raises the question, if we now have a professional military, with weapons provided for the use by the federal government, does the original need even exist? Ordinary citizens are no longer called upon to be available for instant militia service, and provide their own weapons to boot.
Next time: why an amendment against homosexual marriage is so not what the Constitution is for. In case I'm still in a political frame of mood.
