End of Summer A Blues: Okabashis to be returned

It's not even the middle of June and already the summer's almost over for me; soon I will be hunkered down in graduate student-mode, reading my butt off like I have the past fall and spring.  I can't complain, though -- I got to blog whenever I wanted, got to have a really fun birthday/sleep-over for my son, had a barbecue, and got to read and watch manga and anime non-stop for almost two months.  I cannot complain.

Now onto some late-breaking updates; remember how I was all happy about my Okabashis and how sustainable they are?  Well, they may be sustainable, but they aren't sturdy, and almost a month into getting them they developed cracks and tears in the uppers. 

Here's a picture of my poor Okabashis with the tear on the right one.  It has since grown a little larger since the taking of this photo, because I had no other slip-ons for taking that walk down the driveway to get the mail (I got another pair soon after, however). 

On the left one is a crack near the ball of the foot (there's also one on the right, not shown).  Maybe it's because I got a larger size so I could wear socks, and the shifting of my foot caused the tear, or maybe it's just the general design of the sandal.

In any case,  now I've got to run them through the washing machine and then send them back to Okabashi.  I downloaded the return form, but sending things back to the manufacturer is not one of my fortes,  so we'll see if I actually get around to it. 

So now I have a new pair and they seem to wearing quite well -- it's a different style and (I think) one for women, so maybe it'll hold up since it's closer to my shoe size.