Wet paper and despair" is exactly it. I always figured insurance would just fix things, but seeing how much it doesn't cover totally changed my mind. That kind of community help is everything.

You're right about adding that buffer, @ray_sullivan. The ratings seem to be for ideal conditions that never happen in the real world. It's safer to just assume the bag won't perform as advertised.

Cut them open and still find fibers?

Wait, you used a heavy crepe in Austin? That's the real shocker for me (that fabric must have been sweltering in the heat). Honestly, a sharp shape always wins because it flatters the person first. A crazy print is just fabric, but a perfect silhouette makes the woman wearing it look powerful. People remember how someone looked and felt, not just the pattern on their dress. You made the right call for a gallery opening, where looking put-together is the whole point.

Isn't it more about how we're taught now? The training pushes button pushing from day one, so the scan just never gets built into muscle memory. You see it when guys are heads down in the cockpit on a clear day, totally missing that they're drifting off altitude. Maybe we need to go back to making people hand fly more often, even in the fancy planes.