"Vala! What are you doing?"

Vala hoisted up the half-dozen or so bags hanging from her wrist and shrugged. "What does it look like I'm doing? I'm going to take them all back to the store."

"Again?" Exasperation flooded Sam's face. "You can't keep returning shoes over and over again, just because you can't make up your mind. There'll come a point when the store will refuse to serve you."

"And why would that be, Samantha?" Vala huffed indignantly. "It's say on the little scrap of paper they give you after the sale that I have the right to a refund or exchange if I change my mind within seven days of the purchase."

"Seven days, yes, but not seven minutes. This'll be the third lot of shoes you've taken back to the same store in the last few hours."

Vala set the boxes aside and slumped dejectedly down on her chair, a lock of hair bearing the brunt of her bad mood as she blew it out of her eyes and tucked it behind her ear. "You know, this would be a whole lot easier if we all wore the same thing."

"Olive drab and day-work blue BDUs every day? Don't we do that already?"

"I was talking about shoes. Why is it so needlessly difficult to match the right pair of pumps with my slinky little red dress? You know the one—backless, long lace sleeves and a neckline so low you'd swear its being sucked through a black hole."

"Because the dress isn't the issue, neither are the shoes," Sam replied flatly.

"They aren't? Could have sworn—"

"Daniel."

"Where?" Vala nearly snapped her neck trying to spot him through the crowd.

"No, not here. Daniel is your problem—the reason you can't decide on the right shoes for what is supposed to be a team dinner, not a first date."

"Second date. The first didn't quite go so well, even when I was wearing the right shoes."

"Okay, the second date then," Sam conceded wryly. "Vala, with what you're planning to wear, Daniel is hardly going to be focused on your feet."

Vala smiled broadly. "You think he'll finally notice my other attributes?"

"Oh, I think he and ever other male at the SGC rose to attention the moment you stepped through the gate."

"There is a lot to be said for making a good first impression, Samantha." She picked up the nearest bag and made a show of inspecting its contents. "So why is it so hard to pick just one pair of shoes?"

"It isn't, for most of us. What's wrong with the ones you've got there?"

"Well, Daniel is six feet tall and every pair I've bought will make me taller than him."

"And that's an issue?"

"What man likes his woman taller than him?"

"Since when has Daniel been your man?"

"Do you always answer a question with a question?"

"Touché. But yes, when the initial question doesn't make sense. Look, this is Daniel, and he's not so shallow as to care about something as trivial as coordinating heights."

Vala sighed theatrically. "But I care."

"Let me see if I've got this right: You're going to take back all of these shoes because every single pair will make you taller than Daniel, who truthfully wouldn't care and probably wont even notice?"

"Uh, huh."

"Then why did you buy them in the first place?"

"Truly, Samantha. When does one need an excuse to buy shoes?"