Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Shoe Shopping

So I have two more days to pad my blog count for the month. I could Bush League it and post a Utube video. I could just write a few words of nonsense like I usually do and say see ya..................

Or tonight I could write about Shoe Shopping.

Apparently shoe shopping is an activity all humans with money in their pocket share no matter what culture, mindset, or outlook they may have. Everyone wears shoes. They're kinda like assholes - everyone has them, only with shoes most of us have two. I am sure there are some small indigenous percentage who wear no shoes, but I would guess most of humanity is shod in one form or another.

Scribbit is over in India at the moment. So she is doing a travel blog for a couple of weeks. One post was about shopping Indian style. A really great post that imparted just how different shopping there is than here. From the attitudes of the clerks, sexual politics of shopping there, and the commonality of shopping that exists everywhere. She pointed out a couple of ladies in Burkas gently lifting their head to toe coverings to peak at the gaudy rhinestone shoes they were trying on.

Generally if I take the time to read a blog post, I take the time to comment. If nothing else to let the blogger know that yeah, someone does read their take on occasion. I commented about how shoe shopping was probably pretty universal, but it was broken down by gender. That men and women approached it differently. A man is more likely to try on a pair of shoes and close his eyes or walk around to get a feel for the fit. Women on the other hand more often than not look for the first mirror available to see how they look. From the huge numbers of monstrously non sensible shoes they will gladly put on their feet, fit is not the women's first concern. Figured I had covered it with my comment, I left.

I made the mistake of thinking about my comment later. I decided my comment only told a small part of the reasoning that went into purchasing new footwear. Men of course do care how shoes look. And most women, unless buying shoes for those fancy smancy Brou-hahas, will often buy for fit as well as looks. The difference in the male/female approach though is - a guy will decide the shoe looks good or bad before he even puts it on his feet. A gal will try anything on and hope it fits.

I won't get into the aesthetic parameters of shoe fashion. As far as I am concerned, feet are not the most handsome appendages we have, so why worry about how a shoe looks. They are all pretty damn foolish lookin in my opinion. Considering how foolish feet look and it's no wonder.

Now would be a good time to inject some education into this worthless post about shoes. But why spoil it now. Shoes have been around long enough that knowing when we started wearing them would do little to elevate the worthiness of this post.

I do remember as a kid hating shoes with a passion. I even used to toss them away occasionally and tell my mom, I lost them. Teachers take a dim view of students who show up shoeless in America. Parents take a dimmer view. Mine sure did.

But once I was in charge of my own clothing destiny in college, I did attempt to not wear shoes for a year while going to Towson State in the Bawlamer area. I was maybe 75% successful. Going to class barefoot was no problem. If someone whined, I stopped going to class. After all, I couldn't give in and toss my vows of shoelessness. One of them had to go. And it was damn sight easier to not go to class than to stuff my feet into a pair of Chuck Taylors.

You haven't lived until you can walk down snowy streets in bare feet. At the time I was sure I was just so cool. Now 38 years later, I realize I was a pretty stupid college student. Insisting on going barefoot was but the tip of the iceberg.


Onto another tangent..........................

9 comments:

BBC said...

Speaking of videos, I hiked into the hot springs today and posted about it.

SPIRITS VIDEOS

susan said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
susan said...

speaking of videos and speaking of shoes and speaking of too many viewers (BCC)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCF3ywukQYA

susan said...

I followed your link to her post about India and found as interesting as you'd described and, yes, I left a comment. I don't travel around blogtopia much because of the time involved so thanks for a good tip.

I was lucky enough to grow up in the countryside and eschewed shoes most of every summer. My father often said my feet were like little paddles and come fall I might just have to wear the boxes rather than the shoes. He was wrong but the picture of wearing shoe boxes still makes me smile.

The Blog Fodder said...

I am now wearing European shoes - long pointy turned up toes and butt ugly.

The gals here wear the classiest high heeled stilettos ever summer shoes and winter boots. How they walk on these streets in a mystery.

Whenever a cute new pair of shoes leave her feet in blisters, Tanya says Shoes good, feet bad. Sigh! women!

Commander Zaius said...

I do my best to stick with what a little termit of a redneck described one time as my "hippy sandals".

Damn army boots messed up my feet and nothing really feels comfortable. In fact dress shoes are a torture. So that really makes shoe shopping for me quick and easy.

Randal Graves said...

I think us dudes do care, but we've got it easier if one follows fashion convention. As long as the shoes match the single-color suit, we're done and it's back to the couch.

My favorite is when it's 20° and snowing, and these college kids have on their winter coats, gloves, a hat, all while wearing their sandals. Yokels.

Laura said...

Now Mike, you've seen my feet. You KNOW mine are cute, cute, cute! :P

I do like shoes. I don't own a lot of them and I don't think that I have a "passion" for them. I used to just wear sandals but now I'm totally into high heels... :P

((Hugs))
Laura

Scribbit said...

Thanks for the mention! We're finally back now and getting past jet lag. What an amazing trip. What an amazing pair of shoes!