mlroseplant

I recently bought these Söfft Willa shooties on a whim. A nostalgic whim. Early in my heeling days, in late 2012, I bought an identical pair brand new from Amazon. I can remember wearing them quite a bit in the early days, as they were fairly tame at 3 1/2" in height, and had very plain styling. I cannot remember why I got rid of them. I do seem to remember this spot around the zipper that caused me some discomfort, but the memory isn't that vivid. In any case, that does not seem to be a problem with this new-to-me pair. I've worn them outside long enough to know that there are no comfort issues. I do remember a point where I got rid of almost all my shoes that were less than 4", as if that were some badge of honor or something. Maybe that had something to do with it. I don't suffer from such hangups now, and every once in a while, you need something in that 3 - 3 1/2" range. One thing that has not changed is the noise level on these shoes. I remember my old pair being super loud. Part of that was being self-conscious, but they are on the loud side. As I said before, they've got 3 1/2" high heels with no platform, and the heels are cone-ish shaped, and kind of underslung, cowboy boot style. The heels are approximately 1 inch thick at the bottom, so they definitely do not make a "clicking" sound. Their sound is much lower in pitch. What I did not manage to get into the pictures is that there is a short zip on the inside of the shoes, and the buckle you can see is merely decorative. The weather has been really lousy here for a couple of weeks, so I don't have a picture of me wearing them. It's back to the top of the washing machine for now.

I didn't think any of the girls looked particularly "grungy," but this is not a normal situation. The kids were told in no uncertain terms that this was a dress-up occasion, and the only participants were those in the concert band who are motivated on their instrument(s). This was a voluntary event. Therefore, you kind of had a better class of losers show up. There were a few thick soled boots with dresses, but not that many. Most girls wore normal flat dress shoes, either ballerinas, mary janes, or something like that. My son wore a suit and tie, but not every boy went that far. Many did.

The question is, is any of this worth it? Yeah, you could start an office battle, but would you want to? I know I wouldn't. And just exactly how bad is it? Does this happen daily? Hourly? What is the demeanor of the ladies? Snooty? Playful? Bossy? There are way too many questions that simply can't be answered in print. Perhaps the easiest way if you just can't stand it is to have your station moved. Even that is not without consequences. Let's face it--it just ain't easy bein' us.

I ran into the same woman last night at my local school's music contest. As is turns out, her son and mine were performing in the same ensemble. We were both wearing heels again, but toned down considerably from Easter Sunday. I elected to wear some 3 1/2 inch booties, and she was wearing what appeared to be her "normal" 2 1/2 booties. We did not discuss shoes in front of strangers. The kids played very well, and received top marks for their efforts. I saw more high school girls in heels than I've seen in a long time. There had to have been at least 10. Zero stilettos, but hey, we can't have it all. At least not all at once. Top height was probably 3 1/2", so nothing crazy, which is probably good. These girls have a lot of practice ahead of them.

I have just finished a complete shoe inventory. It's been well over a year since the last one. The reason I haven't released it yet is because I haven't yet had time to compile statistics. The raw data is all there, but it doesn't really tell you much about the collection, other than that there are 106 pairs of heels in it, plus 2 duplicates of my favorite sandals that I keep buying. The total number has remained fairly stable for several years. I was glancing at some lists from years past (I didn't always record in the same detail that I do now), and I can tell you that sometime between 2018 and 2021, my collection grew from 56 pairs to low 100s, and has stayed in the low 100s since 2021. I would be able to get it down under 100 pretty easily if I could just be a little more ruthless, but for now, everything once again has its place, and I've even got a couple of empty spaces available.

Happy Easter to those who celebrate, but alas, I have no Easter picture to show. To tell the truth, my heath took another turn for the worse last week, and I'm still getting over it, to the point where I had to beg off my hymn leading duties to another person because my voice would not tolerate that much use. I put everything I had into the choir anthem, and that was all I had. When I got home, all I wanted to do was take a nap. Which I did. I wore a traditional men's suit in a sort of light gray/silvery fabric with a purple shirt and tie, then boring old black oxfords with 4 1/4" stiletto heels. They are some of my oldest shoes, and to think when I first got them over 10 years ago, I thought they were incredibly steep, almost to the point of not being able to walk in them normally at all. I had higher at the time, but nothing that high with no platform. Today, of course, they are a little bit of nothing. The only thing of interest that can be told with no pictures is a conversation I had with another church member whom I know somewhere between acquaintance and friend. She has a son who plays in the school band with my son. She is one of those people who often wears heels to church, but not by our definition. We're talking the 2 - 2 1/2" range block heels. On this Sunday, she approached me after the service while I was tearing down equipment and said, "I'll bet I have taller heels than you do today." Both of us were wearing flared pants that more or less completely covered our heels, so I said, "OK, let's see what you've got." We both pulled up our pant legs, and what she had on were black suede ankle boots with about a 4 inch slim but not stiletto heel, and about a 1 inch platform. She assessed my oxfords, and determined, "Nah, I guess I've fallen just a bit short of the mark. But I wanted to show you, because I don't wear these very often, and I'm not very good at walking in them." In actuality, she seemed to be doing just fine.

Ah, we've started a whole new thread on this subject, which is probably a wise decision. Without getting into great detail about it, I have found that yes, indeed, the "push off" is probably more important than the step forward. After all, other than momentum, the leading foot, which we all tend to focus on, provides no energy at all to get us from Point A to Point B. So it is really these series of pushes from the trailing foot that keeps us moving. The question is how to transfer the energy from one foot to another. It is my belief that the best looking way is for the bottom of the trailing foot to be perpendicular to the ground at the time of power transfer. This may also coincide with being the most efficient way to walk. Your mileage may vary. What I do not find efficient, though somewhat attractive, is excessive movement of the opposite hip immediately after power transfer. It might be more natural for biological females to walk this way, but it is mostly an affectation of models and beauty queens. Which is not to say that we can't take cues from these people, but their example needs to be toned down for the street. The main thing I have found is that there needs to be fluidity and relaxedness when walking in heels, however that presents itself. While at the same time retaining an upright posture to an almost rigid degree. Particularly, pay attention to your head. As we get older, it for some dumb reason becomes easier for us to jut the head forward, ahead of the neck, instead of keeping it on top where it belongs. That doesn't make any damn sense to me, but I only know that it is so. I have to consciously fight "turtle neck." That alone can completely ruin the effect of heels. Pay attention to all of these things, but relax. I know, nearly impossible, init?

Too soon, evidently. . .

I ran across this ad on one of my social media feeds. I have been getting ads from them for some time now, but didn't realize they made high(ish) heels at all. They mostly make work boots or wannabe work boots. However, it is obvious, after the slightest investigation, that the juxtaposition of the ad copy and this particular photo is a complete accident. These boots are not intended for men, but I had hoped so for several seconds. I will say that they do up to size 12, not skipping `10.5 and 11.5, which is fairly impressive.

I just did a complete rearrange/reassessment of my collection less than a week ago. But not a complete inventory where I commit several hours to using pen and paper. I haven't done that in over two years. I kind of wish I were smart enough to get all of this stuff on the computer, but I'm not. I have several hand written lists that I've made over the years, and it's interesting to compare the lists to see how my tastes have changed somewhat in that time, starting somewhere around 2015. Anyway, I have 105 pairs of heels. It seems to me that it's too many, because there's no way I can really wear them all. Back when I had 50 pairs, I could sort of claim that I really wore them all and not be lying much. When I do get around to doing a current inventory, I think I should include a spot in each shoe's statistics that estimates how many times I've worn a particular pair in the last year, in the last two years. I think that would help me reduce my collection down to something more reasonable. Sometimes, that decision gets made for me. I got rid of about 10 pair recently because of damage, either catastrophic or incremental. I documented elsewhere that the heel snapped clean in half on my most worn, and on of my favorite pairs of shoes. And at the other end of the spectrum, I knocked the cobwebs off my Nine West Dance Card mules, which I really like, but have rarely worn. The colored portion was peeling off the leather everywhere. No fixing that! Anyway, hopefully I can report on my shoe situation soon in a little bit more detail.

Yup, I get you. It sure is nice to see that you're still around. I think we chose almost the same boots to wear, See & cf. my thread, p. 85. I like the slight pop of color along with it.

Happy Palm Sunday, everyone. It sure was cold and rainy for the load-in yesterday. It was cold and less rainy for the load-out. I had to set my camera back in the garage so it wouldn't get wet. One thing about the major religious holidays is that church attendance is way up compared to normal. Next Sunday at Easter there is a chance we'll have a packed sanctuary, which I haven't seen in years. As an aside, my Jewish friend from the Twin Cities just sent me pictures of her Purim service, and it looked well attended also. She wasn't wearing heels, though! I didn't necessarily wear anything different than normal, but I did get caught up on ironing last week when I was sick, so my shirt and pants haven't seen the light of day for some time, even though they are not new. Also having not gotten much love lately (judging from the cobwebs I had to knock off of them) are my BCBGeneration Sassafras boots. I figured this was one of the last chances I'd have to wear them for the season. The only thing I really don't like about them is that they are really too big around for me, and an inch too tall by my estimation. I hadn't been walking for 8 days because of my illness, and I almost overdid it today. I walked 3 miles (in other boots) and wore these boots for about 4 hours directly after. My feet actually cramped up a little bit as I was trying to get the boots off.

You know I've never been one to worry about meandering conversation. In fact, my intended reply which is back on topic seems so silly and petty following your statements, that I have decided not to say anything about walking mechanics at this time. Because, in the grand scheme of things, who really cares? Thank you for sharing your story, Bubba.

That looks like deterioration similar to what I've been experiencing lately. In fact, I just got rid of about half a dozen pairs because of it. Unless your shoes are full grain leather, I think this is bound to happen sooner or later, and I will venture to say that it will happen with increasing frequency over the next few years. You see, neither of us much like what is being offered these days style-wise, so we are pretty much stuck with older shoes. Unless those older shoes were particularly expensive, and sometimes even if they were, this is going to continue. As far as the heel cap goes, I feel your pain. I wouldn't give you two cents for the heel caps on those hollow, plastic molded heels. I remember when me and the ex-wife were first married, she bought a pair of what I thought were expensive shoes at the time. Somewhat similar in heel height and style to your Cathy Jeans. Within a month, she had lost a heel cap, and I was horrified to see what that heel was actually made of--plastic. I didn't know all that much about shoes at the time.

Ah, a subject near and dear to my heart, and one which I have probably spent way too much time contemplating. Aside from a few fetish people, the most recent example being the "leaner" guy who posted elsewhere on this forum, I think we can all agree that the ideal situation is to appear as though walking in heels is completely effortless. I do agree that there are a ton of fairly useless videos out there, and a few that actually give horrible advice. As you have surely discovered, there are a few exponents out there who still advise walking toe-to-heel, something I defy somebody to actually accomplish. We'll make exceptions for ballerinas and professional Latin dancers, but it's a patently ridiculous assertion that anybody should ever walk this way. Nobody walks that way, even in bare feet. That being said, one definitely does not want to strike the ground aggressively with the heel, it is there to act as a stabilizer for just an instant until the ball of the foot can contact the ground. Ignore this advice at your peril! Don't ask me how I know. So it all comes down to what you really want to accomplish with your walk. It has been the subject of much debate just exactly how much femininity, if any, that a guy needs to emulate while walking in heels. I don't mind striving toward the more feminine looking walk, but more important to me is attempting to minimize my natural bowleggedness. Therefore, I spend a lot of effort trying to walk with my knees together, something that is not traditionally natural for me. This becomes more and more difficult the steeper you go, for reasons I cannot really explain. I see I have STILL not answered your question, and I cannot do so at this time, as I have run out of time. I gotta go to work. If there is still interest in the next couple of days, I will continue.

Found it!

Here's a little outfit I put together to run some errands yesterday when I got to feeling a little better.

I came really close to having a No. 38 failure yesterday. A chunk of wood fell out of my Bebe mules, right below my big toe. If I could figure out where it happened, I could probably glue it back in, and you'd never really know. I'm not going to call it No. 38 yet, but for now they are strictly house shoes, and possibly early morning walking shoes.

Being as I am feeling under the weather, and have time to do such things, not being at work, I have come up with a list of shoe failures for the past 10+ years. I'm not counting shoes I've decided to get rid of for whatever reason, I'm talking about actual failures. I come up with 37. The most common reason for failure is that the shoes just simply wore out. They got too beat-up looking to justify keeping. The second most common reason for failure is broken shanks. This causes the heel to become all wobbly, despite the fact that the heel itself has not broken. I chalk this common failure up to the fact that I choose to walk in shoes that weren't really meant to be walked in.

I guess I do technically have three sets of clothes: Work, church, and whatever else is not either of those two. Although, I guess I could make a fourth category for outside-of-work-work. And of course, it depends upon the season. I don't believe that I personally know anybody, other than my friend the tailor/nail tech person, with whom I am not actually allowed to interact these days, who wears actual high heels. Even my wife, who was quite famous back in Vietnam for being a high heeled queen, never wore "actual" high heels. Let's face it, they were mid-heels. I do have one picture of her wearing actual high heels, but that is long in the past, and is not happening today.

Our church has two distinct services. It used to have three, but attendance has been down, like it is for practically all mainline churches across the country, and especially since the pandemic. The "early" service, at 9 a.m., is the so-called "contemporary" service, and has all popular style music with a guitar based band. I never go to this service, unless it's absolutely necessary, meaning that somebody from that band is sick or on vacation or something. The funny thing about that band is that everybody in it is older than me, except for the choir director, who is the de facto leader and pianist. Contemporary, indeed! The service I attend is now called the "blended" service, which means that half of the music is accompanied by the pipe organ, and consists of hymns that are 100 or more years old, and the other half of the music is accompanied by piano, bass, guitar (which is the choir director, my son, and me), and that consists of hymns that were written, say, 20 to 50 years ago. Also, the traditional choir sings at this service. Anyway, that was a lot of background to say that no, nobody wears heels anymore. Not for real. You do occasionally see somebody who is pretending that she's wearing heels.

I was thinking perhaps Kitty Carlisle. I'd never heard of Kitty Wells, but I looked her up. Both of them Kittys (Kitties?) lived well into their nineties, and were quite influential in their respective genres.

It's a name I made up. I'm sure there is somebody out there called that, but I don't know her.

Yesterday's church OOTW. Less than special, but you can't hit a home run every time at bat. Besides, I'm kind of tired of winning.

Here is what I wound up doing--I wore jeans (the same ones pictured below), a turtleneck shirt, as it is still not warm, and was very windy yesterday, and my white Nike cheer shoes, which are stylized trainers. To my mind, the cheer shoes are pretty girly, but for some reason they are enthusiastically endorsed by my wife. I even took them to Vietnam, where they didn't raise a single eyebrow. My reasoning was that my job was to drive the car, find the place, smile and nod a lot, and we wouldn't be doing any walking, so what is the point of wearing heels? This woman had a very nice restaurant in a working class neighborhood, and has all of the licenses necessary to sell street food as they plan to do together. They must have really liked each other because they talked for an hour on the phone after we had been back home a while. I can't really understand the Vietnamese language, but I can understand the tone. My wife hasn't been this happy in a long time. I hope it lasts. In other news, I am trying out my wide(ish) legged jeans again. I understand that they're back in style. Also, I found this lightweight coat that I'd forgotten about. I don't really like either of them, but they got the thumbs up from my Twin Cities fashionista friend. I reckon that's good enough for me. The only problem I see is that I'm remembering one of the things I don't like about bootcut jeans, and haven't missed at all for several years--if you wear mules, as I am wont to do, the hem of the pants often gets caught between the bottom of your foot and the top of the shoe. I hate that. This is not a problem with other styles of shoes, so perhaps giving my pumps some more love is in order.