mlroseplant

19 hours ago, spikesmike said:

mlroseplant: George Burns was not ever funny. Gracy Allen was the comedian of that couple. She wrote most (all) of their material. After her death George never had much of a career. Mike

That's sort of what I meant in reference to my comment. It wasn't really very funny. It was me attempting to play it straight with the word(s). What I do find funny is that now we seem to be using a slang meaning to define slang, and it's still being debated (and misunderstood, although that might be on purpose, it's hard to tell).

I can remember the first time I ever looked in the mirror (at approximately age 20, or 35 years ago) while wearing high heels, and thought to myself, "God, I look absolutely terrible, I'm never letting anybody see this." And it was true, I did look terrible.

It had nothing to do with the actual clothing or shoes, it had everything to do with the way I carried myself. I guess I've always known it, but for most of my life, I have looked terrible moving through the world--bad posture and a funny walk with bowed legs. I still catch myself doing this from time to time, I have to work at it constantly, and I'm never really satisfied. It's even worse now that I'm on livestream video every single week, I get to see what happens when I'm thinking about what's going on in the moment, and not how I'm carrying myself. "Wow.  .  . did I just walk down those steps like that?" (Involuntary shudder).

Everybody is different in that regard, that is, sweatiness and relative comfort. Believe it or don't, I have never actually tried wearing thin hosiery with pumps (or anything else) for more than a couple of hours at a shot. I can tell you that, for me personally, I can't do bare feet in an enclosed shoe for very long, even though I know plenty of people who live their daily lives this way.

Hmmm, after having read the recent discussion, I seem to have the privilege of simultaneously being both irrelevant and influential.

Wow, did I just do all that? I really didn't mean to, I was just trying to be funny, in a George Burns kind of way.

On 5/15/2023 at 8:04 AM, WedgesAreFun said:

Not me, I'd enjoy the heck out of those hahahaha

I sort of get it, but I must know, where on earth would you enjoy any of these? With what outfit would you ever wear them? And to what venue, other than possibly some sort of cosplay event?

Yes, that does not sound like something I'm going to undertake. If these were actually fine quality shoes and worth preserving ad infinitum, this peeling business wouldn't be happening in the first place.

I hope that is not actually true, because if it is, I probably need to report you to the authorities. I do find it interesting that we never use that word in that past tense, either. And if we did, I'm sure the grammar would be wrong.

I probably shouldn't own anything that should be in a museum, simply because I would want to use it, whatever it is. I am not a strict preservationist. For example, the mower I typically use on a day-to-day basis, while not a true Frankenmower, is a mishmash of 3 different years. It's a '72-'73-'74 model. I got it one piece at a time, and it didn't cost me a dime. You'll know it's me when I mow through your lawn.

It is a shame that Alex linked, not to us, but to our brother who is in a coma. That is, the Heels4Men forum. As an aside, it bugs me that the credit for this article is "Alex." I've always been bothered by celebrities who use only one name, and that includes Prince.

There is a lot of stuff to talk about here. First, yeah, no, there ain't no way I'm paying $35,000 for a car. There are many, many Crown Vics/Mercury Grand Marquis to be had for a very reasonable price. I got mine for $5,500 with no rust (difficult here in the midwest) and 90,000 miles. I'm very glad I don't need/want a pickup, talk about crazy prices!

Second, there are only Lawn Boys in our collection. Second cousin, once removed to your Evinrudes. My 14 year old son got the bug a lot harder than I ever did, and the collection keeps getting relatively older and older. He likes the pre-1970 stuff, and he actually mows 6 lawns with it, but when the grass gets so high (we've gotten a lot of rain lately), you pretty much have to dig out the "modern" stuff from the 80s as a practical matter.

I have no idea how, but we also have three vintage clocks. All working. One of them plays the Westminster chime every quarter hour. This must not be allowed to get to the point where we start buying parts clocks. Interestingly enough, I do not collect guitars, even though I'm totally the type.

The way I first noticed something was amiss was that I looked down when I got to church and noticed that there was a small white spot right in front of my toes, almost where the shoe meets the ground, and I thought, "I haven't even worn these shoes for 20 minutes and I've already managed to trip on something and take a small chunk out of the leather!" Turns out that wasn't the case, that bit of the shoes are not leather either, and it's just coming apart. However, red Sharpie matches the shade perfectly and camouflages the damage quite nicely.

19 hours ago, spikesmike said:

mlroseplant: Nice color theme and heels. Other. - What kind of old cars are you talking about? Those cars in your driveway do not look that old. Interests? I own a 1934 classic Buick. model 41 series 40. So, what are you driving? Mike

Yes, I suppose in the grand scheme of things, my cars are not all that old. My main car now is a 2004 Crown Vic. The backup car is a 2002 Buick Park Avenue. What I am getting at is that most people in my income range drive newer cars than I do.

While I do not have a great passion for cars, I do have a number of vintage lawn mowers, a hell of a lot of old instruments (which all get played regularly), and of course, a lot of high heeled shoes.

If I had a dollar for every time some drunken patron has asked me to play Free Bird, I'd be a rich man.

Although I have not been keeping up on the "New Shoes/New Sandals" thread, I just got a new pair of Steve Madden "Barbb" sandals last week. I think they were made in three colors, and I have all three--black, bone/ivory, and now red. These red mules were I guess what you might call New Old Stock, as they had obviously never been worn. I did the unthinkable, inadvisable action of wearing them out untried. In fact, I never even put the things on my feet for the first time until about 20 minutes before I had to walk out the door to go to church. However, having two other pair of the identical model, and being very familiar with what they are, I took the chance. Besides, I wanted to get all the mileage out of my newly purhased red jeans that I could, and it would seem a shame to wear black shoes.

Everything went just fine, and I got to the point where I forgot I was wearing them, that is until it came time to load out my equipment. Carrying heavy objects while walking down a slight incline always reminds you that you're wearing high heels, I don't care who you are. Anyway, I got home, ran a couple of errands, so I did not take my shoes off right away. By the time I did, I was somewhat disappointed to find the following situation, pictured below. Disappointed, but not entirely surprised. As you may have guessed, like so many shoes in this price range, the uppers are actually leather, but the linings are not, and are therefore subject to the dreaded polyurethane degradation sitting right there on the shelf doing nothing.

Oddly enough, the black pair I have shows no signs of the same deterioration, and they've got to be about the same age, plus they've been worn really quite a bit over the last 10 years. It's not like I have to get rid of the shoes, but it is somewhat inconvenient to have one's feet covered in little bits of plastic at the end of the heeling day.

It has been a while since I posted any pictures, so here is one. It is nice to not have to force myself to go outside, now that the weather is reasonable. Yes, I still drive old cars.

May I gently suggest some explanatory content to complement the images. Brand and model name of the shoe, if available. How and why you got them. That sort of thing. Otherwise, we're just looking at another picture of somebody wearing black pumps, which, I mean, how are we supposed to react? I don't know about everybody else, but my first reaction was, "Yeah, those look all right. And?"

There are a lot of worse things in this world than jellies. They are certainly not for me, as my feet started sweating just looking at the image of them. However, I can't really explain why I find some things attractive either, so I guess I'll just keep my mouth shut. Along those lines, I have been looking for a pair of what I call Douyin Girl shoes, which are sandals with a lucite block heel, and usually a clear PVC upper strap. However, I've had no luck at finding just the right combination of heel shape and upper, and even if I did, I am sure that my feet would not like them.

That would make for an interesting video (or audio recording, as the case may be). Concerning the instant pair of sandals, another problem with not being real wood, and this is a problem I've had consistently with Jessica Simpson shoes, is that the molded unit bottom will split transversely in half directly beneath the ball of the foot. This seems to have happened on every pair of JS I've ever owned save one. Maybe it's just me.

Speaking of shoe failures, I had a rubber sole come off one of my Sofft sandals last night. Chinese made, of course. Not a difficult fix at all, since I found the errant piece.

As far as actual working boots go, I have long given up on the idea of buying a pair of "lifetime" boots. The reason is because in my personal situation, the insides of my boots wear out long before the outsides, and by the time they get to that point, they are kind of gross anyway, and it's time to get rid of them. It must be something in my personal chemistry.

Having gone through all of the above, I cannot personally report a great deal of difference in ultimate durability between my Chinese shoes and those made elsewhere. Sure, the Italian shoes are much nicer, but in the end, being non-Chinese is no guarantee that it won't break at inopportune times. After all, we are talking about a product which we use in a way it was never intended--to be worn and walked in.

9 hours ago, hiddenheels said:

Look really nice! I don't have any of these styles, but still working figuring out my style, so am not opposed to it. If it's wood, does it provide more stability?

If I may jump in here, I can probably answer that one, being the owner of more than a dozen pairs of wooden heels. First, it is rather unlikely that one is going to get actual hunks of hardwood in this price range, but second, it doesn't really matter as far as stability goes. I have wooden heels that are real, and many that are simulated, made from a variety of materials. The fact that it is wood does not intrinsically make it more or less stable in my experience. A number of other factors affect how the shoe walks much more than the material. Where it does matter is the sound. Actual wood or wood product does have a distinct sound compared to plastic.

20 hours ago, roundy said:

Another vote for almond toes here! Best of both worlds. I don’t mind a pointed toe but I do struggle to get a good fit vs a more round toe myself. Not a fan of really elongated pointed toes either though. 
 

Square fronted heels seem to be in fashion too atm. Can deal with it on a sandal but not shoes or boots. I didn’t mind it a decade or so when they seemed to taper a little more into a square toe but the ones I’ve seen lately seem to be cut square right at the end of the shoe.

Yes, this modrun super-square toe is just.  .  . ugly. Maybe that's the point, I don't know. Perhaps the reason why it's less objectionable on a sandal is because sandals are only two dimensionally square, whereas shoes add the third dimension of square. One might even call it cubism.

23 hours ago, Shyheels said:

I see your point, although in the case of China they do seem to have acquired a very poor reputation in terms of quality, workmanship and materials. And because of their dominance in world manufacturing, and the profit-at-all-costs mindset of the global brand names, they are leading the charge in the race to the bottom.

as for the philosophical reasoning behind not wanting to purchase Chinese made good, I suppose it’s like the vote. Nobody vote on its own is going to make a different, but collectively they certainly can.

 

 

We have a large number of electrical fittings at work, sold by a major brand name (Thomas & Betts). It seems that even they, with a longstanding reputation for quality, get the parts wherever it's cheapest at the time. We got in a large batch of supposedly identical fittings, and at least the boxes looked the same. About half the fittings were made in China, and half in India. Nominally and functionally, they were the same, but not interchangeable, mainly visually. If you just used them randomly, the finished product looked very odd and not uniform at all.

I have always wondered why pointy toed shoes get such a bad rap. I mean, it's not like any toes actually go into the pointy part, it's just kind of decorative dead space, kind of like the tail fins on late 1950s American automobiles.