mlroseplant

To answer the questions in order, I have never met or heard of a guy who has a desire to wear high heels outside of the online community. It is unlikely that it's the case, but as far as my own personal experience goes, I'm the only one. The answer to the second question is no, the thrill hasn't faded much at all. To be sure, wearing heels is ordinary to me, but I will say that when I put on whatever shoes I'm going to be wearing that day and stand up, feeling the full height of the shoes for the first time since waking up still gives me the same feeling it always did. That has not faded over the years. What is different is that sometime over the last 12 years, I now require more steepness to get that feeling. 12 years ago, in 2012, I started off in effective 3 inch heels, and I very clearly remember my first real walk in them. It felt like a mile was going to last forever. I could not WAIT to get back home and get out of those shoes. My very next pair of shoes, bought several months later, had a 4 1/2 inch heel with a 1 1/4 inch platform, so effectively 3 1/4 inch heels. By this time, I was somewhat better at heels, but 3 1/4 inches still seemed pretty high to me, definitely felt like a heel. I started actually walking places in heels in 2013. I had a few more pairs by that time, but most of my walking heels were in the 3 - 3 1/2 inch range. Over the years, this has gradually increased to the 4 - 4 1/2 inch range. 3 inch heels no longer do it for me, and I have proven this in the past week, as I have been wearing lower heels (the few that I have left) in an effort to avoid further injury. I'm trying to take it real easy, hoping my Achilles tendon gets back to normal soon. The last three days it's been feeling pretty good, but I forced myself to wear low three inchers this morning, even though it feels like I can do more. It's just not the same. On pavement, it doesn't even really feel like I'm wearing heels. I was a little bit grumpy wearing the shorter heels. I need around four inches of steepness before I'm thinking to myself, "Yeah, this is the life." As to the third question, I'm with Shyheels on that one. If I'm putting on Hunter boots, it's for work purposes. I've never thought they looked all that great as a fashion statement, no matter how shiny they are, or what color they are. I will make an exception for Shirley Temple. She looked cute in them. No offense to anyone here who likes the way they look. I probably cannot get over the association I have in my mind with doing a job I'd rather not be doing.

It's a very common expression on this side of the pond. Of course, the sound of the actual insects only happens about six months out of the year where I live, so I have no idea how that became part of the slang lexicon. It's been fairly recent, I would say within the last couple of decades.

Just as soon as they do, let me know. I need a project to carry me through until retirement.

We can them "muck boots" in my trade. I have two pair: One nondescript plain black pair for actual mud, which I keep at work, and one shiny PVC pair with a pink lining and a 2 inch wedge heel for use at home. If I need to wear either pair, I'm probably hating life, at least a little.

Crickets on this one so far. I think we're to the point where we don't have to gush over every article which refers to us in a positive light. Wordy, but not in an academic way. I'm not sure what the heck it was I just read.

I don't normally report on interactions I have with people every time, but this one may be worth noting. A couple of days ago I was at the grocery store with my son. While we were trying to find where they kept the kosher salt (or would that be koshering salt?), a lady nearly ran up to me and said, "Oh, I'm so glad I caught you! You were in here a couple of Sundays ago, and you had on the most beautiful shoes, and I wanted to compliment you, but you got away from me before I could do it." I was going back mentally to think which shoes it could have been, and I think I may have wondered out loud as much, when my son piped up, "Well he does own a few pairs." I smiled kind of sheepishly, thanked the woman, and went on my merry way. Actually chased me down in the store. Never had THAT happen before. No wonder I was at a loss for words.

Although I've had a fascination with heels since childhood, I did not actually start wearing heels for real until age 44, in 2012. I started with clogs before that, but the first time I wore shoes with an obviously elevated heel was in May of 2012. They were also clogs, but with about a three inch heel. I stuck with clogs for quite a long time before I tried some other styles, and today I will wear just about anything that I find attractive.

Yes Taylor Swift DOES wear high heels for shows all the time. Hasn't seemed to make any difference with young girls adopting heels. Many of my younger relatives are Swifties, so I know a little something about her. Although she writes a good deal of her own material, much of it is. . . less than awesome, especially by the time the arrangers and producers get hold of it. Not to put too fine a point on it, I've always thought she was kind of a hack, and that's even before she switched from country to pop. I tried to like her music, I really did. Some of it from 10 years ago wasn't all that bad.

Yeah, it's a little strange, because it doesn't really hurt, per se, it's just a little achy when I walk in high heels for more than a mile, and it's a little funny when I'm walking uphill in flats (such as mowing a hilly lawn). I'm just worried about it actually causing me a problem if I'm not careful with it. I do and have done calf/tendon stretches every day (among other foot/ankle exercises), but lately I need to do them gingerly on the right side.

This week is the week of non-mules sandals, it would seem. My choice of the Söfft Ivory sandals this week is partially because they are among the lower shoes I have, and I'm trying to take it easy lately, so as not to injure myself. As I said elsewhere, my Achilles tendon is bothering me a bit, and I think it's because I overdid it on the heel training a couple of weeks ago, and then I overdid it on the walking the last two weeks of August, trying to catch up and make my monthly goal. Which I somehow managed to do, but that was not smart.

Back to the original question, but in a completely different way, "Does height matter?" Yeah, I guess it does, because I have done the unthinkable to myself now. I have injured myself, and I'm having to take it easy for a while. I think I know how this happened, but I'm not 100% sure. All I know is that I made it worse by pounding the pavement incessantly for the past two weeks, trying to make up for my laziness in the first two weeks of August. I have overtaxed my Achilles tendon in some way, and I can tell that for me, there is a HUGE difference between a three inch heel and a four inch heel. Actually, there is a pretty big difference between a three-and-a-half inch heel and a four. It's not that I can't wear a four inch heel at the moment, but it seems inadvisable to do so. Hopefully taking it easy for a week or so will solve the problem. I hate to even entertain the idea of giving up high heels altogether.

If we could but make heel wearing into a challenge, a sporting event of some sort, I bet it would come back pretty quickly.

I get the fact that heels are not as popular as they once were, and a lot of that has to do with the fact that women aren't expected or required to wear heels anymore. This, coupled with the fact that everyone, and I mean everyone, even those who supposedly love and live in heels, sets people up with the caveat, "Well, you just have to push through the pain. It's the cost of beauty." Even the author of this article said that, despite her professed fondness for heels, her feet and ankles were messed up from years of wearing heels at the law firm. My first question is, "Why did you let this happen?" There is no need for any of that. We know this. Why doesn't anybody else know it?

I work with three guys who are at least semi-serious runners. I think all of them have done at least one marathon, and they do shorter long races on a regular basis. Get all three of them together, and the talk soon turns to this running shoe vs. that running shoe, what do you use for heart monitor/GPS, etc., etc. The reason I bring this up is because somehow they got talking about leg shaving one day. Evidently, some runners shave their legs. All three of them think it's ridiculous. One of the guys said, "C'mon, you're not a swimmer! You can't tell me that a little bit of hair is going to create that much drag at speeds we can run." Then they got into talking about how some guys will show up at a race with stubble on their legs, like they forgot to shave for a few days. I, not being a part of that conversation at all, quipped dryly, "Yeah, I hate it when that happens." They laughed, but had no idea why I thought that was a humorous thing to say. Don't get me wrong, even though this particular group of guys doesn't know me outside of work, I never got the impression that they were ridiculing a guy for shaving his legs. They were ridiculing any perceived performance gains, much like Shyheels feels about guys who remove decals off their bicycles. In order to tie this all back together, I'll repeat what I said before--It's perfectly acceptable for any guy to wear tall boots if there's some perceived practical reason for it. I think we got off into this leg shaving business because the attitude is pretty much the same. Of course, it's all ridiculous and subjective. Why do body builders shave pretty much their entire body, and that's just fine, but if I did it, I'd be really strange.

I had to take the day off work yesterday because my younger son had to have his wisdom teeth extracted, and I wanted to personally make sure he was ok after the procedure, having been through it myself, albeit nearly 40 years ago. Dentistry has come a long way in that time, but it is not always pain free. My son was a trooper, and did just fine. It will take a few days before he's back to doing his normal thing, though. I made the conscious decision to wear my normal clothes to the dentist office, which is not the same dentist I go to, so they've never had the pleasure of viewing my footwear up in the chair. I sat in the waiting room for over an hour, and I only got a bit of a sideways glance from an older couple during this time. I even saw my neighbor while I was in there, but he is already indoctrinated into the life of Melrose. I pulled out a pair of sandals I hadn't worn in a while, my BCBGeneration Poland. I've had these for quite a while, but I don't wear them often, and I'm not really sure why. Probably because I gravitate toward mules when I'm picking out something, and these obviously are not.

The weather has been brutal here as well, until yesterday, when it was less brutal. All this talk about "doing my part" has got me to thinking that I better check out my collection to make sure I don't need to replace or augment anything. I put quite a few miles on my black, block-heeled Vince Camuto knee-highs last year, and I was beginning to detect signs of possible failure. I can remember thinking that those boots were just for showing, not for walking. I really hope I'm wrong about that. I have run into the same phenomenon with shaving legs. It's perfectly acceptable IF you "have" to do it for some kind of sport, but otherwise. . . you a little weird.

It's kind of a curious thing, isn't it? Here in Middle America, it has become way more acceptable for men to wear a wider variety of colors, and pink has become a favorite on the construction site. Maybe it's the Breast Cancer Awareness campaign that did it, but nobody even bothers to mention anything anymore if a guy shows up in a pink shirt, even if it's not Friday. However, outside of equestrian circles, I do not see tall boots on men around here. With one exception: Latino laborers. Maybe not knee high, but they often wear their boots on the outsides of their pants. Plenty of men still wear cowboy boots around here, but always on the inside, and I doubt we've got any secret knee-high Luccheeses underneath there.

I went pretty casual (for me) to church yesterday. Part of the impetus for this was the fact that I thought I had overtaxed my right Achilles tendon last week, and I wanted to wear something a little bit lower, so as not to injure myself further. However, I have neglected these cute BCBGeneration wedges since I bought them, I think this is only the second time I've ever worn them, so it was about time anyhow. Despite the fact that we hadn't practiced nearly enough, Mickey and I were "on" yesterday. Sometimes, you get lucky and have those days.

He does seem to have sequentially year'd Hondas: '81, '82, '83, '84. Then a '72 Suzi, and then my two bikes, which are super contemporary by comparison: '06 Kawasaki, and my '09 Yamaha scooter. We'll get rid of the '81 Honda and the '06 Kawi, which won't screw with the sequential numbers.

We wound up buying the bike in question, which is nearly identical to the bike I had in my early to mid 20s, and which I rode through 2/3 of this country on. I think I probably had more miles on that bike than all the other bikes I've owned combined. The example we bought is basically a good solid machine, but there are a bunch of little things about it, the main one being that the brakes really suck. That's probably the reason I was able to offer substantially lower than what the guy was asking, and he went for it. The plan is to sell the 'old' bike to my older son, and I've finally got my own old bike sold, so we'll be down to five motorbikes again. Two around town scooters, one serious road bike, one fun bike, and my big scooter. Let's see. . . that's four for him, and one for me. The kid doesn't even have his real motorcycle license yet. What is wrong with this picture?

I definitely went through the thong learning curve late in life. Come to think of it, I don't think I even owned a pair of sandals of any type until I was 40. Which is odd, considering that I'm Mr. Sandal today. I'm probably making up for lost time.

I had occasion to visit my bank again yesterday. I sheepishly admit that we're headed out tomorrow to probably buy yet another motorbike (but hopefully divest ourselves of two), so I needed greater quantities of cash than I normally keep on hand. The bank lady was there again, and I guess she must be for real, because all four times in my life I've ever seen her, she's been wearing heels, and actual high heels at that. On this day, she was wearing what I would call loafer pumps with slim heels. Thicker than stiletto, but definitely not block. Given my vast experience, I would peg them at 4 1/4" high, no platform. There were a ton of people around, so I didn't say anything, once again.

I had trouble with that also, but it's something that I forced myself to get used to for the sake of style. Part of it is psychological, part of it is physical. Kind of like learning to play the guitar. Yeah, your fingers are going to hurt for a while.

It's been a while since I've snapped a picture, and I've got some new sandals to show off, Calvin Klein Fia. Our church choir had a little get together at a restaurant last night, and during the dinner, it was announced that we have at last found a new music director. That is very good news, because I'm not taking over the job, I just don't have the time or the energy. I have never had much luck with thong sandals lasting very long, so I went nuts and bought four pairs, hoping that among four of them, I would have something for at least a couple of years. This is the first pair to arrive. Shorts are by Talbots, and are called "Perfect Shorts." They're made of a very nice, dressier material, and would in fact be perfect were they a couple of inches shorter.

See, it wasn't that hard, was it? Free the toes!