mlroseplant

Luckily, the equipment she currently has limits the amount of carrots that need to be peeled at one time to around 15 lbs. Depending on the recipe (she makes about a half dozen different varieties, plus crab rangoons), that will go with several pounds of onions and about 8 heads of cabbage. This is not really enough at once to cause much in the way of repetitive stress injuries, but trying to get the water out of the cabbage is another story. We used to do it simply by squeezing it manually. This worked fine when she was making them for our personal consumption, but became unacceptable when she started selling several dozen a week. After much experimentation, the solution turned out to be one of those swimsuit dryer things that spin around very rapidly. It works unbelievably well, and it doesn't hurt your hands at all! Turning back to the subject of chopping stuff up on a countertop, I don't like to wear much of a heel if I have a lot of things to prepare, because it puts me at an uncomfortable height ergonomically. I can see why actual tall people sometimes have their kitchen counters made higher than standard, if they plan to stay in that house for a very long time. Of course when preparing normal supper or whatever, it doesn't matter much, and I normally wear short heels in the kitchen. The one exception is kneading bread dough. In that case, it's an advantage to wear very high heels to get a better angle for mashing.

I did onions too, and that's ok. As long as I never have to chop cabbage ever again. For some reason I hate that particular operation, and besides that, I evidently can't do it right anyhow. I suppose there is sometimes value in being incompetent. In much the same way that you never, EVER want to admit to anybody that you know how to finish concrete. The Big farmer's market starts May 6. My wife, bless her heart, is shooting for the stars with sales expectations. She has rolled over 3,000 egg rolls in the past 10 days or so, and that number continues to climb, until we run out of space in our 3 (!) deep freezers. Here is one about 2/3 of the way full.

Luckily, the part that actually touches your foot is made of leather, and really I just need a little tiny bit more room. I also am being extraordinarily conservative, being as these are expensive shoes, and I actually got them from Russia. If I had that much patience before, what's a couple days more now? Besides, our crazy Iowa weather dumped some snow on us yesterday, at this late date. Oh, no, do you think I will get in trouble for using the "s" word? I know it offends some people. That's a good thing to know. If I ever get caught in a rainstorm with these, off they are coming!

Coincidentally, I am attempting to stretch out some shoes at this very minute, using my high heel shoe stretcher. I've used it quite a bit, with some great results, and some mediocre results. In this case, I am strictly trying for a little bit more width, and I expect I'll get it. I had hoped that these sandals would stretch out on their own naturally, but such has not been the case. Patience is key, especially since I was too cheap to buy a pair of these stretchers, and have to do them one at a time. Purchased online several years ago. Just search for "high heel shoe stretcher." You'll have more choices than you can shake a stick at.

You've no idea how many carrots I've had to peel in the last week. I'm definitely annoyed. 😆

Today, I'm going to share some information about shoe durability. Up to now, my most durable shoes had been my Söfft "Belicia" sandals, in which I walked a total of 107.5 miles, or about 173 km. I had to throw them away after that, because the strappy leather pieces had become so stretched out that not only did they look quite unsightly, but they just didn't fit well anymore. Among other things, my little toes would stick outside the straps, and we can't have THAT. Still, 107 miles on a pair of heeled sandals, AND. . . AND on the original, out-of-the-factory heels to boot. I've never seen anything like it before or since. That was back in June of 2016. I'd had the sandals for approximately 3 years. Last night I broke that record, in my Nine West "Sizzle" oxfords. Sizzle. What a dumb name, but that's what they're called. I've had these shoes for over 8 years, and they're been featured in this thread and many oxford threads a number of times before. While they have outlasted the Söfft sandals, They've been through three sets of heels in the process. The factory set lasted 21.2 miles, and the first replacements lasted 42.1 miles. The set that is on there now has outlasted the first replacement set and looks to have a few more miles left in it. As a practical matter, the shoes probably have way more than 110 miles on them, because I only count recorded walks in my total. All of the trips to the grocery store or the shopping mall or church are not included. That would be a little bit weird if I did include such incidental trips, don't you think? That is probably the reason why the second set of replacement heel tips seems to have outlasted the first by a substantial margin. The first set no doubt had a lot more unrecorded miles on it. I don't wear the shoes a whole lot except in the coldest months of winter, but I used to wear them a lot more just to go out places than I do today. When I realized that they were within spitting distance of having the record, I've purposefully worn them for almost every walk lately, putting 25 miles on them in about the last 30 days. Put some polish on them, and they still look like brand new, unlike the poor Belicia sandals by the time they got to this stage of their lives. They have 4 3/4" heels with a 3/4" platform, so they are neither very low nor very high. They are a good training shoe for a couple of reasons. Number One is because they are comfortable. Truth to tell, they are a 1/2 size too big for me, so I always wear them with the same socks I would wear for work, a wool blend type hiking sock. This is perhaps the secret to overall comfort compared to wearing shoes that require thinner socks. Second, they are high enough to get the benefit of working your high heeled muscles quite effectively, while at the same time giving aerobic benefits as well, because they are low enough that you can move along at a pretty good clip while you're doing your walking. Pictured below is a very recent walk in said shoes. I really need to learn how to not look annoyed in my photos. I am obviously not cut out to be a TikTok girl.

There is a lot to be said for the modern day, and there is a lot to be criticized about the modern day. And thus has it ever been. I may be making this up, but I seem to recall that archaeologists unearthed some scroll from ancient Egypt which read something to the effect of, "The younger generation is going to the dogs." It's absolutely true that there are some things that are pretty messed up today, but something that isn't messed up is that I can go to church wearing high heels now, whereas back in the day when men wore suits to church every time, it would have been truly scandalous. I am imagining walking down the street with groups of children following me, yelling and taunting. (Involuntary shudder) My younger son had his first solo contest playing the tuba. "Contest" is probably not really the correct word for what actually took place, but that's what they called it. From the looks of things, most of the band kids participated in it, and the kids were told to wear concert appropriate clothing for their brief individual performances. I must admit that my son is exactly like the rest of the kids we criticize. He looks like crap 99% of the time, and my wife is of absolutely no help when it comes to rectifying the situation. Despite being rushed to clean up after I came home from work, I managed to get him in a shirt and tie at least. Luckily, he is now big enough that he can wear my shirts. When we got to the school, there were varying degrees of interpretation of what is "concert dress," as you can imagine. As expected, the girls tended to looked quite a bit more polished than the boys. I didn't have time to observe a lot, because I was trying to get Mickey and his 25 pound tuba to where they needed to be, but I did see one girl in the ubiquitous white cotton dress wearing the silver shoes pictured below, or something very, very close. So there is at least one 12 year old girl left in this country who evidently aspires to wear heels.

Since I don't really have anything going on this week that is interesting to talk about, other than getting my second Moderna jab on Sunday, I will keep on the subject of church and heels. Last Sunday was confirmation Sunday, where youth who wish to join the church and who have gone through the better part of a year's worth of classes are confirmed as members of the United Methodist Church. This is typically in 8th grade, or 13-14 years old, more or less. Usually there are 15-25 new confirmands each year, depending on the size of the class. This year we had six, which is a little worrisome, but it's been such an unusual year, I guess we can't really put too much emphasis on that isolated statistic. There were 5 girls, 1 boy. Just like normal, the girls looked great, the boy looked like crap. No, that's unfair, he didn't look like crap at all, but when a boy puts on an actual button down shirt, that now counts as getting dressed up. The girls were all wearing cotton, sort of unstructured dresses which hit about mid-thigh. One girl wore a black dress with knee high riding boots in this style, the rest wore white dresses with flat sandals. I wouldn't necessarily expect heels in 8th grade, but not even a hint of a heel in the bunch. What struck me is how similar they all looked. The same style dresses, virtually the same hairstyle on all of them. I guess kids really do create their own uniforms if uniforms are not provided. As my youngest is in 6th grade, I guess I'll get to observe stuff like this more and more in the near future.

Since I was playing in the band on Easter Sunday, it is impossible for me to estimate how many women were wearing heels. We had a bigger turnout than I would have expected, which is good. From what I saw walking on the street after the service while I was loading my instrument and equipment into my car, there were quite a few wedges, quite a few block heels in the sub-3" range, and a frightful number of espadrille-style flatforms! I did not personally witness anybody in what I would consider a proper high heeled shoe. If I were to relax my definition a little bit, I could probably get the numbers up to something that's not so depressing. I thought the girls all looked rather nice, except for the fact that their shoes were too low. 😛

I am one of those lucky fellows who has U.S size 9 feet or EU 39-40, depending on who is making the shoe. I imagine that if I had been wearing hosiery of some sort, it might be possible to slip off a shoe without using my hands. I do not wear stocking or pantyhose, but I do have several pairs of trouser socks in several colors, as the situation dictates. For example, it doesn't look right to wear a traditional men's suit with no socks at all. And in fact, I did accidentally walk out of my pump on my way to church a few weeks ago, and right in front of one of the neighbors, too! Luckily, I have practiced standing on one foot quite a lot, so I was able to reach down and slip it back on quickly without looking like too much of an idiot. As to your other point, yeah, I don't think you'll ever see a guy dangling for any other purpose than simple experimentation, just to sort of figure out how it's done. We're a small enough subset as it is, I doubt that there would be more than three women, and possibly three gay men on this earth who would be attracted by such a thing. I could be wrong, it wouldn't be the first time, but I think this is pretty much a women-only type of thing.

Your earnestness is quite charming! My first reaction was, "Oh come on man, that TikTok was some funny shit." But then I got to thinking about it. And I'm like, "I'm going to try it. Right here, right now, at 5 o'clock in the morning." So I did. As I suspected, this method no worky-worky for me. My feet are shaped in such a way that my pumps have to be rather tight, probably too tight, or I walk right out of them. This is why I don't wear pumps too often. There is no way that the toe of the opposite shoe can gain enough purchase to pop the heel out, or even get it started, for that matter. Furthermore, if dangling is largely flirtatious behavior, I'm trying to figure out who I would attract by dangling. The likely answer would seem to be no-one at all. In fact, it might have rather the opposite effect, I am guessing.

I actually did get my second Moderna jab in high heels, but that was kind of accidental. I didn’t expect to get it that day, they just had some extra doses left over when I stuck my head in the pharmacy. But since I don’t have a picture, I suppose it never really happened.

That assumes, of course, that we (or they) agree on what reality is. I do sense a certain reticence to turn this into a thought exercise, so I'll just abandon that train of thought in favor of perhaps a more helpful and productive one: It's probably too much to hope for, but I have noticed a change in the way people reacted to me back in 2012 compared to how they react to me now. I'm not sure that any of it is anything other than dumb luck.

I ran across this rather humorous clip the other day, and I thought of this thread. I don't know that this comes from TikTok, but it sure is in the style of TikTok. There's something there for both the dangling enthusiasts and for the people who don't quite get it. https://www.instagram.com/reel/CNHxPUVHL8s/?igshid=1ggj86d23vaml

Heck, I figured that was just a bump-out in the wall. Perception vs. reality? Haha! See discussion elsewhere.

René Descartes walked into a McDonald's and ordered a Big Mac and a large Coca Cola. The kid behind the counter asked him, "Would you like some fries with that, sir?" Descartes considered it for a moment and said, "I think not." He promptly disappeared. Bah-dum-bum! I assume that we are not talking about this kind of basic philosophical perception, where if a tree were to fall in the forest, and my wife didn't hear it, would I still be wrong? That is another joke, by the way, for the benefit of those for whom English is not your first language. I think that one of the biggest problems society is facing in modern times is the inability to agree on what reality actually is. This has been going on for thousands of years, one ancient example being recorded in the 18th chapter of John in the Christian Bible, where Pontius Pilate asks Christ, right before Pilate sent him out to be crucified, "What is truth?" Of course, this story is likely apocryphal, but it doesn't diminish the idea that we have been struggling with this problem, probably since humans acquired the ability to speak. However, the reality/perception gap seems to have widened exponentially since the advent of the internet and 24 hour news. I don't disagree with you 100%, but I do think that perception, or perhaps I should say "inaccurate perception," plays a bigger role than it has in the past. The attitude seems to be that my reality is no more valid than anybody else's. When presented with what once would have been considered solid, documented evidence, suddenly all that claptrap is Fake News. What can be done with THAT? You can't logic your way out of it. The only thing you can do is to try and be a decent person, gain some respect, and hope you can change the world just a little bit, one person at a time. This goes for heel wearing as well as more philosophical issues. It does make me quite weary from time to time, but most of the time I remain optimistic.

I would love to jump in on this, but I'm going to do the sensible thing, sign off, and make it to work on time. And that is at least my perception of reality. In actual reality, I could probably be quite late with no actual consequences, but not every day. To be continued, perhaps.

I don't feel like those are a whole lot wilder than some of your other shoes. Was it the animal print that made you think twice, or just the sheer mass of the wedge? Also, I can't figure out how you got your feet to go like that. Are you, like, insanely flexible? Let us know how things go out in the real world. I've actually had some good luck with the Chinese stuff as far as comfort, and sometimes even durability. Then again, I've had some bad luck, as well.

Eight years ago, when my heels were lower, and the general style of heels was higher, there were a few ladies who occasionally wore higher heels than me. Today, it is not even close. For a small town, it is a pretty good sized church. Back in the day, membership exceeded 1,000, and you'd get maybe 250 to 300 on a typical Sunday among three services. Today, I'm guessing it isn't even half that, and that's pre-pandemic. We do not know what the future will bring. I know we've lost some people, but we might also gain some people. You never know. Everybody knows mainline protestant churches are slowly dying, pandemic or no pandemic. That's been a planned summer project for several years, and you see the result! 😆😆😆

My Easter outfit. It's the first time I haven't worn a jacket to Easter services, perhaps ever, but I thought it looked better without the jacket. Shoes are Nine West Bellafina.

I can kind of understand that feeling, although it’s not as acute with me. There have been a number of work functions/meetings where I could have worn heels, but chose not to because I felt it would make life easier. Funny thing is, if there’s anybody who could get away with it and not lose any respect, it would be me. I’m just not ready yet. I mean, we’re talking money and my livelihood here.

I have already found a practical use for one of the several low heeled (<3") sandals I have bought recently. Changing the liturgical flags at the church! It's basically wearing flats, I can't really tell the difference. Because I can't tell the difference, I wonder how much I'm really going to wear them. Time will tell.

I think it is possible to become quite a bit more flexible at an older age like we are, but the sheer dedication and the amount of time it would take is probably not worth it for the sake of achieving such a narrowly focused skill. Yes, it might be kind of fun to learn to walk en pointe, but am I going to spend years training to be able to do it? That's what it would take for me. So, no. Probably not. My friends will simply have to remain unamazed.

I'm glad you found something to wear with your normal guy clothes. I have never carried around shoes in the car for that very reason. If I'm not wearing heels, I'm probably wearing other clothing which would not go particularly well with heels. Some people would violently disagree with me and say that the rest of your outfit doesn't matter, but I refuse to wear filthy, greasy work jeans with heels. They don't go together.

Haha, right! Those of us who actually walk in heels most likely do not spend a lot of time perfecting the art of dangling, among other reasons because it's dang near impossible without manual help, and that would take away much of the appeal, wouldn't it?