Karen's Quest and Question #2: Shoes

I only had one response to Karen's Quest and Question #1: Bunnies!, but it was only the first week, so we'll press on. Here comes

KQQ #2: Shoes

What do you like best about your favorite pair of shoes?

The idea is to post one photo of the subject (your favorite shoes in this case) and a one-sentence answer to the question posed above. My personal response cheats a little:

Quality matters: for once I have well-made women's shoes with custom orthotics, 
instead of cheap men's shoes that wear out in a month and leave me limping.

Last week I asked,

Rabbits, hares, jackalopes, Harvey... what is your preferred name for the floppy-eared creatures you encounter most often?

Jama answered...

The fluffy little animal is commonly known as Rabbit here or in my language ( Malay) as Arnab.

Karen answered...

The ones I see are mostly desert cottontails, but I quite like the name bunnies, myself!

Now it's your turn. Please post your "favorite shoes" photo and one-sentence answer in your blog, and include a link back to this entry. (Anything else you put in the entry is totally up to you.) Then come back here and leave a link to your entry in the comments below. I'll be back next Monday with a roundup of responses, plus the next topic. And if you missed the Bunnies, toopic, just this once I'll allow responses on that one for an extra week. Have fun!

Karen

Booted

I had two possibilities in mind for tonight's entry - well, three, actually, but the third probably represents many hours of work, so it was never likely to happen tonight. The other two:

1. I could finally get around to writing properly about Gallifrey One, or at least part of it.

2. I could post Round Robin leftovers, the pictures of boots that I omitted because I had too many shots to use and because I chose to be extra-literal in my definition of the word shoes.

Then I dawdled, and followed my incoming email, and decided to watch some Doctor Who, and it got to be after 1 AM. Boots it is, then!

A female "Captain John" struts on stage at Gallifrey One.

Barbie's 1968 friend, Talking Stacy. She's English.

I guess I haven't changed this doll's clothes in a few years, because it's wearing the same outfit, boots and all, in both this 2004 blog entry and this 2005 one.

Tutti, wearing the boots from the "Puddle Jumpers" outfit.

Black Rose Kate's boots, which don't fit me. Explain that away, hmm?

I should mention that Black Rose Kate is a time traveling pirate who occasionally visits this blog and comments on modern life. I first wrote about her on Talk Like a Pirate Day in 2005, and she turned up at my doorstep, literally, that Halloween. She doesn't like it when I call her fictional, so I won't. Her adventures and commentaries are collected on one of my other blogs (follow the link).

As for my own boots, I do have a pair of grey cowboy boots...somewhere. They've always been at least mildly painful to wear, and I wouldn't even try to put them on now. But in looking for them for photographic purposes, I accidentally came across these in one of the hall closets:

No, I don't know where the other black-and-blue boot is. That pair was mine, and the much nicer all black "moon boots" were John's. We bought them circa 1982 at Monroeville Mall in Monroeville, PA, outside Pittburgh, after a record show. See, the only way we managed to keep open the doors of our record store, Rockarama, for about three years was by packing up the best of our imports, used records, buttons, stickers, etc. and taking them to record shows on the weekends. Our most frequent destinations were Pittsburgh (Monroeville), Cleveland, Cincinnati (Covington KY), and Detroit (various suburbs). We made the drive from Columbus to somewhere nearly every weekend, in a 1964(?) Ford Falcon van with a leaky transmission and no heat to speak of. Rust had put a big hole in the van right at my feet, where the cold winter air blew in and froze us both. That particular weekend it was something like 10 degrees with blowing snow, so we fought the cold by buying ourselves some boots. I wanted moon boots like John's, but they didn't have any left in my size, so I settled for the blue-black ones. And yes, they made for a much warmer trip home.

Not much use in Tucson, though. Especially if I only have one of them!

Karen

Round Robin: Whose Shoes?

It's Round Robin time again, and for the last ten minutes I've been trying to cobble up a good pun to go with this week's topic, "Shoes," as suggested by Vicki of the blog Maraca. The previous sentence is the best one I could find to shoehorn in here. Since this paragraph is almost solely about stepping into some gags, which have already gotten rather arch, let's toe the line, shall we, before I feel like a heel!


There was a cartoon many years ago by a guy named Jack Ziegler, in which a time and temperature sign on a bank announces, "TODAY'S WEATHER: SHOES." I've never actually seen the cartoon, although I could almost certainly rectify that by pulling out the CD ROM that came with my New Yorker cartoon collection book, and probably will do so shortly. But I read those three extraordinary words in a book review in Time, way back in 1979, and they've stayed with me over since. Today's weather: shoes! Glorious nonsense! That's what's raining down on us this weekend, courtesy of Vicki and the Robins.


But what shoes can I show you? Do you really want to see the scuffed monstrosities I clop around in everyday? A few years back I posted pictures of the cheap athletic shoes I wore almost exclusively for five or ten years, accompanied by a long explanation about my large feet and the fact that I can only wear men's shoes in certain styles, usually in a size 10 1/2 W, because anything else leaves me with foot pain. Some anonymous idiot showed up a few days later and left a comment about my lack of style. Uh, yeah, thanks for that. Next time, read the text, buddy.


Hey, it could be worse. When my previous pair --laced shoes from Payless for $45, 3 times what I usually pay) died the death after two months in December 2007, the soles actually split down the middle, exposing the metal rods inside. Those were fun to walk in that day - especially when I went to lunch. It was raining.


But enough about my shoes. I originally planned to crop a bunch of pictures from the Masque of Mandragora costume contest at Gallifrey One, and show you just the shoes worn by the contestants (and one of the judges, above). But even from the second row, I didn't really get the resolution to end up with nice sharp pictures of everyone's shoes. Still, here are a few anyway:


This shot is from a sketch involving the Seventh Doctor (left), his friend Ace (right), and the Second Doctor (not shown). I love the attention to detail the Seventh Doctor guy showed, wearing those two-tone shoes! (By the way, for those who may not know, I'm talking about a convention for my favorite tv show, the long-running British series Doctor Who.)

The Fifth Doctor (left) wore what were probably called sneakers, back in the day. The Tenth Doctor (right), who wears this style of footwear exclusively (the better to run around and run away) calls them "trainers." He actually mentioned in a recent mini-episode for charity that his footwear was inspired by his previous self. This is not the first time the Doctor has talked about shoes, though. In the Third Doctor's very first appearance in 1970, his very first line of dialogue consisted of the word "Shoes!" Half-delirious, half scheming, he was trying to recover his shoes from the staff of the hospital where he was a patient. The reason: he'd hidden the key to his TARDIS inside one of his shoes. A quarter century later, the Eighth Doctor was suddenly delighted to discover that a pair of shoes Grace had given him had stretched out, and now "fit perfectly!"


Let's move on to the most stylish shoes here at the Museum of the Weird. As you see above, John's shoes don't qualify, and no, Tuffy doesn't wear shoes. Then whose shoes are they?


Well, Barbie's of course! And Skipper's, and Tutti's, and Casey's and so on.


The shorter, rounder shoes in this shot are for the Remco line of "pocketbook dolls" from the 1960s, Heidi and Jan and Spunky. Somewhere along the line the shoes made for these dolls either got much better or much worse, and I have examples of each. Some are fairly heavy plastic, have well-defined molded bows on them, come in several colors, and fit the dolls well, if a little tightly. The others are of thin, white plastic, indistinctly molded and a little too big. Odd, that. Forty-five years, later, however, I don't suppose it matters much!

And now you know the source of the shoes in the two "Today's Weather" shots: not rain clouds, but Remco and Mattel.

Now go see everyone else's photogenic shoes!

Karen

Linking List

Vicki - POSTED!
Maraca
http://mymaracas.blogspot.com/

Carly - POSTED!
Ellipsis
http://ellipsissuddenlycarly.blogspot.com

Lisa - POSTED!
Lisa's Chaos
http://lisaschaos.blog-city.com

Jill - POSTED!
Letting Crazy Take a Spin
http://lettingcrazytakeaspin.blogspot.com/

Karen - POSTED!
Outpost Mâvarin
http://outmavarin.blogspot.com

Martha - POSTED!
Perception
http://journals.aol.com/lifes2odd/perception/

Annie - POSTED!
Pictures of Craziness
http://krspkrmmom.blogspot.com

Momma - POSTED!
Sandcastle Momma
http://sandcastlemomma.blogspot.com

Sahvvy***Welcome New Member*** - POSTED!
Instantaneous Existence of Me
http://instantaneousexsistence.blogspot.com/

Sandra - POSTED!
StrongChemistry
http://strongchemistry.blogspot.com

Janet - POSTED!
Fond of Snape
http://www.fondofsnape.com

Nancy - POSTED!
Nancy Luvs Pix
http://journals.aol.com/nhd106/Nancyluvspix/

Suzanne R - POSTED!
Living . . . Suzanne R's Life
http://newsuzannerslife.blogspot.com

Nan - POSTED!
Life is Like a Lunchbox
http://www.shawnanigans.net

Robinella - POSTED!
Robin's Nest
http://robinellablog.wordpress.com

TJ **Welcome Back TJ** - POSTED!
TJ's Photo Expressions
http://tjphotoexpressions.blogspot.com/

Chrissea - POSTED!
Chris-seas Corner
http://chrisseas-corner.tripod.com/

Jan - POSTED!
The Prytz Family
http://theprytzfamily.blogspot.com/

Old Dog ***Welcome New Member*** - POSTED!
Wise Old Dog
http://wiseoledog.blogspot.com

Kim - POSTED!
Nekked Lizard Adventures
http://nekkedlizardadventures.typepad.com

Celeste ***Welcome New Member*** - POSTED!
Ragracers
http://ragracers.blogspot.com

Sarah - POSTED!
Charish Me
http://charish-me.blogspot.com

Teena - POSTED!
It's all about me!
http://purple4mee.blogspot.com/

Shorty - POSTED!
I Couldn't Help Myself
http://icouldnthelpmyself.blogspot.com

Sandy - POSTED!
Myanderings
http://myanderings-myanderings.blogspot.com

Carlo - POSTED!
Captured By Carlo
http://capturedbycarlo.blogspot.com

Jan, AKA Wammy - ***Welcome New Member*** - POSTED!
The Ellis Family Cincinnati
http://theellisfamilycincinnati.blogspot.com

Gattina - POSTED!
Keyhole Pictures
http://gattina-keyholepictures.blogspot.com/

Kiva - POSTED!
Ecletic Granny
http://eclecticgranny.blogspot.com/

Distant Snow and Disastrous Shoes

I would have started on this entry earlier had I remembered that I took over 30 pictures while I was out taking Tuffy to the vet. There was snow on the mountains, and I was trying to get a decent shot of that. I never quite managed it, but I'm posting two of the better attempts anyway.

Tuffy still has an infected and inflamed tongue. This accounts for her stinky breath, a symptom I don't think I've mentioned here until now. The vet gave her more prednisone at a lower dose, plus a sort of doggy mouthwash we're supposed to squirt into her mouth with a syringe. There were supposed to be antibiotics too, but they weren't in the bag. John will have to pick those up on his way home from work.


At the office this morning I noticed that my right shoe felt a little odd on my foot, and was sticking to the floor a bit. When I looked at the sole, I saw a huge split in the plastic, exposing a piece of metal and shredding the heel. Later in the day I noticed the same thing on the other shoe, although not as severe. These were $40 or $50 shoes from Payless, about three months old. I paid more than usual, and got inferior shoes, clearly! That's certainly the most sudden and extreme Gratuitous Shoe Failure (GSF) I've ever experienced. Well, okay, they were worn down, but I've never seen another pair of shoes split down the middle like that.


Tonight I therefore went to Wal-Mart, where I usually buy shows if they're not out of everything decent in my size. As you can see, my size is currently Men's 10 1/2 Wide. It's a little tricky getting a men's show that looks acceptable on a woman in an office setting, but that's what I have to do.

No big thematic wrap up tonight, or even a decent rant. Sorry. Good night!