22 September 2008

Come to the Darkside....we have cookies!

Finally, I must admit de-feet (pun intended) over some of my sillier high-heeled shoes.

I bought a pair of (gasp!) Crocs.  In the name of comfort.

(You may expect the world to end at any second now.)

I first became aware of Crocs through Dooce & Blurb, aka Heather and Jon Armstrong.  Jon - - - loves them.  Heather - - - hates them.  A while back, they had an ongoing back-and-forth Croc war on their blogs.  Jon had (I think) a yellow pair.  Blazing, sunshine yellow.  Or at least that's what I remember the pictures of.

Readers of both blogs chimed in, and the comments made for highly hysterical reading.  When I actually saw pictures of the shoes, I wrinkled my nose.  Ewww.

And then I went to visit my baby sister in Cal-i-forn-i-a, and she had a pair.  My sisters and I all wear roughly the same size shoe, and I stole those Crocs the very first night, when we sat 'round a campfire on the beach.  Reluctantly, when I left the island where she lives, I left the Crocs behind, too.  Mostly because she threatened me with death if I took them back to Ohio.  These things inspire passion, I'll tell you that.  

You see them everywhere.  They match absolutely nothing, look terrible, and remind me a whole lot of Swedish trädskor, which literally means wooden shoes.  That gives you a false impression of wooden shoes that are carved and boat-shaped.  But trädskor are clogs, with wooden soles, leather uppers, and open heels.  Swedes wear them everywhere.  Even sometimes with dress-up clothes, which, I must point out, is very un-attractive.  But, they're practical, comfortable, and with the wooden soles being about 2-1/2 inches tall, they keep your feet out of the slush in the winter and away from the mud in the spring.  I brought a black pair home when I was 17, and when I went to visit in 1999, I brought home a brown pair.  They're great for gardening, and that 11-th hour trip to the grocery store for a missing ingredient in something you're trying to pull together for a dinner party.  (Not that I'd know, of course.  I always have everything I need.  *eyeroll*)

I went to visit my sister in 2006.  Two long years ago.  Since then, I've looked at Crocs in sporting goods stores and shoe stores, online, just about all over the place, and I just could not bring myself to spend $40 on a pair of shoes that are so ugly, I don't want to be caught dead in them.  I freely admit to a shoe-shopping problem, and having spend scads on far less practical shoes, you'd think that I wouldn't blink at the price tag.  "Reason" (of a sort) asserted itself, however, because the nagging voice in my head that wants me to be lots more frugal kept saying, "$40?!?!  Are you KIDDING me?  Put those back!"

As with all consumer goods, though, the price started to come down, and with news stories this year about people getting injured in Crocs (although I know nothing about the details, just remember it was in the news) they started to become a bit more reasonable.

In addition to a shoe-shopping problem, I also have an Amazon.com shopping problem.  I lurves me some Amazon.  I browse there nearly daily.  I buy things from them less frequently than daily, but often enough that when I log in to the site, it says, "Welcome, Lucy.  We have recommendations for you!"  I know, it does that for everyone.  But it tempts me frequently, and I have been known to purchase things based on wise and all-seeing Amazon's recommendation alone.  They know my buying habits, which ought to scare me a little, but strangely, does not.

So they had a picture on their gateway page, what you get when you type amazon.com into your browser, and a little SALE! notation, and so, I went and had a look.  Amazon had Crocs in every color of the rainbow, even in some colors that should never be considered for shoes.  

My current favorite color is a fire-y red.  I used to think I couldn't wear red, but I've darkened my hair a bit, and I like what I see in the mirror when I'm wearing a blazing red.  So I bought a red pair.

Comfortable doesn't really cover how these things feel.  I had sided with Dooce in the Croc war, but having worn them, I now take Blurb's side.

That does not mean I'll be wearing them outside of the house, at least not regularly, but man, those are some soothing shoes.


1 comment:

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