Shoes for thought....

I am now a commuter.  I take 2 overland trains and 2 underground trains a day.  I get on the train in Bracknell to get to Waterloo, get on the underground at Waterloo, stay on through Southwark, and get off at London Bridge, then the reverse to get home.  It amounts to about  80 minutes of train time each way.  However, the trains are PACKED during rush hour, so I spend those sardine-like hours trying to find somewhere to look whereby it doesn't seem as if I'm  staring at someone or the other.
My solution is the floor as much as possible (when I'm not reading), which means I see a lot of shoes during the course of my travels, and I have made several observations:


1. Lots of women take a deep breath each morning and put their tennies on with their smart business suits, laughing in the face of fashion to save their feet.  I applaud these women.


2. Lots of OTHER women fear the fashion gods and wear terrifyingly high heels from dawn to dusk.  I am not one of these women.  I think they're nuts!!


3. There are some FUGLY shoes out there!! Holy cow there are.  And I'm not just talking about girl shoes either (although some of those defy the laws of nature let me tell you!),  I'm talking about men's shoes as well.


My inspiration for this post, for example, was a particularly jaw dropping pair of men's shoes. 


"Try to imagine, just for a moment..." (bonus points if you know where that quote came from) a business man (I'm going to guess mid-late 40's) tailored pinstriped suit, briefcase, newspaper tucked under his arm, you know the type.  Professional.  But the shoes!!!  Black leather, polished, no scuffs, probably ridiculously expensive, normal from the heel to the point at which they should have ended.... but there was no end in sight.  Instead of a rounded or even slightly pointed toe, they kept on going... and going... and going.  It's like the energizer bunny had a hand in their design!  I am absolutely not exaggerating when I say there was probably 3 1/2 inches or pointy shoes PAST the end of his toes.  


"Winkle-pickers" my Nan would have called them, I could all but hear her say it when I saw them.  I'm really not sure how I didn't actually laugh out loud when her voice popped in my head.  


Now I know I am FAR from a fashionista, I'm thrilled I have a pair of actual "crocs" flip-flops, but seriously , the shoes were ludicrous!


I've given it some thought and I think that on a different guy the effect wouldn't have been so laughable.  I actually know someone who wears pointy man-shoes and because he's uber-cool and stylish they don't look silly at all.  Having said that though, I never saw him wear any THAT pointy!


One last thing before I go;


I am clinging to the hope that the worst footwear offenders I see are Europeans, most likely French or Italian because they think they are the rulers of fashion and can therefore wear any combination of crap and make it look "fashionable".  Well you can't.  Stop it!  


When I'm trying to eat my lunch I don't want to see you in your lime green and black zebra print leggings that you oh-so-casually paired with hot pink and blue frilly edged wellies and your new "I <3 London" sweatshirt.  It's nasty and you look like a twit.