the underwear drawer

brown suede shoes

Lo, I have seen the yawning gates of hell, and it looks like Sunday morning in the children's shoe section of Harry's Shoes.

Cal's been walking for about four months now, but so far he's mainly been either barefoot or shod in these soft soled leather slippers that are all the rage these days. However, it's getting colder and wetter around here now, and let's face it, these city sidewalks have all sorts of pointy crap all over. So we decided to get him some real shoes.

Time for some fun factoids!

DID YOU KNOW that the price of children's shoes are not scaled to size? That a shoe that is one third the size of an adult shoe is inexplicably not one third of the price? And in most instances actually costs the same amount, if not more, than my own shoes?

DID YOU KNOW that going to a children's shoe store in September ranks somewhere between being trapped in the Peds ER during flu season and being incarcerated in the Ministry of Love for thoughtcrime? And that Lord of the Flies-esque bullying and intimidation will take place right under the noses of unsuspecting adults, who, while hurriedly trying to contain the carnage of scattered shoes, will turn their backs on kids beating each other up with the latest in Goretex-lined winter bootwear?

DID YOU KNOW that Morgan Freeman works at the children's shoe department of Harry's Shoes? He does! I mean, the guy looked like Morgan Freeman! And he was all calm and grandfatherly. I didn't even mind it when he pronounced my first two choices of shoe "inappropriate" as a "primary walking shoe" (I thought they were just sneakers, but I guess I was wrong) and then proceeded to give us a whole analysis about Cal's foot-type and his shoe-ing needs. I figure either there's a lot more to this whole shoe-buying thing than I initially thought (Step 1: measure foot (optional), Step 2: buy shoe) or he was totally snowing us with fancy-talk.

Either way, we bought the shoes. We got these:




Which, you know, are pretty OK-looking, and didn't make Cal fall down. I don't know that they would have been my absolute first choice, but we got them because Morgan Freeman told us to.

My first choice, by the way, were these:




I found them sitting on one of the chairs at the shoe place, and I just loved them, they were so flexible and light and they just looked cool. But I was instantly suspicious, because there were TWO shoes sitting there (you know, the matched pair) and all the other display shoes were just ONE shoe, to thwart theivery. But then I just figured maybe some kid had been trying on those shoes, decided not to get them, and then left. So I was holding the shoes, checking them out, and trying to hustle Cal into them before the salesman boxed them up and took them back to The Back Room Where The Shoes Live. But then this mom-type lady came up to me and asked me for the shoes back in this cold voice, and I realized that they were actually the shoes that her kid wore into the store. Like, from their house. In fact, the store didn't even have that model in stock--I checked, after they left. So that's why we didn't get those shoes.

But (I checked when I came home) they do sell the cool blue sneakers on Zappo's, so I could always get them for Cal next time. Morgan Freeman, child shoe expert, said that at this age, we could expect that Cal would outgrow his new shoes in about ten weeks. TEN WEEKS! Doesn't that sound fast to you? Fact or scam to sell more shoes, I cannot determine. They didn't teach me about toddler shoe fitting in my Peds residency.

Currently watching: "The Office." This show is so funny, I can't believe it's on network TV. (I downloaded it off iTunes.)