23.1.09

A waste of decent shoes


So tomorrow night I’m going to a friend’s house for cheese and wine to celebrate her 41st birthday. I don’t eat cheese but am tempted to have a glass of wine or two. This though will mean paying for a taxi home, for which the cost of the 11-minute journey – and that’s keeping to the speed limits, which taxis don’t – will be around the same price as a restaurant meal in Ireland. Mm dilemma. I’m lucky enough that I can afford the taxi but I just can’t get my ahead around the fact that the cost of visiting a friend is so extortionate. I rarely go out though, so I think I’ll swallow the fare and the wine and put it done to ‘life being short’ which is my answer to all sorts of indulgences.

The other far more important issue is shoes. Yes, as you know, I have plenty to choose from. The thing is though that people take their shoes off indoors here. You arrive all glammed up and tall, then cross the threshold and you’re padding around in your stocking feet, two inches shorter with trousers flapping around your ankles and under your feet. So of course, I’ll have to wear a skirt and tights to avoid the too-long trouser problem and then place my lovely shoes prominently at the door to be admired and marvelled over. Except they won’t be of course. Around here, they never get the attention they deserve. 

16 comments:

JEDA said...

yeah, but maybe your friend will have a small, decorative basket of blue plastic booties to slip on over those shiny black heels...

one can always hope

Unknown said...

Oh no, I think that would be worse! Bad enough having to use them at the barnehage - although as someone who cleans floors I do understand the logic.

The housewife said...

Enjoy! But doesn't your friend allow indoor shoes? Fire her I tell you - these are your shoes we are talking about!

Michele said...

Those shoes are fantastic! It is terrible here, isn't it, the way such beautiful objects of lust and desire have to sit in the closet most of the year? I do see some women wearing spiky-heeled boots in the snow but I don't know how they manage to actually walk.

I'm so used to taking my shoes off for visits I now think more about my socks then about shoes. That kind of makes me want to cry.

Mel said...

!!!! I cant believe it? Why dont people wear their shoes indoors? I can understand removing muddy, wet wellies but we aint talking about those....

My gosh, grounds alone to leave Norway immediately.

Unknown said...

It's one of those awkward things that your host opens the door in their stocking feet and unless she/he says 'oh leave them on' as you crouch to remove your shoes, you're kind of obliged to. I've considered taking along a nice clean, hardly been worn pair to put on inside but I think that as she has just moved house and has new flooring, they're a bit protective of their surfaces. I mean in general I understand that it is much more hygienic not to drag outside dirt around inside but when socializing I would prefer exceptions to be made.
Michele - ditto about the socks
Mel - completely agree! As is the extortionate price of a professional blow-dry.
Maybe my friend will shame me and let me leave my shoes on - I'll let you know if I'm brave enough to ask! That said, if I'm the only one brazen enough to want to wear my shoes, I'll feel awkward anyway....

Jo said...

What a strange dilemma and it just makes zero sense to go out dressed up and not keep your shoes on, I am with Mel, ridiculous, arrive in wellies, take them off, whip this pair out of your bag in front of the host/hostess and viola, you are the best dressed there.

Heathcote Safari said...

Ha! Have you seen that Sex & the City episode where Carrie is similarly obliged to remove her gorgeous and terribly expensive shoes at the entrance to a friend's house? When she comes back to put them on before leaving they've gone. Nicked. So watch it, Shoe-Fan ... hold on to those heels!!

Batgirl said...

My friends and I always permit people to wear their shoes at parties. A friend with a new wood floor was iffy (worried about holes/dents), but decided she needed to wear her own heels to complete her outfit. So the rule in her house is now: if it's part of the outfit, it stays on!

Michele said...

I'm back for round two of the wearing-shoes-in-the-house discussion. :-) I feel obliged to confess that I am guilty of expecting everyone to remove their shoes before coming into our house. Sorry! It's the stupid wood floors! They were SO expensive but are, to my mind, SO stupidly fragile. Seriously, our cat has dented the area around her food bowl where she sometimes scratches (she's weird). Everything dents these floors. It's not hard wood, like we had in San Francisco; it's some sort of "natural" wood flooring that is absolutely useless. Useless I tell you!

Jo said...

LOL, here I go on the Greenpeace thing, if the wood was hard it would probably be coming from one of the rainforests. Here in SA we tend to use either laminate (I know nasty but there are a few good ones available) or better the veneered floors which can be sanded occasionally, better for the environment and less costly. Ok I will step down now.

beaverboosh said...

Too right girl, I haven't worn my manolos in months!

Unknown said...

Jo - did it!
HS - I LOVE that episode of SITC. I'm impressed the BB remembers that they were Manolas ;-) Shame I haven't got a pair - yet.
Batgirl - my friend doesn't wear high heels but she kindly allowed me to do so in the end.
Michele - sympathies on the flooring. If you ever invite me around, I promise to put those little protector things used on the legs of furniture on my heels ;-)
BB - I guess at least this has given the corns on your feet a break ;-)

Michele said...

Yo, Greenpeace, step back! :-) I know you're right that a lot of hard wood flooring can come from endangered environments, but our floor in San Francisco was simple oak, put in when the house was built in 1917. I do believe that oak was American-made, girl!

The flooring we have in Norway is veneered, and we'll probably be sanding it soon enough. Since it's so useless! :->

Unknown said...

That is a dilema! When I lived in Cleveland,Ohio,USA and Chicago,IL USA I always carried a shoe bag of sorts during bad weather. Now I live in Rochester MN,USA (lots of Scandinavians and I'm dating a Norwegian!) and i am considering doing this again. For 3-4 months of the year i wear a depressing pair of snow boots because of all the sand and snow. Great shoes. Don't give up!

Matthew Celestine said...

I think the custom of removing shoes in Nordic countries is great! I wish more people in the UK would adopt it.

I have an whole blog about removing shoes in homes: Shoes Off at the Door, Please You might like to take a look.