I don’t know about you, but I tend to wear the same shoes most of the time. I don’t have to wear a suit to work so when I get up in the morning I’ll normally reach for the same shoes day after day after day. If I go out for a drink or two, I’ll wear those same shoes. If I go to the cinema, or drive to a friend’s house to go biking, or go shopping, I’ll wear – you’ve guessed it – the same shoes. I like to call them my Default Shoes. That’s because they are my default choice for almost all occasions. Sure, when I need smart shoes I’ll wear something else, or if I go running I’ll wear running shoes, but 9 times out of 10 I’ll lace up my default shoes when I leave the house.
The problem is that no shoe lasts forever. When any pair of my default shoes start to wear out I’ll start looking for a replacement. I’ll buy the replacement and gradually wear them more and more until I just stop wearing the old ones and throw them out. Thus I have new default shoes and the circle of life continues. I have just passed through such a transition period and as a mark of respect I’d like to tell you about my old shoes.
I bought them in Las Vegas a couple of years ago. At the time my default shoes were a pair of brown Adidas Gazelles and they were past their best. I figured I’d go for a pair of black shoes next, my motivation being the shoes Richard Ashcroft wore in the video to Bittersweet Symphony (which happened to be Clarks, by the way). I had a look in a few shops until I eventually came across the Vans you see pictured above.
We’ve been all over together. I’ve taken them half way around the world. Been drunk in them. Driven thousands of miles in them. Played football in them. Had job interviews in them. They’ve been ever-present in my life but it was time to move on. They were falling apart. I was on my third pair of laces and the soles were wearing through. So it was with a heavy heart that I started to look for a replacement. And I found them, courtesy of my brother (who’s my clothing consultant – he has more style in his small finger than I’ll have in my whole lifetime).
They’re a pair of customised Adidas running shoes and they’re pictured right. I’m not going to link to where I got them from because I don’t want everybody out there wearing them – I want them for me! Oh, all right then, you can find them here. And although they look pretty loud, I love them. I’m looking forward to a long partnership with them and if I have half as much fun wearing them as I did with my Vans I’ll be doing well. It’s the dawn of a new era.
Your clothing consultant obviously didn’t consider the fact that you might run into difficulty matching the luminous yellow in your default shoes with your clothes….
…..unless, of course, you have a penchant for wearing incandescent coloured clothing…..
…..actually, having seen some of your Hawaiian shirts, I take that back – he probably did take that into account!!
You have around ten times as many shoes as anyone else I know!
Just imaging how many shoe racks I’d need if I didn’t periodically throw old ones out…
John, you’re a strange, strange person…..
What I find most interesting is this “wearing out” business. I can’t remember the last time a pair of shoes around here became worn out. We have this weird thing where our shoes apparently engage in hand to hand combat while we’re asleep. That’s the only reason I can think of to explain the number of shredded shoes we find in the mornings. (Our dogs are equally perplexed.)
Don’t you dress smart for job interviews, even if you know that the job itself doesn’t require it? And just how do you know that Richard Ashcroft wore Clarks in that video? And when are you going to write about the Porsche 911? (You mentioned it once in a comment I think)
Here goes John:
There was an interview that I attended and I told them I was coming straight from work so I wouldn’t be in a suit as that would have looked suspicious to my former employer. I got the job so maybe it worked!My brother told me that one (he knows about clothes).Good idea. I’ll write one tomorrow. All I’ll say now is Damn they’re fast!
*puts sunglasses on*
Green and Yellow as your default shoes????