No, what you see at left is not a Muppet reject. It's the bottom of my black shoes.

First, an overview:

I carry two pairs of shoes. (Carry? Since when do I speak like that? Own. I own two pairs of shoes.)

One pair is brown, one pair is black.

I wear them most every school day.

Usually they'll last me a couple of years, and then I'll buy a new couple of pairs.

But this time the black pair gave out sooner than the brown.

And though I've lasted a bit with the crack in the bottom of the shoes (yeah, there's a crack in each), I need a nice pair for an event Saturday night.

So I now have new black shoes.

That's the new pair at right - they're a little narrower at the toe, but they're very comfortable. I spent a little more on these than I've spent on past shoes, but nothing ridiculous. (I have a thing against spending a lot of money on shoes or sneakers. Or maybe I'm just cheap.)

Lately I've been going with the slip-ons. You know why, mostly? I've had terrible luck with shoe laces. (That space is intentional. I know they're shoelaces. But sneakers have shoelaces too. So the space indicates I'm talking about the laces that are specific to shoes.)

I pull the laces tight, and inevitably they break. Well ahead of the shoes. And I hate buying new laces and threading them through the shoe. I just hate it. So slip-ons are the perfect solution. (Are slip-ons loafers? Because I'm sure they're not called slip-ons. But that's what I do...I slip them on.)

Here's the other thing, though - as I approached the register to pay, I asked the woman if they sold any shoe horns. She said, "No, but I can give you one." I accepted her offer, expecting a little, classy shoe horn like I grew up watching my dad use. He had a nice shiny silver one. Actually, I expected kind of a tortoise-shell one. Slightly less classy. Out of the cabinet behind her, though, she pulled out what must be an industrial shoe horn. It does not seem practical. But I'll use it. My new shoes are too nice to damage squeezing my foot in without it. I just need to find a place to store the thing - this picture might not do it justice - I think it's more than a foot long: