So I finally got new shoes, and after you see what the old ones look like (I took pictures, as promised), you’ll see that these were badly needed. The new shoes are Airwalks, and are black with white laces and accents. Cute shoes. The style is called “Ricco”. Take a look:
Cute, don’t you think? So after I bought them, I went down to Staunton Mall and did a lap from Belk to JCPenney and back to break ’em in. Then after that I went to work and checked out paying customers while standing in them. Much better than the old shoes.
Speaking of which, how badly did I burn through the old shoes? Take a look.
An overview of the soles. Note the big hole on the left shoe, the beginning of one on the right shoe, and the way the toe on the right shoe is destroyed. Next…
This is a close-up of the left shoe’s hole. I completely wore through the sole and part of the insole. I’m sure it wouldn’t be too long before I would have gone through the insole and into my sock. This hole completely compromised any waterproof-ness that the shoe might otherwise have claimed, because when I got off work on Wednesday and it was raining, I took one step outside and my foot was soaked. So what else is there?
This is the toe of the right shoe. This was the subject of a joke about my shoes related to Wal-Mart’s dress code for associates. At Wal-Mart, we’re not allowed to have open-toed shoes. My joke was, “I need new shoes, because at the rate I’m going, these shoes will soon slip beneath the dress code as they become open shoes.” The very tip of the shoe had developed a bit of a flap on it, and it went up and down. Water entered the shoe through this toe hole, though you couldn’t stick your finger through like the left shoe hole. And it gets worse…
And this is the last one. This is on the top of the left shoe, and basically, it’s a rip. Don’t know what caused that one, but it’s about two inches long, I’d say. You could see my sock through it, and it was definitely on its way to getting bigger.
So there you go. I certainly got my money’s worth out of those shoes – and ran on perhaps three months of borrowed time as these shoes were starting to fall apart in around September, but I had to wait to get a job and get paid first before I could replace them.
So where are the old shoes now? In the trash. I’m putting them out of their misery. I’m just glad to have some new shoes finally, since I think you would agree – I need them.