blistering heat and feet

we've had several days of hideous hot and humid weather here in toronto. if the sun isn't beating down on you, you feel as though you are wading through hot butter. urgh. oh, did you want to sleep comfortably at night? not so fast, you great un-air conditioned masses.

and most alarming of all - last friday i heard the summer's first cicada. normally those suckers don't come out until the august long weekend. just goes to show that nature thinks it's pretty freakin' hot too.

but what is amazing about the hot weather is that you can wear girly skirts and beautiful shoes. after getting over my summer cold, i decided it was time to christen the new gorgeous shoes i'd picked up on an end-of-season sale just before the plague hit me. are these not just amazing? so so pretty! and they made me so tall and feminine. when you're 5'4" it's nice to pretend you're 5"8. ack! that's right, 4" heels.

as i left the apartment, i had a vision of me placing a pair of comfortable shoes in a bag and bringing those along - just in case. you never know how new shoes are going to treat you (normally not well). throwing caution to the wind ("i'm tall! i'm wearing a flirty skirt! look at my shoes!") i left without the sensible gear.

what a mistake. by the time i got off of the subway downtown i was feeling like i was walking a bit like one of the chinese women who'd been through a deforming foot binding. as i clomped my way through the underground i could hear a definite change in my gait. where previously i was tap-tap-tapping along, now i was whap-tap-whap-tapping along. and wondering if i'd ever seen the grocery store selling flip-flops. the answer, in case you were wondering, was"no". but being a somewhat/sometimes bright girl, i picked up a box of band-aids (55 & assorted sizes).

regardless, men held doors open for me twice as i made my way to work. i like to think it was because i was tall and wearing a flirty skirt and had empowering shoes on - but in retrospect, it may just of been because they saw me trying not to limp through doorways. they could very well of been thinking, "poor poor girl, why'd she go out without her cane?".

i walk the 10 minutes to work and at this point just dying to sit at my desk and take of my shoes and plaster my feet with band-aids. which i do. which is a good plan, until i need to use the washroom. which meant i needed to put the evil shoes back on. i do my best and wander on over to the loo and a gay co-worker sees me and says, "work it girl! you look amazing today!". i smile, thank him and then lean against the door and say i'm about to cry. immediately understanding the look in my eye in the way only a gay man or another female would, he looked down at my feet and said, "ooh, new shoes. ouch. if it's any consolation, you look great."

i could go on in a similar vein, but i think we all get the picture. i ended up having to cancel a lunch with another co-worker. i had to tell her why i needed to postpone our club monaco trip. being an amazing person, on her way back from lunch, she went to a dollar store and picked up a pair of flip flops for me to wear the rest of the day. prior to the gift of comfortable shoes, i was convinced i'd need to take a cab home. the cab would of cost about $25.00. washing out the point of buying those death-trap shoes on sale.

so there i am wearing an orange skirt and new cheap PINK flip flops. there was some orange on the sole of the shoes (in a vague attempt to match, i guess) but let's not be fooled. they were bubble-gum pink. quite a bit less fabulous than the enzo angiolini's i was wearing earlier in the day. i'm sorry, let me revise - i wasn't so much as wearing them as having my feet turned into minute steaks in them.

regardless - i wore those flip flops home, the pretty new shoes in a bag by my side. and trust me - i did my level best to muster all the glamour of a fashion forward five-year-old as i walked back down the street.

[music david usher, "the music"]