Thursday, February 14, 2008

Boots on the Ground

The last 12 months have been bad, bootwise. Side zippers on the Magnum Stealths blew out, which was not so surprising since I've always thought that side zippers were lame anyway. Took them to a shoe repair shop to get them fixed. When I went to pick them up, the guy said that fixing both boots was a total pain in the ass, and he wouldn't do it again. Not even for another NT$400. But, he did a pretty good job so I showed him my hiking boots. The outsoles are cracking, disintegrating, and peeling off the shoe. My idea was to remove both outsoles entirely, and replace them with a leather sole of some kind. The shoe repair guy suggested that I throw the boots away and buy new ones. I pointed out that it is not easy to buy size 15 hiking boots in Taiwan, and he said that I should go to America to buy new ones, because what I want to do to fix the old ones won't work. He also said to not by huan bao xie zi (low impact boots?), because the rubber always disintegrates after three years. I bought my hiking boots 3 1/2 years ago, but I don't really remember if they were environmentally friendly or not. But that would be one of those classic unintended consequences things if you have to buy (and throw away) twice as many boots trying to be nice to the planet.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Daya rd and jin hua rd. 3 doors north on daya. There is a shoe store that has 14,15,16 but they are leather dress shoes.
I know this because by boss is the same height and shoe size as ...

Chaon said...

Yep, the Te-da xie zi dian. I stopped by Tuesday just to see if they had anything new. Nope.

E-bay is looking better and better.

Anonymous said...

In context, he might have meant soft rubber bottoms, which would mean "low impact" for your joints. Yes?

Anyway, someone as tall as you deserves whatever they get...

Johnny

Chaon said...

Literal translation is 'environmental protection shoes'. The only thing I can guess he means is the hiking boots that are supposed to be easier on the forest ecology when you go stomping around in the woods. But I'm not really sure.

And am I the only guy who's feet kept growing into his late thirties? I always wore a size 14 until a couple of years ago.

Red A said...

Your feet squish out more. At least mine do, because I wear Birks too much.