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This is the real gray matter! The other wasn't finished

Lately I've found myself--thank God! and I was lost for sooooo
long---ahem, let me try again. Okay, here's the deal. I have never
really thought of myself as a decisive person, but on the career path
I've chosen to take, I have to make decisions all day long. (Imagine
looking at 50,000 pairs of shoes and picking, oh about 75.) Some of
the decisions are good and some are not so good, but you know, if I
was perfect, not even Shanta would be able to stand me, I'd be so
annoying.

Outside of work is another story. Because outside of work, 99% of the
time, I really don't care about the options I have, and I'd much
rather go with the flow then set the course. It's just not worth the
effort for me to jump start what little brain cells I have left after
a day of decisions decisions decisions.

But there is something I've been grappling these last few months. I
made the decision a long time ago to do something, and I'm finally
ready take that leap of faith. Yes, I think, um, I'm sure, that I'm
ready to stop... dying my hair! (At this point the women who are
reading this may gasp. Any man reading this will probably stop
reading because if they have hair at this stage in life they are just
grateful. If they don't, well then this life alterating plan of mine
would be just down-right insulting. Kind of like a very wealthy
person exclaiming in earshot of his underpaid maid who is sending half
of her salary to help feed, shelter, and clothe her thirty relatives
back home in Ipoorlandia that he may have to start cutting back by
selling off one of his houses, or something along those lines.)

The truth is that when I was growing up, I never ever thought I would
dye my hair. Not that I was in love with the color or anything. My
natural hair color, which I have not seen in over twenty years, is
brown. And I didn't start dying my hair because I was tired of the
color; I was just having one of those days. You know, the
kind of day when you may find your (lost) self agreeing to covering
your body with raw bacon and swimming in shark-infested waters because
someone suggested it and you really had nothing better to do anyway,
and what the hell your life sucks and you need to do something
different. Oh, I'm sorry, I thought everyone had days like that.
Well, it was before I was on medication... Anyway, truth be told, it
was a sucky day, largely because I was having man problems. (Man
problems? Is that redundant?) NOW you know what I'm talking about.
And I was in my twenties. And I just knew, KNEW, that this guy liked
me, really really liked me, but because of x, y, and z, well, he just
couldn't reciprocate. No, he wasn't married. But there were
circumstances. BUT if I had new and improved hair, x, y, and z won't
matter because he won't be able to resist me! Was it true that he
liked me or was it something my poor demented 20 year old mind
conjured up? Looking back on it today, all I can say is, "Thank God
nothing happened!!!"


So back to my hair. The hairdresser had repeatedly suggested I color
it red, and that day, in a weak moment, I relented. Did I love the
new color? I must have, because I kept dying it. I got a lot of
compliments on it --to which I'd always reply, "You could have this
color too if you really want it." I never tried to pass it off as the
real thing. I just thought it was obvious that it wasn't my real
color, because, well, I don't know. I was so naive about this whole
hair coloring thing. I had no idea that about 75% of American women
already dyed their hair. I just assumed that everyone kept their
natural color, except for in those very obvious cases where the woman
is almost 100 and has jet black hair. I'm naive, but not stupid. (OK,
well maybe not THAT stupid.)

When I first starting coloring my hair it was pretty easy to keep up.
I'd color it maybe once every three or four months. (I should clarify
that I don't do this myself because I can't even braid hair. I need
professional help.) Not too many years passed before I started
seeing white hair in my part. I didn't freak about it but I didn't
want this Pepe Le Pew thing going on with my hair. So I had to dye it
more frequently. Shortly after I got married (I couldn't wear white
hair on my wedding day!)I looked in the mirror --which I should have
done more often -- and what I saw reminded me of Johnny Carson's joke
about Reagan not dying his hair, but bleaching his face. My face was
too old for my hair! The next time I got my hair colored, I asked for
highlights as well, to soften the stark contrast between my red red
hair and old white face. This did the trick for a while, and all was
right with the world.

But how long could I keep doing this? My friend Audrey, who also has
a few gray hairs, and I used to say that maybe we'd stop coloring our
hair when we turned forty. Since we both passed that milestone (she
is younger than me, damn it) I think we decided we'd change it fifty.
After all, we're not old yet -- isn't 40 the new fourteen? And God
forbid that we look older than we actually feel. That's just wrong.
Isn't it? I have to say, though, that I did like my highlights. And
most other people did too. Not that I would expect them to tell me
otherwise. Because who would tell me that it looked like crap? My
mom. Well, she didn't say that it looked like crap, but she would
say, as we passed the 100 year old women with jet black hair, "You
better stop dying your hair or your going to end up like that!" Those
poor women. No matter how dark their hair is they are just not going
to fool anyone. But maybe they aren't trying to -- maybe they just
got used to doing it, liked it, and well, good for them. Was I trying
to fool everyone? Was that what she thought? I certainly never lied
to anyone about it. I just liked it. But was I trying to look
younger? Truthfully, I am the kind of person that has always assumed
that everyone else was older than me. It's not because I look younger,
I'm just so immature. This is partially because I don't have children
and therefore never ever had to act responsible. I can swear all day
long and have popcorn and licorice for dinner. So what difference
would the color of my hair make? Was I afraid that I'd no longer feel
attractive...and then it clicked. That is how I got myself into this
whole hair coloring thing in the first place. Over a man! I'm
telling you, they are more trouble. (Not the gay ones, mind you. I
mean the ones who know that they are gay.) And that's when I decided
to quit dying. (Well, that and the realization that it was stupid to
dye my hair red and lighten it with blond,to look natural, when if I
just left it alone, it would look natural.) I am sure my mom will
approve. She has white hair now, and has only dyed it one time in her
life and that was when she was in her 50s and trying to find a job. I
guess gray hair is a hinderance then. But she does get tons of
compliments on her hair. Because who would tell her that it looked
like crap? Oh, I would, if it did. But it doesn't. So I'll just
find something else she does that I can nag at her about.

I want to make very clear that my decision not to dye is in no way to
be construed as a statement against those who do it. After all, I've
been there, sister. I know what it's like. And for all my huffing and
puffing, I having let it go yet. But I will. And who knows? After
the last temporary rinse washes out and I am faced with the truth, be
it good, bad, or ugly, I may hightail it back to the salon. After
all, isn't it is a women's perogative to change her mind?

Gray Matter

Lately I've found myself--thank God! and I was lost for sooooo long---ahem, let me try again. Okay, here's the deal. I have never really thought of myself as a decisive person, but on the career path I've chosen to take, I have to make decisions all day long. (Imagine looking at 50,000 pairs of shoes and picking, oh about 75.) Some of the decisions are good and some are not so good, but you know, if I was perfect, not even Shanta would be able to stand me, I'd be so annoying.

Outside of work is another story. Because outside of work, 99% of the time, I really don't care about the options I have, and I'd much rather go with the flow then set the course. It's just not worth the effort for me to jump start what little brain cells I have left after a day of decisions decisions decisions.

But there is something I've been grappling these last few months. I made the decision a long time ago to do something, and I'm finally ready take that leap of faith. Yes, I think, um, I'm sure, that I'm ready to stop... dying my hair! (At this point the women who are reading this may gasp. Any man reading this will probably stop reading because if they have hair at this stage in life they are just grateful. If they don't, well then this life alterating plan of mine would be just down-right insulting. Kind of like a very wealthy person exclaiming in earshot of his underpaid maid who is sending half of her salary to help feed, shelter, and clothe her thirty relatives back home in Ipoorlandia that he may have to start cutting back by selling off one of his houses, or something along those lines.)

The truth is that when I was growing up, I never ever thought I would dye my hair. Not that I was in love with the color or anything. My natural hair color, which I have not seen in over twenty years, is brown. And I didn't start dying my hair because I was tired of the color; I was just having one of those days. You know, the
kind of day when you may find your (lost) self agreeing to covering your body with raw bacon and swimming in shark-infested waters because someone suggested it and you really had nothing better to do anyway, and what the hell your life sucks and you need to do something different. Oh, I'm sorry, I thought everyone had days like that. Well, it was before I was on medication... Anyway, truth be told, it was a sucky day, largely because I was having man problems. (Man problems? Is that redundant?) NOW you know what I'm talking about. And I was in my twenties. And I just knew, KNEW, that this guy liked me, really really liked me, but because of x, y, and z, well, he just couldn't reciprocate. No, he wasn't married. But there were circumstances. You know, because if I had new and improved hair, x, y, and z won't matter because he won't be able to resist me! Was it true that he liked me or was it something my poor demented 20 year old mind conjured up? Looking back on it all, almost twenty years later, all I can say is, "Thank God nothing happened!!!"


So back to my hair. The hairdresser had repeatedly suggested I color it red, and that day, in a weak moment, I relented. Did I love the new color? I must have, because I kept dying it. This was pretty radical for me, because it really was something I had never considered before. And I am so naive. I had no idea that about 79.95% of American women already dyed their hair. I just assumed that everyone kept their natural color, except for those very obvious cases where the woman is almost 100 and has jet black hair. I'm naive, but not stupid. (OK, well maybe not THAT stupid.)

When I first starting coloring my hair it was pretty easy to keep up. (I should clarify that I don't do this myself because I can't even braid hair. I need professional help.) I'd color it maybe once every three or four months. As the years passed -- not too many years unfortunately -- before I started seeing white hair in my part. I didn't freak about it but I didn't want this Pepe Le Pew thing going on with my hair. So I had to dye it more frequently. Shortly after I got married (I couldn't wear white hair on my wedding day!)I looked in the mirror --which I should have done more often -- and what I saw reminded me of Johnny Carson's joke about Reagan not dying his hair, but bleaching his face. My face was too old for my hair! The next time I got my hair colored, I asked for highlights as well, to soften the stark contrast between red red hair and old white face.

Well, it was brown. Now it is gray. Gray gray gray! I didn't start dying my hair to hide it -- rather my hair was a . since I had a I think i After all, isn't it is a women's perogative to change her hair color?

Fall

Is it possible to fall in love with a pair of shoes?

Um, that's what I'd call a rhetorical question. Of course it's possible! In fact, I've had this feeling about many, many pairs. It may be wrong, but I don't have a monogamous relationship with my shoes. I am living in shoe sin and I am not ashamed. I've had many shoes in my past, and present, and I'm sure I'll have many more in the future. However, I don't consider myself a shoe whore. Because unlike a, well, whore is such an unpleasant word. I think vamp is more appropriate, don't you? Anyway, would a shoe vamp (har), have real feelings for her shoes? No! She'd just use and abuse them, right? I mean, that's what vamps do. Not me. I love them. Love love love them.

I have different categories of shoe love. There's the obvious, these-shoes-are-so- hot kind of love, which is more passionate in nature. Yes, I can put them on while alone in my house and just gaze lovingly at them. When I wear them out and about, they are like my trophy-man. I notice people look at them, and when I catch them staring, I smile smugly, as if to say, "Yes, these are coming home with me tonight!"

Then there's my happy shoes. Happy shoes are cute and comfortable. When I look at them, I think, "How could something this cute be so comfortable?" It is possible to have the best of both worlds. These are the shoes I would take home to meet my mother. And my mother would actually approve! Sigh. I'm such a lucky gal.

Then there's the great deal shoes, which always make my day because I can't believe that these shoes, which are so so so cool, cost less than the pedicure I just got, which by the way, shows off my incredible shoes even more so! It's kind of the pat-myself-on-the-back type of shoe. Yay me! I am so smart and practical, which no one else would guess by looking at my shoes, because they look like I spent a fortune! But no, I saved so much money, I can go buy some more shoes, if I want. Or I can just savor the moment, everytime I happen to glance at them, or get compliments on them, which is quite often.

I do have to admit, though, that there have been times I've selected shoes for the wrong reasons. I've bought some knowing full well that the shoes and I just weren't right for one another. Just not a good fit. Oh sure, in the beginning, I was thinking, I can make it work. But that kind of unrealistic expectation just leads to pain and suffering. And the best thing to do is to just let them go. I don't care how gosh-darn good looking they are or how they gave me goose-bumps when we first met. I gotta break it off. No hard feelings -- if they give someone else joy, then that's a good thing, and if they give someone else pain, well, then they are just cruel shoes and if they don't change their ways, they are going to find themselves in the dumpster one day with yesterday's news. Either way, they aren't MY problem anymore.

I could go on and on about the little shoe harem I have at home. I could count the ways in which I love them. But I think I've made my point. So the next time anyone gives you, my fellow shoe lover, grief about your shoes, or complains about the stilettos in your closet, just remember, there's nothing you need to apologize for. Just remember -- "Love means never having to say your sorry."

Fall

Click here: How to open a wine bottle with a shoe. [VIDEO]

Click here: How to open a wine bottle with a shoe. [VIDEO]

Shoe blues weight loss/gain news

I am soooo cranky today and it's the first beautiful day we've had in a week or two [Disclaimer: I started this yesterday] and that makes me even crankier that I'm cranky on such a nice day! I think part of my crankiness stems from my diet. You know, food is my weakness. There's just always a reason to eat. And I'm a huge stress eater. And according to my scale, I've been stressed for three years. And we've had the store for three years. Hmmmm.
Well, before the store opened, I got a divorce and quit my state job, benefits and all.(Weight Gain 10 pounds). Once the store opened, I was so happy.(Weight loss 10 pounds). But then, the recession hit. I was like Lloyd Bridges's character in "Airplane!" --"Looks like I picked the wrong year to start retail!" (Weight gain 10 pounds). Then I decided to quit wallowing in wallow. (Weight loss 7 pounds). But then, I found out that I had to have a hysterectomy.
Believe me, I was happy to have the procedure, but I decided to wait 6 months until our slow season, right after the holidays. Now how could I possibly diet knowing that I was going to have my insides taken out? (Weight gain, 15 pounds). Oh sure, I lost part of the weight I gained the following summer (weight loss 8 pounds), but then we decided to relocate. Talk about stress! (Weight gain 7 pounds). Then I tried to follow a routine (weight loss 2 pounds), but the truth is, I never felt quite at home there. (Weight gain 5 pounds). And then we moved again! (Weight gain, 5 pounds). Well imagine my surprise when I couldn't fit into any of my clothes! Yes, I was surprised because the clothes I had were my fat clothes from last summer. And apparently, I was in denial. Actually I was also in spandex, which really helps with denial, because if something has even 2% spandex, you can stretch it to fit. So I went back to Weight Watchers. I figure if I pay someone else to watch my weight, I tend to lose it easier. It's called paying the piper. So I played this game. They were not allowed to tell me how much I weighed, they could only tell me whether I went up or down. The first week wasn't great, but I went down, just a smidge. The next week I felt confident -- I had exercised and watched what I ate. "Down!" She exclaimed. I was excited. "Really? How much??" I asked, eager to hear the dramatic results. ".08" Well that put me in a tailspin. A lousy eight-tenths of a pound? What the hell? If I had not tried, I would have been thrilled with that, but I did try! I really worked at it. I even skipped my favorite beer when I went out to eat and got a salad instead of a three cheese individual pizza. (This was in part because when I went to the bathroom, I noticed the toilet paper holder had a spare roll. My favorite beer is Fat Tire. Spare roll? Fat Tire? I took it as a warning to be good.

Well, the next week I had a doctor's appointment and since they always add at least 5 pounds to the scale there, I just held my head high -- high enough so I wouldn't see the scale-- and told them I didn't want to face the ugly truth. Which was that I had gained 12 pounds in 2 years, but since I didn't look two years ago, I still only had a vague idea of my actual weight. Finally the following week, I went back to weigh in. She looked happy. "Down!" I had almost given up hope. "How much?" I asked, almost afraid to hear the total. "Two pounds!" Two pounds! I was triumphant. Two pounds! Alone in my car, I mustered up the courage to peek at my weight. HOLY S***! It was awful. I had no idea I weighed that much! I hadn't weighed near that amount since 1997. After seeing my weight, I had plummeted from the top of the world to the depths of hell. "I HATE EVERYTHING!" Of course, I still hadn't come to terms with the fact that it was my choice to wait in line for an eternity for the double dipped chocolate cone at Dairy Queen's drive-in, as was it my choice to test every restaurant in our strip mall, as was it my choice to eat a bag of Cheetoh's for dinner. (They were puffed, so half of them were air.) And what do I really have to complain about? I have a great job, great friends, a great house, great pets -- no love life, but I was married, so being single is really appealing to me right now. But I'm not perfect, and I want to be. And perfect to me is 20 pounds lighter. Once I lose that, I'll find fault with something else, I'm sure, but I'll be thin, so how bad could anything else be?
So anyway, that's where shoes come in. Many of you have seen the book we sell at ShoeTopia, "The Shoe Diet", in which the author uses her love of shoes as inspiration to lose weight. For example, whenever she felt tempted to cheat, she'd surf the net and look at shoes to keep herself on track, since shoes would be her reward when she reached certain goals. I think this is a fabulous idea, but since I have a shoe store and have shoes staring me in the face 6 days a week, I find it virtually impossible to wait to get them until I lose a few pounds. So I came up with a better idea. One of our customers had told us that every inch of heel height makes you lose five pounds -- visually, anyway. And it makes perfect sense too. Think about it --the healthy weight range for someone who is 5'8" is higher than it is for someone who is 5'4." And what easier way to lose weight than to slip on a pair of 4" platforms? Look -- I lost 20 pounds! Finally, a diet I can enjoy! Sure, it's a yo-yo diet, but hardly hazardous to my health. (A podiatrist may beg to differ, but hey, everyone has to have something fun!)

We moved!

We are now located at the shopping center at the corner of Iles and Chatham Road, across from Schnucks (Montvale Junction).