The bottom of your shoes

[housemaidsknee]

LA guy, i got the joke, or what you thought was a joke. I was trying to answer an earlier inquiry as to whether a polished sole would in fact be slippery in the wet weather.

we all got the attempted joke. thanks, phil.

 

[LA Guy]

Ouch. No love.

 

[Phil]

Im sorry LA guy, I didnt mean to be rude. That response was written in between 2 very irate phone calls from vendors of mine. It was written in haste. No hard feelings. Now, on a happier note, I am off to Block Island for 4 days of fishing (which is really just an excuse for me to sit on the beach and drink). Have a great weekend.

 

[housemaidsknee]

Ouch.  No love.

don't take it too hard - i guess phil is right. i tend to be more curt when at work. wonder if i come off as abrasive with others around here - you've got me thinking.

 

[BjornH]

It's always slippery when wet.

To give LA guy's comment some respectability it can be viewed as a literature quote. In "The Jerk", if I remember correctly, this was tattooed on the upper inner thigh of his girlfriend. Thumbs up..

B

 

[T4phage]

Quote:

(T4phage @ 16 Sep. 2004, 06:41) Clean the sole of your shoes, then apply warm linseed oil with a toothbrush. Â Helps waterproof the bottoms.
Does it enhance the appearance?
No, not really.

 

[AlanC]

I've used some Obenauf's on soles before, although it will darken them some.

 

[JLibourel]

Back when I was an Episcopalian altar boy, some of the manuals for altar boys prescribed polishing the soles of one's shoes since they would be very visible to the congregation. I seem to have the notion that the soles of formal shoes should be blackened. Otherwise I have never heard of putting polish or dressing on soles. An exception would be edge dressing, such as Allen Edmonds sells, that I put on the visible edges of my leather-soled shoes.

Concerning putting oil on the soles of the shoes, wouldn't there be a danger that that would soften them, making them kind of "punky," hence more prone to damage or abrasion?

 

[faustian bargain]

seems like you'd leave marks on the church carpet...maybe they wanted to keep track of where the altar boys are going.

 

[johnw86]

When I was a young teen, I worked for one summer doing shoeshines in a barbershop...I was taught to use liquid polish (in the bottle with the attached sponge) to go around the edge of the sole and heel.

 

[Rabbi Mark]

Don't do it. You'll stain the carpet and after all why bother? I like the idea of an oil treatment and walking on wet sidewalks today in Manhattan I see the appeal, but polish?

I think it would give, most of all, the impression that one doesn't walk anywhere, ever, or gets carried in a sedan chair on the rare event that one does actually leave the house. So I guess if you're going for that Last Emperor of China look, go for it.

Good thing you brought this up. Nice to see an almost universal reply on a topic of men's aesthetics.

 

[Leo Jay]

Strikes me as a bit effete... and, yeah -- the whole carpeting thing...

 

[A Harris]

It's more about increasing the longevity of the soles than it is about making them pretty.

 

[Carlo]

Word of extreme caution before doing this.

In one of my genius moments I decided to do this to the bottoms of my riding boots so they would not soak in water when I was washing down a horse...

There is a little known rule in the game of polo - if you fall off while playing (AkA unscheduled dismount) you owe the other players a case of beer. I bought 3 cases of beer after the next match when I made the only thing between me and the orthopedic surgeon slick.

Lesson: He who mixes slippery stuff with the sole of his shoe had better expect to fall on his rear. Imagine stepping on wet pavement and landing on the back of that Super 150's suit.

 

[rws]

Years ago, I learned that Spanish noblemen (well, at least some members of the Spanish nobility) were nearly fanatical about having the entire soles of their shoes polished. The aesthetic desire seemed to have been to present a monochrome appearance on the foot (indeed, I don't remember seeing any "spectator" shoes on noble Spanish feet.). I don't know whether this insistence is still prevalent. (My observation was made as Franco's rule was waning, at a time when many old-fashioned social rules still appertained in Spain.) But (with apologies to Mark Bateman) having one's shoes resoled with synthetics instead of leather can satisfy that aesthetic desire.