Tuesday, May 6, 2008

The forgotten triumph of the 80s?

I was re-tying my shoes for about the 5th time today--very annoying--when a question occured to me:

Q: Why did Velcro shoes go out of style? They're so much easier!!

A: Ya got me. I used to love boat shoes, too, and they went way out of style.

All I can really do is observe that velcro's appeal fades over time. Ever look at the velcro from your toddler's shoes? Once they've pounded around in them for a few months, the "clingy" part gets so full of string, grass clippings, dog hair and shmutz that it flaps uselessly off the top of the shoe like a dried slice of ham. I imagine that, inevitably, the same thing happened to adult shoes and people got sick of pulling the springy lint out of them.

3 comments:

Donovan Valdes said...

Good point about the shmutz, but by then it's about time to replace the shoes, no? OR they could invent a replacement velcro strap to replace the old....

THAT's IT!! It must be a conspiracy by those greedy shoelace manufacturing corporations. No shortage of Shoelace Lobbyists in Washington, I'll bet. They probably also have secret agents running around America placing shmutz in Velcro straps.

Doug0 said...

I always thought it was the Shmutz Fairy.

Donovan Valdes said...

No, it's just an agent. Dressed like a fairy.