Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus—I know because I’ve got his red shoes

Here are my new red shoes, which arrived via UPS early yesterday.  Ho Ho!  I’m so tickled to have them, I keep pausing my television to go into the bedroom and look at them.  My gosh, aren’t they nice?

Even though they weren’t cheap (more on that later) I’m surprised at their quality—it’s top notch.  And they’re real leather too.

I know what you’re probably thinking—“You got a new pair of shoes, who gives a tinker’s damn!”  Well you’re right, but you have to understand two things:

1. I’ve been looking for a pair of red running shoes for a long, long time.
2. But I’m a freak of nature and have two platypus feet.

Does this sound normal to you?  For as long as I can remember, I’ve worn a size 9 1/2 shoe.  In my thirties, my shoes began hurting my feet so I tried a size 10; but they were no good, too loose but still hurt my feet in the front.

Eventually I learned about Wide shoes, and all was good again.  Then in my early fifties, the sides of my feet began feeling pinched again.  That’s when I discovered Extra Wide.  But those shoes can be limited in style & color; still, I made do.

And then in my sixties, I began to notice that Extra Wide was a 50/50 toss up.  Sometimes they fit, not always. 

(A few weeks ago I was with my sister Shawn at a Skechers store, half the 9.5 EW shoes hurt my feet.)

So I’m on my computer a couple weeks ago, and googled “it’s hard finding mens shoes that fit”, and found a discussion board where one guy was saying the exact same thing, and someone recommended he check out Propet shoes.  They specialized in extended sizes and widths, and shoes requiring orthotics.

I went to their website and began looking around, and that’s when I saw the red shoes.  In size 9.5, up to XX (5E).  Extra EXTRA Wide.  Yes!  

Still, they were $114.95 and I couldn’t bring myself to pay that much for a pair of shoes.  (I just got 2 new pairs of shoes a month ago—buy a pair, get one for free at Skechers.)  I looked at these daily though, and then a few nights ago they were discounted to $84.00 and I pounced on them.

But there’s magic in these ruby red sneakers:  I tried them on, they fit good… but I still wished they were 2% less snug.  I looked them up again on the website and saw someone asking if you could remove the insoles as they wanted to insert their own arch supports. 

Another person said yes but remember, Propet shoes also come with removable insoles under the main insoles if you needed more room.  They do??

Yep—I found and removed them from mine (the blue insole below).  And now they fit perfect.  I think I’m going to save these sexy red beasts for our senior center’s first outing in December, and wear them with a splash of Old Spice cologne.  Maybe they’ll work their magic on someone else too. ;^)