Manolo says, here is the Manolo’s latest column for the Express of the Washington Post.

Dear Manolo,

I’ve just got my first big career break, an upper-midlevel management position at a new company. I’ve jut turned 27, fairly young for this position, and I’ll be supervising several people who are older and have been in the field longer than I have, so I need to look professional and authoritative without being stodgy. Please help.

Leigh

Manolo says, how the Manolo remembers his own precipitous climb up the corporate ladder at the shoe store of Señor Mercurio Albornoz y Bahamonde.

Already, by the age of twelve the youthful Manolo had achieved the exalted rank of Manager of Lacing in the Department of Boot-Blacking, where he was in command of four other shoeshine boys, including the very resentful Teofilo, who at 57 years of age, was understandably bitter at having been passed over for the promotion.

But, such was the cutthroat and competitive nature of professional shoe shining, in which only the best succeed.

Naturally, at the shoe shop of Señor Mecurio everyone understood the importance of having impressive and authoritative feetwear, shoes which instantly conveyed the importance of their owners.

Here, in the soft black patent leather, is the National from Stuart Weitzman, the handsome shoe with the air of competent authority.

Manolo says, several months ago the Manolo pointed out the audacious shamelessness of the Steve Madden shoe company, who not content to steal the shoe design, literally pirated the publicity photo from Saks Fifth Ave, in the attempt to sell peoples the cheaply fake Louboutin knockoffs.

Now comes yet another entry in the ledger of shame from Steve Madden, this time the ridiculous attempt to copy-cat the Sportiletto, the very distinctive stiletto shoe from Balenciaga.

As the Manolo’s internet friend Stacy says.

Here’s the problem, the copycat isn’t an illegal manufacturing company that specializes in secretly producing knockoff goods, it’s popular shoe designer Steve Madden. How awful is it when a designer blatantly plagiarizes another designer’s work? Even though the two labels are eons away from each other in price, reputation, quality and target buyer, it seems really wrong. It might not be so bad if the concept of making a shoe from a bunch of tennis shoe scraps had trickled down the design ladder and Steve Madden reinterpreted it in a different way (designers borrow from each other all the time and hardly any idea is a completely new idea these days), but to use the same colors and details, from the pink and black mesh down to the green buckle, is pretty unbelievable.

Unbelievable, unimaginative, unethical, and ultimately shameless.

P.S. Thanks to the Manolo’s internet friend Wannabe for alerting the Manolo to this.

Manolo asked, whose shoes?

Manolo answers, it is the Tom Cruise!

Congratulations to the Manolo’s internet friend Amy who got the correct answer first!

Manolo asks, whose shoes?

Manolo says, perhaps our long international nightmare is finally over.

Shares of Crocs Inc plummeted over 40 percent on Tuesday, a day after the maker of brightly colored plastic shoes slashed its sales and earnings projections for the first quarter and year, in what one analyst dubbed a “stunning fall.”

[...]

“Current macrotrends in the environment” have led to weaker-than-expected sales, according to Crocs Chief Executive Ron Snyder, speaking to analysts during a conference call on Tuesday. Colder weather and the closure of the company’s Canadian factory were also expected to crimp profit.

Factories producing Satan’s feetwear are closing? Sales of ugly plastic clogs are plummeting? Super Villain CEOs are whining at the press?

Can ticker-tape parades and joyous public pronouncements of thanksgiving be far behind?

Manolo says, outside it is the glorious spring Monday! The birds are chirping, the flowers are blooming and, most importantly of all, the sun is shining.

But, sadly, you are locked inside your office, chained to your desk deep in the twilight belly of the corporate galley, pulling relentlessly on your oar.

“Battle Speed!” shouts the Boss Man from the helm.

In response your district manager pounds out the new beat on the top of his desk, quickening the pace at which you must row. The next cubicle over, your immediate supervisor, Ms. Grog, begins lashing Betsy, the new girl.

“Faster, scum! Quarterly projections are down,” She yells.

At that moment the intercom crackles to life.

“Oh, noes!” you think to yourself, between breaths, “here it comes.”

“Ramming Speed!”

And now it is double-quick time, with the pounding on the desk, and the lashings of the coworkers. But it works, and the ungainly corporate ship lurches forward!

You’re pulling harder than ever now–rowing, rowing, rowing–your entire physical being engaged with the work at hand, but your mind drifts away, to Rome and that semester abroad, when Aldo, your Italian “boyfriend”, insisted on circling the Colosseum three times on his Vespa, with you hanging on the back, laughing and full of life!

“Gladiator sandals,” you think to yourself, the sound of Betsy’s whimpering at the edge of your consciousness, “I need gladiator sandals.”

Manolo says, here is the Manolo’s latest column for the Express of the Washington Post.

Dear Manolo,

I am a mom with active preschool and toddle-aged children, plus a babe in arms. I’m also building an at home business. My primary market is other moms, so I am often meeting potential customers while I’m out and about with the kids. I need to find a shoe that say pulled-together mom/successful business woman that can be worn to the park or zoo. Did I mention that I’m 5’4” and have wide feet?

Laura

Manolo says, it is lamentable, but the only truly suitable outfit for the mother of the young children is something similar to the toxic waste coveralls, cheap clothing that can be incinerated after being soaked in mucus, playground dirt, and partially-masticated arrowroot cookies.

Indeed, it is only with great effort that one can avoid the modern American version of the biohazard suit: the college sweatshirt and mommy jeans.

But, avoid it you must, for you are young and ambitious, and have plans for economic world domination, something that cannot be achieved while wearing such dowdy and dreary clothing.

As in many things, you should take as your model, the redoubtable Martha Stewart, who has perfected the entrepreneurial homemaking millionaire look: pressed and preppy, aggressively comfortable and no-nonsense.

Here is the Prari Cristina, the casually elegant, Italian wedge-heel loafer that would look perfect with jeans or khakis.

Manolo asked, whose shoes?

Manolo answers, it is the Paula Abdul!

Congratulations to the Manolo’s internet friend Kelly T, who was the first to guess the owner of these wonderful shoes.

Manolo asks, whose shoes?

Manolo says, is four and three-quarters inches too high?

In the this case, the Manolo thinks not.

Manolo says, the Spirit Fingers challenges us to identify the Bond girls.

Manolo says, if the NASCAR peoples had made their ridiculous shoes like this, it would have been infinitely more amusing.

This is the Opel Agila Shoe, which as you may see, looks like the front end of the new Opel Agila minicar, and is apparently not much smaller than the car itself.

Of the course, only the shoe, which was unveiled earlier this month at the Shoebaloo shoe store in Amsterdam, comes with this…

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