Manolo’s Shoe Blog

Manolo says, it is Monday, and you are back at your desk furiously burning up the internet in your Cyber Monday quest to purchase as many of the bargain-priced gifts as possible. And it is all because, this year, as God is your witness, you will not wait until the last minute to do your shopping.

Still, your tendency to wait until the last minute is nothing compared to that of your brother, who famously does all of his shopping on Christmas Eve, usually after the normal stores have closed, at the Seven-Eleven or the Quik-Stop, which accounts for the many unusual gifts you and your children and parents have received over the years. (Indeed, who can forget the Christmas in which you unwrapped the brand new oil filter wrench? Or the Christmas in which your children received bags of Slim Jims and cans of the mint flavored snuff?)

Of the course, you suspect that this is one of the many reasons why your brother Bob remains unmarried well into his early forties. Yes, he has plenty of girlfriends, including the exotic dancer who accompanied him to your niece’s christening. She was the one with the shorty-short skirt with the handkerchief hem which very nearly exposed her lady-bits when she sat down. (Gary and your teenaged son still mention her “impressive rack” when they think you are out of ear-shot.)

Sigh.

Oh well, back to the shopping.

Ayyyy! Gucci! Gucci! Gucci!

Gucci! Gucci! Gucci!

Manolo says, today is the special day of obligation here at the Manolo the Shoeblogger’s humble shoe blog, for today is the birthday of our patron saint, the Maestro Manolo Blahnik, who was born on this day in 1942.

Naturally, we shall celebrate this holy day with feasts in the Maestro’s honor, toasts to his continued good health, and shoes!

Truly, we are not worthy!

Manolo says, today as the Manolo gathers with his friends and family to give heartfelt thanks for the true blessings that Divine Providence has bestowed upon him, you may be assured, dearest internet friends, that you will be counted among the foremost of these blessings.

Allow the Manolo to now wish upon you the happiest of all Thanksgivings.

Manolo asked, whose shoes?

Manolo answers, it is the Kate Beckinsale!

Perhaps the Manolo’s internet friends were distracted by the holiday, but no one correctly identified this week’s personage of note.

Manolo says, the Manolo loves this…

My grandmother collected miniature shoes nearly her entire life. I loved her shoe collection and would plead to ‘play’ with the shoes whenever I could. I loved each shoe so much, I would even spend the occasional Saturday morning dusting the shoe cabinet and each individual shoe. I was the only relative that showed any interest in her shoes and when she died in March, 1993 at the age of 91, she willed all the miniature shoes to me.

And now you must go look at the whole collection.

Manolo asks, whose shoes?

Manolo says, it is Tuesday and you are back at your desk doing whatever it is you normally do, but very badly, as you are completely distracted by Thanksgiving, which is now barreling down upon you like the runaway freight train full of free-range turkeys.

Thanksgiving was not supposed to be crazy this year. It was going to be just you and Gary and the kids and your mother. But then your mother called two weeks ago, and said she’d invited your Uncle Bill to fly out from Buffalo for Thanksgiving.

“Okay,” you thought, “one more won’t hurt. Uncle Bill is an old school nut who will probably goad Gary into an argument about professional football. But one more won’t hurt.”

And then your mother informed you that Uncle Bill insisted on inviting his son, your layabout cousin Billy, to fly in from Hollywood to join you. Billy calls himself the “writer-director-actor-producer,” although what he really is is the 43-year-old, cut-rate playboy who subsists on the variety of menial jobs and handouts from your uncle. Although, to his credit, he did once appear as the non-speaking extra on Will and Grace, in the distant background, as the coffee shop patron.

Speaking of people subsisting on handouts, two days after your mother’s call, your daughter Jeannie, who is away at the college, called to say that she has invited some dorm friends home for Thanksgiving — three foreign girls and one Latvian boy — who have nowhere to go for the holiday.

“The more the merrier,” you think. And then the conversation takes the surreal turn.

“Mom,” says Jeannie, “one of the girls is from Africa, and in her culture the turkey is considered sacred.”

“What?”

“We can’t have turkey, because Ki’x'il’ko,” the name included three clicks and the pop, “says her people consider the turkey to be a type of sacred spirit.”

Later, when you tell Gary that you’re going to have to order goose for Thanksgiving, his reply is succinct.

“Bull-crap. The turkey is sacred to my people, too, especially when served with sweet potatoes and cranberry sauce.”

“But we can’t be offending this girl.”

“Tell her it’s a really big chicken. Nobody thinks chickens are holy.”

And then five minutes after you get off the phone with the butcher, who informs you that you cannot order the 23-pound goose, so you’ll need three smaller birds, Jeannie calls back.

“Mom,” she says, “Ki’x'il’ko says it’s okay to have a turkey. She looked up the word. It’s ostrich that’s supposed to be sacred to her people.”

Luckily, you were able to call the butcher back and cancel the flock of geese.

And now, on Tuesday, with two days to go, you are frazzled and distracted from your work. And yet you are also filled with pride that everyone would consider your home and your family as being the good place to celebrate this important holiday.

Look, here is the Christian Louboutin Feticha Botta Platform Boots, simple, beautiful, dead sexy.

Manolo says, ayyyyy! Super, extra-straight, manly-man Gerard Butler, shows that anything goes!.

Manolo says, the Manolo heartily approves of this…