Manolo’s Shoe Blog

Manolo says, it is Monday, and another Mother’s Day has passed and left you feeling slightly less than fully cherished and honored.

It is not that your children (and their enabler, your husband) did not try to make the day special for you, for indeed they did attempt to specialify it their own peculiar manner.

Sometimes, contrary to the popular banality, it is not the thought that counts. Sometimes, it is the actual item, or the manner in which it is delivered that counts.

Take, for the example, that celebratory breakfast in bed, prepared by your teenagers, delivered by your pre-teen, and semi-supervised by your man. Yes, the eggs were undercooked and the coffee over-bitter, but the real problem was that you were compelled to lie in the beatifically maternal state under the tray, pretending to enjoy the meal while your bladder screamed out for relief.

To say nothing of the marmalade stains on your comforter.

Let us agree that our new Mother’s Day tradition includes time for the mother get up, do her business, put on her finest houserobe, and arrange her hair into something more presentable. Then, and only then, can the digital camera make it’s appearance.

“Smile, Mom! Oh, wow, look at that hair! I’m going to put this one on my Facebook account!”

Take, also for the example, the celebratory Mother’s Day dinner at Cooter Brown’s Rib Shack. Yes, your slab of pork ribs was bar-b-qued to perfection, and the hot wings were suitably spicy, and your bottomless Mason jar of sweet tea was frequently refilled…but still, there was that nagging question at the back of your mind, “What? Was Hooters all booked up?”

Well, at the least, the Russell Stover’s chocolate sampler from your husband was tasty, even if it was delivered in the Target bag together with the receipt for the oil filter and the packet of tube socks.

You know what would have made your Mother’s Day, super fantastically special? Special shoes from Chiristan Louboutain that spell out “Love”!

.

Why, they are just like your family, impractical and faintly ridiculous, and yet also, just like your family, so filled with good intentions and sweetness, so brazenly about love, that any errors of judgment can be easily overlooked, indeed embraced as what makes them special.

Manolo says, it is Monday and you are back at your desk, and frankly, for once you are so happy to be there, although not nearly as happy as you are to know that tomorrow this election madness finally ends.

This is absolutely the last time you register you political party as “independent”. Indeed, your phone must have rung forty times this weekend, what with the robo-calls, and the pollsters, and the polite young people from both of the campaigns, trying to sway your vote, or begging for money.

Nearly as bad as the phone calls, was the constant bombardment of the television ads. Mendacity and hyperbole, bombast and misdirection, and numberless attempts to frighten and bully you into voting one way or the other, and those were just the ads for the county supervisors.

And then there is the entire problem of social discourse. You have spent the past several months tip-toeing around your acquaintances and business colleagues, speaking obliquely and avoiding certain topics, lest these peoples turn out to be the avidly unreasonable supporters of one faction or the other.

One minute you are talking about taking your nephews to the zoo, because they “love the elephants” and the next, you are embroiled in the heated argument about tax policy with someone you barely know.

Oy, but this is tiresome. You long for the days when participatory democracy meant voting for the homecoming queen, not trying to sort out the various currents and subcurrents of the modern American political system.

But, what can you do? You are the good citizen, and so you do your part, educating yourself and participating as best you can, even if you find all of it about as satisfying as the trip to the dentist.

And now you need the break, the long, pleasant, politics-free break.

Wait. What’s this in the Post? “The 2012 race commences first thing Wednesday morning.”

“Ayyyyy! Manolo take me away!”

This level of weary malaise and alarm calls for something super fantastic, some spectacular, something Louboutain!

Boots, platform, tall, fantastic, super.

Manolo says, it is Monday and you are back in the office, where the tension is thicker than the sopa de chicharo and twice as salty.

This destructive uncertainty and madness was not what you expected when you went into the investment banking so many years ago. Indeed, the recruiter at your college assured you that it would be just like sitting under the money tree and waiting for the shower of golden fruits.

But now, ayyyyyy! People are running around like the chickens with the heads taken off, smelling strongly of panic and fallen portfolios.

And you, yourself, you have the terrible insomnia, and spend every free second obsessively flipping through the business news channels, furiously texting rumors back and forth with your co-workers.

Have you heard the latest? The CFO has been placed on the suicide watch. It turns out that when he had prepped at Choate he had mercilessly, ruthlessly, bullied the younger boy, whose name he has just remembered: Ben “Stinky Pinky” Bernanke.

Ayyyy! Disastre!

You need to go immediately to your personal happy thoughts place, full of pastel-colored candy rainbows and chocolate unicorns. And shoes, beautiful expensive wonderful shoes, like these pointy-toed, patent leather boots from Christian Louboutin.

Yes, the purchase of those boots seems impossible, but have faith, the sun will come out tomorrow, bet your bottom dollar!

Manolo says, it is Monday and you are back at your desk, slaving away again for The Man. However, today, unlike most other Mondays you are feeling perky and chipper and bubbly and…and…wonderful, for you think that you may possibly, might be maybe in love.

Of the course, you cannot be 100% positively certain, for the modern condition of your generation, which might best be described as detached irony mingled with studied diffidence, has rendered you incapable of fully evaluating such things.

But, there it is again, that incomparably wonderful tingly feeling in the exact center of your chest, together with the shortness of breath that strikes you at odd minutes, with the hot flushes and the sweaty palms.

And one could well imagine that this might be the onset of some terrible illness, except that these symptoms are usually accompanied by bits and pieces of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s Sonnets from the Portuguese, frequently wrapped around powerful mental images of that broad-shouldered, curly-headed young man with the liquid brown eyes.

So that one minute you are working on the Barfflefarb account, when whammo!

I think of thee!–my thoughts do twine and bud
About thee, as wild vines, about a tree,
Put out broad leaves, and soon there’s nought to see
Except the straggling green which hides the wood.
Yet, O my palm-tree, be it understood
I will not have my thoughts instead of thee
Who art dearer, better! rather, instantly
Renew thy presence. As a strong tree should,
Rustle thy boughs and set thy trunk all bare,
And let these bands of greenery which insphere thee
Drop heavily down,–burst, shattered, everywhere!
Because, in this deep joy to see and hear thee
And breathe within thy shadow a new air,
I do not think of thee–I am too near thee.

“WHERE THE HELL DID THAT COME FROM!” you shout silently to yourself, “I haven’t read Browning since I was thirteen!”

And now your heart is pounding in your chest and sweat is beading on brow, for you are picturing your beloved (”yes, ‘beloved’ that’s the exact word”) with his trunk all bare.

Ayyyyyy! What can this be but love?

The Manolo, who has experience in such matters, would now counsel you to relax, to enjoy what is the greatest of human emotions, terrible in it’s power, sublime in its effects.

Of the course, you will need shoes, beautiful shoes expressive of your condition.

Beautiful, simple, sincere shoes such as this pointy-toed pump from Christian Louboutin, for you have decided in this instant that you have been all wrong about Elizabeth Barrett Browning, that she is the poet after your own heart, the one person–beautiful, simple, and oh so very sincere–who understands exactly how you feel!

Manolo says, Monday+January+Nasty Weather=Wicked Bad Depression

Louboutin Sandals+Crystals=Super Fantastic Happiness!

Manolo says, over the next few days, the Manolo will be giving his forecast for the coming years shoe trends.

This next trend, which has been developing over the past year, has now fully arrived, and it is the brightly colored shoes. Currently we are seeing shoes which are saturated with color, not the primary color, but rich variations in the purples, the oranges, the yellows, the greens, the blues, and the reds.

In fact, the Manolo goes so far as to call this the “Year of Color”

This trend to color is visible at all levels of the market. Look, here are affordable shoes from Enzo Angliolini in bright orange and yellow.

And in the more expensive prices, here is deep purple satin slide from Ralph Lauren.

Yellow-ish platform shoes from Bruno Frisoni.

Two varieties of red from the Christian Louboutin.

So, add some colors to your feets this year.

P.S. Shoe Trends for 2008, Part One.

Manolo says, the Manolo cannot recommend everything that comes from the atelier of Christian Louboutain. In this case, it is the Anemone, the Louboutin shoe with too much junk in the trunk.

P.S. Here is the Manolo’s internet friend Poochie expressing her disappointment with these shoess.

Manolo says, in case you may have missed this last week, the Manolo caught the shoe designer Steve Madde stealing the designs of the master Christian Louboutin, and also the photos used by the Saks department store to promote the Louboutin shoes.

Over the weekend the Manolo’s internet friend Susan, at the Counterfeit Chic, dissected this case, and notes the irony that the photo stolen from the Saks website has more protection under the law than the design of the shoes, themselves.

Of the course, for the Manolo the greatest crime is that Steve Madden is attempting to defraud his customers, by making them believe his shoddily made shoes are exactly like the masterful original upon which they are based.

P.S. The Manolo’s friend Julie, also had the few erudite words to say about this case at her new shoe blog, Almost Heeled.

Manolo says, on the left you see the beautiful Miss Fred Tacco Boot from Christian Louboutin which the Manolo mentioned earlier today, retail price $695.

On the right you see the Steve Madden Becks patent leather bootie which was spotted by the Manolo’s internet friend Carrie, and priced at $149.95.

Clearly, the Louboutin has inspired the Madden shoe, although, if one looks closely, as our internet friend Cassandra has done…

Is it just me or is the picture on the Steve Madden link Carrie posted the same exact picture of Louboutin’s shoe, but with the red sole photoshopped out?

And that is indeed the exact conclusion of the Manolo, that the graphic designers at the Steve Madden have simply stolen the Saks Fifth Avenue picture, applied the computer, and… hey presto! It is now the Steve Madden shoe!

Of the course, the other Steve Madden Becks Booties, in the different colors, required slightly more complex photoshopping mad skillz…

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