Is anyone out there sickly?

Of course you are. We here in the Designated Writers offices can’t swing a cat without hitting a person who is either coughing up a lung or challenging the Consecutive Sneezes record. (JJ once sneezed 33 times in a row; he’ll have to tell you about it but I think it was in fifth grade. He came close to breaking his own record one morning at the Shreveport Journal, circa 1987. I was there. It was a joy to witness.)

Half of the DW team has been placed on the Physically Unable To Perform list. (That would be JJ.) The other half (me) is soldiering on and almost over a cold that started the day before the Hawaii Bowl in Honolulu (Hawaii Bowl Eve was Dec. 21) or on the plane home. Being in a plane with 215 other people for eight hours is like swimming in a giant petri dish. (“Yes, I’ll have coffee, tea, and bacteria. Thank you!”) People don’t realize how sick teams get during the course of their season, spending all that time together in the weight room and shower and sweating on the field/court. Injuries are more than pulled muscles and wrecked knees.

Anyway, we’ll be back to 100 percent by … well, by at least spring.

Meanwhile, if you are sick as we are, we feel your pain. And ours.

So a quick word to say we whiffed on the Los Angeles Chargers, who apparently never left Los Angeles for their unwatchable game in Foxboro, and we whiffed on the Colts, who never left Indy for their game against the “Chefs,” correctly picked the Eagles (who should have won on the scoreboard although they had no business even being in the game) to cover, and correctly picked the Rams to cover. The Rams offensive line is still knocking the Cowboys into next week.

Sunday is the best sporting day of the year, not counting possibly Masters Sunday. I have the Rams and the Chefs to cover. If I miss, well, I’m already sick, so who cares.

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(This is from our Florida-based, Chicago-raised, Louisiana Tech-educated contributor Don Walker who, considering his last name, appropriately shares today about shoes…)

The ‘Sole’ That Sees Beauty May Sometimes Walk Alone

Every year, twice a year, I purchase two pairs of dress shoes. And because I’m 59 going on 75, and I’m like an old man set in my silly ways, I buy the same brand of black and brown Dockers’ Gordon Cap-toe Oxfords. They are  dandy and everything you would want in a shoe, meaning they don’t tear at the heel of the foot on the first and second wearing; they don’t pinch the little toe; and they keep their shape until I open the next box of Gordon Cap-toe Oxfords, usually six months later. One can find a pair on sale at Macy’s or Kohl’s, and they’re usually around $55. I purchase mine online because I decided several years ago there is no reason to go where other shoes are sold right there alongside them because I know exactly what I want: Size 10 medium Docker’s Gordon Cap-toe Oxfords. If there was a fan club for Docker’s Gordon Cap-toe Oxfords I would certainly belong to it.

On Monday, after having been gifted a pair each of brown and black Gordon Cap-toe Oxfords at Christmas, I donated my most recent old pairs of Gordon Cap-toe Oxfords to Goodwill. That was last year, because today is Wednesday, Jan. 2, 2019, and I awoke ready for work and comfortable in the thought of wearing my newest pair of black Gordon Cap-toe Oxfords to work. But wait! What have I done?

I stood there at 6 a.m. with the closet door open, my chin pressed to my chest as my eyes scanned over the shoe rack. I was suddenly struck by the backlash of a noble deed. Not only had I donated my Gordon Cap-toe Oxfords to Goodwill, but I had unintentionally donated my prescribed Powerstep orthopedic insoles right along with them.  My plantar fasciitis needs those insoles for additional comfort. And, darn it all, I had visited the doctor’s office again just recently to purchase two additional sets of insoles at $45 each for those shoes I just donated!

Fast forward to 9 a.m. and I’m clogging around my office. I was determined by now that at the day’s earliest convenience I would head straight to the podiatrist’s office and purchase two new pair of insoles, owning up to my mistake by paying the full price and, essentially, turning my new $55 Dockers Godon Cap-toe Oxfords into $100 shoes. But wait!

What if I were to go to Goodwill and find my shoes on the sales floor, purchase them for $2 or so and retrieving my insoles? I would save myself as much as $75! At lunchtime I headed straight to Goodwill in search of Dockers Gordon Cap-toe Oxfords with Powerstep insoles. As I pulled in to the Goodwill parking lot from U.S. 1, I could see the “Drop-Off” area on the side of the building and there were countless bins both on the ground and on a loading dock that were overflowing with donated items. Tax time looms. Still, I remained optimistic I would find my shoes somewhere inside the store, but that was not to be. I left shoeless, but for the new shoes on my flat, achy feet.  I was told they would have one of their employees do a bin dive later in the day to see if they could be found, but I have little hope when the only description I could provide them is to show them the very shoes I was wearing and, with a nod of resignation, tell them they’d be recognizable by the blue Powerstep insoles.

“Brand of shoe?” the Goodwill manager asked.

“Umm,” I said. “They were Dockers Gordon Cap-toe Oxfords.”

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