Fashion... And Lack Thereof

I don't think I'm too stupid.  I can recognize when something is fashionable and when it's just designed to show rebelliousness or declare independence and free thought.

The pants hanging down off the wearer's ass is one thing, but some of the pants that I've seen displayed as their choice of hanging pants just cracked me up.  Last week I saw a guy walking down a sidewalk with his hang-me-downs at half mast as usual, but they were sweat pants!  I'm talking about some butt-ugly old sweat pants--undoubtedly off of a very tall guy because the crotch of them was hanging below his knees--being worn in a lame effort to look cool.  What they looked was pathetic.  They weren't even clean.  It basically looked like he was wearing someone's shop rag.  If someone would show him a picture of himself from behind he'd probably feel pretty stupid.

Now I keep seeing evidence of guys wearing the opposite.  Shirts or jackets with arms and waists way short, and high-water pants with no socks.  I see it as an opposite--and opposite to the extremely baggy pants that proliferated for so long (and helped to drive the crime rate lower because nobody could run in them).  I don't like either opposite.  Not one bit.  Maybe it's European--I don't know.  I haven't seen it in person yet but I'm sure I will someday, and when I do I'll click my tongue and shake my head like old people are supposed to do.  Here's an example of what I'm talking about.   The one in the middle is tolerable, but the other two... Ugghh...

Now let's talk about ladies' shoes.

A couple decades ago I remember thinking about how sorry I was to see the then-current style of shoes that was coming into vogue.  I'm talking about the flat, featureless, blah-looking shoes that totally took over for so long.  To me they looked like ballet slippers with endless varieties of paint jobs.  After all, what else can you do but change their color?  Okay, you can also put bows on them.  Basically, they don't have any other features besides the hole you stuff your foot into or the teeny excuse for a heel they have under them.  I know that flats are still available because "fad fashion" never goes away, it just diminishes into yet another among the multitudes of choices.  See, you can still get them anywhere--Here are a few still available from Target:

Is it just me?  I'm sure they're comfortable for the wearers.  They're just not flattering at all in my book.

Now let me jump to a style that I do like.  It's brand new.  I'm talking about what I guess are currently called "ankle boots", but I'm talking about the shortest of those. They have all the style of regular fashion boots (who doesn't love boots?) but have no long tops that cover the calves.  They're stripped down and display the legs in all their glory.  I think they look great with bare legs.  Like many fashion styles, they're not for everybody.  I think I like them best with short skirts.  Sorry, I just love the look.  I like the ones no taller than these:

I don't know beans about fashion, but I know what I like.