About seven months later I reported buying brown Merrells from Millets in Epsom on 17th May 2012. Didn't like the brown as much as the green, but I got used to it.
There then appears to be a gap in the record although I know that I had tried to buy another pair in Epsom with none of our various outdoor shops having had anything suitable, even supposing I had been willing to move into more serious shoe mode and spend rather more than the £75 or so that the Merrells cost. TKMaxx did not do any better than the expiring, and now expired, Millets.
But I have now bought a pair of smart gray Merrells (11's) from Cotswold in Cambridge, much better than the brown although otherwise identical. An excellent buying experience with a first rate shop girl who as well as having good shop girl manners seemed to be a serious walker herself who could offer advice based on experience, as well as that from the training manual. We were very taken with the gaiters she had sold to her previous customer, natty looking things, but we desisted when she explained that they did not do away with the need for the waterproof over trousers which I find rather a pain. More for keeping rubbish out of one's shoes than for keeping rain off one's trousers and not to be confused with puttees (see illustration).
Judging from the picture I would think that it would be difficult to get the tension in puttees right and that it would be easy to get them far too tight. Would seem OK when first wound, but not OK at all after 10 minutes or so, by analogy with the difficulty one has judging the proper tension when winding a long Elastoplast onto the end of one's finger.
The brown Merrells were really quite tired, this, seemingly, after about a year, but a year in which I probably did less walking than usual. The lower heels were worn well down into the sponge interior and the complicated upper heels were getting very ragged. It is a wonder that the outer foam of the upper heel lasts as well as it does, although I try to save both heels and fingers by using FIL's handy horn-like shoe horn. Handy both because it is about a foot long and one does not have to bend to far to use it and because it has a handy little chain ring with which it can be hung just inside the back door, where it is most needed. Other, shorter shoe horns upstairs.
PS: revisiting the shoe horn in question I find that while of horny colour and of roughly horny shape, it is not horny at all. Rather made of an endangered species of West African hardwood. Leading to wondering whether unreliable memories worse than no memories at all. Are they just trash with the potential to confuse, or do they convey some deep meaning which might be deeply good for something?
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