It's a Gas

The other night, while watching TV, I happened to stumble across* Center Stage. While I am extremely tempted to recap this movie in all of its craptastic glory, I can't bring myself to give it my standard treatment, as I actually adore this movie, and have seen it approximately ninety-two times.

While watching the movie, I arrived at the inevitable Big Super-Important Dance Scene Upon Which the Main Character's Entire Dancing Career Depends (mandated, of course, by Article 3, Section VI, Subparagraph J of the Dance Movie Code). In this scene, the main character, Jody, dances to a song that I (heretofore) thought was entitled ''Candy in my Heels Tonight.'' As I watched the dance scene for the fourth time in a row, I rolled my eyes at this utterly stupid chorus. Hearing this lyric, seemingly about candy in one's heels, made for a weird mental image, and, me being me, my mind somehow leaped to thinking about OTHER things that might be in one's heels, which inevitably brought me to this:**

This is seriously how my mind works. Be very afraid. Skeptical that these could really be the words to the song, I Googled the lyrics, at which point I learned that the actual phrase was CANNED HEAT, not candy.

“What kind of a person has canned heat in their heels?” I thought to myself.

As it turns out, I do.

For you see, I have farting shoes.

Allow me to explain.

In what will surely be a lesson to never clean out and organize my closet ever again, I discovered the offending footwear wayyyy in the back of my closet, buried beneath shoes, some bonus shoes, and just to change things up a bit…SHOES. The fart shoes are black leather flats that I had purchased but never worn, and somehow tossed into the abyss of my closet, forgotten…until now.

Upon discovering the shoes, I was thrilled. I mean, cute black flats? Who doesn’t need those? I decided to forego my planned-upon heels, and wear the black flats the very next day. All was going well until I stood up on the train as it pulled into the station, and I started to exit my seat. I began hearing…a distinctive sound. A sound which at first made me suspect that everyone in my immediate vicinity had eaten truck-stop enchiladas for breakfast. It soon dawned upon me, however, that the sound was coming from MY OWN FEET. Charming. It seemed that something about the shape of the shoes made them expel LOUD puffs of air with each step I took.

“Pfffbbbbt! “PWWWWRRRP!” said my shoes.

My seatmate, a middle-aged guy, looked at me with a mixture of disgust and what seemed to be admiration at my apparent brazen flatulence.

I tried to laugh it off, saying, “Oh, that? It wasn’t me! It was my shoes! Ha ha!” He shrugged...and went back to clandestinely picking his nose. Klassy!

All through the station, my shoes let out these weird, fart-sounding puffs of air. With each fartstep, I died a little inside. Particularly when I realized that my schedule was extremely packed, and would preclude me from having a free moment to stop and purchase a pair of mute footwear.

I attempted to make my way through the day by oh-so-casually gliding everywhere, rather than walking, so as to avoid the telltale noise, but I was no match for these shoes. First of all, I looked batshit insane doing this. Secondly, much like Jaws, the shoes learned from my behavior, and got smarter. I swear: They grew increasingly bold as the day went on, going so far as to make the noise when I merely shifted my weight from one foot to another in my apartment building’s (OBVIOUSLY) crowded elevator. Oh, the other passengers all tried to be nonchalant. But I know what they’ll think the next time they see me. And that thought will be, “Fart girl! Fart girl!” Or alternately, “Hey, here comes Farty!”

Sigh.

I believe with all my heart that I probably would have elicited fewer stares had I worn the leopard-print goldfish shoes.

Tempted as I was just to toss the stupid things, I kept them because If I have a free moment, I may attempt to make a video of myself walking in them so you can see/hear them in action. I'm caring like that. And also crazy.

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* Very purposefully added it to our NetFlix queue, and did a little jig of glee upon its arrival in our mailbox.

**You will have my undying love if, apropos of the goldfish shoes, this means anything to you: "Uh, your fish are dead."