Shoes

There was this Scottish guy called Allen and he says to me 'Are you left handed?'. To which I reply in the negative, I was going to follow up my response with something like; why would you think I'm a cack-handed freak? but prudence got the bettor of me. Just as well really because he informs me that he's left handed and it's not too wise to jibe your superiors with such banter. It becomes apparent though, he's got a bee in his bonnet because he pursues  the topic, 'Are you sure...' yeah like that makes sense, someone not knowing which hand they favour. So to placate his curiosity I inform him that my dad was left handed, and that he was a tailor so it was something that he had to accommodate with special shears. 'I've noticed you do lots of things left handed' he continues, 'can you write your name with your left hand?'.

'I dunno, never tried.' I tell him. Anyway he passes me a pen and scrap of paper and I write my name left handed, which to my eyes, looks like the trail left by spider who's just escaped drowning in ink; Allen though, is pretty impressed by it. I invite everyone else seated at the table to have a go, we were at lunch by the way, but no one else seems inclined to try. And so the incident subsided into history, just another piece of inexplicable trivia from the past. Until that is, I had trouble with a new pair of shoes, the laces just wouldn't stay done up. So I tried to solve the problem by investigating reasons why laces would continually work loose and I came across this video: You've been tying your shoe laces the wrong way.

Right a new way to tie shoe laces, this has gotta be worth checking out I think; isn't it amazing what interest in trivia the internet arouses? Something seems very wrong though as I watch the video, the guy seems to be demonstrating the technique the wrong way round, as if he were left handed. Not another cack-handed freak I think, what the hell makes him think he's a suitable person to instruct normal people? So I find another video, same problem but this time I manage to work out these people are demonstrating the same method of tying laces that I use, just the wrong way round. That's a strange co-incidence though I think, two videos and two lefties, what can be up? Then a disturbing possibility dawns on me, hastily I check out other lace tying instructional videos and everyone is tying their laces the wrong way round. Eventually the penny drops and I realize that dad taught me how to tie shoe laces left handed. Armed with this new insight my attention returns to those troublesome shoes, the ones with the recalcitrant laces. Doesn't it make sense that the nap on laces would be arranged for right handed people, I think to myself, so I reverse the laces and guess what, it works.

So if you've got a pair of shoes where the laces keep undoing, forget the new way to tie laces, it's most probably the way you tie 'em already anyway. The problem is probably, that you're either a freaky left handed aberration or that the laces have been threaded incorrectly. It only seems to be a problem with very flat tape laces too, the ordinary round ones work either way.