So, I went shopping for some sensible shoes that would keep
my feet dry and I ended up with these bewitching Frye mini cowboy boots….

(Okay, those of you who understand, well, you understand –
and those of you who are immune to the charms of cowboy boots, well, just shake
your heads kindly and I will go on)

So, I have these beautiful boots and they fit marvelously
and I walk around in them for several days without getting blisters or anything
(really, they are that fine!), but…my
socks keep working themselves down over my heel and wadding up under my
foot.  No fault of the boots (which, as I
said, fit marvelously) – and surely cowboys have been wearing socks
forever…they do wear socks in their
boots, don’t they?  It’s not like
Scotsmen and kilts and boxers, is it?

Anyhow, I fully intend to wear socks with my boots. 

I pondered.  And I realized
that the issue was probably the fact that the boots are not snug around the
ankles and in-steps (so that one can slide them on – they do not have zippers,
of course).  Socks are pretty stretchy –
that is, machine-made socks are
pretty stretchy – and they just sort of slithered down through the space in the
boot.  But hand-knit socks are shaped to fit the foot – they have more
structure and less stretch.

Ah ha!  I changed to
hand-knit socks and the problem was solved! 
One can only suppose that cowboys traditionally wore hand-knit socks
(what the Scots wore, hand-knit or no, I cannot suggest).

And I guess I have a pretty good reason to be searching out
the sock yarn at Madrona Fiber Arts Winter Retreat next week!