I went shoe shopping this morning and walked out with two pairs.

I originally went to look at some Adidas I spotted in Osaka last month, but they didn’t feel great once I tried them on. I kept browsing and found some blue Nike Pacifics on sale that looked and felt good, so those went in the cart.

Then I wandered into the women’s section and found the same shoe in different colors, including a white version and a brighter blue. I knew right away I wanted the white ones. The blue took a little more thought, but I went with the darker shade since it’s a bit less flashy. (see bottom photo)

I used the store credit card and got $30 off, so two pairs of shoes for $93 after tax. Not bad at all!

Both pairs are heading to Japan next trip. One will stay there permanently. My Japan wardrobe is already pretty set since I left pants, shirts, underwear, and my Converse high-tops there last time. The goal is to eventually travel between our two homes with nothing more than what I’m wearing and a spare set of sleeping clothes for layovers. I think it’s a good plan.

Quick FYI: I always lace one shoe differently than the other. Just a habit I’ve had since I was a kid.

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I’ve had my Columbia sneakers for a while, but I was never a fan of the black laces. So, I swapped them out for some white laces from an old pair of running shoes, and I love the new look! In the picture, I was testing different lacing styles and ended up choosing the one on the right – clean and simple, right? The other one was just a little experiment!

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My new pair of On Cloud running shoes arrived. I usually wait for the 20-30% members-only sale at REI to buy my next pair, so when it comes time to switch over, I have shoes ready. The “experts” say that you should replace your running shoes after 400-500 miles or so, and that would mean every couple of years for me. But this past year I have been running much more, and only after 5 months, I have run 550 miles! It seems like I am just breaking in my new shoes!

Anyways, in the photo above are my brand new On Cloud running shoes (4th pair) which I will switch over to when I feel like my current shoes are ready to be retired to everyday casual use. The other pair of shoes in the photo are my original On Cloud running shoes from 2014 which I have been using as gardening/yard work/garage shoes. I will use my 2nd pair of On Clouds for that use. So it’s time to say goodbye to the old grey and orange shoes. Thank you for all the miles (and lawns mowed)!

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After a few years of use, it’s time to finally replace my black Chuck Taylor All-Stars. I’m a little sad since I’ve worn these shoes on my travels to New York City, Morocco, Spain, and China. I bet they still have a few grains of sand from the Sahara inside! Lots of great memories were made while wearing these shoes.

But it’s great to have a nice, new pair of high-tops, and there is a nice little design improvement over the old ones: the tongue has a loop to put the laces through so that the tongue stays better aligned straight. Almost every time I wore my old ones, the tongue would drift to the side and I would think to myself that I need to cut slits in the tongue to feed the laces through. I guess the designers at Converse thought the same thing!

Anyways, I bought a half-size larger than usual because I really enjoy wearing my semi-thick Darn Tough socks. This combo of sock and shoe is just about perfect now.

While doing a little research on All-Stars, I found some really cool info about them. Did you know that the basic design has been in production since 1922? Coming up on the century mark! Amazing.

By the way, I bought the shoes from Shoes.com, using Rakuten cashback. It’s a really good cash back program, and if you want to sign up using my referral link, we’ll both make out like bandits ($25 for me, $10 for you). It’s a nice and easy way to save money… in fact when I bought my barbecue grill at Walmart.com the other day, it earned me a $14.85 check. Pretty nice, right?

I hope you had a great day!

またね～

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こんばんは。How’s it going?

Today I received a pair of green Feiyue shoes in the mail. I’m excited to wear these because the heel part of the shoe is low, like a slipper. This makes it easy to slip on, but of course, it’s not so secure on the foot. But I bought these to use in the house, as slippers. I think they are really comfortable, even without socks. And I love the green logo! It’s a nice change from the red and blue logo that is on my other pair of white Feiyue shoes:

It’s weird to wear shoes in the house since we always take off our shoes when entering the house. But if I only wear them inside, that should be okay, right?

I hope you had a nice day!

またね～

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こんばんは。How are you?

Today something I have been waiting for arrived in our mailbox: new shoes! I fell in love with Feiyue sneakers when I was in China and brought a pair of white ones back with me to the States. However, they were quickly claimed by Bay (but I am happy he likes them!) so I was looking for some replacements. There are plenty of sellers on eBay and the prices were very reasonable – I bought these black sneakers for about $16 including shipping!

They are really comfortable and lightweight, but they don’t seem very durable but I think they are designed to be very flexible. It’s strange but the padding on the soles is biased towards the middle of the foot, so you feel very unstable… or you can think of it as giving you extra agility. After all, these are the sneakers favored by parkour enthusiasts and martial artists, not skaters.

Anyways, I love the look of the gummy soles even more than the white soles of the shoes that Bay took from me. And I had to tie the laces in the same way I’ve always tied them, which is simply that the pattern of the left and right do not match. I don’t remember when I started tying them this way, but it’s just something I always do now.

By the way, we don’t wear shoes inside our house normally – the only exception is with new shoes.

I hope you had a nice day!

またね～

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こんばんは。So, I’ve been wearing my black Converse a lot lately… like the past year or so. In fact, it’s the shoes I took to Morocco and Spain. And Stockholm before that. And Miami a while back. And to see SCANDAL, where I matched shoes with Rina! Everywhere. It got me thinking about the different colors of Converse again, and I am wanting a pair of red ones. It’s been a long time since I’ve owned a pair!

You know, I’m pretty sure that the type of converse you gravitate to can tell you a lot about your personality… but I don’t know exactly what those distinctions are.

However, here are a couple fun “analyses” for what Converse colors say about you. Enjoy!

• What Your Converse Say About You: A Definitive Guide by Tori Telfer
• What Your Favorite Converse Color Says About Your Personality by Stephanie Therrien

I hope you had a nice Tuesday!

またね～

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Hey there! Today I bought a new pair of hiking shoes, the Merrell Moab 2 Ventilators. Last week I went hiking and wore my Keen boots, but they are a size too small so when going downhill, my toes would hit the front of the boots. That’s not good. The reason I got the Keens was because I found them at an REI garage sale for only ~$15. They were good replacements for another pair of Keens that I bought for even less! So I couldn’t pass them up. However, as I found out last week, the small size won’t work for hiking.

Old boots and new replacements

A post shared by Barron バロン (@barronfujimoto) on Mar 23, 2017 at 9:08pm PDT

After a bit of research, I decided to go back to hiking shoes rather than boots. I used to wear hiking shoes a long time ago and thought they were great. I also decided to forego the waterproof models and try a ventilated model, and the Merrell Moab 2 Ventilators fit the bill. These feel great because the toe-box is large and fits my foot nicely. I tried on different sizes, using a very thick sock, which is comparable to my Darned Tough socks, so I am confident that the size I chose will work out well. Tomorrow I’ll put them to the test on the trail, since the weather looks good for a hike.

But if for some reason they don’t work out, I can always return them because REI has an amazing return policy.

I hope you had a great day!

またね～

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