OESH

Around the World in Eighty Days is one of the great serial adventures of all time. Indeed, it’s outsized success sparked the genre itself and bequeathed the presumptive title of the Father of Science Fiction on author Jules Verne.

A fitting introduction for Today’s Contest, a 5 question multiple choice test, we’ll call OESH Around the World

1. Is the following OESH in front of

A. Victoria Falls

B. Niagara Falls

C. Chagrin Falls

2. In 2012, OESHer Jo Ann Cahn is finishing her first half-marathon in

A. London

B. New York City

C. Boston

3. Are these 3 generations of OESHers related to a

A. great educator in Charlottesville

B. great trombone player in Wichita

C. great auto mechanic in Buenos Aires

4. Is OESHer Kathleen Korth sporting this Lizard high above

A. Vancouver, British Columbia

B. San Francisco, California

C. Bogota, Colombia

5. Is OESHer Becky Mitchell wearing her Classic in

A. Milan, Italy

B. Orlando, Florida

C. Green Bay, Wisconsin

Think you got ‘em all right? Submit your answers, comments, etc. to Leave a Reply below and we’ll post some of the best ones–as well as reveal the Answers!–very soon. If you’d like to email us at service@OESHshoes.com with a photo for another round of questions, we’d love to see it, too.

Some traditions are especially beautiful and MUST be continued, so back by popular demand is the blog we posted for Thanksgiving, 2011. The annual parade in New York City is the backdrop for all here at hq to wish you and your gathering a wonderful Thanksgiving, 2012!

This photo of Underdog is from the Macy’s Parade the first year we actually saw it, in 1983.

I especially remember walking around 77th street and watching them blow this guy up at 11 o’clock on Wednesday night. It’s a good thing Underdog was netted that evening–it was quite windy and if he had gotten loose he might not have responded to traditional canine commands to get in line for the parade (had he blown across the Hudson River, for instance) on Thursday morning.

And here is a certain young lady “I’m a size 8 but a size 10 feels real gooooood” from that same year. As we see Olive approaching the Dakota on Central Park West, Ms. Oyl would have gained benefit from OESH–that tendency to create a 180° angle with her feet (common to many cartoon characters, apparently) would clearly be mitigated by a compliant weight-bearing architecture allowing for a unique and healthy re-distribution of forces leading to more efficient foot motion and even, perhaps, a realistic view of proper footwear sizing. I shudder at the size of the required cantilevers, though.

Have a great Holiday!

“Confluence” is defined as a flowing together of two or more streams. Today’s journey for yet another magnificent OOTW begins with the lovely left OESH of Karen Van Lengen in a photo taken this summer:

Karen happens to be a very wonderful friend to all of us here at OESH hq, perhaps due to her remarkable capacity to listen to 5 different voices simultaneously and offer a unique blend of compassion and analytical savvy to each. Multi-tasking, thy name is KVL!!!

In her free time away from her equally awesome family–Karen manages to teach here at the University of Virginia as the distinguished Kenan Professor of Architecture, a school she lit up for the generations (n.b. plural form of the word) to follow in her previous role as Dean. Her professional work is the essence of the velvet glove–deceptively powerful in its synthesis of meaningful change in a structured boundary, presently focused on sound and the public realm.

Let’s pause to wrap our heads around that one–understanding the whys and hows of our aural sense as influenced by where we live and work & vice versa. Is that freaking cool, or What? And she loves wearing OESH! As does her Daughter Kiri, as well as her Mom, Brother, and Sister-in-Law.

Oh…and we mentioned confluence…that meeting of “two”…the other time you might have seen the glorious beach Karen was strolling upon this summer? It was St. Andrews, Scotland in July–and Can’t you hear the music from 1981′s Best Picture now? Let’s turn up the Vangelis, Ms. Conductor!

Last month we exceeded the amperage that our current electrical service could provide. To keep things going, as well as to begin using our new machines, we added not just another electrical service, but an additional utility pole with a specific type of transformer that powers our manufacturing equipment in the most efficient way.

It involved a bit of paperwork. At one point I heard, “Oh miss, only the University uses that kind of power.” But in the end, Dominion-Virginia Power came through in a big way. In less than four hours these awesome guys (and trucks) dug a deep hole, brought in and planted the pole, attached the new transformers and brought wires across the street to a tower that feeds directly into the OESH factory.

So on my way home, I hear on the radio, the famous song snippet from SNAP, “I’ve got the power!”

Indeed we do.

The National Society of Black Engineers magazine for pre-college students, NSBE Bridge, presented a fine article by Peter Slavin describing the nasty long-term consequences for women wearing high-heeled shoes in the just-published Fall, 2012 edition. Of course, the central point of the article was tethered to Casey’s research on the devastating impact on the knee joints for high heel wearers: “Biomechanics and Cute Shoes“.

As more and more publicity surrounds OESH, more and more we hear from writers who enjoy re-presenting the published medical evidence foundational to the development of OESH footwear and Casey’s story in particular. As noted above, NSBE is the third magazine this month, joining Today’s Medical Developments and VIVmag.com, to feature OESH and Casey! We are very pleased to see excellent niche publications report on the compelling movement toward our unique, healthy footwear–and are always happy to discuss OESH, your enjoyment, and the growth we are seeing, with other solid media entities looking to feature our compelling business success story.

Thanks Peter and Thanks NSBE!

Casey with Mickey the filament winder in Fall, 2012 for NSBE Bridge

This can be placed onto the top of the OESH Media pile: Online Magazine Today’s Medical Developments stacked the OESH Lizards onto the cover of the October, 2012 issue. You can find the OESH article, wonderful in every way imaginable, beginning on page 56

October, 2012 cover Today’s Medical Developments

This week’s featured OESHer, Jean Lanham, started accruing OESHer street cred back in 2011, when she sent us the following glowing testimony (which you may have seen in that August’s OESH email newsletter):

It’s me again.  I ordered size 8 Classic and I have not taken them off except for sleep.  I love them that much. I had a total knee replacement a year ago and had never regained my free and easy gait.  I’m bouncing around the place as though I was 23 all over again instead of almost 80…I have placed an order for the Lizard and I thank you very much for getting a shoe right.  The design and technical part is a wonder and I’m enjoying examining the shoe along with the joy of walking again…I discovered the site after reading the NYT article regarding toner shoes.

Jean also posted a rave review of her Classics on a Washington Post article about minimalist shoes, noting, “I have barely taken them off since I first put them on my feet (…) I have all the others that are out there and they are going to be donated to a place that recycles shoes for playground equipment.” So she cares about the children, too!

But even more than with her kind words about OESH shoes, Jean impressed us with the stories of what she does while wearing them. As a volunteer for Suburban Hospital’s Mobile Med/NIH Heart Clinic, Jean helps “provide cardiac care for the vulnerable and uninsured residents of Montgomery County, MD” – a much-needed community service, and one I personally appreciate as a heart-owning Washingtonian – and is happy to tell everyone about her fabulous shoes along the way.

Jean also loves to travel – in an email earlier this year she sent us a picture of herself on New Year’s Day crossing the Swinging Bridge in Buchanan, VA. Tracing her Southern roots, Jean braved the cold and the swinging in a pair of black Classics.

Regarding her OESH, she reported, “I was a bit hesitant to walk across something so moveable but the shoes kept me sure footed. Part of my family behind me to catch me but they weren’t needed.”

Not that that should come as a surprise – Jean, an accomplished dancer, told us she uses the Classic as her jazz shoe of choice and, though she didn’t mention doing so specifically, we’d hazard a guess that at some point she busted a move or two on her way across the bridge. Just saying.

In addition to owning an impressive five pairs of OESH (two Classics, two Suede Sandals, one Athletic) herself, Jean has also converted her three daughters to the cause. With two of them blazing through the Billy Goat Trail along the C&O Canal in Maryland and another doing her thing in Colorado, we can’t wait to see how Jean’s daughters plan to follow in Mom’s OOTW-worthy footsteps – literally and figuratively.

So there’s Jean, this week’s OOTW and our soul sister from another mister. Keep on dancing, fixing hearts, and spreading the word about sensible footwear everywhere you go!

If you would like to nominate someone you know for OESHer of the Week, email ellaevans@oeshshoes.com with their name, contact information, and what makes you think they’re the bee’s knees… get it? Bonus points for a picture of said nominee wearing their favorite pair of OESH.

VIVmag offers insight, advice and authentic stories to inspire and motivate women in their quest for a balanced and healthy lifestyle. Casey was highly impressed with their request, through writer Victoria Clayton, to discuss the remarkable research published by Casey and her colleagues on the detrimental long term effect of traditional running shoes on (especially) our knees in the recently posted Fall, 2012 issue.

VIV has a neat idea, publishing its content on-line only. It is quite satisfying to see such a state-of-the-art magazine focus on the cutting edge research of Casey. The article, MINIMAL TO THE MAX, leads with “Is less cushioning and support the secret to better running and fewer injuries? One expert is certain the new stripped-down running shoes are on the right track.” As long as they refer to the Harvard Indoor Track, we certainly agree…thanks again Victoria, and Viva la VIV!

What is it about Julia Child that brings so much joy? Maybe it’s actually, what isn’t there about her, that brings it.

Ms. Child would be 100 right now, and since this is our 100th Blog, we thought it would be great fun to celebrate her enduring spirit with a few of her mythic quotes:

“The only time to eat diet food is while you’re waiting for the steak to cook.”

“The best way to execute French cooking is to get good and loaded and whack the hell out of a chicken. Bon appétit.”

“Always remember: If you’re alone in the kitchen and you drop the lamb, you can always just pick it up. Who’s going to know?”

“Maybe the cat has fallen in the stew, or I have put the lettuce out the window and it has frozen, or the cake has collapsed…if the food is truly vile, then the cook must simply grit her teeth and bear it with a smile — and learn from her mistakes.”

And finally, who would have known that Julia Child foresaw the beauty of OESH Manufacturing: “I think every woman should have a blowtorch.”

Thanks Julia–and onto the next 100 we both go!

We make OESH for real stories. And we surely don’t look for puffy pro sports types to inspire us. Instead of following some yokel clubbing little white balls in the sand, we’ve got Kellyn Kusyk, who’s been training exclusively in OESH for a year and a half.

In her first high school cross-country tri-meet, running on a fairly difficult course (But aren’t all cross country courses difficult?), freshman Kellyn not only won, but set a course record with a time of 20:54. Kellyn was gauging her move for 19 and a half minutes, on the leader’s shoulder in second place, all the way until that last quarter mile. Then she pulled something out of nowhere, an extra gear no one knew she had. In those final few hundred yards, both girls were sprinting–but somehow Kellyn sprinted faster. So much faster in fact, that she won by a full 6 seconds.

Kellyn (orange) takes first, Louisa (white & green) finishes second

But there’s more. Her whole team won–the first tri win in four years for Charlottesville High. The fact that Kellyn’s older sister, Jayme, a junior who also trains in OESH, is captain of her team, undoubtedly has something to do with this. The Charlottesville girls team has a record 25 runners this year! And they all ran great, each in their own way. But especially it was Kellyn’s Run to Win that gives us the best inspiration of all.