Evidently, getting a pair of black UGG Cardy’s, in a 7, is about as easy as getting a good job in this economy. I was lucky enough to be gifted with a pair of 8s for Christmas… unfortunately, they’re too big to even pretend they fit and now I’m on a mission to do an exchange.
Calling all of the stores in Illinois to see if my bad luck has finally bid me ado proved futile. Something akin to me calling up Steven Speilberg, on his cell phone, asking for a gig and him actually being happy to hear from me. You should hear the sales clerk on the other end, voice laced with an air of pity for my naivete… if not precisely an “in your dreams, loser”, then something definitely on par with that reaction.
I have a history with these boots, and I’m starting to wonder if it’s just not meant to be. Back when I was gainfully employed and couldn’t come up with enough ways to throw away my money, I set my sights on a pair of these boots. It had been a while since I owned a pair of UGGs, call it a little boycott against the boot that was on basically every female foot in the country. So when I searched Zappos I couldn’t remember which size to get. I’m typically wear a 7.5, but UGGs don’t run in half sizes.
I didn’t want to run the risk of getting the wrong size, so I put the purchase on the back burner until I could get into a store to try them on. Before that happened, the season changed and there was no longer a need to spend my money on some boots.
CUT TO: Chicago, Fall 2009.
UGG season has returned with a vengeance and I still think the Cardy’s are the cutest item in the UGGly boot family. I finally get into a store and try them on and it turns out I wear a 7, which they actually have in stock. They’re as cute on my feet as I’d imagined they’d be… problem… I’m B-R-O-K-E.
So when that super Dad of mine asks what I want for Christmas, I seize the chance to get the boot I’ve been coveting for two seasons. When he asks me what size I need… I’m stumped… I can’t remember if I need a 7 or an 8. My dad proceeds to go on a virtual wild goose chase for either a 7 or 8, because under normal circumstance I could probably fit either one. But if we’ve learned nothing over the last few months, we’ve learned that my circumstances are rebelling against normal… And unforch, my dad was not alone in his UGG search. These things are basically SOLD OUT everywhere.
On Christmas day, I’m not expecting anything when all of a sudden my dad hands me a big UGG-sized box from under the tree. My heart is pumping… did he pull it off? Really?
Like a kid 20 years my junior, I ripped off the wrapping paper, to see that paper-bag colored box with U-G-G in big letters. Thrilled is an understatement. My dad tells me that the store didn’t have a 7, which made the which size dilemma pretty simple, an 8 it was. So I slipped my feet into the warm lambs wool…
And they’re HUGE. But I want them to fit soooooo badly. I flop around in them for a while, trying to make them work, but the fact remains they are just too big. On one hand I’m eternally grateful that my Dad even bothered to search high and low for a boot that’s apparently as popular as the Sony PlayStation, on the other I’m bummed I can’t rock them on what turned out to be a very white Christmas.
The day after Christmas, armed with my 8s, I searched for a 7… this is the part where the sales clerks basically laughed in my face. Before I could even get the Ug-… out of my mouth, I’m informed that “they’re, like, sold out nationwide“.
Hoping against hope, that somewhere in the tri-state area, there is a person with a 7 wishing they had an 8, I tried again this morning, calling every store from Ohio to Indiana to no avail.
So today I blog to you so close, yet so far… with boots too big and job prospects too little… 2009 (the year of hard knocks) truly can not end soon enough.
