October Boot Wearing

During October I decided to keep track of which boots I wore and for how long. I tried to wear boots as much as possible, and wear taller boots whenever I could. I did my usual 'inch-hours' measurements where I took lo-tops as the zero-point and multiplied the height of the boot with how long I wore them for. If taller boots are better than shorter boots, then the higher the inch-hours score the better.

I managed to wear most of my boots, from my normal converse hi-tops, all the way up to my riding boots. I wore boots for a total of 272 hours, and lo-tops for only 43 hours. The boots I wore the longest were:
Converse XX-Hi: 87 hours (worn on 14 days out of 31. I even slept in these boots one night, which I enjoyed doing.)
Lonsdale Boxing boots: 58 hours (worn on 11 days)
Converse Hi-tops: 54 hours (worn on 8 days)
Adidas Boxing boots and Riding boots: both worn for 22 hours each.

I also wore my wellies on 15 days during the month, mainly in the garden, but managed to wear them for a total of 12 hours.

My total tally was 2,800 inch-hours if I ignored any times when I didn't wear anything. If I counted nothing as -2 inches, then the total was 1,940 inch-hours, which was equivalent to wearing Converse hi-tops for 864 hours, or 36 days straight. This was also equivalent to wearing my wellies for 139 hours, or  5.8 days.

By subtracting time spend wearing no shoes, I have to wear boots for a minimum length of time to avoid being in negative inch-hours. Since normal Converse are just over 2 inches taller than lo-tops, I need to wear them for just under 12 hours per day to break even. Alternatively I need to wear my wellies for only 3 hours a day to break even.

October Boots Survey

I have the results of the boot-wearing survey for October. As usual, boot heights are divided into low (ankle height) to top (knee length). The results are similar to previous ones where women wear more boots than men. I think all of the high and knee-length male results are from me wearing my lonsdale boxing boots and my knee length converse xx-hi, otherwise most of the male boot-wearing is short boots.


       none    low    mid    high   top
Male   84.54%  14.01% 0.48%  0.48%  0.48% (of 414 people)
Female 58.42%  17.11% 15.00% 3.68%  5.79% (of 380 people)

Male:
Female:

Boot survey part 3

It's time for another week-long boot wearing survey. This time the weather was cold but mostly dry.

Of 277 men, only 19% were wearing boots, but 52% of 250 women were in boots.

	Shoes	Ankle boot	Above the ankle	Calf length	Knee Length
Male	81.2%	15.26%	0.7%	2.2%	0.7%
Female	47.6%	18.0%	16.0%	8.8%	9.6%

Compared to the last survey, which was in december and it had been snowing, there were fewer people wearing boots. I was wearing my tall boxing boots, which will have accounted for nearly all of the calf-length male boot-wearing.

Men:

Women:

Boot survey part 2

After the recent snow and cold weather I have repeated the boot survey.
From a total of 470 people, (male 228, female 242),  30.56% of men were wearing boots and 78.51% of women wore boots. These are both increases over last month.

	Shoes	Ankle boot	Above the ankle	Calf length	Knee Length
Male	60.44%	23.96%	3.13%	2.08%	1.39%
Female	21.49%	21.90%	32.64%	14.05%	9.92%

Men:

Women:

Boot Wearing Survey

I decided to do a week-long survey of boot-wearing. This survey was conducted in and around where I work, which is in a mostly pedestrianised area. I made a note of how many people I saw while I was walking around, mainly walking between the car park and my office, and whether they were wearing shoes/trainers, ankle boots, above the ankle, calf length or knee length boots.

In total I observed 1048 people, 536 male and 512 female. 

Only 19.03% of males were wearing  boots, while 58.01% of females were wearing boots.

	Shoes	Ankle boot	Above the ankle	Calf length	Knee Length
Male	80.97%	16.23%	1.87%	0.75%	0.19%
Female	41.99%	19.14%	23.24%	11.52%	4.10%

I wasn't surprised to record that women wore more boots than men. There was only 1 recorded man wearing knee length boots and that was a builder wearing wellies. I included myself in the tally, so my 20-eye doc martens and my boxing boots helped to boost the above-the-ankle and calf length count. In fact all but one of the male calf length boots were me - the other was a motorcyclist.

In the charts below, non=shoes/trainers, low=ankle boot, mid=above the ankle, high=calf length boot and top=knee length boot.

Women:

Men:

I might conduct the survey again in the summer and see how the results change.

Summary of 2009

Ok, so 2009 is over. I was successful in wearing boots for some part of every day. There were a few days when I nearly went boot-free but I always managed to slip on a pair of boots for at least a few minutes of each day.

The most popular boots were my Vans Sk8-hi (worn for 110 days) and my Doc Martens (worn for 81 days). This is the same way round as after 6 months.

Next in popularity were my Adidas boxing boots (62 days), closely followed by Le Chameau wellies and Gola boxing boots (joint 57 days). At the 6 month point, the order was Gola,Wellies, with Adidas tying with my Levi's tall converse.

Running order after 6 months:

1. Vans Sk8-hi
2. Doc Martens
3. Gola boxing boots
4. Le Chameau wellies
5. (joint) Adidas boxing boots & Levi's boots
6. B&W Converse
7. Blue Wellies
8. Other Converse

After 12 months:

1. Vans Sk8-hi
2. Doc Martens
3. Adidas Boxing boots
4. (joint) Le Chameau Wellies & Gola boxing boots
5. (joint) B&W Converse, Levi's & Lonsdale boxing boots (new entry)
6. Blue Wellies
7. Other Converse

I only bought the Lonsdale boxing boots in October but I wore them at least once every week so they did quite well after only a few weeks.

I wore my different types of boots roughly equally. Low boots includes Vans and Converse. Boxing boots includes my Levi's 'tall converse style' boots. Knee length includes Doc Martens and Wellies.

As expected, I wore low boots mostly in the spring and summer. Knee length boots were mostly worn in autumn and winter, being worn less during summer. I wasn't expecting boxing boots to be mostly an autumn thing.

The numbers vary because I would have worn more than one pair of boots for some days, so each would count towards the total.

After 6 months, my Blue Wellies were my newest pair. They cost £20 and I had worn them fewer than 20 times, which worked out as over £1 per wearing. By the end of 2009, I had worn them 31 times. I actually bought the boots in the autumn of 2008, so I had already worn them a few times before I started keeping count. They are probably down to 50p per wearing by now. They are starting to look a bit battered since I was wearing them when I was painting the house, so I might get around to replacing them sometime this year.

Half way through the year

My year of boot wearing is half over now. I have enjoyed it so far. I thought I would give a bit of a summary of the first 6 months. I have been keeping track of how often I have worn each of my boots, even if I only wore them for a few minutes, such as pulling on a pair of wellies to go into the garden.

My Vans Sk8-Hi have seen the most use. They are a very versatile pair of boots: comfortable, ideal to wear with both long and short trousers, and suitable for both cold/wet and warm/sunny weather. I bought them about 3 years ago in a sale. They were very cheap, under £10, so I couldn't walk away without buying them.

The second most popular boots have been my doc martens. These are also my second oldest boots. I can't remember how long ago I bought them but it must be about 15 years ago or longer. Since I love wearing tall boots, I usually wear these whenever the weather is looking a bit grim.

There was a surprising tie for third place: My gola boxing boots and my Le Chameau green wellies. I occasionally wear the boxing boots in the evening. They spend most of their time under my computer desk so I usually slip them on when I'm working at my computer. My green wellies move around a lot. They sometimes spend a few weeks in the kitchen next to the back door, which means I can easily slip them on when I go to the garden. They can sometimes spend weeks in the boot of the car or in the store room near the front door.

Fifth place was also a tie, this time between my adidas boxing boots and my Levi's red tag 'fake tall converse'. These are boots which I tend to wear exclusively for work. They are very comfortable to wear when I am in the office. They were only a couple of 'points' behind third place.

The other boots, in order, are:

• Black and White Converse. My oldest boots, almost 20 years old.
• Blue Wellies. My newest boots. I still haven't reached the £1 per use mark yet.
• Maroon Converse.
• Black Converse.

Above: pie chart showing how often I have worn each of my boots.

Below: pie chart showing the different types of boots and how often I wore them. Wellies and Doc Martens count as knee length. Mid length include the boxing boots and Levi's boots. Vans and Converse make up the ankle boots. I was pleased to see that most of my boot wearing has been taller boots.