BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: olddude
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 07:21 PM

Well what I am a thinkin of leaving my old guitar strings all over the trees in the park and stuff. Hey maybe someone can use them, clean em up, why not share- times is tough ya know. One time when i was a kid my mom said, get rid of that old couch (loveseat thingy) well it was kinda heavy so I called me cousins. We couldn't figure out what to do with it ... then cousin Eddie (yes I had a cousin Eddie) came up with the plan. Well since we all when to a Catholic grade school and since Sister Rose (mean mean woman) always told us it was better to give than receive, the next morning on her front porch was an old couch with a note (no need to thank us, better to give than receive)

I am so going to burn for that one!!

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 07:00 PM

A her d of bras?

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Smokey.
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 06:37 PM

The correct collective noun for bras would have to be a 'rally'. (as in mass support)

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Slag
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 06:17 PM

A bevvy of bras? A bustle of bras? A booblet of bras? Maybe just a bunch of bras. It is certainly bizzare to see so many brazziers bound to a fence. If it involved a bra-burning would you use a brazier to burn brazziers? Missing from the photos are the free spirits who have been loosed from their bindings, what a happy lot they must be.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: frogprince
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 06:01 PM

Isn't the Christian system based on the cubit?

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 12:04 PM

Old dude, I really REALLY do not recommend taking a ladder (esp. aluminum) and putting it up to an electrical line. Wait till the shoes fall off.
==============
It occurs to me that if the drug-dealing rumor is true, then the cops simply need to look for people who are standing around outdoors in their socks.
==============
Mousethief, I learned that the two systems are called metric & Christian when I read an article about boat-building in Ireland. The Irish sailmakers showed up and the first thing they did was convert the blueprints "from metric to Christian."

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: mousethief
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 11:11 AM

"Metric and Christian"! Bwahahaha! Two thumbs up.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: olddude
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 10:34 AM

When you need a new pair, all you need to do is get a big ladder. See people are sharing things, always a good idea to help out a neighbor who needs new sneakers

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Charmion
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 10:03 AM

In my routine peregrinations about Ottawa, I pass two spots where the overhead hydro wires display dangling sneakers. I believe they are a form of performance art: Look what I can do! Dare ya ta try it!

BTW: How to identify the Ontario residents in this thread? Check the ones who use the word "hydro" to mean "electricity supply."

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 10:01 AM

Enough gab! Let's do some science.

Hanging on an electric line near Walgreens at 39th and Broadway is a pair of enormous athletic shoes (trainers). They look like they fit somebody about 6' 6" tall.

Step 1. Assume the line is 25 feet high.

Step 2. Some Mudcatter who is very tall should weigh his athletic shoe.

Step 3. Now he should weigh the shoe when it is saturated with water.

Step 4. Report data to Mudcatters

Step 5. Mudcat physicist will figure out with how much force that shoe will come down, perhaps on somebody's baby, when the shoelace finally breaks. Do it in both metric and Christian systems.

Then shoes on wires won't seem so funny.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: frogprince
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 08:54 AM

I just found some electrical wires hanging from my shoes; what do you suppose that is about?

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: JennieG
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 06:10 AM

We saw the shoes on overhead wires often when we lived in The Big Smoke (Sydney, Oz), but since moving to The Small Smoke have only seen one pair. Obviously folks hereabouts hang onto their shoes and keep wearing them, while there is still wear left; they don't want to throw away a perfectly good pair of shoes. Just think of those poor soles - sorry, souls - who have no shoes.

Cheers
JennieG

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: GUEST,Patsy
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 05:02 AM

No I can't say I've heard or seen anything like that happening in Bristol UK. I've seen the odd solitary shoe that has been accidently dropped out of a gym bag holdall and put up high on a wall for the owner to find it again or unintentionally discarded shoes or trainers after a heavy night on the beer usually found on Sunday mornings but not high on electrical wires. Shoes and clothes generally cost too much here to part with. As for stringing people up on a wire they just might do that in some areas!

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 04:26 AM

"HERE IS WHERE I AM PEDDLING DRUGS! CUSTOMERS LOOK HERE; COPS LOOK AWAY PLEASE"
There's a mile of difference between knowing drugs are being sold somewhere and catching the sellers - as the cop who told me about the practice pointed out.
I thought advertising your wares was part of the process of selling, or do they go round saying "Psst, wanna buy drugs" to everyone they meet - yup, that sounds sensible!!
Everybody knows that drugs are available in the pubs in central London, especially around Piccadilly Circus, but catching the scum at it.....
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 11 Feb 11 - 02:20 AM

Over here in the UK it is certainly not new. .....


I must have led a sheltered life!


DC

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Smokey.
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 10:47 PM

Yup, that's the one - ah, they don't write 'em like that any more.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: mousethief
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 10:33 PM

Well I never felt more like slingin' my shoes
Up on a wire, there's nothing to lose
I threw them
Now from a wire they sway

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Smokey.
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 10:03 PM

Hence the song: "Did You Ever Feel More Like Slinging Your Shoes?"

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Smokey.
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 09:57 PM

... and although it's something I've never tried, I suspect being completely off one's trolley is not conducive to the accurate projection of footwear, especially two at a time.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Smokey.
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 09:53 PM

Ah, but they won't be if they've run out..

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: mousethief
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 09:39 PM

If they're high enough they can just fly up there.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Smokey.
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 09:33 PM

How do they fetch them down again when they've run out of drugs?

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: mousethief
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 07:57 PM

Yes just what drug users need to do, say HERE IS WHERE I AM PEDDLING DRUGS! CUSTOMERS LOOK HERE; COPS LOOK AWAY PLEASE.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Fergie
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 07:46 PM

Is this a case for the 'Mythbusters'?

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 06:38 PM

Police are as capable of believing and spreading urban legends as anybody else.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Smokey.
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 04:11 PM

Sacrificial offerings to the Shoe-God. It's bound to happen when a consumer society is in recession. "And lo, more shoes shall come from the East and all soles shall be saved." (Nostradamus)

Or perhaps there are people with more shoes than sense..

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: GUEST,999
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 03:57 PM

topsie, they ain`t taken a whiff of my sneakers. Trust me, they would be sorry.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 03:31 PM

Even if it didn't originally signify a drug supplier, once people believe it does, drug suppliers may think it worth a bit of cheap advertising.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 03:02 PM

Folklore or not, the 'drugs here' explanation is solidy established in the West of Ireland. It was a garda (policeman) who told me that was what they signified.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 01:55 PM

At last! A thread truly deserving of the FOLKLORE prefix, and here it is riding naked. What a crazy place this is!

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 12:56 PM

I sorta doubt the end of school celebration thing is as applicable today as it was a few decades back. In the '50s and '60s, "gym shoes" were only for gym class. It was very uncool to wear them as daily wear. They had no class. Since the 70s, most kids wear athletic shoes all the time. There's no need to change shoes for gym class. The symbolic gesture of throwing one's ugly, smelly gym shoes (which one only owned because they were required for a despised required class) over a phone wire on the last day of class just isn't there any more.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 12:55 PM

actually, THAT picture in Cardrona, New Zealand... the idea of the fence spread.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: GUEST,999
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 12:24 PM

It`s a gift, Ebbie. Besides, Don had the cigarettes.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Ebbie
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 12:18 PM

"If you have a lot of bras all together, what's it called?"

Surely it's called 'BRASS'?

Guest/999, your compassion toward your shoeless schoolmate is impressive. :)

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: frogprince
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 12:12 PM

I know what that is, Bill; that's the fence by the gate at Mountain Air Ranch in Colorado.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 11:46 AM

Look carefully...You see... the RIGHT shoes get company.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 11:45 AM

shoes? now here's something to ponder!

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 11:00 AM

It's the urban equivalent of shooting stop signs - i.e., pointless copycat behavior. (I don't believe in the drug connection at all.)

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Bainbo
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 10:23 AM

There are hundreds of them hanging from a couple of trees in Heaton, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK.

May not be unconnected with the fact that there are a lot of students in the area. But it still makes quite an impression when you come across it unexpectedly, as I did.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: maeve
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 10:22 AM

"Lucky kids to have sneakers in the first place." That's what my husband said too.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Becca72
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 10:02 AM

Been happening in Maine since at least the early/mid 70s because I have seen it most of my life. As Maeve said, it's usually either bullying or just to see if it can be done...

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: GUEST,999
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 09:41 AM

Lucky kids to have sneakers in the first place. When my best friend in my youth lost one of his--the left one--we tied my right leg to his left leg and went to school like we were in a three-legged race. Them times was tough. Especially in winter when there was a few feet of snow on the ground.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Bobert
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 09:23 AM

Well, you do have to have electricity, Sins, to have "electrical wires"...

B;~)

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: SINSULL
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 09:20 AM

I haven't seen it in Maine, bobert, but in NYC it was a sign that the scholl year was over. No more pencils, no more books, no more teacher's dirty looks or dirty sneakers.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: maeve
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 08:57 AM

Ed T.- Yes, I've seen it in action on the last day of school.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Charley Noble
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 08:56 AM

"If the shoe fits, wear it!"

"If it don't, give it a hurl!"

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 08:52 AM

A friend indicated the show thing was often done on the last day of school before a break?

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 08:00 AM

Round here it's usually bunches of flowers for somewhere someone has died, often by the roadside after a fatal accident. I can't remember the flowers when I was younger. Probably someone did it and others liked the idea and copied it. Now they are doing it everywhere.
Could be the same with the shoes.

Another idea - in some places there is a tradition of hanging bits of cloth to a particular tree, often in connection with a wish. Maybe they throw the shoes and make a wish. If the shoes stay on the wire the wish will be granted (maybe).

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 07:52 AM

There is something peaceful about this picture:
Purple over water

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: maeve
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 07:49 AM

I can't speak about the theories regarding a connection to death or drugs. Every time I've actually seen it happening it's been one of two things:
1. Adolescent chucks shoes up to see if they'll stick or
2. Adolescent chucks another child's shoes up to bully him.
One time it was a visible celebratory act for his eighth grade graduation.

Maeve

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 07:48 AM

If you have a lot of bras all together, what's it called? Surely not a flock, not a litter, not a murder, nor a gaggle? If there is not a word, maybe Mudcat could come up with one to suggest to the international body registering such stuff (surely there is one)? :)

A pile of bras

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 07:42 AM

More bras

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Big Ballad Singer
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 07:29 AM

I used to hear that the shoes marked a spot where someone had been killed. Some said specifically by gunfire, others just said someone died at the place.

Has to have SOME kind of interpretive meaning... most people aren't smart enough for anything truly random to cross their minds. It takes a person with a very focused mind for something REALLY out of the blue to just scurry through.

I'm either sticking with the drug symbolism or the homicide symbolism. Sad, either way.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: mouldy
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 06:23 AM

My son in NZ says it's to do with drugs (in particular, "P" over there) - the type or brand of trainers denotes the type of drug, apparently.

Andrea

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Slag
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 03:53 AM

It's a stoopid fad that comes around every 15 or 20 years, not always in synch with all areas. They'll be smashing the mailboxes again here before long. No original thinkers among them.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: bobad
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 11:11 PM

I like bras on the fence better, myself.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 11:00 PM

This has been seen in Queensland too - can't remember for how long.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Ebbie
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 10:54 PM

As snopes said, boots - especially 'cowboy' boots - in the west are found festooned over all manner of fences. And I don't think those are kids, except maybe at heart.

As someone above said, What else are you going to do with 'em?

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Charley Noble
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 10:54 PM

There must have been about 50 pairs outside a seaside restaurant in Victoria, British Columbia, when we were there a few years ago. When we asked "Why?" someone explained they were a memorial to a jogger who died young. Worked for us.

I just resisted making a terrible pun...

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Beer
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 10:20 PM

Oh! you did that as well?
There's pee in my beer and I'm crying for you ......

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: mousethief
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 10:12 PM

Ick, there's pee in my beer.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Bobert
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 09:33 PM

Yeah??? Pee in the cup, beer...

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Beer
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 09:03 PM

I don't buy the drug dealing thing. I think it is just one of those silly things that the youth go through. I may be wrong, but this takes place much more in villages and lonesome highways. I am guilty of this, and back in the sixties as we left a swimming hole (This was in Nova Scotia and maybe they are still hanging there). We did it for fun, nothing to do with drugs.
ad.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: olddude
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 08:56 PM

They are all mine, I get ticked off cause I cannot find a pair that fits my oddly shaped feet

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Ed T
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 08:53 PM

Each time I see such dangling footware, I wonder,what happened to that person. Could it be a case of spontaneous combustion?

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Little Hawk
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 08:43 PM

Drugs are almost always available within shouting distance, aren't they? ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 08:27 PM

it happens in Australia, too.

And the same answers/theories are here.

Tho as my area has underground wires & is famed for drugs (it is the entertainment capital of Sydney, or maybe even Australia) the drug dealer explanation doesn't fit

sandra

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Bobert
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 08:18 PM

I like that explanation, Bill... That's kinda my take on it as well...

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Fergie
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 08:12 PM

Here in Dublin I often see pairs of sneakers/trainers hanging on overhead wires. In my experience it is mostly in workingclass areas that you can see this sight. I have been told by my sons and some of my students that is a signal that drugs are available within shouting distance.

Fergus

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Bill D
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 07:55 PM

It's the modern "Kilroy was here"

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: ClaireBear
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 07:40 PM

There's a pair dangling over lines on highway 17 a few miles out of Los Gatos. Just turned up last week. Wonder if the drug den is in the nearby reservoir or the surrounding forest? Or maybe the CDF fire station across the highway?

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Janie
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 07:38 PM

When I see them, I just think, "more litter."

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Little Hawk
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 07:02 PM

It's odd to me that this subject should come up now, because I was in Barrie a few days ago and was puzzled to see a pair of sneakers hanging from the hydro lines in just the way described in this thread. It's the first time I've ever noticed it.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: mousethief
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 06:57 PM

Hear ya, MM. The whole 'drug den' thing is inane. What drug dealer would advertise his whereabouts for the police to see? Puh-leeze.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Andy Jackson
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 06:51 PM

I think the above are all talking about 'merican shoes up wires. Over here in the UK it is certainly not new. I can well remember walking home as a nipper and often being bemused by the sight. That is over 50 years ago and I don't think they had drug dens in that part of Surrey then!

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Bill D
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 06:29 PM

guesses, plus pics

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Bill D
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 06:25 PM

Snopes knows as much as anyone

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: GUEST,999
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 06:13 PM

Someone here told me it was a way gangs marked their turf. Beats me. However, if anyone happens to come across a three hundred dollar set of high-top sneakers, size 11, please send èm to me. I`ll pay the postage.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Jack Campin
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 06:12 PM

Have a look at urban legend sites.

Subject: RE: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: BrooklynJay
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 06:07 PM

It's been going on in Brooklyn for 25-30 years that I'm aware of (if not longer).

Jay

Subject: BS: Shoes Hanging from Electrical Wires???
From: Bobert
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 05:55 PM

Okay, I'm sure this is a "men" question but seems that over my life time I have seen alot of shoes that were tied together and somehow ended up hanging from electrical wires... So the P-Vine saw here first pair today and asked me about it??? Huh??? I mean, I've been seein' 'um going back forever and just thought it was funny but...

...I didn't have a clue how this got started or what it means (if anything)...

Anyone have any thoughts on this subject???

I mean, is it a southern thang??? Do other folks do this kinda stuff, too??? I mean, it always seems to be mens shoes so I rteckon that womanz ain't into it...

(They don't wear tie shoes, Boberdz... No laces then no way to get 'um to hang...)

Good point, Anon...

So, ya'll... Have at it...

B~