Shoe Shopping Bust

Had a friend take me to tonight to K-Mart and Kohls in last-desperation attempts to find some work-a-day shoes that fit.

No go.  Only a very few W width shoes -- not in my size (8 or 8.5, a popular size) or in any style I'd care to wear to the office.

Two hours of valuable evening time wasted, and I'm so pissed off right now I could kill someone with my spit. 

Like middle-aged women don't exist?  Like no one has wide feet?  Most of the shoes and boots I saw out there are things only hookers would wear.  That you see them creeping into the "professional" (I use that word advisedly) world speaks ill volumes about the level of taste existing in women today.  I think there are MILLIONS of women out there in the world today who find themselves in the same predicament.  What the hell are they doing for shoes? Wearing sandals all year round?  Oh Goddess!  I mean, no offense, Goddess, I know you usually wear sandals and Grecian robes and all that, but I can't pull off that look at the office in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 2011. 

And what is with all this plastic sole crap?  Ho wonder so many femmes are now running around in $19.99 on sale "mukluk" slippers.  Geez!  I'd like to see them wear THOSE in a blizzard.  But maybe they're the idle wealthy, and don't have to slosh through wind, water, slush, mush and - oh yeah, the fluffy white crap that falls by the foot here in Wisconsin in December, January, February, March and sometimes April, too. 

I'm disgusted.  I need new shoes - I can't find any.  Well - maybe I could - if I spend $100 or more for a single pair.  This is not St. Louis heels I'm talking about.  This is work-a-day pumps or a flat that won't kill my feet. But, it's not as if I haven't looked (many times recently) at Zappos and other on-line shoe purveyors!

Why can't I find ANYTHING in a reasonable price?  Where did all the shoe stores go to?  All the "department stores" stock these days is "medium" width in styles I wouldn't be caught dead in.