Wyn Drabble: What the floggletoggle's going on?

Wyn Drabble.

"A rose by any other name would smell as sweet," quoth Juliet Capulet.

Well, if Juliet weren't currently deceased, I would tell her that jandals by any other name (choose from thongs, slops or flip-flops) would still be just as irritating when they are near the end of their time.

Let me admit I'm no expert on the terminology of jandal anatomy but my main issue is with what I shall refer to as the floggletoggle - it's the little stop-button which prevents the crossbars (probably not their real name) pulling through the sole and rendering the jandals incapable of performing their important ambulatory function.

When I splash out and spend $3.99 on a pair of jandals, I expect them to get me through at least two summers before I struggle with toggle trouble but for two weeks now I have been struggling. With both pairs! (Yes, I have back-up jandalry.)

Floggletoggle failure appears quite suddenly. There you are sauntering along, whistling a festive song and wearing your hat at a jaunty angle when suddenly all hell breaks loose down below.

The floggletoggle pulls through its assigned hole and expanses of rubber start flailing in random directions. Sauntering ceases, the festive air fades and the hat falls off. Running repairs are pretty simple but might only last a few more steps.

A son who was home for Christmas offered me a quick-fix tip which I'm happy to pass on. You know those little fasteners that hold the sliced bread in a plastic bag? Well, you take one of those and slip it around the rod (not its real name) to which the floggletoggle is moulded on the underside of the sole (see fig 1). For a while this will prevent the problem.

Fig 1: Move back six spaces and miss a turn.

Take no notice of the use-by date on the fastener - that applies to the bread, not the jandal (see fig 2).

Fig 2: Fastener not guaranteed if used for the jandal purpose.

I wear jandals in the river whence I have just returned after letting our new dog have a swim. I find you can't beat a good jandal on a stony riverbed but the ones I just wore lasted one step through the water.

It's the increased pressure of waterflow between the bottom of the foot and the top of the jandal sole area that does it. There's probably a technical name for it - perhaps hydrotoggle.

Anyway, limp pieces of rubbery waste in hand, I had to hobble over the stones back to the car after this pedal waterflow incident. It was the death knell of this particular pair and I hadn't taken the back-up pair with me.

It was clearly time for an upgrade. I checked jandals online. To my horror they had gone up significantly. On the first site I visited, jandals were $9.99 but there were even some as high as $12.99.

One pair was $19.99 but it must have had diamond-studded floggletoggles. These were clearly jandals targeting a different demographic. More your luxury jandal.

Perhaps I needed to visit one of those bargain emporiums and rummage through some bins. But first I checked one more online option.

What I found warmed the cockles of my heart. Men's jandals in black or navy were $2 a pair. Or two pairs for $3. I resolved to buy two pairs of black ones. That would give me back-up if floggletoggle fatigue occurred. And all at 75 cents per jandal.

I discarded the old and eagerly awaited the new.

And, for Juliet's information, parting was not sweet sorrow.