Call it a slow news week. Call it an important medical issue that we’ve all been ignoring for far too long. Or simply call it my throwing in the towel too early, before an even more pressing issue to joke and haw about crosses my beloved news desk. Like it or not, you’re all here now and clearly although you’d probably like to think that you’ve got someplace better to be, you really don’t, so without further a due, let’s talk feet.

Specifically, my feet. I know, I know – most people think that us Internet celebrities are vastly too monumentally important to get intimate enough with their fans to the point where we might even consider sharing such vastly personal details about ourselves, but what the hey! I’m not like other writers on this here “Internet thing,” so let’s do it – let us boldly go where no other creative souls (or soles???) have dared to go before, albeit I do believe that they pretty much all opted out because of the smell. Well, their loss is our gain because I really do think that we’re all going to relate to one another even better after today’s little discussion…

…although you wouldn’t really think that there’s even much to be said about feet – they serve a very distinct purpose and except for a select few examples, they’re really not all that pretty to look at, so by this point there’s probably a few of you thinking, “What’s all of the fuss about?” Well, I’ll have you know exactly what the fuss was about – earlier this morning, I grated my feet. There – I said it, and now those few of you are probably feeling just a little bit sheepish about being such jerks, now aren’t you? I’m going to let it slide this time, in the name of continuity, but next time a little more civility in the name of my feet wouldn’t be too much to ask, I don’t think.

I’m not really even sure if grating my feet would be the correct term for it, but I’m sure you all know what I’m talking about, if not from actually doing it yourselves, but from having a significant other that’s always done it and raised a few eyebrows along the way. As some of you may be aware, apparently grating your feet is actually a very necessary practice to help remove dead skin cells that haven’t otherwise opted to leave the soles of your feet through the rigorous routines that feet find themselves going through on a daily basis. I guess it’s kind of like hair or dandruff, or when you get one of those really nasty sunburns that are normally only attributed to tourists and you end up looking like a freaking lobster for the next week – you know the kind, where it’s damn near impossible to sleep and such simple acts as breathing and blinking make you do everything shy of screaming out in pain. Granted, the stuff on your feet doesn’t really hurt, but it’s still pretty gross, if you ask me…

I think I first learned about foot grating from my mother, as I remember seeing one of those patented grating thingys (pictured above) in the medicine cabinet, but needless to say, I wasn’t about to ask and she was in no rush to tell! Many, many years later, I began to wonder for myself what the story was behind those brushes, and also why it was beginning to hurt less and less when I stepped on sharp rocks while I was walking around barefoot in the yard. Eventually I learned that it wasn’t necessarily a good thing for me to have such established padding and exactly what I could do to correct the matter. I bought one of them goofy-looking cheese grater-things for the bathroom myself, but I’d never dared to actually use it before today.

It was a simple enough discussion, and before you ask – no, I wasn’t forced to grate my feet in any way. I just briefly announced to my girlfriend, “I think I’m going to grate my feet today…” and that was that. Well, actually she technically replied with, “What???” which no surprise, I’m pretty much used to at this point, but after waving the brush to show what in the world I was actually talking about, she bid me a laughable “Oh – have fun!” and we were off!

Now, you wouldn’t think that something even called grating your feet would be anything short of painful beyond all recognition, but I suppose in considering that we’re really only dealing with already dead skin anyways, there’s not a whole lot of pain to be felt anyways. In fact, it was kind of enjoyable until I came to the stunning conclusion that my feet are gross and it’s going to take forever. It was then that I began putting a man’s spin on the approach to speed things up a bit – what if the brush had larger openings, or was simply on a motor of some sorts? Could I use a belt sander and really make Tim Allen proud, or would it just land me a weekend trip to the emergency room? Would it be worth the forty bucks to follow my girlfriend’s suggestion of going in for a pedicure and letting somebody else worry about all of that dirty work, or would doing so make me remotely gay?

…not that there’s anything wrong with that, of course…

Unfortunately, my deviating was cut short when my plans were trumped by the simple suggestion to just work on the task a little each day, and it was at that point that I’d realized that I had just spent the past twenty-five minutes genuinely thinking about the past and future welfare of my feet. It was, admittedly, a tad bit disturbing, but really it can’t be any worse than the realization you’re feeling right now as it occurs to you that you’ve just spent the last five minutes reading about my considering the past and future welfare of my feet! But I say if you’ve learned a thing or two about my feet, your own feet, or even just feet in general after reading my tale, then this column wasn’t written entirely in vain. For that, we’ll have to wait and see what next week will bring…

So just what exactly have we learned here today?

  • Not just Scott’s feet, but in fact most feet are pretty gross when you really get all up into their space, and as important as it might be for you to take good care of them yourself, if you’ve got the money to pay somebody else to take care of them for you, it’s worth being considered even just a little remotely gay to not have to undertake such tasks yourself.
  • If you do decide to tackle such immense burdens on your own, be sure to consult the owner’s manual on your foot grater to ensure that no damage is done by overzealous grating, if you will. Also, don’t use a cheese grater, even if you think it might go a little faster…
  • Don’t think that grating your feet is something that you can do in public, even if you’re one of those types who thinks it’s ok to cut your fingernails while the rest of us are all sitting around watching TV or trying to carry on good conversation. All personal grooming, and grating your feet certainly fits into this category, should be done in the privacy of your own bathroom and nowhere else!
  • And finally, no matter how much you’re looking to make a given point, don’t wave your freshly used foot grater around like a magic wand, pointing it suggestively at a spouse or loved one. If you were wondering during the act just exactly where the dead skin goes while you’re grating, a good portion of it goes inside the brush and will likewise exit the brush if it is jostled like so. Just trust me on this one, folks – nothing says, “You are so sleeping on the couch!” like spraying dead skin cells from ones feet all over your newly-washed bed sheets and/or loved ones. Again, sorry about that one, honey…

I hope you’ve found this weeks adventure to be both enlightening and beneficial to you and your feet, and with any luck, perhaps you’ll be able to turn those unsightly paws into something a little more tolerable before your next trip down to the pool as well! But of course, I’m no miracle worker, for I’m just a man with a single foot grater and arguably some of the nicest footsies this side of Tampa Bay. The rest, my friends, is up to you…