Jerry Conner: I am a professional low-budget traveller and a professional dumbass.

I am a professional low-budget traveller. In the year 2022, I'm still stuck on a limit of USD 30 per night for a hotel/motel room. This is the same limit from my youth. I hope to take this limit to my grave, but we shall see. The world never stops changing, and maybe one day I'll have to change too--or die first.

I have the luxury of being able to break this limit when necessary, but I try not to put myself in such a position. Never mind all that anyway. My thriftiness (cheapness) is widely known, so there's no reason for me to write about it. I mean, I am a self-described professional low-budget traveller after all. This post is not intended to be about hotels/motels. It's supposed to be about boots/shoes.

In preparation for a month-long hiking trip in the mountains, any reasonably coherent person would check their gear prior to packing. My excuse for not doing so? I was melting in the heat and humidity of Thailand, from which I ran away screaming, "I can't take it anymore." Still, I had plenty of time for a gear inspection that I never did. My excuse is just an excuse, a pathetic attempt to cover my failure with words.

I love my Ecco boots. They have given me many years of faithful service, but maybe too much service for too many years as it turns out. I wore them on the plane from Thailand to Korea. Everything seemed normal. They seemed to be the same reliable boots they always were. I walked 11 kilometers in them yesterday, and everything seemed okay. Sure, I saw some unidentified black stuff on my motel room floor, but I blamed it on the motel.

Now my beloved Ecco boots are in a trashcan in a shoe store at AK Plaza, attached to Pyeongtaek Station. There was no reason to keep them. They are completely gone--unusable and beyond repair. They have been replaced by an excellent pair of New Balance 878 running shoes? Walking shoes? Five minutes of fruitless Internet searching yields no decent link. You know how that goes. You finally give up, thinking: "F the Internet." Or at least I do. One thing is certain: These brand new, US size 11 New Balance shoes are a whole lot better than my broken down, aged-out-of-service Ecco boots. They have already passed a walking test. How they'll do for mountain hiking we shall see beginning soon.

To the employees of Microsoft and Google, to whom I provide so much feedback, let me clearly state: "I am a dumbass. I failed to check my hiking gear prior to packing it and using it. 64 years old, and evidently I still have no sense at all."

Let me thank the following folks: The young lady at the bakery who directed me to a shoe store. The young lady at the shoe store who directed me to AK Plaza. The gentleman at AK Plaza who directed me from his section of fancy shoes to the hidden sneaker section. And finally the young guys at the sneaker section who found a rare US size 11 shoe that should meet my walking/hiking needs.

My crime: failure to inspect my gear prior to a hiking trip

My penalty: forced purchase of a pair of New Balance 878 shoes at the price of USD 97.68 / KRW 129,000

Cheap bastard that I am, I am fully aware that I could have purchased these shoes much cheaper at Ross, Marshalls, or Nordstrom Rack in California. But I'm not in California. I'm in Pyeongtaek, where I was damn lucky to find a good pair of shoes in my size. The self-professed professional low budget traveller had to spend some serious money. But if I'm going to spend money in Korea, I'm happy to spend it here in Pyeongtaek. This is a good town with good people. Their acceptance of the sudden reappearance of an alien from another planet is greatly appreciated.