Barefoot?

Based on the title you might think I was going to post about barefoot running, well you would be wrong. This is about barefoot driving.

I grew up driving barefoot, ok, I can almost hear some of the thoughts from those that know I am from southern Indiana (once a hillbilly, always a hillbilly). That doesn't have anything to do with it, I grew up in a small city, ok at least not much. Anyway, I started driving barefoot right after I got my license. I used to go water skiing and if you ever have wet and sandy feet, well shoes aren't really appropriate so I used to just drive without any shoes. The other problem I had was the clutch and break pedals on my old Datsun 510 were a bit smooth and if you had any moisture on your shoes, you foot would just slip off the pedal which would usually lead to a few other issues.

So, one of my favorite days in Minnesota is the first day I drive barefoot after a long cold dark snowy ugly winter, it is usually in late February or March (ok I have been known to rush it) and after that first time I tend to do it all spring/summer/fall long up until the first or second snow of the next winter. If I was tough enough I might do it all winter long but alas I am not. The way I do it is to wear my soccer slides to the car and I slip them off to drive. It does mean that I have to put shoes on in my car when I get to work as soccer slides and dress pants probably wouldn't meet our dress code. It does work ok for Kwik Trip though. It also might mean I occasionally wear strange shoes or socks at work as I have forgotten my work shoes once or twice (I always have my running stuff) but for the most part no one noticed or at least made any comments to me.

Now I used to think that it was illegal to drive barefoot but since I wasn't sure, I googled it and here is what I found on wikipedia:

Another common myth is that it is illegal to operate a motor vehicle while barefoot. Some people speculate that, because you use your feet while driving, there's more room for error and your feet could slip off of the pedals, resulting in an accident.^[7] In fact, in all 50 states and territories in the United States, as well as in Canada, and in the United Kingdom, it is perfectly legal to drive barefoot.^[7][8][9] However, in some jurisdictions, police officers may ticket you for other things if the fact that you were driving barefoot or in flip flops/high heeled shoes hindered your driving and/or resulted in an accident.^[10]

You can check out the references on wikipedia under barefoot

So if you get bored wearing shoes and aren't yet into barefoot running give barefoot driving a try, it may not be the smartest thing I do but I do know it makes driving more fun at least for me.