Shoes are not my friends. Putting socks and shoes on rank among my least favorite activities. I often wear flip flops at inappropriate times and in colder weather than I should. This just serves to tell you a little bit about how much I pay attention to shoes. Last "winter" (in quotes because there aren't really seasons in Southern California) I needed to buy shoes. Constant wearing of flip flops was no longer an option. I went on Piperlime.com and quickly found a pair of slip-on Chucks. Yes, slip-ons, that is how much I detest putting on shoes. I don't have time for laces (and I'm in that stage of life where I'm both too old and too young for velcro).

Occasionally I get email newsletters from Piperlime. I've already explained my affinity (or lack thereof) for shoes to you. That being the case, I seldom pay attention to their emails. I'm just not usually in the market for new kicks. The subject line of today's newsletter got my attention - mostly because it seemed out of place and didn't make sense. It was: "Military's next steps. Flare jeans too!" I opened the email, just because to me that meant something about the military now wearing flare jeans (tell your own DADT joke) and I was confused.

What I found was a newsletter focused on women's footwear and jeans. Targeted message fail. I don't care about my own shoes, much less women's shoes. I discovered it may have been my own fault upon closer review of the email. It is clearly marked to set up preferences for the type of emails I would like to receive. I guess I never set them up. It even said please.

Clicking on the link brings you to a page that asks you for your email address and to confirm it. They also tell you they will send you $15 on your birthday if you tell them when it is. Then you can select to receive updates for Women, Men or Kids. Additionally, you can decide to receive emails from Gap, Banana Republic, Old Navy and Athleta, which are their sister companies. I was glad that they didn't just automatically sign me up for all of them.