The Devil* Wears Vibrams

(*Or God or possibly an archangel or something; it hasn’t been fully sorted out just yet.)

Here’s how nutty this barefoot and Vibram craze have become: it’s led me to plug TMZ.

A few years ago, this wouldn't have seemed out of the ordinary; large chunks of column space on this blog were regularly devoted to Britney, Beyonce, American Idol reports, and pretty much any significant blip on the pop culture radar. Gradually, and seemingly unbeknownst to me at times, an evolution of sorts took place where the pop culture stuff took a backseat to all sorts of (admittedly, equally nonsensical) other stuff that occupied my attention. In hindsight, I’ve decided to consider that turn of events as “not better or worse, just different.”

(Rest assured, however, my annual Spelling Bee report - see right sidebar - is still alive and kicking, as I’ll hopefully demonstrate later this spring. I’ll pause while you mark your calendars.)

So back to TMZ.

Over the course of a single season, Mark Pellegrino has become a favorite enigma of Lost fans. Depending on which storyline you believe, his Jacob character is either a manifestation of the Creator himself, or perhaps an assistant benevolent holy being responsible for guarding the souls of people searching for redemption. There’s also a possibility that he’s the Devil, attracting those same souls by promising them whatever their heart’s greatest desire might be. Like I said, it hasn’t been fully sorted out yet – but presumably we’ll find out for sure in about 8 more weeks.

Mark Pellegrino as Jacob; photo courtesy ABC

He also happens to be a newly converted Vibram FiveFingers user, which is the rather thin premise for the video embedded below. A TMZ crew ambushed Pellegrino at the airport after returning from Hawaii, and seemed completely fascinated by the far-out crazy things he was wearing on his feet. His reply is perfectly straightforward: “These are, like, the new thing in running shoes.” And the remark of a TMZ staffer is pretty much what you’d expect: “Could you imagine walking in the bathroom in those?”

If you're so inclined, watch it for yourself here (click into website to play):


So … yeah. The whole thing’s neither here or there really – other than perhaps a slight indication that Vibrams, as well as all things barefoot, are starting to get some heightened exposure among mysterious actors and brainless tabloid companies. Also of note is that Pellegrino refers to the FiveFingers as “Zombie Feet”, when any loyal FiveFingers user can tell you they’re really Gorilla Feet. I'm sure someone will point that out to him sometime.

I don't really have anything else to say on this one, so I guess I’ll just leave it at that. And I suddenly remembered why I don’t do as much celebrity gossip anymore.