I would have pulled his shoelace as he passed by. It's important to expect the unexpected.

I'm a fan of tying my shoelaces once and then never untying them. I just slip my foot in and out of the shoe. The laces never come apart.

Yeah wow. I like that after insulting 20,000 years of hard graft before europe learned to tie its shoelaces (which it didn't invent) he throws in the US which has only graduaded from a bunch of english genocidal religious fantaics, via industrial slavery, to violent global domination after the rest of the world imploded less than 80 YEARS AGO!!
Full disclosure: Im British (sorry)

You can also use a shim to release the catch on the ties, or if you have replaced your shoelaces with paracord you can use them as a friction saw by bicycling your legs.

Both of these methods are easier if you have a little slack to play with, so don't tighten your own restraints unless you are certain the zip ties are thin enough for you to break successfully, or you don't have anything available to use as a shim or saw.

Edit: To clarify, I don't mean to suggest shimming or sawing are easier than snapping (Though with very thick ties it can be). I mean it is easier to shim or saw with a little slack, than to shim or saw without slack.

Shoelaces: nesting material
Pan: nest

Uh, well you see Officer, I'm wearing one high-top sneaker and the other one's in the sidewalk there minus its shoelace because I'm... uh... late for my basketball game and was going to do it up along the way. Oh, jeez, forgot my registration too! Mind if I put my shoe back on and wander up to my apartment to get it? Okay? Great, thanks."

*runs

>> ^radx:

"Look behind you, a Three-Headed Monkey!"
Worked against sword wielding thugs, ought to work equally well in these cases. Problem solved.


Unless your opponent happens to be a coked out schizophrenic, in which case he says "I know, that's Bob, Bob gets you when I'm finished". Might as well stick with the classics, like "Your shoelace is untied".

>> ^soulmonarch:

"This was filmed to show the passion and art of glowstringing and sticking, to show peace, love, unity and respect."
BWAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. SNORT
...whew, okay. Now that's out of my system. Cool video though.


I couldn't take that at all seriously either. It's very humorous to see how much import people ascribe to certain things.

'This was filmed to show the passion, and the art of tying my shoelaces, to show peace, love, unity and respect'

>> ^MaxWilder:

I believe the Ian Knot is a faster way to achieve a similar result. It's what I use, and though it is not perfectly secure like a double knot, I'd call it 99% and still easy to undo.

The Ian Knot achieves the exact same result, and more quickly.

But for the sake of argument, say you want to keep tying your shoes the same way you always have but want to get the strong form of the knot - this guy is still going about it inefficiently, I believe.
The gentleman in this talk recommends wrapping the loop the other way, which is fairly counter-intuitive and must be re-done each time the shoe is tied.
However, you can achieve the same result by wrapping the initial wrap (at the base of the knot) the opposite direction. Even if it "feels wrong" to do it, you still only have to do it once in a blue moon, as long as you never completely unlace that wrap. (I use an Ian Knot, but I still leave the base wrapped when I "untie" my shoes.) Then you can tie the upper, more complicated portion of the knot exactly the same as you always have, using the muscle memory you've cultivated over all these years.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'terry moore, ted, talk, shoes, laces, stronger, knot, axis, orientation, how to' to 'terry moore, ted, talk, shoes, shoelaces, stronger, knot, axis, orientation, how to' - edited by calvados

He's still doing it wrong. See video.

It will save you at least an hour of shoe-lace-tying-time in your lifetime!

I believe the Ian Knot is a faster way to achieve a similar result. It's what I use, and though it is not perfectly secure like a double knot, I'd call it 99% and still easy to undo.

2 more comments have been lost in the ether at this killed duplicate.