“Would you like to get a pedicure?”

This is the equivalent of a guy asking you, “Hey, how about we enter the competitive eating contest? We could eat a wheelbarrow of hot dogs together.”

You see, pedicures are definitely a girl thing. Guys just don’t see a reason for them. And now with warmer weather (unless you’re reading this in Australia), it’s flip-flop time, which also means it’s pedicure time.

Many girls put more care into their feet than a guy would to his entire body. To guys, feet are . . . well, feet. We don’t really think too much about them. In fact, if some guys aren’t careful, they forget even the basics. I’ve seen guys with toenails as long as elephant tusks, and once mine looked like miniature diving boards.

Foot supplies for girls include nail polishes and dryers and mysterious products like cuticle oil. The only products available for a guy’s feet prove that we don’t really pay much attention to them: athletes foot spray, stuff to control odors or cure ingrown toenails. It’s almost insulting. Then again, some guys’ feet look so scary you could make horror movie titles trying to describe them:

It Crawled Out of the Shoe
The Giant Toe Invasion
The Smell that Destroyed the Earth

Meanwhile, foot care for girls is all about cleansing, buffing and polishing. These words mean “car wash” to a guy.

That’s the crazy thing about pedicures—girls love them, but the actions associated with them sound more like a day at a construction site: scraping, filing, sanding, painting . . . well, except for moisturizing. I doubt you’ll hear that at a construction site.

HARRY: This hydraulic nail gun is starting to hurt my hands.
ROCCO (setting down hammer): You probably need a good hand cream—something more moisturizing.

It’s also hard for guys to imagine the amount of work that goes into a pedicure. How can approximately 923 different procedures be done on feet? But then again, most guys don’t even realize they have something called a cuticle.

Here’s a guy’s version of a pedicure:

Step one: Take off socks.

Step two: Ponder, Hmmm, what’s that on my toe?

Step three: Pick it off.

Guys may not understand pedicures, but they surely appreciate them. I can’t imagine my wife, Sally, with feet like mine—and I’m sure she wouldn’t want them.

Of course, mine don’t get out too much. Here’s a hint about how often I wear flip-flops: I have a tan line at my ankles. When I’m barefoot it looks like I’m wearing white shoes or just stepped in a bucket of marshmallow crème. (Actually, that sounds pretty fun.) One of the last times I wore flip-flops all day I almost lost my feet forever.

Sally and I were at the Great Sand Dunes National Monument in Colorado. It was sunny—and sand plus sunny equals hot. The farther we walked, the hotter that sand seemed. So hot, in fact, that I finally began dancing around and flapping my arms. My feet felt like grilled sausages, and I looked like a polka dancer who was just hit by lightning. Finally, I shrieked repeatedly like a panicked duck and ran to safety—and shoes.

Was the problem the sun? The sand? No, it was my feet. Sally was still in her flip-flops.

Maybe pedicures secretly create secret agent feet, feet that feel no pain, withstand fire, explosions and raccoon attacks! If that’s true, then I think guys would be all over getting one. You can never be too ready to defend yourself from an angry raccoon.