These are the AGL boots that I asked earlier in the week about stretching. I am pretty conflicted about these. On the one hand, the ankles come close to fitting (yes, there's still some crinkling but it's way less galoshy than most pairs I've tried), which is a huge, huge fit issue for me most of the time. They are pretty comfy, although the soles feel slightly slippery to me, the leather is nice, and the height and shape are good.

On the other hand, they were really expensive, even on sale, and for that price I kind of want them to be perfect. They are not perfect because of the slightly too tight calves (they are tight enough to pinch but then again they DO zip up so they wouldn't have to stretch very much).

And no gold zippers. I worry that these may look too boring or generic, but maybe that's because I've been obsessing over the gold zipper thing for too long. And as I mentioned, although the ankles fit more closely than most, there's still some crinkling in front. Is it too much and does this bother you? (To be honest, though, I think there's always going to be some crinkling there, otherwise I couldn't move my ankle, right?)

Anyway, I can't decide how I feel about this, and I think I might have too much emotionally invested in this boot search to be objective. So do you guys even think these are worth considering? (I will add that I do have another pair of boots coming next week, that do have gold zippers and are a much more reasonable price after discounts, so if those are fantastic this may be a moot point.)

Sorry about the weird flash-y mirror pics. It was the only way I could get the pictures to show enough detail.