O my gawd, gag me with a spoon! You're not seriously equating birkenstocks with flip-flops?

Valley girls wear flip-flops. Girls in Newport Beach and Venice Beach and Santa Monica and English girls out in the snow in London wear flip-flops. Maybe the Great Birkenstock/Flip-Flop divide isn't important in Florid'oh, but it is in California.

En un viejo país ineficiente, algo así como España entre dos guerras civiles, poseer una casa y poca hacienda y memoria ninguna. -- Gil de Biedma