Clarence Dwinkly Award for Shoe-Tying Excellence

The Clarence Dwinkly Award for Shoe-Tying Excellence is an award given out yearly to a person who has displayed "Excellence, innovation, or perserverence in the feild of shoe-tying." The award is named after Clarence Dwinkly, author of the award-winning book How to Tie Your Shoe, and its sequel, How to Tie Your Other Shoe.

Winners of the award are given a pair of golden shoes (made of genuine gold-painted plastic). They tie the gold shoes on stage while stirring music plays. Last year's winner, Thomas Dismal, performed an on-stage shoe-tying that had many people in tears. "Up to this point in my life, I was a nobody," says Dismal, "I worked at a local bank, putting the caps on pens. But now I've won a shoe-tying award, and I feel like much less of a nobody. Sometimes, when I'm walking down the street, people actually NOTICE me!"

The award has gained much fame in the shoe-tying community, and is considered the goal of every professional shoelace tying professional. Many amateurs attempt to send videos to the award committee, including one infamous man who attempted to tie his shoes, but ended up strangling himself with the laces. He won a posthumous award that year for his heartbreaking devotion to the art of tying a knot.