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Monday, June 2, 2014

Hey! Nice Pants!


The relationship I’ve had with pants has been a long and sometimes ill-fitting one.

It’s not that I don’t like them – some of my favorite pieces of apparel have been pants! –but in a world where a size 10 is sometimes larger than a size 14, one develops trust issues.

And this is why I tried on over 10,000 pairs of pants on Sunday.

Ten thousand pairs.

The memory of those poorly lit rooms weighs heavily on me.

Part of the problem, I suspect, is that somewhere along the line the American Pants Manufacturers (in cooperation with the United Federation of Trousers) decided that while pants may be asked to successfully cover you from, say, hip to ankle, these haters of women, curves, and, yes, democracy, by golly, have decreed that they can assure coverage only when you are standing up.

Wait, what? You want to sit down? Sitting down is for chumps and you’ll do it but it will cost you the dropping of the pants’ waistline and the exposure of either a.) your underwear, or b.) your butt crack.

Both of which may lead to a guest appearance on The People of Wal-Mart.


In the fruit bowl of life, I am, physically, what one would refer to as a “pear”. I’m a little wider on the bottom than I am up top, am small around the middle, and mix well with nuts of various types.

So Sunday I braced myself for humiliation and set off in search of coverage.

When I go to try on pants, what I get a lot of, these days, is a waistband far too wide for me. I call these pants “grapefruit smugglers”, as there is plenty of room at the back for transporting your larger fruits, storing wallets, or protecting tea-cup variety dogs from larger dogs.

After several dozen pairs of pants – and listening to the women further down the dressing room aisle laugh themselves hysterical over the swimsuit/swimsuit cover-ups they needed for an upcoming cruise – I finally found what I was looking.

A single pair of pants that fit properly.

I searched in vain for another pair just like them and was denied.

Still, I have my one pair; and like my mom says, oh, no one’s looking at your pants. Change the shirts up, throw in a jacket or a scarf and no one’s the wiser.There’s nothing like starting the workweek with a new pair of pants: I feel fashionable, I feel sleek, and I feel productive.

This week’s going to be awesome.

30 comments:

vanilla said...

And you will look sleek and fashionable as you mix with the nuts!

Sioux Roslawski said...

Your waistband is too large? I ain't shedding a single tear for you (said the woman whose waistband looks like it's trying to contain a bionic bundt cake a moment before it explodes).

Kwitcherbellyachin'. ;)

Furry Bottoms said...

I had to laugh at Sioux. A bionic bundt cake?! Now that's pretty descriptive.

Your waist is tiny, you mean to say? So the waistband of the pants you try on are too large. I WISH I HAD THAT PROBLEM!!

I look like that guy in Despicable Me. Skinny legs with a large over stuffed top.

However, you're going to have a fantastic week. A new pair of pants always makes me feel neat. SO have a wonderful one!

Furry Bottoms said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

I'm a funny shape I am and pants are hard to find but I persevere....fingers crossed that the next time I go looking I also will be successful.

Leenie said...

There'a always those polyester double knit pants from the eighties. They didn't discriminate. They made EVERYBODY look bad.

Launna said...

I have the same shape Pearl. That pear shape with the huge waistline... I too get excited when I a pair that fits me correctly... :-D

Buttons Thoughts said...

Yikes I thought that walmart shot looked familiar I think that is my cousin:) Seriously 10,000 pants is not a lot in the BIG scheme of things:) I am talking about myself here as usual,mixed nuts I like that:). Hug B

Sioux Roslawski said...

Pearl--By the way, how could that woman NOT know that her rear end/thong are hanging out for everyone to gouge their eyes out over/laugh about? Can't she feel the air on that expanse of flesh?

(I consider the wellbeing of all mankind and make sure all of me is covered--at least from my knees to my neck...)

savannah said...

*sighing* This is the number one reason I wear skirts all the time, sweet pea!!! xoxoxo and here's to a great week!

Shelly said...

The gapping at the waist, hems that are hitting at the tops of the ankles...my frustrations with pants have a storied history. As they say down here, as long as your chones (Spanish slang for underwear) aren't showing, you've got a good pair of pants.

Connie said...

Pants shopping is enough to drive anybody nuts! I'm glad you found one pair you like. :)

Bill Lisleman said...

"Mix well with nuts" - hey are you calling your readers nuts?
Are your pants as colorful as your posts.

jenny_o said...

I found two perfect pairs of pants for my shape twenty years ago. They stopped making them right after that. But I still wear them, along with another almost-perfect pair from ten years ago.

I am not a fashionista. Not a surprise.

I'm glad you're going to have an awesome week!!

Yamini MacLean said...

Hari Om
...and this is why I'll stick to sari and salwar...

Super glad you are starting you week at the top of your being. May it be ever thus!! YAM xx

Joanne Noragon said...

It's so, so awful finding pants. It's even awfuler finding the perfect pair and being unable to buy a spare.

Unknown said...

So glad you found a pair to fit your pear!

Elephant's Child said...

Jealous thoughts. Now sally forth and enjoy your perfectly fitting awesome week.

Ian Lidster said...

Re the Walmart Miss, tacky. On the other hand, as a guy I kind of like seeing girls' underpants. Call me sick.

fmcgmccllc said...

When that blessed day comes that I can find pants, I buy them all even if they are mustard yellow. Pants are worse than finding a bra.

Gigi said...

Buying pants - as you well know - is a horror show. I've practically given up on them and try to wear skirts or dresses for work.

Chicken said...

I love that new pant feeling . I have the opposite problem of you, however. I can only dream about a career smuggling grapefruit and tea cup dogs. It is funny. though, how quickly that new pant feeling can turn into that, "what the hell was I thinking" lament just a couple short weeks later. Not that it will happen to you. Assuming you are a better shopper and less multiple personalitied than me. Why yes, I did just abuse that word, you want to make something of it?

Lin said...

Ugh. Pants shopping is almost as bad as shorts shopping. Double ugh. I will pay a fortune for shorts and pants if I can get them to fit right...and then I buy every color they have. It's worth it if you can find something you like.



Rose L said...

I hate pant shopping! I went to the Walmart website and was so shocked by the way people dressed!!!! I never go to Walmart so do not see these odd people.

Lynn said...

This was hysterical because I could so relate... except for the part about the waistband being too large. Errrr.

Jo-Anne's Ramblings said...

This made me laugh so much that I wet myself

Linda O'Connell said...

I have six pairs of black capris, but only one actually fits my hippo hips. I completely understand.

Jono said...

Your mom is wrong. I am looking at the pants. You can tell a lot about someone by their pants.

Geo. said...

Pearl, as a guy who got a pretty much off-the-rack 1940s body, I've never much thought about pants. But after 44 years of marriage and raising a daughter -who became a theatrical costume designer-- and reading your excellent account here, I feel absorbed into a kind of pants sisterhood. My compliments!

Drake Sigar said...

As if the discrepancies weren't confusing enough, now we have to deal with vanity sizes. Yes apparently we have gotten to the stage where we WANT manufactures to outright lie to us.