A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Clothes Horse

So I kicked off my clean living/diet yesterday with a shopping trip for my "target" jeans with my friends over at the Fashion Herald. Trying to slice 10 inches off my waist. And thank fucking christ I didn't hafta try anything on at the store - I reckon I'd rather hire a dwarf to play speedbag with my sack than try on clothes at a store. I mean honestly, is there anything worse? I've foregone trying on clothes knowing that there was a chance they'd be so small they'd dig into my aorta and my heart would explode into ribbons. Fuck it I'll shrug, I'm willing to roll the dice. Women, on the other hand, are amazing with the trying on stuff - I've even been with women who try on things they KNOW they're not even going to buy, which REALLY blows my fucking mind. Baffling. So I get home and aw fuck, whatever I've bought is about 8 sizes off. Aw well, I say. I tried. And I don't care if it cost me the last $40 to my name, and it's the difference between paying off a loan shark or him breaking my legs, I'm not returning the shit to the store. No way. It's not happening, I'm not going through that. And god forbid a woman sniffs out that you bought something that should be returned; she will be all over you like R. Kelly at a Girl Scout pee trough. "You gotta return it! Return it, return it! You gotta return it!!!!" They're as flabbergasted that you're not sprinting back to the store to return it as dudes are when you tell them you didn't score with a girl after taking her to the Olive Garden AND a movie. There are two ways to temporarily stun a woman: give her the actual number of times a day you masturbate or tell her you're not returning clothes to the store. Either one, it's a complete gut-punch to them.

So buying clothes is always a bit of a crapshoot. And while I'm thinking of it, let's take a moment to debunk this urban legend that in jean stores across the country, mothers are constantly checking the crotch of the jeans their sons try on. Anytime some kid in the movies or tv is trying on pants, we have to get the bit where the mother is completely obsessed with there being enough room in the crotch. At no point did my mother ask about my package fitting my jeans, much less dig around in there like your hear stories about. Camon.

I've found it's hard for guys to admit publicly they're fat - I never really did it til here. We always say things like "hey hey, I'm the big guy!" or some stupid shit. But the fact is we should be saying "hey hey, I've got 7 years to live and the last person to see my dick was my mom when she was fishing around in the crotch of my Toughskins!" Big, husky, whatever, we never say we're fat. Unlike a woman, who will set their alarms earlier so they can have more time to tell everyone they see how fat they are. Is there anything better than watching two chicks whose ribs you can see trying to out-fat each other? Like watching Tito and Jermaine Jackson trying to out-brother each other. Absurd.

It's the same thing with being depressed, a dude will never come out and say "I'm depressed." Women? No problem. Well, mostly cause they all think they're 400 pounds I guess. A dude and a girl could spend the day both doing the exact same thing: laying in bed staring at the wall depressed outta their minds. Yet ask them what they did all day and you'll get two different answers.

GUY: "just some bullshit."

GIRL: "Oh god, I laid in bed all day depressed out of my mind. Cried my eyes out, ate a cake, cried for a few more hours. Oh god, I'm so depressed. Oh yeah, and don't forget I'm fat."

Probably the single-most frightening thing about tagging along with a woman while she shops is that moment when she shoves her purse on you while she goes to try something on. And by "something" I mean "every fucking thing in the store." You try to run away but next thing you know you're standing there holding a handbag in the middle of the store. And of course this is the exact moment your old high school football coach has decided "you know what, this seems like the right time to stroll through the middle of Daffy's for no particular reason" - you lock eyes on each other for a split second, he sees the handbag and barely mumbles a "I fucking knew it" while shaking his head and walking away. The ironic thing is, the more you're asked to do the hold-my-purse routine, the less likely it is you'll ever fuck this woman. It's never the husbands, or boyfriends, or bad-boy fuckbuddies that do this shit. If the girl likes you and you're fucking her, you can say "get that shit away from me!" when she tries it. Hell, she's lucky you even came along. It's always the pining dudes, the hopeless Duckys of the world who are desperatly in love enough to actually say "oh yeah, of course I'll go shopping with you!!!!" in the first place. Believe me, I learned this one the hard way.

So all things considered, yesterday was fairly painless - obviously I'm not returning anything anytime soon, since it will be months before I can fit into the jeans ayway (went with the 33 inch waist after all.) I didn't hafta try anything on, and I didn't find myself holding a handbag. Well. In public. Day 2 of clean living! Winning the battle!!