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serindeI dragged Steve to the outlet mall yesterday on numerous quests that had eluded us. Most of them continued to elude us, alas.
Desired: casual non-jeans slacks, garter belt, moderately-casual fall/winter dress, black skirts, winter (dress) coat, next book for the Artists Way group (me); black lug boots, suit that fits, work trousers (him); small frying pan, weekend-trip-sized duffel bag, new cellphone plan (us).
Acquired: blouse, lots of silk undies, winter coat, comfy yet stylin' sandals (me); suit, 2 wondrously soft button-down shirts, work socks, work shoes (him); large umbrella, duffel bag, sm. frying pan, sundry kitchen utensils, small cutting board, and oh God a pizza stone please shoot me (us).
One of these lists is not like the others. Though my failures to acquire were not my fault, thank you. So, okay, I've been suffering through the hip-hugger craze; if you look long and hard enough you can usually find something, though. They haven't wholly eradicated regular jeans, and for dressier slacks most professional women aren't into showing their ass-cracks, so. (You're screwed if you want casual, interesting pants, of course, but at least there is something to put your limbs into.)
Skirts, now, there is a whole different problem.
This may or may not be due to the same "all women must look like young boys" aesthetic. I don't know and, frankly, I don't much care. But for whatever reason, every designer on God's green earth is missing the fact that women's waists are supposed to be smaller than their hips. I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that most Gentle Readers, even the ones who don't advance sartorially beyond jeans & t-shirt, have noticed this. It's not a great secret of the universe. Yet every. single. black. skirt I found, and I found a hell of a lot, was cut straight-down waist to hips. (Some flared out below that point. Thanks, guys, real helpful.) So I can have something that fits my waist and is really tight across the hips so it showcases the belly I still have (it's shrinking like the rest of me, but it still doesn't want to be silhouetted, m'kay?), or I can have something that fits nicely across the hips and is several inches too wide around my waist. Belt it in, you say? Mmm, doesn't that look attractive, having big wodges of fabric all scrunched together.
Let me be perfectly accurate: I did find one skirt. It fit. It was attractive. It was cheap! But someone had fucked up the side seam stitching, which was all puckered in an extremely notable fashion. Sale rack, so there wasn't another one that might not've had the problem.
Bah. Humbug!
One minor point of self-aggrandizement: I tried on a size 12 pleated miniskirt...which turned out so much too big I could take it off just by wriggling my hips; didn't have to unzip it at all. It's a bitter pleasure in light of the rest of it, but still.
If this stupidity doesn't end within the next year or so, I'm going to go after the whole lot of them with a very big axe. Just you watch those headlines. ...OK, rant over.
Steve marched along dutifully, in spite of the fact of still being sick and having various oppressions visited upon him during the course of the day, and even maintained a reasonably cheerful countenance through most of it. I have given him permission to hit me over the head with it if I fail to get our $7 of use out of said pizza stone in the next two months.
Desired: casual non-jeans slacks, garter belt, moderately-casual fall/winter dress, black skirts, winter (dress) coat, next book for the Artists Way group (me); black lug boots, suit that fits, work trousers (him); small frying pan, weekend-trip-sized duffel bag, new cellphone plan (us).
Acquired: blouse, lots of silk undies, winter coat, comfy yet stylin' sandals (me); suit, 2 wondrously soft button-down shirts, work socks, work shoes (him); large umbrella, duffel bag, sm. frying pan, sundry kitchen utensils, small cutting board, and oh God a pizza stone please shoot me (us).
One of these lists is not like the others. Though my failures to acquire were not my fault, thank you. So, okay, I've been suffering through the hip-hugger craze; if you look long and hard enough you can usually find something, though. They haven't wholly eradicated regular jeans, and for dressier slacks most professional women aren't into showing their ass-cracks, so. (You're screwed if you want casual, interesting pants, of course, but at least there is something to put your limbs into.)
Skirts, now, there is a whole different problem.
This may or may not be due to the same "all women must look like young boys" aesthetic. I don't know and, frankly, I don't much care. But for whatever reason, every designer on God's green earth is missing the fact that women's waists are supposed to be smaller than their hips. I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that most Gentle Readers, even the ones who don't advance sartorially beyond jeans & t-shirt, have noticed this. It's not a great secret of the universe. Yet every. single. black. skirt I found, and I found a hell of a lot, was cut straight-down waist to hips. (Some flared out below that point. Thanks, guys, real helpful.) So I can have something that fits my waist and is really tight across the hips so it showcases the belly I still have (it's shrinking like the rest of me, but it still doesn't want to be silhouetted, m'kay?), or I can have something that fits nicely across the hips and is several inches too wide around my waist. Belt it in, you say? Mmm, doesn't that look attractive, having big wodges of fabric all scrunched together.
Let me be perfectly accurate: I did find one skirt. It fit. It was attractive. It was cheap! But someone had fucked up the side seam stitching, which was all puckered in an extremely notable fashion. Sale rack, so there wasn't another one that might not've had the problem.
Bah. Humbug!
One minor point of self-aggrandizement: I tried on a size 12 pleated miniskirt...which turned out so much too big I could take it off just by wriggling my hips; didn't have to unzip it at all. It's a bitter pleasure in light of the rest of it, but still.
If this stupidity doesn't end within the next year or so, I'm going to go after the whole lot of them with a very big axe. Just you watch those headlines. ...OK, rant over.
Steve marched along dutifully, in spite of the fact of still being sick and having various oppressions visited upon him during the course of the day, and even maintained a reasonably cheerful countenance through most of it. I have given him permission to hit me over the head with it if I fail to get our $7 of use out of said pizza stone in the next two months.
