I basically just make it up as I go along.
Start with the Hickey Freeman catalogue.
For questions about the frogging on my smoking jacket,
go to StyleForum.net for sartorial solutions.
The done thing? L.L. Bean sends me a catalog. I send them my order from it. That settles it.
Blood-bank t-shirt XXL, denim shorts, running shoes w/o socks, gimme cap from water park
Esquire & GQ, of course. Lawyer shows on tv.
I go to up-market outlet stores or fast-fashion stores and try to look a little gayer than the rest of the straight guys. Every now and then I look at the NYT men's fashion supplements to get the salivary glands working, but mostly I just breathe it in through the adversphere.
The really important thing here, surely, is: yes, for god's sake, wear an undershirt.
6 is true. I prefer the A-shirt, known for its use in domestic violence, to the T. Doesn't give you protection in the pits, but takes care of the back and doesn't show up when you loosen the tie and top button.
Observation. IME, all middle managers and sales/marketing types dress alike, so if you wanna look like them it's not particularly hard to figure it out. Esquire and GQ, like mcmanus says, if you feel like being lectured about the precise amount of cuff to show below your jacket sleeve.
Look for what the well-dressed dyke is wearing.
Then aim to be a little less butch.
Are we talking about work clothes here, or casual?
There's also What Not to Wear, which occasionally makes over men, although like Esquire and GQ it's all about fitting people into a particular, very restrictive fashion modality. What frustrates me is that while I'd kind of like to dress a bit more nicely on a regular basis, doing so would inevitably prompt my cow-orkers to ask me how the interview went.
The really important thing here, surely, is: yes, for god's sake, wear an undershirt.
God yes. That should go without saying.
They are the undershirt that's fun to shirt.
I just run into the store, grab whatever's on the rack closest to the door, and run out. It all goes with what I already have since men are only allowed to buy one of four colors.
Then I have an inch or two chopped off the legs, since the fashion powers don't acknowledge men of my height.
16: Perhaps, but it's also a sincere question.
One just knows, especially if one spends one's childhood, youth, etc., in New England, even in what people call straitened circumstances.
"Know first who you are, and then adorn yourself accordingly."--Epictetus
17: Undershirts were murdered by Clark Gable, a few decades after the celluloid collar shuffled offstage.
Are y'all mixing up the colors on your undershirts, or keeping it corporate?
They make undershirts in different colors?
If they're different colors, they're not undershirts, they're T-shirts.
If you read Esquire religiously, you'd know this.
wear an undershirt.
Skipping an undershirt to me is sort of like wearing thong underwear: Whatever reasons you may have for doing it are your own, but your dress clothes will suffer due to the lack of buffer from sweat and other bodily fluids.
I never wore undershorts much until my now-wife declared that I look sexy in them (I'm just quoting her - I have no illusions). But they're practical as hell, and generally invisible.
Which is what makes the idea of colors so odd.
Whatever reasons you may have for doing it are your own, but your dress clothes will suffer due to the lack of buffer from sweat and other bodily fluids.
And laundering them does nothing to mitigate the damage?
I dunno about you, but I don't generally wash my clothes in the middle of the day.
25: Yeah, as far as I can see the whole point of undershirts is that you can't see them, which makes me wonder why you would wear colored ones. But I don't wear them, so I don't really know anything about this.
your dress clothes will suffer due to the lack of buffer from sweat and other bodily fluids
What other bodily fluids do you have going on up there?
I don't generally wash my clothes in the middle of the day.
Jeez, man, how much do you sweat?
Me personally? Not very much. I can tell you from observation, though, that some of my cow-orkers are not so fortunate.
(Tilda Swinton in Michael Clayton? About right for some of them.)
Huh. Not a problem I've ever had, I have to say.
If you wear both an undershirt and a shirt (not to mention a jacket) you're surely more likely to sweat. The cure causes the disease.
I'm not sure there's a done thing any more. I see people wearing what I would have thought to be quite unacceptable ties without a shred of remorse.
And laundering them does nothing to mitigate the damage?
Well....
1. Laundering shortens the lifespan of your clothes.
2. Some clothes must be drycleaned, which is expensive, bad for the environment, and an additional errand.
3. Depending on the person and the climate, sweat stains may not be cleanable.
29: Dude, I said thong underwear too.
It sounds like you guys are mostly talking about significantly fancier dress clothes than the ones I wear.
What other bodily fluids do you have going on up there?
Pus, blood, serum, you name it.
Also, I don't really understand 34.1; you mean wearing undershirts entails wearing your shirts more than once before washing them?
Salespeople. Seriously.
The last time I went on a date, I decided I wanted something new to wear. The salesguy approached asked if I was looking for work, casual... When I said "date," he looked at what I had in hand, shook his head with a kind but pitying smile, and sent me off to the dressing room where he delivered a collection of suggested options. The date was a bust, but I LOVE the new clothes. Antonio clearly knew better than I did what would look good on me.
I have to think this would work just as well for guys. Go into a store where you like the way people look and see what they set you up in.
Not necessarily. Could be Gap or J. Crew -- would you define those as fancy?
29: Drool is a problem in some work environments.
Could be Gap or J. Crew -- would you define those as fancy?
Mine are from JCPenney, so maybe.
Actually, now that I've read the thread, I have to admit that my answer, at the bottom of it all, is already there in 25: my wife tells me what to wear.
As mentioned long ago in another thread, my basic fashion sense stayed consistent from approximately 1986 until 2001, when my wife's insistence started adding fashionable items to my wardrobe.
But I think that the non-SO thing that effectively influences me is occasionally going into the local high-end, high-fashion, been-there-forever men's store (Larrimor's, for any locals) and getting a sense of how I would dress if I had a lot of $$ and good taste. Then I go into the local dept store (now Macy's) and buy stuff that is reminiscent.
Good Christ, that was a fast 15 comments for a Staurday night.
Dude, I said thong underwear too.
Aha. Must have been my tendency to try to pretend it doesn't exist.
All the people who never leave the house are giving fashion advice.
Also, does the Gap really sell dry-clean-only stuff?
I confess, I have been pushing "dry clean only" lately. It's a pain to get to the dry cleaners and thus far plenty of things labeled "dry clean only" seem to survive the machine.
Last year around this time, shivbunny decided he needed some nicer clothes and went to a men's store that was having a gigantic sale, gave them a budget, and let them take care of it.
And then spent the text day imitating the excited yelp of the salesman as he declared that shivbunny should wear earth tones. Earth tones!
Also, thongs are fine. It's not like one's ass sweats that much.
The Clark Gable story is classified as "undetermined" at Snopes. Click through and scroll down to the pretty picture. Such a fun movie.
Di makes a good point in 38. I've only followed this advice once, and had to check myself from wincing at the salesclerk's use of the verb "suiting," but she did know her stuff.
You mean wearing undershirts entails wearing your shirts more than once before washing them?
I am given to understand that particularly among younger people (not to say gentlemen specifically), the phenomenon of wearing something more than once if it passes the sniff test is quite common.
I just run into the store, grab whatever's on the rack closest to the door, and run out. It all goes with what I already have since men are only allowed to buy one of four colors.
Not this. You're buying things you're going to wear around in public, not hitting the 7-11 for a burrito.
I am given to understand that particularly among younger people (not to say gentlemen specifically), the phenomenon of wearing something more than once if it passes the sniff test is quite common.
Savages.
All the people who never leave the house are giving fashion advice.
Snark from the man who washes his clothes in the shower?
52: Also the man who put up this post.
Also, I don't know if the Gap still sells dry-clean-only, but certainly back in the day they did.
Good grief, I remember when the Gap was considered new. How unsettling.
In which he claimed My interest in this is mainly academic, don't forget.
I haven't been to the Gap in ages, so I have no idea.
55: Of course. Just saying he's not in much of a position to complain about who's responding to his question.
50: I exaggerate, but I can't say I have much fun shopping for clothes. I've only recently mastered the trick of shopping before I absolutely need five pairs of pants. The lack of desperation frees me from needing to grab whatever's at hand.
Where is this "in public" of which you speak?
Just imagine stepping into an elevator where this music is playing, and wear whatever would feel right.
My experience with buying 5 pairs of pants the day before I absolutely need to be wearing them is that it's quite difficult to find Dockers in a 32-inch waist. I bought all the ones I could find that were even vaguely in my size range, and I think that's all they had (at JCPenney, of course).
I want to say one word to you, ogged. Just one word: plastics.
No one should listen to me about fashion; I had to call my sister from the fitting room today to be talked out of buying a cheap suit because I was worn out and grouchy and just generally loathe shopping. (Her solution: "Give me your measurements and I'll go shopping." Thank heavens for siblings.)
62: That seems to be the preferred solution, yes.
Where is this "in public" of which you speak?
That place where you can't comment on Unfogged.
My undershirt encouragement has more to do with what most non-t-shirts look like without undershirts under them. (Nipply, among other things.)
My undershirt encouragement has more to do with what most non-t-shirts look like without undershirts under them. (Nipply, among other things.)
Can't say I've ever noticed this, but then I haven't been paying very close attention.
This is a real problem for many. I'm one of those deceptively charming types who can wear anything and carry it off, but I understand how tough it can be for ordinary people.
Can't say I've ever noticed this, but then I haven't been paying very close attention.
Well, all I can say is: please consider the humble undershirt, for it will make your shirts lie smooth and pleasingly.
69: I'll consider it, but my main problem with dress shirts is that they tend to be too billowy, which is unlikely to be solved by undershirts. I am teh scrawny.
This is a real problem for many.
I don't really understand this. Don't most people live and work among other people, some of whom are clothes-wearing men?
Re: 68, I think I've finally cracked Gonerill's pseudonym.
I exaggerate, but I can't say I have much fun shopping for clothes.
Also: yeah, shopping can be a pain in the ass, especially if you don't know what you're looking for and/or are hard to fit. I think many men tend to find clothes shopping more challenging because a) they don't realize that just because it's for sale and it fits doesn't mean it's a good look for you; b) women have more latitude for self-expression in clothing, which can make shopping more fun for us; and c) women tend to be more practiced at it and have learned which brands/styles/stores work for us and which don't. It takes some effort to learn what does and doesn't work on you, but it pays off because you can blow right past the stuff that will look like ass on you and get something good.
I wear the same clothes unto rags until whichever woman I have been living with gets embarrassed and buys me new clothes. Then the circle begins anew.
Undershirts? I go from my air conditioned house to my air conditioned office, via my air conditioned car. I do not understand this bodily fluid problem of which you speak. Also, I smell like roses.
Also, if you can't see Apo's nipples, how will you know when he's ready for action?
Damn. Rumbled. What was I thinking when they took that photo, though? Possibly I was aiming for the "effortlessly handsome in my natural environment, doing crunches on a concrete slag heap" look.
teo,
I'm so glad to hear of someone who also has my sartorial problems. 32 waists are hard to find, but a 31 would be more accurate and they're basically impossible to find. And dress shirts that are long enough in the arm are tres billowy. It makes me look like a little kid trying on his dad's clothes. I never would have thought that anyone 6 foot tall would need to wear a small. The advent of slim fits of various kinds has helped though. The funny thing is that the sizes that fit me fine shopping in West Coast cities end up being enormous on my when purchased in the Midwest or South.
73: That's all true, but it feels like more of a lack of excitement on my part. Clothes just don't give me that same jolt as shopping for music or books, or the occasional electronic doo-dad. I can hang out in a book store for ages, but I refuse to rummage through a chaotic discount rack.
So I guess I'll be waiting in line when the iPants come out.
I'll be second in line for iPants. I can think of all kinds of great apps for them.
Another thing I don't understand: pleats. As far as I can tell all they do is make your pants look gigantic.
(Good thing Labs no longer reads the blog.)
77: It's really quite remarkable, because I'm like the most average-sized guy ever, that it can be so difficult for me to find clothes that fit.
It isn't the pleats that make Labs' pants look gigantic.
And dress shirts that are long enough in the arm are tres billowy
Oh wait, maybe I do have something helpful. The skinniest guy I know actually buys European clothes because they look less clownish on him.
Unfortunately, that's the end of my helpfulness. I have no idea what brands or where to purchase. (I do know that they are not noticably different from American clothes -- that is, I've seen European stuff that looked like it was from a different planet, but these clothes aren't like that.)
Well, it must be the pleats that make mine look gigantic.
As far as I can tell all they do is make your pants stomach look gigantic.
Fixed.
83: Yes! We were all commenting at a party about a friend with a European wife who looked like a damn furriner now.
Yes, pleats make me look like I'm storing a month's worth of food in my jock. When that comes into style, I'm all over that.
My style is relatively basic. I get Men's Vogue bc the editor is the gf's friend. So I look at that. I also see other guys in suits every day so I have a constant monitor on dress style.
For casual stuff, I keep basic as well. Like Di, I ask salespeople.
Actually I should be paying more attention. I got invited to this sorority event and will have to avoid looking either like a geezer or a skeezer.
It strikes me that we no longer have a rich stock of phrases with which to describe the man who is too concerned with fashion. Fop. Dandy. Coxcomb. Macaroni. Swell. They're all obsolete.
Is it because we no longer subscribe to the notion that a man can be too concerned with fashion?
Compare:
Are y'all mixing up the colors on your undershirts, or keeping it corporate?
and
All the people who never leave the house are giving fashion advice.
with:
My interest in this is mainly academic
Coxcomb. Macaroni. Swell.
Never heard these, but I did almost use "fop" and "dandy" instead of "fey" and "mannered."
Seriously, while I'm not sure what an undershirt for a man is that's not a t-shirt, I'd venture that you'd be interested in different colors for sexy disrobing purposes. Or the very thought of same in the course of your daily perambulations. Think, men, think.
Fops never store a month's worth of food in their jocks.
92: I thought of metrosexual, but I've only ever encountered the term in the Style section of the NYTimes, where it's presented as something fresh and positive (albeit, sometimes in a somewhat tongue-in-cheek manner). Those earlier terms carried a decidedly negative charge.
93: You've heard Yankee Doodle, right?
Stuck a feather in his cap
and called it "macaroni"
I have no idea what brands or where to purchase.
I shop at Sean because their stuff is European cut and fits me better. They're only in a few cities though.
but I did almost use "fop" and "dandy" instead of "fey" and "mannered."
Thereby almost demonstrating a keen grasp of the distinction between adjectives and nouns.
Thereby almost demonstrating a keen grasp of the distinction between adjectives and nouns.
Sometimes Ben, as in this instance, I write things while thinking "I'll bet w-lfs-n will nitpick this," and leave it unchanged just so that I can feel like I'm playing you like a marionette. FYI.
I shop at Sean because their stuff is European cut
What an annoying website. "Welcome to our online store" it says. "Welcome to our online 4 page brochure, circa the web 1998" is what they mean. But I suppose if you could buy stuff online then just any old plebe could purchase from them ...
Stuck a feather in his cap
and called it "macaroni"
I always wondered what the hell that meant.
There's a Sean store very near to me which I walk by somewhat often. There are some cool clockwork cufflinks currently in the display, after which I lust despite having no french cuff shirts.
What an annoying website.
Agreed. I also don't understand why all their press notes how cheap they are--"Gap prices"--when all their pants are $175.
Does anyone else find a problem with the word "slacks". Erasing that word from your vocabulary might be the first step.
Oh, I guess it's just one blurb, but I've seen them described as affordable elsewhere.
"Gap prices"--when all their pants are $175.
Maybe they mean the resulting hole in your food budget.
Maybe the Gap has gotten more expensive.
As always in this area, the most parsimonious explanation is that fashion writers are people paid to talk out of their ass.
Wasn't there a store called MODE or something in the late 80s? Jesus, I had a slick pair of pants from there (selected by my mom - I swear to god I'm capable of picking my own clothes, I just tend not to). Muted houndstooth, black & white, slightly trim at the ankle but not pegged....
Actually, if I had one piece of advice to give, it would be to look to the classics (camelhair jacket, linen) and get them in modern cuts - the good materials take care of themselves, and as long as you're not shopping at Brooks Bros., you'll get a cut current enough (but not trendy) to look good for a decade or two - life of the garment.
Stuck a feather in his cap
and called it "macaroni"
I always wondered what the hell that meant.
How about "the monkey thought 'twas all in fun?" Anybody understand that?
Ok, not I am asking for practical advice. Say you want to wear a pair of jeans and a black button down shirt (this is basically all I own that isn't plastic). You wear a white undershirt with that?
Woops, 113 b, please add imaginary italics.
I am not a man, but I would think that in that case, black would be a perfectly acceptable undershirt color.
My LL.M program last year was dominated by international students, half of whom were European. They could not, just could NOT understand why American guys wore "ugly" undershirts underneath their dress shirts, which were too billowy to begin with.
Of course, I spent most of the year telling my American J.D female friends which ones in my program were gay, which ones were just Euro metrosexual (which is as close as you can get to acting American gay), and which ones were man whores to be avoided. There weren't many options other than those three in my program. I went shopping with a couple of the guys. They would spend an insane $175 for just one shirt at Thomas Pink. Me, I get things on sale at Banana Republic and think I'm being very fancy. I can't imagine wrecking a shirt that costs __% of my monthly rent with sweat stains, but there you go. You can insert a xenophobic joke about what they'd smell like as well.
I for one don't mind the undershirt underneath the dress shirt. Then again I am an eminently practical American girl: I can understand the desire to have a buffer between skin and shirt, and it's warmer in the winter. And even though Clark Gable supposedly drove down sales for undershirts in It Happened One Night, they're still hot in a one-more-impediment-to-sex way, and Marlon Brando looked good in them, as did Paul Newman.
Oh, and the Euro boys who were less crazy spenders shopped at Zara for Men, which carries slim-fit styles.
I am not a man
There's still time.
I am not a man, but I would think that in that case, black would be a perfectly acceptable undershirt color.
Aha! That's what I wear with it, but Josh was all "pfft."
I confess that I got a dress shirt custom made when getting new clothes for my sister's wedding (pictures from which leave me unsatisfied with how my suit was altered). However, it was not on my dime.
As confessions go, that's pretty weak tea, Ben.
While I continue defending the undershirt, I want to say that it is perfectly possible to wear an undershirt sufficiently close-fitting that it will not interfere with even an entirely Euromanwhorishly cut shirt, and certainly not with a Thomas Pink shirt.
Also, the price for doing that was actually less than the too-billowy shirts the salesdudes were trying to push on me (which were admittedly made from more appealing fabric).
I got a couple of shirts custom made a couple of years ago when all my friends were getting married, but they cost less than expensive dress shirts. Of course, they don't fit me anymore. Don't buy expensive clothes when you're running more than you ever have/will, ok?
Aha! That's what I wear with it, but Josh was all "pfft."
Misrepresentations! What I said was, "[i]f they're different colors, they're not undershirts, they're T-shirts". Wearing a black T-shirt in your situation would be perfectly acceptable (although, depending on what's convenient, I might wear an undershirt).
I'd rather go to Express than Gap. I still think of Express as Structure.
Custom made shirts are defensible I think in terms of cost-to-quality; Thomas Pink shirts are not really. Spending for the sake of it, for say a designer brand or a trend, makes no sense to me--and I am a stylish girl. So no need to confess, w-lfs-n, that is defensible and the occasion called for it.
I'm short and petite and wish that I could afford to get my clothes tailored to fit me. My mom used to go to tailors in Little Saigon, CA to get her suits custom made in the 80s, and not for terribly expensive. I have one of her jackets, and it fits awesomely. I also have custom-made Vietnamese ao dai traditional dress, and they're less expensive than a fancy dress from Macy's. But it feels nice to have something made for you, and if it fits really well and is well made, it's worth it.
And depending on the place, they don't seem to cost that much more than a slightly fancy brand.
I loved Structure, for some reason. I'm not sure that was wise, though.
114, 118: I'm also not a man, but I have to say, I don't love the black undershirt concept. No, not even with a black shirt (or perhaps, especially not with a black shirt: too much with the monochrome palette, and you could end up looking like Regis Philbin). What's wrong with either going without an undershirt (a feat of derring-do, admittedly, and not for the faint of heart) or, better yet, keeping your shirt buttoned up?
Scale bars, people. How much does it run to have a shirt custom made?
I appear to have a freakish intermembral index/torso length combination, so clothes never fit me right. When I was getting a suit a while back, the sales clerk asked if I'd had shoulder surgeries because the weird fit of the jacket. Bastard.
or, better yet, keeping your shirt buttoned up?
Even if I only unbutton the top button (the one on the collar) of most of my dress shirts, you can still see I'm wearing a T-shirt/undershirt.
114: black is fine. or white. or grey. whatever. Just make sure to wear a black belt and black shoes.
I found this one Parisian store with a web site, but their stuff is too expensive for me, even though I love the style. It's called Stanbridge.
I usually stick to Banana Republic, Ben Sherman, Calvin Klein, Perry Ellis, Claiborne, DKNY and Kenneth Cole. All of them have slimmer fitting shirts - sometimes they're called modern fit.
There's also a place by the Abercrombie folks aimed at young professionals called Ruehl No. 925, but I've never seen one and they don't sell the clothes on their web site. So no idea if I even like it, with it being so exclusive and all.
I don't wear an undershirt when it's warm enough out (note), but it gets cold here, and one wants to layer.
A black T-shirt would be okay with a black shirt.
What's wrong with either going without an undershirt (a feat of derring-do, admittedly, and not for the faint of heart)
This whole undershirt thing is turning into another one of these American Rules Gonerill Is Unaware Of. By "undershirt" here do people mean some kind of wife-beater thing, or a regular cotton t-shirt?
Both?
Marlon Brando wore the white t-shirt in Streetcar Named Desire; Paul newman the tank-style (I hate the term "wife-beater"!) in A Long, Hot Summer.
Need clarification on the undershirt vs. t-shirt distinction.
All of them have slimmer fitting shirts - sometimes they're called modern fit.
Okay, this reminds me of the other reason I don't dress more nicely on a regular basis: clothing designers have apparently decided that my pudgy ass couldn't possibly want to wear stylish clothes. Not that the situation is anywhere near as bad for heavy men as it is for heavy women, but still.
Also: Dov Charney and American Apparel can kiss my fat ass.
but it gets cold here, and one wants to layer.
Get some warm stuff from Filson, the store for manly men.
140: An undershirt is much like a T-shirt, only it should be a) longer (so as to be tucked into a pair of pants without gapping) and b) slimmer-fitting.
I note that Hanes, those heathens, waffle and call them "T-shirts/undershirts".
Get some warm stuff from Filson, the store for manly men.
Indeed. The "Shop by Category" menu includes "Filson Dog."
Josh, I have nothing but sympathy. When I was a 40-inch waist, it was close to impossible to find stylish clothes. Now that I've dropped some significant poundage, my situation is different. Hell, even American Apparell is tight in my chest and shoulders, forcing me to have a shirt that swirls around my stomach.
The truth is they don't want your fat ass uglying up their brand. Sorry. I don't like it anymore than you.
An undershirt is much like a T-shirt, only it should be a) longer
I see. I don't think I own any of these.
I regularly get fashion advice on my undergrad student evaluations. They have strong views.
One of my friends got the advice on his teaching eval, "dress like a ninja."
That was pretty awesome.
The "Shop by Category" menu includes "Filson Dog."
Yeah, but those pics are clearly of a hunting dog, which is a proper manly kind of dog.
146: if you have them, you specifically bought them.
I wear them because I'm hairy and sweaty.
I wouldn't mind the American Apparel thing so much (I don't particularly care for most of their clothes) if it weren't for the fact that they're the supplier of choice for most online T-shirt shops. Which means that as much as I want it, I'll never buy this T-shirt.
Josh: Try Threadless. They use Fruit of the Loom tees and their stuff is wicked cool.
Funny - the cool indie tees from my local Dirty Coast is on American Apparel. Didn't realize it was so widespread.
This whole undershirt thing is turning into another one of these American Rules Gonerill Is Unaware Of.
You Euro types, with your (by turns sly and subtle, by turns glaringly overt) sneers at the good folk of the American heartland. "Undershirt" is to "vest" as "french fries" is to "chips," IYKWIMAITYD.
Paul newman the tank-style (I hate the term "wife-beater"!)
As Jewlia Eisenberg sang:
Sitting at the kitchen table watching him eat my food
He is wearing what he calls a guinea tee
Others call it a wife-beater, but he would never do that.
He could take me away
I was hoping he would take me away
But he would never do that.
"Undershirt" is to "vest" as "french fries" is to "chips," IYKWIMAITYD.
ITID. Except that I think of vests as something kids wear under their school uniforms.
Yeah, I'm building a fine collection of Threadless tees. The one I wore to the July meetup has been a particular hit.
133, and other references to undershirts: V-neck.
I get an obscene number of compliments on this one:
http://www.threadless.com/product/449/Chinese_Peaches
I suspect it's the color.
A V-neck can be a kind of jumper, though.
When the cold weather comes I always get annoyed that my awesome t-shirts have to be wasted under button-down shirts or sweaters or sweatshirts, and that I have to wash them when I haven't even really worn them except for a purpose that could have been just as easily fulfilled by a non-awesome, content-free t-shirt that costs $3 at Target. I need to finally get some undershirts for this purpose.
Hickey Freeman is pretty damn spendy.
This, however, is the massive advantage men have: you can get a few pairs of nice pants, a few nice shirts, a couple jackets and/or sweaters, and if they're well-made basically you can wear them forever and look well-dressed. So no whining.
133, and other references to undershirts: V-neck.
Ah. I'd begun to write to the description in 143 that in that case I understand the difference: I've bought them in the past, usually in the menswear department, to wear as t-shirts. Because they're longer and closer-fitting. And can be found as a v-neck.
Entirely out of fashion for women. As for men, I suppose, at least when worn as an actual outer shirt, a t-shirt. I wear them to work out in, and the looks I receive generally say that I look like I'm wearing a man's undershirt. Which apparently I am.
The waning of the v-neck t-shirt is a sad thing to me; but crew-necks are choking.
Except that I think of vests as something kids wear under their school uniforms.
Well, America is a younger country. And some parts of it are cold as charity in the winter months.
Also, (almost) no man in America wants to wear a jumper (which in Britain, and in some of Britain's former colonial possessions, just refers to a pullover sweater).
How do guys know which clothes to buy and how to wear them?
Ah ... because you see people wearing things that you like, you have some knowledge of what looks good on you, and maybe you have a favorite style or three?
I dunno. I see someone wearing something I like and think "Oh, I like that. I should try that." I look at catalogs and read magazines and blogs. I ask myself, when I go to clothing departments and thrift stores, "Could I do anything with that? Is that something I'd want to wear?"
I don't think that I have the right "look" or "aura" to carry off a cool graphic tee. I look good in a dress or pencil skirt and heels, like I belong in them. But somehow, wearing a cool graphic tee, or band t-shirt (alas), looks like I'm trying too hard, unless I'm wearing a dude's t-shirt the morning after or something. This may be a function of my too hip-to-be-square personality, or a function of most women's graphic tees being too twee and cutesy (even if cool looking in theory), or both. I just wear plain, content-free fitted tanks and shirts when I'm not dressed up.
What's the Unfogged guy's opinion on girls in graphic tees? Hot or not? Is there a certain casual, rocking, cool chick aura needed to pull it off?
Sometimes I think it's harder to dress down than up.
However! The answer to "where do you look to get a sense of the done thing" is easy if you live in an actual city: you look at which guys look well-put-together on the street, and then shop accordingly. And/or you do the same damn thing you do when you're finding your hip tshirts: you go to the small shops that have nice things in the window.
If you live in suburban hell or the midwest, it's a little bit harder, obviously. I suppose in that case you go to Banana Republic or J Crew or the part of the Nordstrom's men's department that has a slightly cooler/younger vibe. The section that's not the rep ties/dockers/polo shirts racks or the loose jeans/Ecko/Sean Jean stuff.
girls in graphic tees? Hot or not?
Are they nipply?
Ah ... because you see people wearing things that you like, you have some knowledge of what looks good on you, and maybe you have a favorite style or three?
I have no knowledge of any of these concepts.
Basically if I were to ask "How do guys know which clothes to buy and how to wear them?" I would be looking for a step-by-step booklet on the process.
Those t-shirts definitely require a certain type to pull off. If in doubt, skip 'em.
Those t-shirts definitely require a certain type to pull off.
That type often being "young and hot" and therefore can pull off just about anything.
To elaborate on 170, I see a guy who makes me think "That guy is dressed pretty well" about once every three months, and it's usually someone wearing a suit that appears to have been fitted to them, or very occasionally someone who is much thinner than I am.
But if I at some point have a lifestyle in which I would for some reason want to find clothes that look good on me, I guess it would be accompanied by entering a milieu in which I am more likely to see guys wearing sharp clothes. So it's moot right now.
My fiancee is definitely not a hipster and wears jeans everyday, but most of her short-sleeved shirts are of the "arresting graphic tee" variety. I think 'most any woman can pull off some of them, if you choose them based on the same aesthetic reasons that would lead you to buy a non-graphic tee, with the "graphic" aspect of it being a bonus.,
The waning of the v-neck t-shirt is a sad thing to me
Mais non, the v-neck is everywhere. Unfortunately, the women's versions at the moment are generally quite plunging. If you are built one way, this is fine. If your cleavage starts relatively high up, as mine does, all sorts of mild-mannered clothing becomes unsuitable for many situations.
My co-blogger Anand has successfully developed a sense of style in the past few years. In undergrad his clothes were disheveled, even by our scroungy standards. But in the past couple years, his clothes have been so sharp and nice that it is something one notices about him.
I don't know how he did that, but I suspect that Step 1 was finishing at MIT.
172: It could also be a function of personality.
Hell, I'm young. I think I look too serious for graphic tees, and despite my love of certain indie rock bands, too poseurly to wear band t-shirts. As if I'm purposefully trying to signal hip hipster cred.
This may also have something to do with my lingering self-consciousness over being a bourgie, yuppie lawyer type, even if I'm back in grad school and was always doing civil rights and academic stuff.
Some women just look better in certain things, as befits their personality and mien. Same with men.
Did anyone else think "WTF is this casting" w/r/t Catherine Zeta Jones as Charlie in "High Fidelity"? She was supposed to be some kind of cool rock chick type, and she just looked too glamorous to rock that t-shirt (Ramones IIRC?). In the non-flashback part of her character's appearance, she looked much better suited to her bustier dress.
I have no memory at all of Catherine Zeta-Jones being in that movie, but that's exactly what I thought about Lisa Bonet as the actual-musician character.
I'd forgotten Lisa Bonet in that! Oy.
Lisa Bonet singing Peter Fucking Frampton, to boot.
Oooh, baby, I love your way.
I'd forgotten Catherine Zeta-Jones, too. Man, between her and Jack Black I think my fond memories of that movie have been retroactively poisoned.
between her and Jack Black
You don't like them or you think they were miscast?
184: Now, though, you LOVE IT.
Mais non, the v-neck is everywhere. Unfortunately, the women's versions at the moment are generally quite plunging.
Methinks you speak of whichever form of t-shirt is currently on offer in stores and shops everywhere! I don't get out enough, obviously. When I see people wearing t-shirts, they're generally shapeless crew-neck, well, t-shirts.
These graphic tees that people refer to are apparently not just band t-shirts, either, unless worn in one-size-too-small. That's the ticket if you want to try to look hot in one.
Generally I'm not a fan of clothing bearing graphic images on it.
You don't like them or you think they were miscast?
I don't like them. More accurately, while I liked them just fine at the time, they've since grown to annoy me substantially.
Generally I'm not a fan of clothing bearing graphic images on it.
On everyone, or for yourself? Do you think it's juvenile?
I agree, for non-casual clothes.
I dress with the assumption that no one will ever notice what I'm wearing. Except jurors -- when I'm going to seen by jurors, it's a careful effort to make sure the ties & suits not just go together, but aren't too repetitious over time.
No one else matters.
I agree, for non-casual clothes.
Isn't non-casual clothing almost by definition graphicless?
I frequently see guys I think are dressed well, but only very rarely in ways that I think would also look good on me.
Also, rep ties: what does the name mean? They ... represent schools/regiments/clubs? Or something else?
I think guys who can wear cool graphic tees with authority and didn't spend more on them than I have for my own business casual clothes should if they want to. But yeah, it can be juvenile, because there's no such thing as dress graphic for going out to dinner. Sweaters are nice and touchable and look grown up.
Plus, buttons are sexy as hell, so I'm a fan of the dress shirt on a man. I have shirt that buttons all the way down the left side from my underarm to waist, and that's fun.
192: I guess by "non-casual clothing " I mean "things other than T-shirts".
191: I only bother to dress nicely when I'm commenting on blogs.
buttons are sexy as hell
WTF?
The idea that women are thinking this has never once gone through my head.
This thread reinforces my inclination to ignore these matters completely, at least until I have a career.
So, if you lean on anything, buttons jab into your ribs?
All obstacles are sexy, of course, but I wouldn't have thought that buttons in particular warranted being singled out for as-hellness.
On everyone, or for yourself? Do you think it's juvenile?
Definitely for myself. Graphics on my chest is just too busy, jarring in terms of both my personality and my appearance (coloring, structure).
But yes, it's true I also associate graphics with advertising, and I'm not so down with walking advertisements. Let's leave that outside. Of course I know that many graphics are nothing like that: hey, one person's wicked cool glyph is another lady's sweatshirt with hearts and sequins.
Back to Catherine Zeta Jones, one thing that annoys me is her unplaceable accent, which comes off as whatever they call "mid-Atlantic." It's just kind of generically Commonwealth sounding, but not OxBridge, not Cockney, nothing interesting...
Everytime I hear her I think, "she's Welsh?!" I mean, she lived there until her early 20s or something, so you'd think she'd have a stronger accent. And I dig the Welsh language.
191: I only bother to dress nicely when I'm commenting on blogs.
I'm wearing several layers of expensive clothes right now.
198:
I never thought about it. It doesn't hurt. It's a pretty burgundy blouse from Anthropologie (this glorified faux French flea market brand, Parisienne bohemian) with a deep lace-trimmed v-neck, three-quarter sleeves, and buttons on the side rather than a zipper. Women's blouses can be weird, often to accomodate darts and have non-businessy fronts they open on one side to accommodate the head and shoulders when dressing.
199: You haven't seen this shirt.
Graphics on my chest is just too busy, jarring in terms of both my personality and my appearance (coloring, structure).
Parsimon has face tattoos!
203b: that's true, but I still don't expect that the buttons are sexy an sich. Those would have to be some pretty exceptional buttons.
Off-topic...this just keeps bugging me. "2blowhards.com" really is racist, isn't it? At least the majority of the commenters. They actually are racist. And the posts about immigration are definitely racist, aside from all the other things they post about.
Was it always that way? It used to be one of the blogs I looked at most often.
It seems to reflect a really odd subset of the population. White people who love the finer things and nostalgia and see themselves as persecuted by ignorant and venal liberals, yet are not nationalistic or religious in the least.
The last 5,000 remaining Rockefeller Republicans?
205: They're *covered* buttons, adding an extra layer of sexiness, as if buttons could be shy and falsely modest, saying yes, but then no, and yes again.
Also, the style of the shirt,, from the brand Odille, was called "Victorian." The sublimated sex is built in.
Of course, men can't wear any kind of v-neck, because of chest hair or the lack thereof.
Really, if I'd grown up making choices like that, of what shape of shirt to wear, I'd be less overwhelmed by the idea of "developing a style" once I turn 30.
2blowhards.com
Haven't read it, but Unf and I wanted to call this blog "Two Blowhards."
I see a guy who makes me think "That guy is dressed pretty well" about once every three months
What about seeing a guy and thinking "those jeans are awesome" or "that's a cool sweater" or "that shirt looks good with those pants"? I suppose a lot of straight men don't/won't look that closely at another man, but I think that developing a style is largely about learning how to combine parts to make some kind of whole.
Graphic tees: my own personal rule is that the t-shirt must be either an interesting piece of design on its own, or related to something that I have a genuine knowledge of or interest in. Even then I only wear them on specific occasions. (Like, for example, I wore my 24 Hour Party People t-shirt to a show not long ago. (Because I thought it was kind of funny (and because Tony Wilson wasn't cold yet).) But I probably wouldn't wear it out casually, because I'd feel like I was looking like I was trying to be hipper-than-thou.)
(It's true. I over think these things.)
Haven't read it, but Unf and I wanted to call this blog "Two Blowhards."
That or Magic Johnsons.
They actually are racist.
Comments just about everywhere outside most mainstream blogs are incredibly racist. It's hardly an original thought, but I used to think that we were over most of our racism in America, but now I think a lot of the inexplicable callousness of domestic programs is about racism and we're nowhere near getting over it--there's just less interpersonal racism.
I've decided I'm too old to pull off the hip graphic-tee, even though I covet a fair number of them. I solve my "how to dress well" problem by shopping almost exclusively at a "good enough" store, and by remembering which outfits make my wife go, "oooh!"
That or Magic Johnsons.
That was Unf's suggestion, but I was never down with that.
I've decided I'm too old to pull off the hip graphic-tee
I felt that way a few years ago. I got over it.
(Besides, seeing as how you're my younger doppelgaenger, if *you're* too old to rock the graphic tee, then *I'm* too old to rock the graphic tee. And that doesn't bear thinking about.)
I'm your younger doppelganger? Awesome! (When did we decide that?)
Well, Magpie and I decided it a while ago. I informed you of it here.
Right, right, right, sorry.
If you're coming to UnfoggeDCon, we can wear matching graphic tees and confuse everyone. Like The Parent Trap!
Was it always that way?
In spite of occasionally interesting writing on the arts, 2blowhards was always annoyingly "contrarian." I stopped reading them in '03--'04?
I ran across this blog the other day. That passage is probably the craziest piece of internet writing I've ever encountered. If I weren't pretty sure that she's real, I'd dismiss it as a parody.
My co-blogger Anand has successfully developed a sense of style in the past few years. In undergrad his clothes were disheveled, even by our scroungy standards. But in the past couple years, his clothes have been so sharp and nice that it is something one notices about him.
I've been thinking about this, hopefully objectively, and have decided that it wouldn't do me any good to do this. I don't think I ever will. I could imagine a line of work in which it might help, but that seems unlikely.
Unless my fiancee/wife tells me it would be a good idea, of course.
I plan to continue with my current style (which could be defined as "like other grad students, except with more t-shirts instead of boring polo shirts, but also more dressy pants instead of jeans"), until at some point it becomes important to wear what other people in my milieu seem to be wearing, and then I'll do that, not emulating anyone in particular, since I can't tell whether someone looks like me or not.
Cryptic Ned as latter-day Beau Brummell is either a glaring contradiction in terms, or else a bold step forward for all of mankind.
I'm afraid I'm just like that, Ned. But I actually do want to dress better. Don't know how, really.
If you're coming to UnfoggeDCon, we can wear matching graphic tees and confuse everyone. Like The Parent Trap!
It'd be like The Parent Trap with one twin played by young, innocent, fresh-faced Lindsay Lohan and the other played by old, coked-out, haggard Lindsay Lohan, but sure.
Sadly, we're not going to be at UnfoggeDCon.
Try Threadless. They use Fruit of the Loom tees and their stuff is wicked cool.
For men, but the women's t-shirts are still American fucking Apparel. And I can't wear men's t-shirts because they make me look like a potato.
Hate. HAAATE. Fuck Dov Charney and the "socially-responsible"-but-hey!-sexism's-ok! horse he rode in on.
This is like asking, 'how do you rock out? I know how to play some chords, and i memorized stairway to heaven. Any help?'
224: Agreed. I do employment discrim law, and so while I'm happy that he pays his workers above minimum and doesn't use sweatshops, I'm not happy about the sexism in his advertising and branding.
And dude, that guy has been sued for sexual harassment several times over. And I am not convinced that all the relationships were consensual, and that all of his come-ons were "welcome".*
(*unwelcomeness being the test for sexual harassing behavior)
205: Covered buttons are a bad idea. The whole point of buttons is to suggest unbuttoning, as it were. Unless you mean self-covered buttons, covered with the fabric of the garment in question. And gloves. Gloves that button are a very good idea.
Hey, actually I just wanted to note that--and this happens perhaps twice a year--I am Becks-style right now. Most of my personality flaws have fallen away under the influence of alcohol. I'm neither truculent nor self-pitying, and hypochondria means nothing to me! Enjoy it now, since I'll be back to my regular self in a few hours.
227: they're self-covered buttons. I forgot that covered buttons may mean that they are covered with a placket, which these are not.
I love buttoned-up gloves
225: but in a world where men are expected to be able to feign rocking out, and spend a lot of time figuring out how to make it seem like it comes naturally, and being not the kind of person who is inclined to rock out is not an excuse that will save you from the social pressure to devote lots of effort to it.
It seems to be like that for women and "having a style".
You know what's fucked up? There's at least 2 guys on my floor -- one a new hire in a menial position, the other one an IT contractor, who regularly arrive at work wearing quilted thermal undershirts as their main shirt. WTF? That's way past cool. Sure, I wear Dickies to work on a regular basis, but I'm a gentleman of girth, and these two dipshits are skinny guys who could wear anything they want. Fuckers.
More to the point, I am completely opposed to a certain conception of history which takes for its model a kind of great continuous and homogenous evolution, a sort of great mythic life.
Ok actually post 2 was right.
Its odd running into people on multiple unrelated forums. Of couse i've been broke recently so avoiding that sight and not checking my ebay saved search results emails.
Maybe swarthy types wear undershits or something. I can't fathom it. I would sweat the fuck out with annother goddman layer. Its bad enough i have to wear a full wool jacket in the 75 degree office buildings.
1. Laundering shortens the lifespan of your clothes.
well, bad laundering does. Decent shirts launderd properly will be just fine. Anyway, another layer under one's shirt just makes the shirt fit that much more like a sheet.
whats wrong with nipples. People should look like they have bodies, not look like they are airy ghosts with a billowy sheet roughly indicating their position in space.
I was starting to tyep 'ties are the one thing i do very subdued, but then i remember a few months ago a coworker complimented me on the tie, and the sort of awkwardly said, 'its not that common that guys wear ... red ties.' I was confused for a bit, until i realized she meant the pink on the tie. Also, remember rush limbaugh ties? Such a fucking black hole of badness vortexing all up.
Dockers=not laid.
Yeah, men don't like clothes because its basically unidimensional, ie how much $$ one spent. maybe some class markers, and occasionally someone does something wierd.
Um, what is this world where there is pressure on men to do clothes?
Dude, are you reading your own comments?
Compare "Dockers=not laid." and "Um, what is this world where there is pressure on men to do clothes? "
in law school i for a time had the nickname 'skin' because i 'showed some skin' when i wore shirts.
I said there's pressure on women to do clothes.
Meanwhile men like Ogged and I think "Maybe I should do some of that too, it looks pretty interesting and I would be a cooler person if I succeed at it." However, much like attempting to rock out, if it doesn't come naturally, we're better off not trying than putting in a half-hearted effort.
Maybe swarthy types wear undershits or something.
DO I EVEN HAVE TO SAY IT?
YES I DO
TEH RACISM LOL
haha. i guess i picture 'doing clothes' as something more than not wearing the most ridiculous stereotyped clothing item. I mean basically if you walk into the gap and pick something up you will be way ahead of that.
Gloves that button seem gratuitously cruel to me. When I'm diving, I have to do a lot of crap with thick-ass gloves on, but buttons are a bridge too far, peeps.
Most people who like clothes like going shopping for them more than they have money to go shopping for them. at least in the age group i am in. So it pretty easy to just tag along and its fun for them because its a new challenge since its a new body and face and stuff.
On the other hand, the linked buttoning gloves look pretty goddamn cool.
241: On the other hand, the linked buttoning gloves look pretty goddamn cool.
Hear that, w-lfs-n?
What age group are you in, yoyo?
I imagine yoyo as a 28-year-old lawyer who is in the upper 0.1% of annual income for his age group. But it's hard to tell.
Really? I thought yoyo was an early twenties undergrad.
Oh, I quite agree about those gloves.
245: I thought he might be a late-teens undergrad who has trouble communicating his ideas in writing. But apparently he's been to law school.
I imagine yoyo as the early-fifties inventor of the jello-mounted keyboard.
Those gloves look quite unnecessary. Do you really have to put them on and then button all those buttons? I would see that as a sign of extreme fitness if a mate could waste resources on ostentation to that extent.
What's the Unfogged guy's opinion on girls in graphic tees? Hot or not? Is there a certain casual, rocking, cool chick aura needed to pull it off?
all i know is that i'd like to help that busty redhead on threadless ads with the pulling off, iykwim
it does require a semi androgynous thrift look
repp ties started out, in england as a way to say what club/school you are in. now, in america, it mostly means you are blueblood, pseudoblooblood, or have taste that leans british (ie, good). note the paradox.
These ideas floating around me are kinda ufoish.
i mostly hang out with 22-26 year olds.
I suppose I can at least thank yoyo for answering my question about rep ties.
I was told about in a you're-invited-too way an early-december party in which there will a christmas tree hung with skulls. All attendees will be required to wear SOLELY BLACK and I'm really looking forward to it.
i mostly hang out with 22-26 year olds.
But is, in fact, a 29-year-old wealthy lawyer preying on the younger and poorer. Cryptic Ned: born out.
I misread 256 as "Cryptic Ned: burn out..." and mentally rejoiced that I'm not the only one.
ime rep ties suffer from a high correlation to asshats, some places, and cluelessness others. Difficult to pull off then, ben.
Graphic tees? Like a t-shirt illustrating proper autopsy procedure? I'm in favor.
Also, yoyo, be careful with the busty redheads. They'll gut you from crotch to sternum like a rainbow trout. (They've got knives)
I am not myself a wearer of rep ties. I just was curious about the name.
261 gets it right. I hope I'm not found guilty by association.
260: it looked wrong when I was typing it, you know.
I thought he might be a late-teens undergrad who has trouble communicating his ideas in writing.
From things he's mentioned, he's at least 25. But I'd guess he's still a ways shy of 30, and to my eye he does his commenting Becks style.
you know, i actually made an incidental reference to the $$ earlier in this very thread. this very thread.
To justify the beautiful, sexy, well-made gloves from butter-soft leather (no, I haven't bought them, but I totally would): loveliness is rare and must be pursued with abandon.
I would rather spend that money on those gloves than say $40 on a graphic t-shirt (I think I have seen some retail for more than that, from those trendy brands/shops, even though it's not like they're made from God's cotton). Overpricing is relative to the value you put on the object at hand; those gloves to me are worth it, but a lot of stuff being sold out there is not. And people will always value/buy stuff that you wouldn't dream of valuing as high/buying.
And yeah, you button the gloves, that's the point.
Are they made of kangaroo, or some other, inferior, creature?
i really expected a picture when i clicked you, number 267.
Struck with the inside of the foot, so as to generate swerve.
what is becks-style commenting
What we now call Michael-style commenting.
267: Oh, I wasn't referring to them being expensive, I was referring to them being buttoned. Expensive things that are superior to non-expensive things are fine. It seemed to me that the buttons were by their very existence unnecessary and a sacrifice of convenience or comfort or something else to fashion. "Ostentation" was probably the wrong word.
Sorry, don't want to make this an argument.
271: Then falling on your ass to the humiliation of millions.
The millions living in England, I presume?
I don't understand 271, 272, 274 or 275.
273: Ah, understood.
I can get functionality arguments. I guess these gloves are designed to not be super functional (although long gloves are warmer), but that's a part of their appeal. Otherwise I would just wear my performance fleece gloves. Although my leather gloves are warmer.
276: we could explain, but cf the the post title.
Relatively back on topic: I can't bring myself to wear anything other than black, grey, or green. Is there a gateway color I can attempt? The wearing of green was a major accomplishment, but that was three years ago, and I'm ready for new challenges.
I don't suppose you know your skin tone, foolishmortal?
I do like a rust color on anyone darker than very fair.
what is becks-style commenting
As I recall you deny posting this way much, but I'm not the first to wonder.
http://www.unfogged.com/archives/comments_6948.html#564632
276: Becks==Becks, but Becks also == David Beckham, who is quite good at taking free kicks, but also has spectacularly missed penalties in important situations.
Skin tone has discrete values? I'm welsh-nordic, raised under fog, if that helps.
I would rather spend that money on those gloves than say $40 on a graphic t-shirt
Oh, sigh.
Close-fitting gloves are wonderful. Not too long ago you could get a pair for mere dollars in a thrift store. Probably still can. An entire basketful you could sort through and try on. Sigh. This would be in a low-scale used clothing place. You could have a longer pair, a shorter pair, several pairs! In ivory, white, black.
No more. (Oh, I just looked at the linked button gloves, what are those made of, why are they shiny ?)
In any event. People pay $40 for a graphic t-shirt? What?
what are those made of, why are they shiny?
They are made of animal.
Perhaps not a rust color, then.
Seems odd that you haven't branched into blue, but perhaps blue with blue jeans would be a little much.
281 is a little bit off. I mean, yoyo's heard it, and probably more than once. Random annoyance should not prompt intervention.
Please, if you are going to wear a graphic tee, consult with your friends beforehand. It is in everyone's interest that your group not be the one dressed entirely in Threadless.
I wear generic graphic tees that I buy at Walgreens for considerably less than $40.
I'm so selfconscious about the amount I paid for the single expensive t-shirt that I own that I hardly ever wear it.
That, and the fact that it's ever so slightly hipsterish, and therefore causes me to break out in rashes whenever I put it on, since even my very skin itself is not a hipster.
People pay $40 for graphic shirts because a)someone somewhere decreed that graphics are now ok and b)they can't decide for themselves which graphics are cool. Which would be fine with me except that I think graphics are awesome and six months from now they'll be unwearable. I, personally, like my Tick t-shirt that asserts that "Evil is Never in Fashion". Before all this shit, people thought I was a geek for wearing it (true). For a brief period, I might not be a geek for wearing it (false), but for the foreseeable future I will be seen as attempting a past style which I never was. Bullshit start to finish, says I.
The graphic tee I want consists entirely of those yellow and black safety signs you see around labs and construction sites, but I don't think it exists. It might, though, and that makes me happy.
My most disappointing t-shirt purchase was a frickin' sweet vintage shirt of Ronald Reagan riding a Harley. I seem to be the only person who can recognize him without squinting quizzically first.
The graphic tees I really want are those made by the creators of such fine web comics as Dinosaur Comics, Achewood, and Wondermark.
THe specific graphic doesn't matter; these days you can get anything you want printed on a shirt. The point is, the fashionable are ruining this fact for the rest of us.
292 -- I have that exact same "Evil is never in fashion" T-shirt.
Fellow law-talking people: is there a way I can gamble on the Multistate portion of the bar against friends taking it in the future? That is, can I know what the score they give me means so that we can adjust it properly? All I have is a scaled score, and I don't know how it's scaled, or if it's particularly good, for that matter.
You all are somewhat forgiven for not entertaining me as it is sat. night, But somewhere heathen it is sunday morning, so spill your heathen secrets. A few days ago, I impugned the antipodean manhood to great effect. Are the men of the Southern Cross shy again? Are the women thereof demure as well?
$40 is a lot for a graphic t-shirt? At the current exchange rate $40 dollars is about what you'd pay for a plain ordinary black t-shirt here if you wanted reasonable quality. Fancy slogan/graphic decorated t-shirts could be a lot more.
Leather gloves are cool. I have a pair of cashmere lined, slim fitting leather gloves that are just great. Warm and go with proper overcoats and suits.
re: much further up the thread.
Zara do indeed make slim fitting clothes for men. They only make slim fitting clothes for men. They don't actually make a size big enough for me, in their more tailored items, and I'm not huge. At the moment, the fairly fat gut is a problem with trouser fittings, but, even without the fat gut their biggest size barely squeezes over my shoulders. That said, they do make very nice woolen stuff.
At the current exchange rate $40 dollars is about what you'd pay for a plain ordinary black t-shirt here if you wanted reasonable quality.
Jesus Christ, did they up the VAT to 200 percent or something? Have you people not discovered cheap third world labor?
re: 302
I could buy a cheap one for 5 quid. But if I went to, say, The Gap, or similar, I'd expect to pay the equivalent of $30-35 dollars, easy. Less during sales, obviously.
£15 quid would be a perfectly normal high street price for a plain t-shirt.
299 -- You want to bet they can't get a higher score than you did, or that they can't get a lower passing score?
I think 'scaled score' just means graded on a curve. In which case, why not compare your scaled score this year to someone else's from next year? Enough people take the thing that the comparison is fair. That's certainly the underlying assumption of states (DC, Colorado, maybe others) that allow waiver based on a scaled score.
193, 261 - It's a corruption of repp ties, the ribby weave of fabric that's used.
Belatedly: 159 makes me really uncomfortable.
As alameida, LB, and Labs appear to be absent, I will now play the role of Super WASP:
Please do not wear a regimental tie unless you belong to a regiment. Please do not wear a school tie. Unless you are wearing it ironically.
Please do not confuse "the done thing" with "what is fashionable."
Please note, there is no sense in which "a pair of jeans and a black button down shirt" can ever, ever, be any part of "the done thing."
Which leads to the final item: "where do you get a sense of the done thing"? Dad. And if your Dad doesn't know, you can go to Esquire and GQ, but there you will be advised much more as to what's in fashion than as to what is the done thing.
Some purveyors of "the done thing" (American flavor) have already been mentioned: Brooks Brothers, Hickey Freeman, LL Bean.
HF costs. BB and LLB do not cater to the more athletically framed gentleman.
J. Press is my preference.
I'm going to have to remember to wear my Yale '67 polo to next time I'm around slol.
To next time, the time after that: to all the times, onward!
Please note, there is no sense in which "a pair of jeans and a black button down shirt" can ever, ever, be any part of "the done thing."
So you're saying that I'll be communicating a personal sense of style if I stick with this, eh? I've been wearing that combination for as long as I can remember. I'll bet it's ok in Los Angeles.
So you're saying that I'll be communicating a personal sense of style if I stick with this, eh?
I don't know about that. But you wouldn't look as if you were ready for work downtown or leisure activities like cheering for the ECAC.
Apparently I'm Kenneth Branagh (with a tan), or Tex Perkins (with neater hair).
Switch it up with a black turtleneck when you want to be Steve Jobs.
I'm going to have to remember to wear my Yale '67 polo
I bet you still own some Cero shirts, too.
Slol has discovered my secret identity.
how do you fight epidermis dispersion on a black button down shirt?
genuinely interested
You stop skinning humans.
Seriously: lint-roller?
Last Christmas I gave my two dude best friends, one of whom is now my boyfriend, Threadless tees as gifts, and they both have subsisted on a steady diet of them ever since.
You know what most young men with poor fashion are lacking? A decent fucking pair of jeans. It's astonishing. It's always light wash, bad cut, or similar. Go to the Gap and spend $50, suddenly your whole wardrobe will look halfway decent.
The Internets do not seem to know what happened to Cero.
319b is right, but also about pants in general. You wouldn't believe how quickly women will peg a guy by the pants he wears. You can get away with all kind of shirt-atrocities, but a pair of jeans or pants that really fits you and is in a somewhat up-to-date cut can heal almost all ills. Of course, non-atrocious shoes help, too.
You know what most young men with poor fashion are lacking? A decent fucking pair of jeans. It's astonishing. It's always light wash, bad cut, or similar. Go to the Gap and spend $50, suddenly your whole wardrobe will look halfway decent.
How is one to identify "a decent fucking pair of jeans"? Is it just that the more you spend, the better they are?
My criteria are
- should not be pale in colour
- should not have random useless pockets and pocket-like things
- should fit
Those are all important, but also, the cut is very important. You can't go wrong with boot cut, for example (boots optional).
The graphic tee I want consists entirely of those yellow and black safety signs you see around labs
It's a shame that the nanny state keeps stigmatizing him.
MLB's Gap suggestion is a good baseline. But the most important thing about a pair of jeans is that they fit and are in a reasonably fashionable cut. If you can get that at bargain-basement prices, do it, by all means. But jeans that are hanging loose around the ass and thighs haven't been seen since the 90's, and now such things look pretty saggy and say "I don't care." That is, if you're reading this thread, one can assume you care at least a little, and might even care way too fucking much about clothes. But the value of a good pair of pants should be as common to a man as the value of a single well-cut skirt or dress to a woman.
You can't rely on just going to a certain store, and anything you pick will be good. For example, Gap.com is selling these, which are hideous. And the exact kind I see a lot of dudes wearing.
323 and 326 both look so similar to what I am currently wearing that I have already given up on detecting the difference between them, let alone discerning why one would be more attractive than the other. Maybe I have to look at them in three dimensions.
(I just booked me and Jammies's flight to Unfoggeddecon! We get in on Friday at 4:30.)
I am not so discerning about pants on men. I might notice if something were especially nice, but I would attribute that to his fine ass, rather than the pants. Then I would do penance for objectifying him.
325 sounds correct. I have one pair of jeans which are less comfortable than all my others, because they fit closely around the ass and thighs, as you say. These are the only jeans which a girl has ever said looked good on me.
So if I was trying to attract women I would wear more of the uncomfortable type, like that - and becuse I'm not trying to attract women I don't care. Comity.
But I don't get the "boot cut" thing.
Please do not wear a school tie. Unless you are wearing it ironically.
Even if you went to that school?
Ok, Ned, I'll break it down for you.
COLOR: 323 dark, grayish, faded, washed to look like it's worn in already (look at the lines near the hips. 326 actually blue (very bad for denim!), no fading or pre-worn-looking.
RISE: 323 medium rise, resting on hips. 326 would come up to your belly button
CUT: 323 boot-cut, which means that in the last 6-8 inches at the bottom, it actually gets a little bit wider, and falls well over the shoe. 326 mildly tapered, would bunch up around top of the shoe.
I fear I may have leblanc-disapproved jeans! Heavens!
But you can't see the "Rise", because there's a shirt over the waist. They look identical in that respect to me.
Also, you think it's good to be artificially pre-worn? I can't get behind that.
The question now is, do I burn them and never mention them again, or wear them the whole time I'm in DC out of spite?
As far as I can tell, and this may be because my monitor or color concept armamentarium sucks, the jeans in 323 aren't blue at all.
If you're not wearing Levi's 501 or 505 jeans, you might as well be putting ribbons in your hair. Hold the line, never surrender.
ben, I recall your denim choices to be acceptable.
With you again, CN. I laugh helplessly at artificially pre-worn jeans. I am so damn hard on clothes. Faded? Attractive frays? I can make jeans look like that within days. Pre-worn? I surely wouldn't pay money for that.
leblanc has weird seventies envy. "Boot cut" looks like some neutered version "bell bottom."
As far as I can tell, and this may be because my monitor or color concept armamentarium sucks, the jeans in 323 aren't blue at all.
As stated in 332, jeans should never be blue.
I recommend erasing this entire thread from your memory as I am preparing to do.
Some pre-wearing looks like shit, I agree. But some of it actually does look quite good, and is rather subtle.
SCMT, it does kind of look like that in the photo, but it reality "boot-cut" just means "falls straight down and over the shoe." Which is good.
I can't believe more people aren't agreeing with me that the jeans in 326 are hideous.
343: You're wearing paisley at this very moment, aren't you, leblanc?
People who can make paisley work should.
346: Gawd, you're evil. I can feel it through the screen.
That's not evil you're feeling.
I think MLB means a wash that isn't uniform in color. Among the crimes 326 commits is having a uniform blue, as if they're pants. But yes, pre-washing must have limits.
Obviously, Ned, if you don't care about having sexy pants, then you don't need to learn about sexy pants. The problem with jeans is that there aren't any eternal truths and jeans are expensive. So just as dudes finally broke in their super-skinny, extreme low-rise punkrock jeans, they now look universally, unbearably stupid. This is why, in buying jeans, I try to notice what is the most extreme style at the moment, and then dial that shape back within the realms of fashion's mutability and your own comfort. During the 3" rise craze of 2004, I got a pair that was lower-rise than my others, and slimmer in the hips, and they at least made me look not completely out-of-it. But now jeans have changed and I still get compliments on mine.
Boot cut does not come off well if you have short legs. The jeans in 326 look idiotic partly because unlike genuinely worn jeans, the pre-worn look shows no actual wear and makes the wearer look like a priss of the first order.
This is academic to me. I don't even have a pair of jeans.
The jeans in 326 are hideous. My dad bought himself a pair of jeans - he can't remember the last time he bought himself clothes, and he has never worn jeans, and he went in the cheapest shop in town (Primark) and bought the first pair in his size, and THOSE look better than those GAP ones. I don't mind blue jeans, but those are that awful mid shade, and they're too straight in the wrong places, and as you look down you expect to see a cm of white sock between them and the shoe (which I hate too).
You can get Levi's 505 jeans for $26 even at the medium-snooty mall near me. Hold the line.
What jeans are supposed to look like.
I agree with the undesirability of a uniform color for jeans. But my monitor makes it look like 323 are a uniform color too.
Also, "sexy clothes" and "stylish clothes" aren't the same.
Jeans are supposed to have noticeably different shades from the front and back?
505's are fine, especially for older men who don't want to look like they're trying to look young.
The cut in 355 is the Platonic form, though I prefer the button fly.
Of all my jeans only one was purchased already not pretty uniform in color, unless my memory fails. The others have acquired their variegation naturally, through being worn over and over, lived in in an active life, and all that rot. True; authentic. Yes, at first I may have looked silly in my monotone trousers, but it was in the service of a fading that could really be mine, really fit me.
In the future one will be able to hire other people to wear one's single-color jeans long enough to acquire these patterns of wear, but even these bespoke jeans won't be as personal as mine.
In the future one will be able to hire other people to wear one's single-color jeans long enough to acquire these patterns of wear
I need to find a Vietnamese houseboy exactly my size.
Have you ever noticed &mdash given the forum, I'm guessing most of you have &mdash how pants are often photographed with the model's package on the right side of the zipper? (Most men pack left, so most non-bespoke clothing is designed that way.) I assume this is a standard trick of the trade.
given the forum, I'm guessing most of you have
An admirable attempt to implicate us in the most gayest observation ever, Jesus.
It's true of Greek statues as well. There was a dissertation in the 30's.
Wait. There is non-bilaterally symmetric space (left, mostly) designed into jeans for the package? I am skeptical.
I can only guess that Jesus, the Gay Lord, is referring to how the zipper is sewn into the pants.
A citation for 363. I remembered it wrong; it was the 70's, and it wasn't a dissertation. I suck!
364: No, seriously. Something like 80-85% percent of men pack left (the left testicle is larger and hangs lower) so there's a slight adjustment. Ask a tailor!
361, maybe it's that the models are presented as mirror-images, to mimick how a person would see himself in a mirror.
I will! This will be part of the next conversation I have with a tailor. What do the few righties do? Chafe? Is there a secret signal that tells them that they have found the few pants designed for them? Special stitch somewhere they know to check?
Geez, Megan, how would I know? I hang left.
The jeans in 326 are hideous. I don't actually much care for the jeans in 323, either, but 326 are an abomination. Too pale, too straight in the wrong places and billowy in others. The "too blue" thing people were mentioning earlier is true too -- what this means is that the blue is the wrong blue, unadulterated except by paleness. Blue jeans should be fundamentally (underneath fading and other wear) the kind of funky greeny-navy blue of indigo, not some kind of clear sky blue color.
In the future one will be able to hire other people to wear one's single-color jeans long enough to acquire these patterns of wear,
True, this, but there exists a long tradition of such things: known as used jeans. Ex-boyfriends', for example. Button-fly preferred.
335:
The question now is, do I burn them and never mention them again, or wear them the whole time I'm in DC out of spite?
The latter, obviously!
Isn't it generally wise to dress to impress those you want to impress, anyway? If you'd really like to attract the attention of a child of the earth, you wouldn't want to wear the latest in metrosexual fashion. Likewise, if you're hot for haute couture chicks, don't be wearing tevas birkenstocks.
But that is the next obvious question, once one knows that the asymmetry exists. And you have known for years. Does it keep you up at night?
Greeny is probably misleading. Murky oliveish navy, perhaps. Anyway, that color.
Rfts wants jeans that look like all the colors of the pool of oil on asphalt.
"I see that sir dresses to the right."
Open the gate, but dock it straight; I see it lists to starboard.
373: Like I said, I hang left, so it doesn't bother me. If I were a righty, I'd be fuming about the pants-industrial complex. People, I read this somewhere once. So obviously it's true. I'd Google for further info, but I'm supposed to be on deadline, and obviously I can't leave comments and do research. But the gentlemen of the blog could perform the simple experiment of shifting over to the other side and reporting back about the fit of their trousers.
Oh wouldst? For science? To satisfy a lady's curiosity?
First I will have to establish a baseline by seeing which side it habitually breaks toward. I've never noticed.
Left sounds wrong, somehow. I blame the corporate media.
There is a gulf in the affairs of men, the lee shore of which is occupied by the wearers of jeans such as men wear now, with the other strand tracked here and there by the carefree tread of the man who knows the joy of selvage, a souvenir of the days when men were men.
First I will have to establish a baseline by seeing which side it habitually breaks toward. I've never noticed.
Well, are you wearing pants right now?
The jeans in 326 are so bad, even the model seems to be embarrassed to be wearing them. (Yes, I can discern the model's emotional state from the way he holds his knees.)
"Open me gate," w-lfs-n, you port-listing philistine.
(328 - Excellent! I booked mine today too, arriving about noon on Saturday. Have you got as far as hotels yet? Too much choice - I need someone to say, "I'm staying here," so I can copy them.)
"Open me gate," w-lfs-n, you port-listing philistine.
I know how it goes, Tia, but this is a family blog.
Let us puncture some myths:
1. Ogged actually dresses pretty well, if unshowily. Plus his button down shirts are ironed (to within an inch of their lives), which counts for a lot even though I myself refuse to iron anything.
2. Buying jeans that aren't a uniform color off the rack is obnoxious. And yes, I've done it myself, but it's obnoxious anyway.
3. Graphic tshirts are just fine, and not at all like tshirts with obnoxious brand names on them. They draw attention and thus have a similar function to textured clothing for men, on which see below. Unless the graphic/message is offensive, in which case they're have the opposite effect.
4. Texture on men is a +++ if you want female attention. The not-so-subtle message is "touch me!"
5. Wearing a school tie if you went to the school is much the same as wearing your h.s. or college ring after graduation. Message: "I am a douche."
6. Pleats are bad, and men might as well take advantage of the fact that they lack hips to wear jeans which don't suggest the opposite.
7. Not wearing an under/tshirt is indeed the mark of youthful devil-may-careness, but i is also true that it is bad for your clothes and no one wants to be able to see through your shirt, especially if you're actually wearing it to a nice event. Anyone who *does* want to see through your shirt will have extra incentive to take it off if all is not revealed at a glance.
I agree with 386 but have been won over to the anti-uniform-colored-jeans side by AWB's position that it is not necessarily a mark of artificial aging, just of dyeing that produces heterogeneous results.
Oh, I forgot one:
8: I'm not buying Slol as representative WASP. Most WASPs I've known dress much more LLBean/Lands End than Slol. Slol doesn't dress invisibly; he dresses impeccably.
Texture on men is a +++ if you want female attention.
Texture = velcro fastenings?
dyeing that produces heterogeneous results.
If that's the case, they've been dyed after construction rather than made out of pre-dyed fabric. Which means the dye won't wear well and they're cheaply made. So.
Slol is a WASP in hickville, so he's trying to keep up appearances, maybe?
Texture = velcro fastenings?
Texture = like the pants I have that my ex (oh so many years ago!) called "touch-me pants".
389: Heavens no. Velcro is unpleasant to touch, and suggestive of little-kid shoes.
"Texture"?
You mean...corduroy?
What else would that mean? Velour? Velvet? Satin?
Best friend Chris is tremendously proud of his blue velvet suit, and he does get stroked a lot while he is wearing it.
Velvet blazers = ick. Has any man ever worn one without exuding unpleasant vibes of one sort or another?
this is a family blog
So you could issue a command to no one in particular to admit passage, but weren't willing to publicly light your own beacon? I think they call that "projection."
I was being hyperbolic a bit before when I commented about this, but not much. I find that there is real gap in mens retail. Not that I'm a particular proponent of the `done thing', but I understand how it works. But I find there are sort of four rough groupings.
1) cheap clothes 2) functional, made reasonably but boring and badly cut 3) younger/trendier better cut, more interesting materials, badly made 4) expensive.
So for example if I'm looking for a shirt I can spend:
$40 : result is crap, just as you'd expect.
$75-120: I can either get something with good workmanship in a boring material (that's ok) cut for a 40 something guy with a 20lb paunch I don't have (that's not so good). Or I can get something cut better, but with bad workmanship from a brand-conscious place. The more chet-worthy, the worse this gets [*], and you also have to avoid bad fashion trends. It'll look a lot better (if you avoid the seasons particular stupidnness), but it won't last. I've had seams and buttons go in not time (or even once in the dressing room, ffs) if I take this route. They can also tend to interesting looking materials that don' wear well.
$150+: I can get one that fits right, and is very well made.
What I'd really like to do is spend the middle range, with a decent cut and decent workmanship. I find this stuff really difficult to locate. Any suggestions?
[*] The other direction is hipster, I guess, but they'll just want to sell you $300 jeans and $75 graphic tees, so we're not in the same game
The jeans in 326 are so bad,
I'm feeling badly for any guys who aren't sure why those jeans are ungreat. ("Hideous" is surely an overstatement.) Whereas the Levis linked in 355 are good, or at least the Platonic form. I'll venture.
It has to do with what the respective jeans emphasize and hide in the shape of the hips and legs.
The Levis are tighter around the knee, above and below: that's a sexy part of the leg, in men and women, the way the leg shape is indented there. The jeans in 326 hang too straight, as people have said, in that they just fall straight from the thighs, so you can't see the shape around the knee.
Similarly with the ankles: sexy in men and women, so the 326 jeans that are too long and hang over the tops of the shoes obscure the ankle. The Levis are of course being worn with form-fitting boots that show the curves of the foot. That's why they're sexy. The 326 jeans are being worn with rather shapeless sneakers but could be better with the boots as compensation.
With slacks as opposed to jeans, a fabric that allows the shape of the lower thigh / knee / calf area to show through when moving is likewise more attention-getting.
396: If it's black, you coul dsend a vibe of "vampire", which isn't entirely unpleasant.
I haven't read through all 400 comments, but I would like to pass on a little-known tip for those of you who hate billowy mens shirts, but don't want to shell out for bespoke shirts or off-the-shelf European shirts.
J.C. Penney (yes, Teo, your favorite store) has a "custom" program in its online catalog. Dress shirts are $55-65--about a third more than the store price, but much less than any alternative short of having them made yourself in Thailand. The selection of fabrics is not huge, but their basic white and shirts are reasonably high quality and perfect for office wear.
Olive oil cake in the oven, Knecht. Herbsaint, no Campari.
Not wearing an under/tshirt is indeed the mark of youthful devil-may-careness, but i is also true that it is bad for your clothes and no one wants to be able to see through your shirt
I know we've been over this, but I really don't understand the pro-undershirt argument. If you're not wearing a tie, your undershirt is going to be visible at the collar; surely this isn't a good thing?
You can get a v-neck, or a "guinea tee" (vide supra), mrh.
I have a couple of nice cashmere sportcoats. Ladies...
MRH, vneck. Plus you do not want pit stains or people going "ew, I can see his chest hair through his white shirt."
6. Pleats are bad, and men might as well take advantage of the fact that they lack hips to wear jeans which don't suggest the opposite.
Funny.
Cashmere sportcoats, yes. Velvet jackets if you're young/thin/fey/queenish enough to pull it off with a sense of humor. Woven fabrics. Silk ties or heavy silk shirts. Brushed cotton with a little bit of a nap. Really good woven cotton with a nice sheen. Cashmere sweaters, etc.
Well of course one's tie is silk.
411: And, if one is a man of cultivated sensibilities, of the heavy weave that makes for a proper dimple.
410: ...or heavy silk shirts.
No. Never. Not for Aphrodite herself and ten million a year.
"ew, I can see his chest hair through his white shirt."
Oh, how far we've come.
This summer, Flippanter is Off By One. In a theater near you.
410: Yeah, well, there's nasty silk and nice silk.
411.2: Eh, okay.
413: Aren't you the guy who is unusually, indeed remarkably, gay?
I'm so gay that I know how to count.
You can find out if you take my course. $495 for three weeks.
Well, if knowing how to count and spell words makes me gay, then you can consider me...um.....oh, it's not an easy decision!
"ew, I can see his chest hair through his white shirt."
This is unlikely to be a problem in my particular case. Still, I'm coming around. V-neck. Who'da thunk?
$495 for three weeks
Too expensive. See you on the other side.
Of course, non-atrocious shoes help, too.
Do these exist? I was shoe shopping yesterday and the situation seemed dire. Every shoe fell into one of several atrocious categories: "I also wear these to the office"; "I'm a gay cowboy"; "I'm a skate-punk snot."
Hey, don't knock "gay cowboy." Yummmmm.
My velvet blazer is well worn and always invites women to touch me. My corduroy one invites nothing of the sort. I also got good use out of a terrycloth oxford a few years ago.
One day, I will be able to afford camel hair. That will be nice.
Bitch is right: Texture rules. When used appropriately, it always transforms something that's a standard color or cut into something stylish.
shopping yesterday and the situation seemed dire
What you see in shops is usually pushing the latest fashion(s). Whatever everybody is wearing these days. You see. It's sort of pathetic. Everybody dresses the same.
I am Eeyore.
And killed the blog. Sorry, folks. Two words: gaucho pants.
Eeyore would definitely look weird in gaucho pants.
428: If you have the body? That would actually be kinda hot.
By which I mean, of course, if you have the kind of early-20s guy body that looks hot in basically anything.
You could put those on the statue of David and they'd look retarded, B.
*They* would, but if the actual model for David was wearing them, he'd look scrumptious and you know it.
B, maybe you're looking for the cutoff skinny jeans that were all the rage this summer?
I was just kidding earlier but I took a picture for you guys; are my pants what's "done"?
If a guy is cute enough, he can wear dorky clothes and it will be endearingly dorky and mitigate the potential for the "too hot for me" attendant insecurity for his partner. This is the unfairness of beauty. It works this way for both genders, though, at least in my opinion.
That is to say, light wash carpenter jeans aren't always a deal breaker. They can be kind of cute, likewise "that's so '90s" Airwalk sneakers.
I know no such thing.
Because you're 110% heterosexual!!!
E.g.: 433? That guy looks like an ass in those pants. But if he were some skinny wiry punky kind of boy? Yummm.
436: no. Because those pants are totally, totally retarded. I don't care how fit you are you'd like some kind of reject from some SuperTrimFast "and look at me now!" ad.
Are we going to have to put up with "Yummm" for a while now? It's already getting on my nerves.
Fuck B already Flippanter; somebody's going to have to.
Excellent! I'll make a point of using Yummmm as often as possible!
441. also lol, :(==8, jejejejeje, l33t sp34k, D/en B/este's name, RanDom capitaliZation, ur 2 ____, omigawrsh, personally identifying information, and the phrase "sex is rape."
Don't forget those.
Also "b/c why?" and "the reason is because".
It's "all heterosexual sex is rape."
B/c why? The reason is because I said so. So there.
It's "all heterosexual sex is rape."
Which phrase, it should be pointed out, contains "sex is rape".
Lol! Teh r34s0n yr 2 dum is b/c :(==8 jejejeje bitchPhd saying "Yummmm!"
Two yummms and y'all are bitching. Try putting up with constant posts about Jessica Biel's ass, then get back to me, you pussies.
Alright already, the pants linked in 433 are really bad. Hideous, even.
"I would never let a woman kick my ass. If she tried something, I'd be like, 'Hey! You get your bitch ass back in the kitchen and make me some pie!' "
Bah. The JC Penny thing in 402 starts at "Regular (5'8" - 5'11"), and has no "Small" or "Short".
Strangely, I am thawing pie crusts for to make pies later this afternoon. But there will be no pie for Flippanter.
452: there are many, many, many, options for getting tailored shirts made in Asia. It's not that easy to tell which are going to be good (I'm feeling that last one, personally, just a hunch), but once you find one you like you're set.
Sonofa.
Let's try that again: many, many, many, many.
UnfoggeDCon is going to be a fashion disaster, I can tell.
Yeah, I know someone who deals with one of the periodic Hong Kong tailors who visits the area, does measurements, and sends you clothes some time later. If I were serious, at least about suits and dress shirts, I'd probably get into that. That still leaves the entire non-formal universe of clothing, though.
non-formal universe of clothing
Precisely the universe I'm confused about. Dressy is easy for guys.
454: Yes, sue me.
461: Nonsense. You dress just fine. Stop trying to get attention.
I'm speaking in the voice of the average man, B. Stop oppressing us.
399 is wrong. In fact, I find it much harder to find decently cut shirts with the paunch than I did without. And if I was spending, say, 40 quid [80 USD] on a shirt, there's quite a lot out there for averagely proportioned men.
Marks and Spencer are doing made to measure tailored shirts for around that price.
This thread only reinforces my belief that it is a luxury to live in a part of the country in which it's perfectly practical to ignore fashion entirely.
Plus his button down shirts are ironed (to within an inch of their lives)
That parenthetical makes me slightly reinterpret ogged's earlier mention of finding "a little stillness or pleasure in something like ironing a shirt ..."
Ogged, you'll have to say what you're confused about with regard to non-formal clothing. Aside from the undershirt collar showing under the shirt.
It doesn't make much sense as a general question.
ogged's earlier mention of finding "a little stillness or pleasure in something like ironing a shirt ..."
As always, ogged speaks in the voice of the average man.
The general question in the post was where one goes to see the done thing modeled. Most of what's been recommended is fine, but very yuppie, with no examples of natty casualwear. We might be having a regional divide. The ex's dad in Los Angeles almost always wears jeans, a t-shirt, a blazer and bright yellow sneakers for non-suit dress up. I can't pull that off, but it's the spirit of what I'm looking to see.
Ogged you gotta get out to more Wes Anderson movies, man.
The general question in the post was where one goes to see the done thing modeled. Most of what's been recommended is fine, but very yuppie, with no examples of natty casualwear.
I get my examples of "natty casualwear" from watching Cribs and rapper mixtape videos.
Really, though, ogged, why wouldn't one go to some fancy-ish, boutique-y clothing store (or even some local designer's store, or one of those pimp fashion places on Market St. in SF) and seeing if there are any clothes one likes? All of this "buy Esquire, get yelled at, then hit the GAP" nonsense seems weirdly neurotic and counterintuitive.
I ask you this in your role as the average, wrinkle-free, still man, obviously.
There isn't really a prescription for good-looking casual clothes, so much as good-looking items which match a particular guy's gestalt. Unfortunately. I'm sure this has been said upstream.
That's what I've done the last few times, Tweety, but I'd still like to see how those clothes can go together. You know how sometimes you'll have a fancy meal that puts flavors together in interesting ways, and gives you ideas for how to do it yourself? That's what I'm after.
You could try on various combinations, per shopaholism.
I'm sure this has been said upstream.
Never underestimate the ability of people here to get caught up in a tangent and miss every other aspect of the topic.
Wait! Ogged needs a personal shopper.
Solved!
That's what I've done the last few times, Tweety, but I'd still like to see how those clothes can go together. You know how sometimes you'll have a fancy meal that puts flavors together in interesting ways, and gives you ideas for how to do it yourself? That's what I'm after
That is totally what fashion magazines and the Sartorialist (and paying attention when you are out and about) are for. Alternately, putting yourself in the hands of the stylish shopclerk.
I say this as if I dressed stylishly, but of course I actually don't.
That is totally what fashion magazines and the Sartorialist ... are for
Yes, but hence the admonition in the post to avoid the fey and mannered. If y'all are saying that that's all there is, well, I've been disappointed before.
See I don't trust no clerks to hew to the high standards of fashion-forwardism I set for myself.
People who don't like to shop and are unsatisfied with their wardrobe should enlist the help of someone who likes to shop, and whose style they generally mesh with. (I love picking out clothes for Jammies.)
almost always wears jeans, a t-shirt, a blazer and bright yellow sneakers for non-suit dress up. I can't pull that off, but it's the spirit of what I'm looking to see
Take this as a formula? Casual clothes + something classy + an accent item.
That last element is probably the hardest to pull off. You've gotta actually like the thing and feel comfortable in it.
Casual clothes + something classy + an accent item.
Interesting.
Take this as a formula? Casual clothes + something classy + an accent item.
Aha, this is the same thinking that went into constructing the perfect outfit.
Top hat + orange coveralls + watch chain?
Which one of those is the classy element?
Can the perfect outfit be modified to "a shirt which reveals a tattoo of your face on your chest"? I know someone who has one of those.
You're confusing things if your classy element can also function as your accent piece.
People who don't like to shop and are unsatisfied with their wardrobe should enlist the help of someone who likes to shop, and whose style they generally mesh with.
I think ogged already knows that he needs a girlfriend, ma'am.
489: a tattoo of your face on your chest
Not a great idea, but a much better idea than the reverse.
I guess I also live in a part of the country where fashion doesn't matter. I wear jeans unless I absolutely can't. Then I wear khakis unless I absolutely can't. Then dress slacks, for the narrow range between 'can't wear khakis' and 'must wear suit.' The important thing, though, is to wear cowboy boots, unless strenuous exercise is involved.
The rest of it is an illusion.
You're confusing things if your classy element can also function as your accent piece.
But if you wear a top hat and nothing else, then you yourself become the accent piece!
469:
I don't see any regional divide.
You can't pull off bright yellow sneakers, but (asking rhetorically) what else is a problem? The blazer in a case like the ex's dad probably wouldn't be something with a European cut. In your case it would be.
What kinds of activities are these outfits supposed to be for? You said: "non-suit dress up." I guess what's lacking is the spirit of whimsy in the yellow sneakers?
If so, trust your existing instincts, which are probably good. Individual pieces that have versatile applications. And something that stands out and gives you pleasure. Whether it's the shoes or a belt. Men don't have a lot of options there if they're conservative in dress.
I think ogged already knows that he needs a girlfriend, ma'am.
No, Ogged just has to find someone that he wishes he could date. She just has to shop with him.
Pwned, I see, by the comments about accents above.
watch chain?
I have one of these. Tip: it's kind of silly without a watch at the end of it.
(The watch is, at long last, being replaced!)
I might be able to swing a necklace made out of an enemy's bones as my accent piece. The rest would be understated.
A chain without a watch is like a fish without a bicycle.
Oh wait, the question is "how do men develop a sense of humor about clothes?" (Yellow tennis shoes)? Or "how do men develop a sense of personal style?"
Same damn way women do. Decide what you *like*, learn what looks good on you (this is what mirrors are invented for), then feel free to mix n match.
Also, like, women's magazine advice 101: Accessories! Which sounds inane, but can be translated into the entirely reasonable advice of, wear your uniform, but go ahead and buy the shoes/scarves/carrier bag you think is totally awesome.
Decide what you *like*
It's true, 90% of it is developing a set of personal preferences. Once you have opinions, only buy items you love*, and then whatever you pull out of your closet will more or less work together. You don't have to have a lot of items to have a decent wardrobe.
*I have a rating system.
Those buttons start pretty high up, yo. Why not be honest and have a fourth?
The question is where one goes to see people wearing something other than Hickey Freemanesque styles (preferably without leaving the house).
weirdly neurotic and counterintuitive
mouseover text
For your next trip out of the house, ogged.
In fact, that whole blog is helpful
From the top post:
Be weary of light colored suits
Illiterate, yet true.
The last half minute of the Cowboys game is going to be pretty exciting, for those who can switch it on right now.
The last half minute of the Cowboys game is going to be pretty exciting, for those who can switch it on right now.
The last half minute of the Cowboys game is going to be pretty exciting, for those who can switch it on right now.
The last half minute of the Cowboys game is going to be pretty exciting, for those who can switch it on right now.
More:
For example, if you wear a pinstripe suite,
First things first. Eire is short for Eireann, which means Ireland (as in 'Éirinn go breá).
Now illiterate in two languages! This is confirming my prejudices about people who follow fashion closely.
OK, OK, I'm turning the fucking thing on already.
Look, you're still wanting to stay in the basic button down shirt/jacket realm, Ogged. It really can't be that darn difficult. Buy men's Vogue once in a while.
Sorry about the multiples. I'll disregard error messages henceforth. It was an exciting end.
Right. Good luck, Ogged. The velvet jacket thing could work. I was a little surprised that guy in the link didn't look like a total dork. If one wants to look/be a little more relaxed, a jacket a little less structured, maybe. Basically, two jackets on hand: one structured, one looser.
Aw, Napi, don't apologize for me being a twerp.
Buy men's Vogue once in a while.
I dunno. If men's Vogue is anything like women's Vogue, I can't imagine it would be very helpful, except for those who are wealthy and/or stylish enough to not really need any help.
Well, you don't buy the stuff that's actually shown in the pictures! You just use it to kind of keep an eye on what shapes/colors are trending, and to get ideas.
Which men's mag is it that publishes The Black Book each year? Esquire? I was reading it on the treadmill (holy shit, am I a yuppie) and it seemed like it had a lot of useful information for men seeking sartorial guidance. It also has a lot of lame-o lounge lizard cocktail info, etc.
I work with people who don't wear undershirts under their dress shirts. You can tell who they are, because when they raise their arms, they have huge yellow sweat stains on their shirts' armpit areas. Yuck.
Men's Vogue is the only fashion mag of any sort that bucks the Whites Only trend. It's had four men of color on its cover in the past 12 months. This is basically unheard of.
Skin tone is one of those things i've stared at long and hard, but still seems like pseudo-somethingi to me.
and while, nice tshirts are nice, American Apparel ones fit perfectly, are really durable, and i'm really happy that bands are starting to use them to make their shirts.
the Hickey line is really nice stuff though.
i can imagine a black shirt and jeans looking just fine.
Also, you think it's good to be artificially pre-worn? I can't get behind that.
Cryptic ned will be wearing raw denim as soon as he figures out what it is.
Honestly the real difference is those shit jeans look fake-worn-in, and the good jean look realistically worn in.
If you're not wearing Levi's 501 or 505 jeans, you might as well be putting ribbons in your hair. Hold the line, never surrender.
And Ogged will be wearing Japanes repros.
pleats are nice on high-waister trousers. wear with suspenders.
460: you can have those guys make you informal shirts too. they hate you, but they'll do it.
Ttam, you're in england. Shirts are made differently here.
And yeah, unless you are in the NBA, don't wear that many buttons.
And i'm always uncomfortable when B is saying things that make me nod my head.
528: I used to go t-shirtless sometimes in Tokyo when it was too hot and humid for me to handle a second layer, which once sparked a conversation between a couple of guys on the train (who assumed I couldn't understand what they were saying) about why gaijin didn't wear t-shirts. Find those fuckers and set them straight, GB.
I agree with yoyo about pleats. Certain men can -- and should -- wear them. These men are thin. Very thin. They can nod appreciatively in the direction of Fred Astaire and Bertie Wooster.
1) The fuck, Steelers? The fucking Jets!
2) Tapered legs make me look like a fifty-year old housewife. They aren't much better on anyone else, even the housewives.
3) If you wear your rep tie "ironically," that increases, not decreases, your time in purgatory.
4) 482 dresses like Hugh Laurie on House.
5) Beyond agreeing that 326 is awful, no real advice for guys and jeans except make sure they fit your ass well.
Any ideas for a new thread? I got nuthin, and everyone else seems to be away.
I was going to post something on waste that I could put here instead.
Ask The Mineshaft: any tips on how to best condition/trim my moustache to make it supple and delightful when kissing?
also, its mainly white shirts that are see-through. white shirts are for funerals and job interviews.
Which is it, TJ?
Both? I don't have all day, here.
It's also cheap shirts that are see-through. Find a discount source for good shirts. In NYC, Century 21 is good.
I'm happy to post a picture of my upper lip for reference.
538 was a possible thread idea, Sifu. What could soup possible have to do with mustaches?
544: they become gently entwined and interdependent as the soup is consumed?
I sent ogged a picture of my moustache and he said it was distburbing. What-ever!
Go for it.
Too late! It's going on waste.
Sifu is the Moustache of (Mis-)Understanding.
Cala, what do you mean by "tapered"? Narrower at the bottom?
Did you photoshop the rest of you out of it? 'Cause that would be really disturbing. A disembodied mustache is not a thing of beauty forever.
I believe that was a typo, and those jeans are "tapired." Meaning that the characteristic wear-pattern indicates tapirs have been used in the distressing of the jeans.
550: I cropped it, naturally. I have to preserve the anonymity of my non-moustache self.
Also, the image was about twice the size of a normal monitor.
Party at ben's place!
One thing to add: get a tailor, even for your casual clothes. If men's shirts are billowy on you ... get 'em tailored! If your jeans are too long or have too much ass ... get 'em tailored! It's not that expensive, and if it is, find a place where it isn't. An urban area should have a decent schmata district (I recommend Mike's Tailor on Main Street and 9th in Los Angeles -- $3 hems!) and most dry cleaners will do alterations, with range in price.
Sifu's moustache, now twice as huge as a very large lizard!
I sent ogged a picture of my moustache and he said it was distburbing. What-ever!
Send it to me and I'll post it.
Though I approve with 554 wholeheartedly in theory, in practice, the prospect of driving my clothes to a whole new location before I can wear them is never very enticing.
I watched 2girls1cup last night and laughed all the way through it, but I took one look at Sifu's disembodied mustache and thought, "damn, I can't look at that."
Aw, man, why'd you have to even go and say that? I've been trying to forget about that website since it was sent to me in "preparation" for a bachelor party, and you've just ruined three weeks of hard work.
OT: The Bills' O-lline *averages* 332 pounds.
Advice for 399: Depends on where 399 lives. Century 21 in NYC has shelf after shelf of men's dress shirts for $50-$75 that normally retail for $250 or more. The Yves St. Laurent shirts are particularly nice fabric-wise and sell there for about $60.
I bought some great pants that fit me just right on Friday, and proceeded to eat myself out of them this weekend. Diet starts: now.
Didn't bother reading the whole thread, but I thought I'd mention that leaving a pair of solid-colored jeans outside on the line for the entire duration of a (two-month) war leaves them awesomely sun-bleached.
OT: So Catherine and I realize that our tivo is broken. And it has been for weeks—about as long as it's been since either of us has gotten any action.
well, a bit less for me. but i'm not as hard up.
Why did you decide to post that in the thread that already has over 500 comments, A-man?
As if you're not a fully fledged member of cry, cry, celibate.
On topic: 400 is correct! I went to my ridiculously crowded grocery store and tested it. The well dressed knees were tightly clothed, just like she predicted! It's bizarre how right she was. I never would have guessed, as in, that's not a property of pants it would have occurred to me to test. Yet it holds true. You people are invaluable.
It's more polite to derail a thread that's already run its course.
I was shopping at Target today, and though I wasn't intending to buy any clothes there, I stopped by the menswear section anyway with this thread in mind. They had some nice Wrangler jeans with a convenient display showing the different styles and how they fit, and they also had some nice flat-front khakis in sizes that would actually fit me. Take that, JCPenney!
Needless to say, I didn't actually buy any pants. But if there comes a time when I need to buy pants, I now know one place that has nice ones.
It's more polite to derail a thread that's already run its course.
Less likely to work, though.
But we all read every comment thread to the very end.
Target, blah. Go to your nearest college town: they will have a used clothes store. People buying clothes with their parents' money will discard nice clothes.
Since our Tivos are broken, what else can we do?
Is there an award fpr Least Able to Fix Home Electronics (Off-Air)?
p.s. Have you tried the cold boot?
You know, Smasher, Catherine, there's an easy-to-hand solution to your mutual celibacy problem.
Have you tried the cold boot?
Only with express permission beforehand.
Excuse my spelling. My subconscious is clearly scolding me for mocking your subconscious participation in the Writer's Guild strike.
Target, blah. Go to your nearest college town: they will have a used clothes store. People buying clothes with their parents' money will discard nice clothes.
This is my nearest college town, and there is a used clothing store. Several, in fact. The thing about those, though, is that you never know what they're going to have or if it's going to fit you.
The jeans in 326 really are hideous. So are the shoes. In the latter years of the first decade of the 21st century, you can't go wrong with a pair of good dark jeans. Straight leg, low to medium rise. Boot cut works with sandals, otherwise not so much. And though I love Loomstate and Paper Denim Cloth with an unseemly passion, you can get great jeans from Banana Republic or J. Crew for a lot less. Personally, I avoid Levis because they never are exactly the right color and they never fit right in the ass.
B. is wise in this thread.
If you'd really like to attract the attention of a child of the earth, you wouldn't want to wear the latest in metrosexual fashion.
Oh, parsimon, it wasn't to be, was it?
I think that for two losers to reset one another's Tivos is a form of cheating, like art dealers agreeing to sell paintings to each other at inflated prices.
Though of course, the two most beautiful people in DC are losers only because they want some action, not because they're not getting any.
I think that for two losers to reset one another's Tivos is a form of cheating
Isn't that how virtually all sex happens, though?
Well, B, I think so, but in 583 I was assuming the conventional point of view for sake of argument.
Isn't that how virtually all sex happens, though?
You mean, through cheating?
583 should be read to the tune of `beautiful loser'
586 wuzme
And it has been for weeks
Weeks? Whole weeks? You poor dears!
Sigh. Of course it's when you can still count it in weeks that it's the worst. Then you settle into Emersonian self-reliance while your sexual fantasies detach themselves from any kind of possible future (the "and a pony" problem, IYKWIM).
Weeks? Whole weeks? You poor dears!
Ahem.
589, re-read 588.2. AWB is right.
Somehow this meetup is starting to look scary.
589, re-read 588.2. AWB is right.
Yeah, I know. I'm just having a little fun with her comment.
591: You're just catching on? Why do you think I'll be at the other side of the continent.
This pony you speak of . . 's it on Facebook?
591: if you get freaked out you can hang out with my moustache.
Might as well be. It's your imaginary pony, dude. You can find it wherever you want and ride it over the horizon.
Perhaps they should have a Tivo-setting room and a safe room.
Found no results for: Armsmasher's Pony
i got one of my favorite belts at target. wearing right now, actually.
I did buy a belt at Target, in fact. I haven't worn it yet, but it looks nice.
Thanks to the writer's strike, my TiVo is empty. Usually, I have a whole bunch of documentaries and such on it that I want to watch but end up staying on there for months ("Hmm...I could watch a Frontline on Iraq or Gossip Girl. As if that's a contest!") but I'm even through the documentaries now!
Is everyone seriously looking to reset at UnfoggeDCon? I have this weird suspicion that a lot of people are going to go home hung over and hard up.
603: Isn't that the tradition?
I'm not, really, but if anyone else is...
584/586:
On cheating:
I have been in a monogamous relationship for a long time and it has become a somewhat long distance relationship which we still expect to lead to marriage.
I have been...almost intentionally...developing a crush on a woman I see every day who is theoretically out of my league but in this one instance would quite possibly be in my league for reasons relating to her always seeing me when I'm at my best and most confident. I may be intentionally cultivating my attraction to her, to the point of making occasions to flirt - instead of ignoring it as a married person should - because it makes day-to-day life more interesting.
Is this normal, or is this a bad idea?
I'm not. I'm just looking to complain. I would like to fix my literal tivo, though.
"to the point of making occasions to flirt"
flirt is a strong word here because it implies that I'm leading her on perhaps. should be changed to "making occasions to be really friendly"
Rationally speaking, a tivo-resetting collective would be the worst place to go to get your Tivo reset. Rationaly speaking. But is Tivo-setting rational?
607: You're not a married person. But don't just be jerking this other woman around, "out of your league" or not. She might be interested in you, too, and if you plan on maintaining your monogamy, you can still enjoy the flirtation if you casually mention having a fiancee to the flirtee. She'll probably be even more comfortable with you then and you can get your "hot chick talking to me" jollies without as much risk.
611 crossed with 609. I wouldn't worry about it, if you're still happy in your long-distance relationship. I can't imagine such a thing, so someone else should cover that angle.
607/609 -- A married man is permitted to be friendly to women. The test is actually pretty simple: are you concealing the 'friendliness' from the SO, because she would think it a violation of your compact? And does the object of this attention know about the LDR?
"somewhat long distance"? What's this mean? For how long? Don't do anything stupid, Mr. President.
614: out of easy poking distance.
Boy has unfogged ever been the hotbed of relationship excitement lately. Thanks, Emerson!
607: Nah, you're all right. Just as long as you wuss out when it matters.
613 is correct. If the interested parties are aware, it's innocent. To the extent that they are ignorant, it's not.
Certain things about 607 lead this bear to believe that MVB is not happy with his LDR. "which we still expect will lead to marriage"? "I have been...almost intentionally...developing a crush"? Obviously, the crushing impulse is not just because, holy crap, maybe I've made the wrong choice and this other woman is so perfect and present and in the same room in ways my partner isn't. It's some kind of dissatisfaction with the LDR, which is normal, because LDRs suck. And LTRs in general can be tedious. New people are exciting because they're not the same old person, and commitment is a bitch, especially if it's with someone you can't even enjoy the physical presence of.
If you're in California, remember that the governor has declared that "eating isn't cheating." And if you're not unhappy in your current relationship, then no worries. Flirting with hotties makes the world go 'round (but AWB is right that you shouldn't lead her on).
If you can't be with the one you love, ask on a blog.
607: This is the sort of thing you really want to be honest about with yourself, and with them. There's nothing wrong with flirting. Hell, there's nothing inherently wrong with *anything*. This is only up to you and your partner to define. But it's pretty easy to figure out if you've screwed up. Ask yourself, if your fiancee/SO found out about what you've been up to, would she cry foul? Similarly, if your crush found out about your LTR, would she think you were leading her on? Don't do either of these things.
If he was happy in his current relationship, it wouldn't feel weird, and he wouldn't be asking about it here. QED.
Van Buren, tread carefully. You are in danger of being eaten by a bear who has bad memories of guys like you.
The test is actually pretty simple: are you concealing the 'friendliness' from the SO, because she would think it a violation of your compact? And does the object of this attention know about the LDR?
Concealing by omission, yes, I guess. And yes, she knows about the LDR, though I don't talk about it much, so maybe being too friendly would be a signal that the LDR has ended.
"somewhat long distance"? What's this mean?
a four-hour drive.
619: That's also possible, but we don't have enough information. Flirting and crushing on someone outside your LTR can be very good for it, I think. But everyone has to be honest about what is, and what isn't going on.
If he was happy in his current relationship, it wouldn't feel weird, and he wouldn't be asking about it here. QED.
No! I'm happy in it. It just feels normal to continue to seek out attractive females and cultivate flirtations. Therefore, my confusion, that both of these things seem like the natural thing to do, and yet I am realizing that I have to force myself to not think about other women.
Basically, monogamy feels weird.
Everything depends on the jealousy-levels of this relationship. In my first LTR, my bf got freaked out if he saw me talking alone on campus with another guy, and it made me, in a sort of Kafkan way, incriminate myself. Every man I talked to, I wondered if I was perversely attracted to because, holy crap, what if my bf saw us?? In my last LTR, we both kind of got turned on by each other's flirtations with other people, which never went past kissing, but it meant that I was a lot more secure in knowing I'd never actually cheat on him, because I wasn't being accused of it all the time.
625: Oh, that changes everything. Concealing by ommission is a bad sign.
Danger, Will Robinson.
this might just be cold feet and you're acting out/around issues you need to sort out, or it could be a sign you aren't up for the LDR.
Either way, stop it. You want to own these issues, and sort them up. Don't construct a situation that may well blow up and make decisions for you.
Come on, people, don't be so strict. Every long-term relationship has its corners of doubt and anxiety and flirting is just a lot of fun. I get the impression that MVB is perhaps youngish and isn't well-acquainted with these feelings and thinks that any doubt/flirting is bad, but some doubt/flirting is totally normal.
You don't need to force yourself not to think about other women. You just need to remember not to do anything about it. Much easier. Do you have a Tivo?
Four hour drive? That ain't shit. That said, do you want the LDR or don't you? Now's a good time to find out (you have an excuse). Like they say, don't lead anybody on. This applies to Miss Four Hour Drive as well. If you're done with her, don't keep her as backup while you work your shit. It's just not done.
Know who really hated Martin van Buren? Davey Crockett.
Concealing by omission, yes, I guess.
This is bad. Not epic bad, but a sign of trouble ahead.
And yes, she knows about the LDR, though I don't talk about it much, so maybe being too friendly would be a signal that the LDR has ended.
Or that you're unfit for partnership.
Monogamy feels weird because it is weird, but it doesn't mean you have to be all !w00t-polyamory! or anything. You just have to let your thoughts have their own space and respect them, and try to think about them in such a way that shows respect for your SO.
You don't need to force yourself not to think about other women. You just need to remember not to do anything about it. Much easier.
Yeah, but does "do anything" mean intimacy, or does it mean "do anything that I wouldn't want my future wife to know about"? That latter would include, basically, any flirtation. Different things. The latter is easy to fall into basically innocently.
627: Imo, you need to have that exact discussion with your fiancee. About how monogamy feels weird, but you are ok with being monogamous (assuming you are). If you are serious about making this a long term relationship, hiding things from her really isn't ever a good idea. Even if they aren't very important things, because that becomes habit forming.
AWBs comments mirror my own experience. Having flirting etc. out in the open is vastly better, it doesn't break down trust but in a way builds it up. Some couples are even secure in more than that, not something that will work for everyone but it can work.
If he was happy in his current relationship
If he were, Snidely Whiplash. Anyway, MVB, if you're going to test your faith in fidelity, best to do it before you're married.
The idea that anyone would never notice other people, never flirt, never have any ideas at all ... this is absolutely looney. Living in a fantasy like that isn't helping anyone.
No! I'm happy in it. It just feels normal to continue to seek out attractive females and cultivate flirtations. Therefore, my confusion, that both of these things seem like the natural thing to do, and yet I am realizing that I have to force myself to not think about other women.
No, really, married men are permitted to meet, talk to, and like women. On more or less the same terms they are permitted to meet, talk to, and like men.
628.2 is insane in my book. I could see how this could happen, but it reminds me of how I get after every non-me sponsored break up, and that is a state that I do not call sane.
637: if he be happy in his current relationship.
Ok, to try to bring these two sides together: flirting is totally normal and fun and you shouldn't freak out that you're enjoying it. With that in mind, if your fiancee frowns on even flirting, you're in for a rough time--I think that's too strict a standard for most people.
It seems absurd (and likely to blow up in your face) to tell your fiancee "Honey, I've been flirting," but at some point you need to come to an understanding of the ground rules that you're both comfortable with.di
635: "Do anything" means intimacy.
I would recommend against having a future wife who you wouldn't want to know that you were friendly with other women, though it would certainly be better than a present wife with the same condition.
MVB, do you expect that your SO never flirts or thinks of men as attractive? Would you consider that cheating? And has she expressed similar expectations of you? Those seem like really harsh demands to have on a long-term partner, especially a long-distance one. You need affection, and to feel affection, for someone who's around pretty frequently. She does too.
Fucking this woman in the bathroom at work in a sudden fit of perversity and then guiltily marrying your SO as quickly as possible so as to end the affair? That's cheating.
644: AWB is right about the bathroom at work. Fuck her on the copier, and make us copies.
['On goldenrod']
Don't try for some platonic idea of what married men are permitted to do, and what they aren't. That's bullshit too, there isn't a rule book they give you with your marriage license (much as some might like there to be). This is something that is going to come from your own relationship --- something you'll work out together.
So a question at this point: Are you omitting to mention anything to your LTR about this sort of thing because you assume she wouldn't be ok with it, or because you know it (since you've explicitly discussed this sort of thing).
I would recommend against having a future wife who you wouldn't want to know that you were friendly with other women
Bzzzzp to this and 639 both. There's a difference between friendly and flirting, and one of them only goes on with people you're sexually attracted to.
I suppose that flirting in the moment is OK, but nothing beyond that. Fantasizing must be nipped in the bud so that my more safe fantasies about utterly unattainable women can recommence.
640 628.2 is completely sane. This can work amazingly well, even with looser boundaries. Vastly better than the situation of people doing things behind each others backs. Not that there is anything wrong with a relationship where none of this is ok --- just, in exactly the same way, this should be explicitly and openly sorted out before hand.
I read "628.2" as referring to the second sentence, not the second situation. If it's to the second situation, then yes, it's a cute little frisson to say to your partner "That barista would look good on my dick" every once in a while.
Are you omitting to mention anything to your LTR about this sort of thing because you assume she wouldn't be ok with it, or because you know it (since you've explicitly discussed this sort of thing).
Assume.
I'm more gregarious and flirtatious than my girlfriend is - I don't remember ever seeing her flirt, including with me. If we were going to say "there's a type of woman you have a fling with, and a type you marry", she's the latter. And therefore it seems like objectively, me flirting with someone is not as big of a deal as it would be if she was flirting with someone. But this is in fact a sexist attitude on my part, since I am also the type of man you marry, not the type of man you have a fling with.
But anyway, we haven't discussed it, because we aren't really exciting people who have ever done a lot of dating.
I guess I have felt like sexually jealous relationships, in which neither partner is allowed to admit to the other that they have sexy feelings toward people, can lead to a lot of suspicion about how one another dresses, how they talk to co-workers, etc. Open talk about flirting means it's reasonable to dress cute to go to work, and a partner can be flattered that other people find you attractive (as those people should, because, to your SO, you're obviously attractive!). In sexually jealous relationships, there's a tendency to dress down except when you see each other, and sometimes even then, to the point that you stop seeing one another as inherently attractive. That can feel rather sad, IME.
647 -- Flirting in the moment is not ok, if (a) it's concealed and (b) the SO would think it a breach of understandings. Fantasies, on the other hand, seem to me to be your personal property. You can't seriously have been asked to give up thought, but you can certainly be expected to give up conduct.
By the way, what happened to the concept expressed in 609?
You're totally fine, you're nowhere near doing or feeling anything wrong, but if you really want trouble, let the Mineshaft have at you for another half an hour.
652: You're right; I haven't actually been flirting, which by my definition would involve implying that if we would go out on a date some time that would be OK with me.
But it seems like at any moment I might do that, because it seems like the natural thing to do. Basically I am restraining myself from flirting because as stated earlier, monogamy feels weird.
Presumably this is totally normal for a married man.
648 is correct. My evaluation of the sanity of 628 is perhaps a better indicator of the health of the relationships that I've been in than anything else. The girls I've been with have tended toward the paranoid.
it's a cute little frisson to say to your partner "That barista would look good on my dick" every once in a while.
I don't know about the rest of you guys, but saying that to my wife would not generate a reaction I'd describe as "cute".
MVB you should get LDR on here and let her see what you've been saying.
656: what if she said it to you?
flirting, which by my definition would involve implying that if we would go out on a date some time that would be OK with me
Your definition is not correct.
657, I would do that if it was about flirting in general, but not now, because it's about one particular woman that I keep wanting to flirt with. That's the dangerous part.
I think this was a productive "Ask the Mineshaft".
659, how about "implying that I'm available"
how about "implying that I'm available"
Entirely different kettle of fish, and not ok.
656: Maybe a milder version? I remember when Max would get extra-cute to go teach his class, I'd say, "Damn, you look ridiculously cute. Your students must all be in love with you," and he's say, "Yeah, there are at least three girls who've been batting their eyes at me during lecture" and we'd titter about it. It made him a thousand times hotter to me to know that girls were making eyes at him. And vice versa--he loved to meet me in places where I was talking to boys who obviously liked me, because he got to think, smugly, "Yup, and she's going home with me, and I'm a lucky dog."
659 -- I was thinking that as well, but it depends on what a 'date' is. I'm a married man. I can pop into the office a female colleague, whom I like (and find pleasing to look at), and say 'how about lunch tomorrow.' Not a date. If our respective spouses were out of town, I could say 'let's go see a movie.' Still not a date.
649: your reading makes more sense than mine, I think.
650: MVB, I really can't recommend strongly enough that you have this conversation with your potential long term partner (or any one, for that matter). Navigating this stuff on mutual assumptions is stupid, because they often don't match up. There is no need for this to be a big production, just a discussion. You really should have a good feel for where each others boundaries are, what sort of compact you can form for yourselves and live with (and up to).
Your going to notice other people, and so is she. Being able to honestly say that you are sexually attracted to someone else and you aren't going to be intimate with them isn't a failing, it's a strength. Far, far more than pretending these things don't happen.
So now we get to the crush side of things. What about her? Well, surprisingly enough, people like to flirt. Some people will like it more when they know it isn't going anywhere. It's a nice way to brighten up your day. So tell her. She may want nothing to do with you after, but that's her choice (and not one you should take away from her). You may find she's much more playful, too. This:
flirting, which by my definition would involve implying that if we would go out on a date some time that would be OK with me
is pure lunacy. Flirting has no such implication. 661 is incorrect too. Flirting means `you're attractive, and this is fun'. Sometimes that's all it means.
And vice versa--he loved to meet me in places where I was talking to boys who obviously liked me, because he got to think, smugly, "Yup, and she's going home with me, and I'm a lucky dog."
This is terrific fun.
661: I lean towards "being friendly with a sexual charge." There's certainly bad-faith flirting, where you let someone think you're available but you're not. But there's plenty of flirting that goes on between people whose partners are leaning on the same dishwasher at the same party. Flirting is just friendly with pheromones. It's a way of reminding yourself and the world that there's still some kick in you.
But 660 sounds like the clapper on the sceneboard, and I'm good with that.
662: So, I have a different and more narrow definition of "flirting" than most others.
Isn't that what most arguments come down to, having different defitions of a word?
I think we have comity here except on the notion that it is exciting/awful to mention to your s.o. that you find some stranger attractive.
656: what if she said it to you?
I'd probably burst out laughing. I'm pretty far toward the "not jealous" end of the spectrum, but it doesn't seem like that's typical for either gender.
Sifu jokes, "MVB you should get LDR on here and let her see what you've been saying.", but this is a decent metric. If the LDR would be ok with this then go for it. If not, then suck it up and fuck your LDR, and save your flirting for the unavailable.
661 -- Are you? Does the SO think you are?
670: I'm not joking. Everybody talking about their relationships on this site should damn well do their best to get everybody else involved in those relationships reading post-haste, lest the consequences be dear. This has not been abundantly proved?
668: Would it be easier to talk about this flirtation if you told your SO that you thought there was a woman who was flirting with you? That might provoke the more playful kind of jealousy/desire that I'm talking about, as opposed to "WTF? You're hitting on some other woman?" Even if it's not the whole truth, it might be a way of opening the topic for discussion.
673: hiding things that you do here falls under the same category of `things not to do' I mentioned before. For what should by now be obvious reasons...
669: I probably wouldn't say it just like that, either.
674 is so crazy that it just might work. But if it backfires, report back.
God help me, I agree with everything AWB has said on this topic. Actually, there's been a lot of good advice here. And remember "eating isn't cheating."
God, I love typing that.
that it is exciting/awful
I think this is the wrong tack. It's not important if it is exciting or awful. What's important is that it is necessary. It is necessary for the long term health of relationships to admit that this is natural, it's part of what people do, and to see how to make sense of it for the two of you. If you can't be honest with one another about stuff like this, you're pretty much screwed anyway.
And remember "eating isn't cheating."
Is that supposed to apply everywhere, ogged? Or only on the godless coast?
671: No, I'm not, of course.
But I would think it was out of bounds to perform date-like activities that you mention in 664. That is, perform them with someone I'm attracted to.
Comity over!
I'm out. But I'll leave you all with a youtube. AWB, I hope your boomer annoyance doesn't prevent you from enjoying this.
That is, perform them with someone I'm attracted to.
So you'd feel all right going to lunch or a movie with an ugly chick?
Is that supposed to apply everywhere, ogged? Or only on the godless coast?
This sounds like a call for science.
681:
that is a nice song. But you don't get a 100 on the apropos-pop-culture-reference exam, because in fact, my situation is exactly parallel not to that, but to Homer Simpson in the episode featuring the voice of Michelle Pfeiffer.
Man, that Temptations performance in 681 is great.
Look, Napi is much older and has been married a long time; it's probably unhelpful to use him as a model or gauge. I don't think you should go out with this attractive woman, but we were talking about flirting. SoupB is right that you need to get clear on this stuff sooner and later, and keep in mind when you talk about it that if you rule it out completely, you'll come to grief. Flirting is how long-term relationships recharge their batteries.
I always feel awkward getting involved in these threads, but,
663 doesn't describe flirting, it describes being flirted with. My girlfriend and I have lots of fun telling each other about it when it happens, but the fun is kept fun by leaving the flirting on our part implicit. I don't mention that I complimented the singer's band after she sexily offered me a cigarette, she doesn't mention that she was wearing her skimpy dress when the guy asked her out on a date, and everyone is happy.
It's probably more mature to give all the details, yes, and one should if jealousy is brewing, but I don't really understand how recounting flirtatiousness could be attractive except insofar as it entails people flirting with you, your flirting being an extraneous detail.
I like the Temptations, Nápi! I have a heart beating in this chest, after all.
I have to go to sleep so I can teach my wee darlings tomorrow. Hooray for short TDay week!
as for 680, assuming you aren't actually trying to cheat (which I take as the premise of all of this) and that you have passed infantile stages of development, why shouldn't you? If your SO isn't comfortable with it, that a different issue. But there is no inherent reason they should be uncomfortable, or that you should either. If you don't trust yourself to behave appropriately in a situation like that, you have other, deeper problems.
681 -- But not before disagreeing with 680. It's not a date because you're attracted to someone, it's not a date because you eat, and it's not a date because you see a movie. It's a date if the possibility of romance is either explicit or implicit. One can be around people to whom one is attracted, and do stuff with them, with the possibility of romance completely absent.
If you could engage in the same conduct with a male friend, it seems perfectly fair to me to engage in it with a female friend. All caveats about disclosure applying.
Pwnd by the person I was responding to in 674
see, 682 is some messed up.
What strikes me as a bit messed up is to avoid casual activities with people you find attractive, like you won't be able to resist sticking your dick in them or something.
687: I don't think anyone was suggesting a play-by-play, destroyer. I mean, I guess if that's your kink, sure. But really, the point was just to be explicit that yeah, it happens, it's normal, and it is no threat.
687.2 is right. The best way to keep other flirtations in the conversation is by focusing on other people expressing interest in you, rather than talking about all the things you might do to encourage that interest. Your partner can assume that you are just naturally charming and sexy out in the world, just as you are with your SO, and that's not a bad thing to think about someone you love.
692: Gswift can't stop thinking about that barista.
But the gentleman in question finds the prospect tempting, and vice versa. I suspect that the both of them are wearing jeans that highlight the knee.
Gswift works the graveyard shift; fucking baristas is no innocent hypothetical for him.
SoupB is right that you need to get clear on this stuff sooner and later, and keep in mind when you talk about it that if you rule it out completely, you'll come to grief.
Okay, now I realize that. This has been a frank and productive evening.
What strikes me as a bit messed up is to avoid casual activities with people you find attractive, like you won't be able to resist sticking your dick in them or something.
Well, if my current relationship ends because I fell in love with someone else, a bunch of people will be mad at me, and I'll feel guilt for not avoiding these situations, and won't that guilt be justified?
Gswift can't stop thinking about that barista.
If I was banging a barista I could get free lattes. Mmmm, lattes.
If I were banging a cow I could get the milk for free.
Gswift works the graveyard shift; fucking baristas the odd corpse is no innocent hypothetical big whoop for him.
Like I always say, "fucking the odd corpse isn't cheating."
Fucking the super hot popular corpse is iffy, though.
won't that guilt be justified?
No. First, you're not married yet. Second, it is impossible to "avoid these situations" for the rest of your life. Third, the goal isn't to avoid flirtations; it's to decide whether, or no, you *are* committed, and whether you *want* to be committed to the other person. What *you* want, not what you think she, or anyone else, wants you to want.
If you marry someone you don't want to marry because everyone expects you to, or because you used to want to, or because you've gone too far to back out, that is a bad mistake, for both of you. If you marry someone you do want to marry, and you intend to honor that commitment monogamously (which btw, I highly recommend actually ironing out with one's future spouse what, exactly, their expectations are--will they feel betrayed if you flirt? Get drunk and snog? Have a one night stand? What level of "feeling betrayed," in their opinion, goes past "we'd need to deal with that" into "possible divorce" territory?), then yes, you need to know what the line is between "flirting" and "uh oh" (a line that convos with one's spouse should help define), and you need to stay on the safe side of that line.
And if you fuck up and fall in love with someone else, then you know, that doesn't necessarily mean you have to divorce your spouse and be with the other person. Plenty of people fall in love with people they can't be with. The issue then is, do you still love your spouse, and are you willing to work to repair the relationship yadda yadda, and are you capable of taking the hit in the gut of letting go of someone you've fallen for because you made a commitment and have other obligations?
Oh like you've never poured the rest of the kettle on Mrs. Right Now, RIP after making the tea.
The issue here is not how one re-warms one's dead corpses. The issue here is that Ogged actually said "grody."
702: Ok, I really should be heading to bed but I'll have a bang at this first.
Well, if my current relationship ends because I fell in love with someone else, a bunch of people will be mad at me, and I'll feel guilt for not avoiding these situations, and won't that guilt be justified?
That just isn't how it works. Love isn't catching, you don't bump into people and suddenly catch love from them and become immune to your partner or something. Look, relationships fail for lots and lots of reasons. The failure of long relationships, ones that have lasted long enough for you to actually get to know each other, always has an aspect of one or both of you not being willing or able to work at it any more.
You don't fall in love with someone else because you met them. You fall in love with someone else because you met them when you had that need. It doesn't just happen, ever.
Can I ask you a question though? Have you been in a serious, long (ish) term relationship before this one?
New relationships are easy. They're also volatile, and crazy, exciting and tiring, prone to blowing up in your face. You can get into a new relationship easily. You can walk away easily, because you aren't very invested. So can they, and they will sometimes. You won't even see what's coming. You can probably have 30 new relationships in the next 20 years if you want. Every one of them will end, most of them painfully. At the end of all that, you'll have half-remembered snippits; names and faces.
If you want something more than that, you have to make it happen. It won't happen to you.
Soup is making sense, Sifu is limbering up corpses. All is right with the world. Now I'm going to bed. No flirting while I'm away, people.
Sifu's recent comments are way creepier now that we've seen his moustache.
I was sloppy a bit in 713. When I said it doesn't just happen, ever, I didn't mean that this implies you don't still love your SO, or that this sort of thing can't be horribly complicated. And it doesn't mean the end of your relationship, all though it might. You can't go through your life without meeting people. If you're open to letting someone it, sooner or later it's likely to happen. You need to ask yourself why you're open to that, and what you need to do about it.
Crushing on someone doesn't mean it's going anywhere, either. Have you thought about this much? Maybe this is just yourself playing around a bit internally with the idea of what this comitment will mean to you, and if you're ok with it.
Can I ask you a question though? Have you been in a serious, long (ish) term relationship before this one?
Yes. And the way it ended was odd. We just both realized that it was inevitable that it would end, and at that point it ended. This was after two years. I have no idea what event or events made it obvious to either of us. We broke up amicably and neither of us dated anyone else for a while after that. But often I felt lonely and wondered why it had been necessary to break up.
It seems like it would be more normal to break up after a long relationship as the result of one person (or both) finding someone else who excites them more. I could imagine doing that in an alternate universe where I wasn't in a fulfilling relationship already. But since I am, if it's not broken, don't fix it.
playing around a bit internally with the idea of what this comitment will mean to you, and if you're ok with it.
I think this makes sense.
Crushing on someone doesn't mean it's going anywhere, either. Have you thought about this much?
The idea has been going through my head that my life would be more exciting and I'd look forward to every day a bit more if I was still in the "new love" rather than "enduring love" state of a relationship, or if my s.o. was with me rather than away from me. I miss those days.
And just recently there is this woman who I would definitely ask out if I was single, and the ideas mentioned in the previous paragraph are starting to have a potential object. But this will pass.
Maybe this is just yourself playing around a bit internally with the idea of what this comitment will mean to you, and if you're ok with it.
That's definitely what it is.
result of one person (or both) finding someone else who excites them more
I think the typical way this happens is that the relationship breaks, it goes on being broken for a while, the people in it draw into themselves, and then later one (or both) of them meets someone new. That becomes an excuse to break momentum and make the change.
More that that, in any long term relationship, you will become comfortable, things become settled and `normal'. It will always be possible to find someone more `exciting', at least for a little while, because novelty is exciting. Your long relationship will have cycles, and sometimes you lose the butterflies-in-the-stomach stuff for a while. That's part of what people mean when they say that relationships take some work. You have to go find that again, to remind yourselves why you are committed to this, to remember what makes it great. Other times this will be obvious.
All that, and what rfts said in 6.
the `new love' stage just isn't sustainable, in part because it is discovery. Much like the `newly broken up' isn't sustainable, either. It balances.
It's easy to cycle on the `new love' `new collapse' thing.
Only one way to try and find out what 30 years together feels like, though. At some point, you've got to piss or get off the pot.
At some point, you've got to piss or get off the pot.
Soup biscuit is a closet sitzpinkler!
Rndless repititions of the `you left the seat up' conversation show I'm not.
But aren't all sitzpinklers closeted, by design?
Oh, fuck, you're supposed to use a stall?
I thought I was beyond embarrassment, but the boys at the mortuary are never going to let me live this one down.
on the upside, at least you know why all those guys were pointing and laughing. Must come as a relief, that.
I think in California you're allowed to have sex with a corpse in public, but not in private.
727: I just figured Vonnegut looked all funny with his mouth open like that.
Your infatuation is based on a physical attraction. Talk to the woman and you'll realize you have nothing in common.
Didn't work for Homer Simpson and it didn't work here.
If you marry someone you don't want to marry because everyone expects you to, or because you used to want to, or because you've gone too far to back out, that is a bad mistake, for both of you.
Amen.
Anecdata for the claim that flirting means by itself nothing more than "you're attractive, and this is fun": the most fun I've ever had flirting was with a gay friend in college, and that incidences of others flirting with me has skyrocketed since I've gotten married.
I'm assuming that I'm not unique in this, so I'd tend to lean towards not feeling like all flirting behavior needs to be confessed to one's SO, any more than I think I would need to confess for making eye contact with a man on the street. Moreover, since it is so common, going out of your way to confess it in an LDR probably doesn't allay any fears.... why would he be confessing to flirting unless there's more going on?
So I part ways with a number of commenters in this thread on how practical the 'would my spouse/partner be okay with this if I told her' test is. In spirit, it's a pretty good test of one's own motivations. In practice, people are weird.
On Jeans:
Gap Jeans used to be good, but now they are crap and wear out easily.
I just bought some jeans from Ann Taylor on sale. They seem much more solid. I like the corduroys I bought from them better. Much cheaper than anything I've seen elsewhere.
I always liked Levi's, ogged, but I don't knwo where to get them anymore. I used to buy Levis at the Army/Navy store in Harvard Square. That's been gone for ages. I don't know where one goes to get Levis. I haven't seen them at Macy's downtown. Remember that I don't have a car.
I saw some Lee jeans recently and they were pretty expensive.
Gap Jeans used to be good, but now they are crap and wear out easily.
Well fuck. I just last weekend bought my first new pair of jeans in years and nwo you tell me this.
Planning any trips out to Natick, Brock? Apparently that's where the Levi's store is.
For some reason I get drug to Natick about twice at least monthly these days. Want to tag along sometime?
Yeah, I would actually. Shoot me an e-mail, when you're panning on going.
735 -- I bought a pair of 501s at Macys in downtown DC just Friday. I'm surprised the Boston store doesn't have them.
Levis are unwearable for me. The men's jeans are the strangest shape. They seem to be cut very 'feminine' over the waist/hip area. The waistband comes far too high up, and the waist/hip ratio is wrong -- if the waist size fits, the hips will be voluminous and jodhpur like.
I found this even when I was skinny.
Shame, as I often like the look of their jeans.
