Beware of Buying Underwear Off the “Clearance” Table

It all started last Thursday, with the knowledge that I needed to acquire new underwear. Keep in mind that I’m not your stereotypical guy who waits until he has to go to work commando because his last piece of “sacred” jockey shorts disintegrated on him in mid-commute. Well fitting underwear is essential in my line of work, which involves long hours with your butt firmly planted in a chair in front of a computer screen. When you’ve spent the last hour mentally chafing over someone else’s crappy code, the last thing you want is physical chafing of your dangly bits.

I must admit that I was pretty darned proud of myself for (a) remembering that I needed new underwear while I was in a store where I could make such a purchase (as opposed to being in the produce aisle next to the visual cue of the cucumber bin), and (b) that I had lucked into a truly amazing underwear sale. I like to think of myself as frugal, or at least somewhat thrifty, because self-delusion is, IMNSHO, easier than admitting the all too painful truth revealed by my bank statement.

I am reasonably certain that the fact that I had not only found underwear in my size, but on sale, and at rock bottom prices, combined with my usual obliviousness, lead to my lapse of checking the packs of jockey shorts beyond the price tag and the size. The “Mogwai” brand should have been a warning, or at the very least, a clue. As it was I was just so damned happy to feed my self-delusions about thriftiness that I scooped up five packs of jockey shorts and headed for the check outs.

So, another way in which I am not a stereotypical guy is that I like to wash new clothes before I wear them. Things generally fit better, and I have found that the incident rate for highly irritating rashes in uncomfortable places became greatly reduced by the “wash ‘em first dummy” policy. So I get home from Target (you know, Tar-je`, the lower end cousin of the fine French retailer J.C. Pen-ne`?), dutifully removed my new soon to be close friends from their packaging, tossed them in the washing machine with some detergent, and went upstairs to get something to drink.

Imagine my surprise when I came back downstairs the next morning and found the washing machine practically overflowing with a year’s supply of underwear. I was pretty certain that I’d only bought two week’s worth, but figured that with new packaging technologies you could squeeze the tighty whiteys even tighter and therefore get more in each pack. Needless to say my delusions of frugality swelled even more, as I tossed an armload of underwear into the dryer and went back upstairs to set up my coffee IV.

I have to tell you, I was mighty happy with the Mogwai brand at first – they fit well, they were really soft and kept my dangly bits warm while I was in the computer room. I guess I’d been wearing them for three or four days when the darker nature of my deep discount underwear reared it’s ugly head. Some friends of mine had been talking up the Heat Flash podcast, and so I’d gone over to check it out right before bedtime. Rumors of Ms. Madden’s naughtiness have not been exaggerated, and when I fell asleep I was more than a little “hot and bothered”, which quite likely fueled the next chain of events.

I don’t exactly recall the exact point in the dream involving the lithe nymph and baby oil where things took a turn for the painful, but I do clearly recall the burning sensation in my dangly bits as my underwear attempted to give me an Atomic Wedgie in my sleep. As I said, the “Mogwai” brand should have been a clue, so I really have no one but myself to blame for violating both rules in the midst of my dream date.

You do know the two rules, don’t you?

(1) Keep ‘em dry

(2) Don’t feed ‘em after midnight

Truth be told, I don’t know what was more embarrassing – the ensuing trip to the emergency room (they’ll be talking about Atomic Wedgie Man and the carnivorous jockey shorts for years to come), or the visit from the weird old Chinese guy who shook his head as he delivered the “product recall notice” for my underwear and wouldn’t leave until I turned over every last pair.

So, this is what happens when one is doing battle in the Cave of Clutter, and decides that certain items have been multiplying like rabbits. Especially if one has a mind like mine, which is not simply twisted, but has actually been tied in a Gordian Knot.

The Beware of Buying Underwear Off the “Clearance” Table by J. Gregory Wright, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.