Monday, March 10, 2008

Reason 1,547,902 why I shoulnd't go out in public...

Last Thursday, Ethan and I took a walk down to our neighborhood Barnes & Noble to kill some time at the Thomas the Train table. Well, Ethan was going to kill some time at the table; I was going to kill some time trying to cram my ass into their child-sized adirondack chairs.

You can't slide into the suckers--they're too narrow at the front. I learned this the hard way, giving myself a bruise on the hips and an even bigger one to the ego. But if you hover over the chair, twist your hips a bit and lower yourself into it, you can park it quite nicely and even straighten yourself out once it's your knees trying to clear the front of the chair.

Initially I just thought it was because my ass was comparable in size to the side of a semi, but thankfully I have seen skinny little moms have the same issue, so it is clearly not just a problem for the chubby girl. Thank god. I actually watched in unconcealed delight on Thursday as another mom, in her skinny jeans, had to go through the same riggamaroll to get into the chair on the other side of the Thomas table. I'm not proud of it, people, but it was nice to see.

Anyway, karma got me for that guilty pleasure because as the aforementioned skinny mom and I started chatting, I casually looked down to pull a piece of fuzz off of my wrist and made a horrifying discovery.

I was wearing one of those thermal-weave shirts (this in and of itself is mortifying--at what point did it become acceptable in my mind to leave the house in what basically amounts to long johns? Who AM I?!), and I noticed that the stitching at my wrist was awfully pronounced; kind of like what the inside of the shirt would have looked like...only it was on the outside. Awesome.

So then, as calmly as possible, while still chatting merrily along with this woman, I started to look at my shoulders...stitching. My other wrist...stitching.

Yeah. My shirt is totally on inside out. Good for me; that's awesome.

You know when you realize something like that and your face gets hot and red and you want to laugh, but you're also mortified and you're not sure if admitting that your shirt is on inside out would make the situation better and funny or just so much worse, and you want to crawl under the Thomas table, but you can't because there are two toddler boys under there bonking their heads on the underside of the table and laughing?

That's how I felt.

In my defense, I hadn't really intended to take my sweatshirt off when I first put the top on that morning. I figured it was chilly enough outside that I'd just keep it on and that would be that. I hadn't counted on Barnes & Noble having their heat cranked. By the time we got up to the children's section, it was either take off the sweatshirt or end up sweating like a pig. And even when I made the discovery of my wardrobe malfunction, I couldn't bear the thought of putting the sweatshirt back on. I wish I were more of a slave to fashion, but the embarrassment wasn't enough to lead me back into complete sweaty discomfort.

Realizing I had no options, I just took some deep breaths and kept chatting. Thankfully her child started melting down before Ethan did, so they took off first and I never had to stand up and show off my shirt in all it's on-inside-out glory, so I suppose it's possible she never noticed.

Anyway, I think it's time to invest in a full-length mirror and dedicate a bit more time to making sure Mama is presentable before she leaves the house. Otherwise, I am looking at a future of embarrassment for both me and my kid. I can just hear it now, "Dude, what is your mom wearing??!!"

6 comments:

Becca said...

Oh gosh! I hate it when I do stuff like that (and I do... a lot... I'm pretty sure Charlie's teacher thinks I'm in high school).

Sarah said...

That's super funny. I do that stuff ALL THE TIME (and I like thermal shirts-- they're cute). I am screwed now that boot season is almost over, and I'll have to try to find matching socks!!

Lindsay Margenau said...

Oh my gosh, I can't erad your blog at work anymore. I'm in tears laughing over the last 3 entries, and noone in the computer lab here can understand what is going on. How embarassing! :)

Amy said...

I recall when I was in high school, inside-out-backwards sweats were fashionable. Since skinny jeans have come back from that era, just tell people this is as well!

Anonymous said...

Oh man, that sucks! Sadly, I think Avery has a thermal shirt from Old Navy where the stitching sticks up like it's inside-out...only it's not. ::running off to bury them in the trash:: But I guess it's better than pulling a dryer sheet from your sleeve or realizing you had toilet paper stuck to your shoe. ;)

Kate B. said...

I'm pretty sure that putting your clothes on inside out is lucky. At least that's what my grandma always told me.

Or you could just pretend that you are going for the deconstructed thing. Like: "Inside out? Oh no! It's just these Belgian designers. That Berhard Willhelm is so witty, don't you think?"

That should shut up anyone more organised when it comes to dressing themselves.

And you know, it could have been a lot worse. (Ever experienced yesterday's knickers working their way down your jeans leg while on public transport? Uhuh. Guilty.)