Chuckle #423 | September 29th, 2010
Shopping in the Red Light District
The blond slowly ran her hands over my husband’s butt and down his inseam. He stood passively in the cubicle as I watched. It was both uncomfortable and titillating. She tugged seductively at his waistband and turned him to face me.
No, we weren’t in Amsterdam cavorting on the Oudezijds Achterburgwal. We were buying a suit. Still, this fitting room threesome felt way too ménage à wrong.
The suddenly business-like sales lady pronounced the pants “perfect”. “Flat front is the way to go for him, don’t you think?”
“Flat front is definitely sexy,” I replied, still reeling from the shock of watching another woman lasciviously handle my husband as he stood before a three way mirror. In public, on a platform. Like a Wall Street pole dancer.
“What do you think?” I asked, turning to my mother-in-law.
“They look great,” she said nodding, and not looking the least bit titillated. (For which I am eternally thankful.)
“How about cuffs?” my husband asked.
“No cuffs”, said the saleslady.
“No cuffs”, agreed his mother.
He looked hopefully over at me. “I want cuffs”, he insisted, looking more like a mulish 16 year old than a successful man of finance.
“Sorry sweetie, I have to agree with your mom. These flat front pants have a very sexy European gigolo look and cuffs would ruin them.” I winked suggestively. Then I shrugged to show him how helpless both he and I were in the face of the combined force of his mom and the sales lady. What I was really thinking was, finally, a pair of pant without pleats or cuffs!
Women have been telling men what to wear since the first colorblind husband emerged from his closet wearing a hideous “tan on tan” combination. You’d think guys would know by now what NOT to wear with khakis.
I don’t have a lot of rules about clothes. I’m not one of those wives who insists on “dressing” their husband. As long he doesn’t clash horribly or put on a Speedo, I am ok with whatever he chooses to wear.
Shopping for casual clothes is hard enough, but shopping for suits is sheer torture. For one, suits are expensive and a mistake will cost you a bundle. Plus, watching your husband get groped by a salesperson, male or female, is decidedly uncomfortable. And what the tailor does to a man’s crotch is practically X-rated, or would be if he wasn’t a 90 year old Italian guy.
Some people are into that sort of thing. I have to look away.
So last weekend, even after I endured this thoroughly disturbing fitting on my husband’s behalf, he still complains that he doesn’t have cuffs on his new suit. He claims he was railroaded by a bunch of women. Well, he was. And he looks great because of it.
We ladies made it up to him by letting him pick out all his own ties, even some ugly ones.
All I can say is that these suits had better last a long, long time because I might never fully recover from sharing that experience with my mother-in-law. My husband should show some concern for my delicate mental state, and stop whining about his lack of cuffs!
