Pajama.

Jeans.

What’s wrong with this picture?

I first saw them in Rite Aid on my lunch break with my friend Lindsay. I was all, “Whaaaaaaat the fuuuuuuuuuuck????” Since then, I’ve seen a few ads and have watched the infomercial, none of which did anything to make me less horrified.

Here’s the thing: I like that clothing has become more casual over the last century. I appreciate that I can go shopping without a corset, a petticoat, tiny, pointy high heels, and even without pantyhose. I like that I can even go to work in pants, a sweater, and flats. But there is a line. And pajama jeans have crossed it.

One of the tag lines in the ads is, “Just because you’re busy doesn’t mean you can’t look sharp!”

REALLY? Are they saying that we’re too busy to get dressed in the morning??? I wonder what we’re supposed to be doing that takes priority over putting on clothes. Texting? Skyping? Checking Facebook? Taking the kids to lessons? Answering work calls? What?

Is this true? Are we too busy? Or are we too lazy? Have we, as a society, reached a point where we can’t be bothered to change from our pajamas into our jeans in the morning? Or from our jeans back into our pajamas at night? Is this too much effort? Do we have to sleep in our clothes and go out in our nightclothes? We’re already apparently too lazy to walk to the TV to change the channel, flush our own toilets, and push or pull a button to put soap on our hands. Are we now too lazy to dress ourselves?

I can kind of understand the appeal if you’re over 90 years old and have a lot of trouble reaching and bending, but that’s really the only acceptable situation. I feel like the main target audience for pajama jeans is people who have just plain given up on life. Because, honestly, if walking from your bed to your dresser is too much effort, something is very, very wrong. And need I mention, if we’re lumbering out of bed and starting our day, wearing our jammies as jeans, does this mean we’re also skipping our shower? Because if you’re taking off the pajama jeans to take a shower, you might as well put on regular jeans. Or, if you’re showering at night, you might as well put on regular pajamas. Unless you’re SHOWERING in your pajama jeans, which I’d believe, because at this point, I’d believe anything.

There are many disturbing things happening in our world today. Pajama jeans may not seem like a disastrous turn of events to you, but I see it as a deadly omen; a harbinger of things to come. Mark my words.

(By the way, someone needs to tell the woman in the ad that she’s too old to wear pigtails.)

I see a lot of these ads come out of the beautiful town of Flossmoor, wherever on Planet Earth that might be. They must know something we don’t, you guys. They seem to have all the answers!

My main question on this one is:
What exactly is the job she’s doing at home? If I click on the link, will it take me to the fololowing job posting?

Wanted: Administrative Assistant for Busy Office
Ideal candidate should have:
3-5 years’ experience in administrative position
Ability to juggle multiple tasks in a fast-paced environment
Bachelor’s Degree in Communications or related field
Experience wearing blue face paint a must
Ability to hold fish in teeth preferred
Telecommuting OK

Citizens of Flossmoor, I’m directing this question to you.

My combination favorite / least favorite ads are the ones that claim that a “mom” discovered some miracle cure or loophole in the system. Why is the fact that a mom discovered it supposed make it so much more appealing? Like Betty Johnson in Somewheresville, USA, is going to all of a sudden do a double take at her computer screen and go, “DALE, GET IN HERE. It says a MOM discovered this weird old trick that is going to make my teeth 10 shades lighter while also putting money in my pocket and infuriating my dentist. And I know I can trust her, because I’m a mom, too! Never mind that I know nothing about this particular mom or if she knows anything about dentistry, or even how to tie her shoes, for that matter. She’s a MOM, Dale. A MOM!!! I’M CLICKING THE AD!!!”

Another question I have is: Why is it always a weird old trick? Do people think it’s more legit if it’s old? and weird? Because I know of some weird old tricks that I wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot pole. (Don’t come near me with those leeches, please!) Science has come a long way, and if given the option between a “weird old trick” and “modern science,” I think I know which one I’ll choose.

I’m going to leave you with a trick from a mom in Lyndhurst (wherever the hell that is; are we supposed to know where Lyndhurst is, or is it a generic town name that anyone in an English-speaking country can realte to: “OH, yeah, someone from Lyndhurst, Dale. WE’VE HEARD OF THAT TOWN! I’M CLICKING THE AD!”)

So this mom discovered this clever wrinkle therapy that makes botox doctors furious (and are there really such things as “botox doctors”? That’s very specific).

I clicked on the ad to find out what the trick was, and as it turns out, she stopped doing meth.

That is a clever trick!

Stephanie had “How rude!”
Michelle had “You got it, Dude.”
Joey had “Cut it out!” (complete with hand motions)
Uncle Jesse had “Have mercy!”

Now what about Danny, DJ, Aunt Becky, and Kimmy Gibler? I’m sure Kimmy had to have one, right? OK, so now that I’ve got them written down, it looks like only half the main characters had catch phrases. But that’s still more than your average family.

I watched so much Full House, I could maybe win some kind of Full House trivia game show, and with the amount of reality TV happening, a game show about a real show wouldn’t surprise me at all. So it could happen! Facts I know, without visiting any kind of website, include:

Their phone number is 555-2424.
Stephanie’s full name is Stephanie Judith Tanner.
DJ’s is Donna Jo Margaret Tanner.

Actually… I think that’s all I know, other than all the obvious stuff. I would lose that game show so hard! Oh, man. Those are good facts though, right?

bum's bum

AWESOME!

Then he got up and picked up some trash in his area. “Well, at least he’s cleaning up,” I thought. “That’s something.”

No. he threw the trash on the street. Isn’t it cool how he doesn’t want trash, his own trash, in his little area, but he’ll put it out for the rest of us to enjoy?

Street, trash can -- so hard to tell those pesky things apart.

I’ve had enough. What do I do???

Do I shout out the window at him? Leave him a note of warning? Do I call someone? Who do I call? Opinions, please. I’m done getting bummed.

I was washing my face, and suddenly I heard the sounds of shouting and condemnation through the open windows, and then some murmuring and a woman’s voice say, “No, you are NOT controlling yourself.” And I was inclined to agree with her, as the man continued to rant and rave. I went out to the living room where I could get an unobstructed view, and there was a woman and a priest facing off with a man with a big, yellow sign that said, “The Wicked Shall (Something, I forget now).” So I hunkered down to watch, and he kept up the tirade for several minutes. More people came out, including the main priest in the white robe, and the street preacher was getting up in their faces somewhat, and my neighbor downstairs announced that she’d called the police.

At this point, I decided I needed to take a picture, so I went to get my camera, and wouldn’t you know, when I came back he’d crossed the street and had set up camp right outside my apartment building (greeaaaat), but continued to shout at them from across the street. So I couldn’t get a good picture. By this point, also, the church cat, Vesper, was trotting outside to see what all the excitement was about. And at that moment, the street preacher said something that sounded like, “You thesperals,” but I don’t think that was it, since that’s not a word, but it sounded enough like “Vesper” that I saw her be like, “What? Me? What do I have to do with this?” Nevertheless, she was intrigued and parked herself on the sidewalk to get an unobstructed view as he continued the rant. He said that word a couple more times, and each time, her ears perked up. Eventually the shouting tapered off, and Vesper trotted back inside, deciding the excitement was over, and similarly, I trotted back to my room, got back in bed and started writing this.

And oh, boy, he’s shouting again, although I can’t quite make out what he’s saying. I have a feeling he may not actually be saying sentences, because I just heard something like, “With folly, set on high! Magnified good with God’s shrimp! And the righteous and the wicked shall personally give the wicked to condemn the righteous.” (What?) Then something about a scholar or a collar, and I think he’s pretty upset about an unmarried couple living together.

And Ohhh, boy, he just very clearly said, “Yes, I’m still here, Cowards. I’ll be here for a very long time. Perhaps week after week.” And by “here” I can only assume he means his current position right by our garage. Mmm, can’t wait for that. Won’t be awkward at all walking by him on my way to take out the recycling.

Well, last night I started a writing class that is held at the teacher’s apartment. This apartment is in a lovely neighborhood with a heinus, heinus parking situation. Like, I guess the first two or three people actually get to park on his street, then the next six or eight find spaces a couple blocks away after circling twice or thrice, and then, there’s me. And I can’t really get there much sooner, because I’m coming from work. So by the time I got there, (and I was not yet late, mind you; when I got to the apartment and started looking for parking, I still had a couple minutes to spare), all the good, fair, and mediocre spots were taken; all that was left was a metered spot, blocks and blocks away and down a steep series of hills, and I only found it after driving around for 15 minutes. And I can’t help thinking this is like a modern-day, non-fishing-boat Ping situation, except that the last person, instead of getting a spank on the back, gets the shittiest parking space of all time.

La-la-la-la-lei!

The reason for this is because my parents have always lived dangerously close to the Springmaid Wamsutta outlet in Asheville, North Carolina, which, coincidentally and irrelevant to this story, is right next door to a Bojangles. YUM. Anyway, so my mom always has way too many towels, and has always either given me her extras or has bought them for me at the outlet. And I think I’ve been using towels I’ve had since college. This hasn’t bothered me in the slightest, because for my first five years in LA, my bathroom was a jarring pinky/purply color, and the only way I could see to deal with that was to lean it toward the purple, and away from the pink, by having white and purple accessories. So my sister bought me a beautiful white shower curtain with purple squares, I happened to find a lovely white bath rug with purple squares, and all my towels from college were, conveniently, purple! When I moved to a different bedroom in that house, my new bathroom was just white, so purple went fine… and when I lived in my last apartment, Mary and I had a bunch of different-colored stuff anyway, so it was no big deal that my towels were purple (and a few various shades of blue that had made their way into my collection (via Mom) along the way).

The Pinky-Purply Bathroom of Doom

Close-up on Those Sweet Purple Towels!

Another reason I’ve kept those old towels is that I kind of hate new towels, or maybe the only new towels I’m familiar with haven’t been the highest quality. I mean, not my Wamsutta towels, because those are great quality… but some new towels I’ve used at other people’s houses, when they’re new and haven’t yet been washed 75-80 times, shed lint all over you and, rather than absorbing water, merely push it around, which is quite annoying when you’re trying to get dry, because isn’t that the point of towels to begin with? So anyway, why would I want to put myself through that, when I can just keep my trusty old absorbent purple friends?

So, back to the other day. I cleaned my bathroom and changed out my blue bath rug for my yellow and white one… and I’d recently gotten some new soap in a yellow dispenser… and I happened to have a navy blue hand towel on the rack… and I noticed how lovely everything looked with the blue and the yellow. And I decided that it was time to get rid of my purple towels and move toward a new dawn… a dawn of navy blue and yellow towels… towels that I would purchase myself, and wash 75-80 times if need be, so that they’d absorb.

And throughout all this, I noticed something kind of disturbing… I noticed that I’m actually very attached to my old purple towels, and that all my hemming and hawing about how new towels suck, and the only acceptable towels are old towels, was actually me masking the fact that I, for some reason, am deeply attached to these purple towels! And as I was spending way too much money on new towels online just now (Monograms! Ahahahahahahaha!), I found myself wondering what would become of the old ones. I could use them as rags, but no, they were too dignified for that; that would be insulting. I don’t think Goodwill takes towels, and if you think I’m going to put them in the dumpster, you can think again. I’m pretty sure what’s happening is that I care about these towels’ feelings! I feel like they’re part of me, like we’ve been through so much together, like comfy old pals. And that, my friends, is precisely the reason I must get rid of them as quickly as possible.

Blue and Yellow Paradise! (The tiles and towels look almost black, but trust me, they're blue.)

R.I.P. Purple Towels: 2001ish–2011.

Here is a picture of Trash Cat Woman being escorted into a police car. I think we all know, however, that the real story here is the ridiculous getup those cops are wearing. WTF???

*This photo and all my info on the topic is from www.dailymail.co.uk

I’ve been reading a self-help book, as I am wont to do, that told me to look for love everywhere I went, and to look for the connections between others and myself, and between others and other otherses. This was very good for me, because lately I’ve been witnessing a lot of hate in the world, and it’s started to get me down in a major way. I’ve gotten so tired of experiencing all the aggression that occurs 1,000 times a second on the freeways, for example, and it all culminated a couple weeks ago when someone put a pre-printed business card on my car that said it hoped I got cancer, because I was parked a little bit over the line in the tiny compact car space that my compact car does not fit into properly. Yes, I will repeat that: Someone went to the trouble of ordering and purchasing business cards that say on the front, “Way to park, asshole.” And on the back, “I hope you get cancer.” It was actually quite a visually appealing card, with a lovely combination of fonts printed on a nice brick-red color. But the point is, feeling that malice directed at me was the straw on the camel’s back of hate that I’d been witnessing, and it made me really, really sad.

So, back to the self-help book. The day after I read the section about looking for love everywhere, it was “one of those mornings” where all forces of the universe were determined to slow me down, and after running to catch the metro, I got there a minute too late, and had to wait, all sweaty-like, for the next one. When I finally got on, a woman using a walker (with difficulty) got on, too. A youngerish woman and a blind man both got up for her to take their seats. (Side note: The question has been raised as to how the blind man knew to get up for her, and my guess is that the youngerish woman said something, or maybe he’s just that good.) Well, the walker woman (henceforth referred to as Walker Woman or WW) took the blind man’s seat and began talking with him and the youngerish woman (YW). When the blind man got off, he said goodbye to YW, and she and WW kept talking. Throughout their conversation, I unabashedly eavesdropped and exchanged eye contact and smiles with both of them at various points. When it was time for me to get off at my stop, I said goodbye to Walker Woman, and Youngerish woman got off there, too. And here comes the best part: Youngerish woman crossed to the other side of the platform to wait for the train going in the opposite direction. She had gone past her stop, and I believe it was out of love, because she didn’t want to prematurely end her conversation with Walker Woman. She wanted to make sure WW was taken care of, and then and only then did she get off and make her way back to where she needed to go.

Love.

I’m so glad I missed my train that morning and ended up on the one I ended up on.

That day marked a new chapter for me, one of looking everywhere for love and kindness, and finding it. I make a point to make eye contact, smile at, and talk with more strangers, and I’m making new friends all over town. I still see the hate, and it still bums me out, but now I have something with which to balance it.

I think you should try it, too. We’ll fill the world with love, one person at a time. Then one day, we’ll realize that we don’t see any hate, because there won’t be any.

(Do I sound like a hippy, or what?)