2013-05-09

Issues: We All Have Them


First, I would just like to lay down a quick disclaimer and say that the “issue” here is not life-threatening, day stopping, cry-for-help issues. I use the word “issue” lightly, just as I use ALL THE WORDS lightly. My husband and I have little everyday issues that we have learned to accept, laugh about and work around.

I feel like all humans have an “issue” with something, big or small. If issues stop you from living your life, get help. Some are hilarious, some are frustrating to those closest to us, and some are just silly. I have many, from food issues, kid issues, and several clothing issues, but unlike most things here this is not about me.

One that entertains me is my husband’s issue with Work Clothes. Not a game stopper, deal breaker, or debilitating texture manipulation issue, just an issue with appearance and fit of his work clothes. I can totally relate to clothing issues. When I think about all my various clothing issues…the first thing that comes to mind is my favorite psychopathic robot, Roberto from Futurama, with his “Ever kill a man with a sock?” (I'll link the video at the end so you can watch it, it's fuuuuuuuny.)

The other day he told me “I’m out of work clothes.” I know what he meant, but I looked at the closet, and well, I would just like to share this picture of our closet with you. All but the 2 pink shirts on the right are HIS clothes. 
 
Almost aaallllllll HUSBAND threads
See what I’m getting at? This is not the guest room closet, which is the graveyard closet that houses the ghosts of clothing that fit in the past, this is our BEDROOM closet. Where he typically hangs his everyday clothing.

He obviously meant he did not have the work clothes he preferred clean and available. Right off the bat, I recognized some of his quags. After 9 years together, I’m starting to understand his clothing issues, but I’m not all the way there yet. 

The collared polo-type shirts are not work shirts in his mind, too casual. Yes even for Friday. On casual Friday he wears the same thing, khakis and a button-up shirt. It’s rare he wears any short-sleeved shirt to work for a number of reasons you probably don’t want to hear about. Meaning they’re not funny.

A couple of the shirts he considers “dress shirts” for special occasions, which means either the style, or more likely the FABRIC is shiny. I don’t even mean pimp, Vegas nightclub shiny,
from endawanda.com
I’m talking about 1% polyester. 

You wouldn’t even know it was there, but that means DRESS shirt to him. A lot of his issues? Are about fabric.

I almost have his work shirt necessity list down. 

This is what I know for certain:

The slightest bit shiny and it's a dress shirt.

They must be mostly cotton, NOT linen. Too wrinkly.

They must be THICK fabric, we don’t know from thread count but NO nip slips. Or anything like this:
from lurvely.com
They must be long-sleeved. With rare exception.

NO WHITE or light-colored BUTTONS. This is his “wire hangers.”

Pattern is better than plain, but not a busy or loud pattern.

They can’t be too dark, or too light. In fact, let’s talk about color.

A special section for COLORS:

Green is great! Especially lighter greens, but not light seafoam green.
from sodahead.com

Dark purple is good, depending on the pattern

Not plain dark purple. Ever.

Blue is questionable.

Navy is good but not solid navy.
from zazzle.com

Light blue must have a good pattern.

Regular red is a NO. In all cases.

Maroon is okay, usually.

Yellow is a no, unless the pattern overwhelms the yellow.

Orange is a no, unless it has a visible Bears logo.

Brown depends on the shade and pattern.

Light gray is a no, dark gray can’t be too dark and again, flecked or a good pattern. Plain dark gray is just black's shadow.

Most black is right OUT, unless there is a busy pattern.

White is only for tampon commercials* and old timey milkmen.

These are not rules we have ever spoken about, these are rules I have learned the hard way. Meaning, I purchased what I thought was a perfectly acceptable shirt for him, only to be rejected for one of these reasons. Or another reason I can’t remember right now. After all this time, I still only run at about a 70% success ratio. Gift receipts, I keep track of them.

This past Christmas, I bought him what I KNOW for a fact would have been an awesome-looking shirt on him. I was leery, it had light blue AND regular RED in the plaid pattern, both no-no’s, but it also had a lot of green. He looks great in light blue, but he has a very special kind of love for light blue, mostly it's called hate, and this is a man who knows all too well that hate is the path to the dark side. It’s a dirty shame, with his brown hair it really looks good on him. He is not a fan, he really has some kind of light blue chip on his shoulder.

My theory? It has something to do with his green eyes. He is kind of sensitive about his eyes. I don’t want to get into it, but basically he has green eyes and he loves green, and he kind of HATES blue, and blue things, and all that blue represents. I have never met anyone with such distaste for one of the primary colors.

I mean yellow? It’s bright, maybe it reminds you of Hi-Liters or urine.
Red? Rage. Fresh pimples. Okay, I get that. It can be an eye punch of a color.
Blue? What the fudge could BLUE have ever done to you? Relaxed you too much? Reminded you of the sky. FUCK YOU SKY. It’s just silly.

Anyway, I have blue eyes and I love blue. Maybe it’s perception, maybe it’s eyeball racism, I’m not sure. But he? Doesn’t wanna talk about it I guess.

Besides the texture and color and having long sleeves and NOT white or light-colored buttons, the THICK fabric also cannot be itchy. Duh, I know, but he has dry, itchy skin as it is so that comes with a heavy dose of irrational fear of itchy fabric. 

We were 90’s kids and Nirvana fans, total flannelcore, and he will not even wear any kind of flannel shirt anymore, which really blew part of brain away when I donated the last couple flannel shirts. We are talking about the man I named Count Comfula almost a decade ago, he should be decked in head to toe flannel 24/7, right?

He said he would still wear flannel if he “finds one he likes” but cannot tell me what that means. I am no flannoisseur, so after a few I just gave up on that. You would think life in ComfyTown would either be draped in velvet or total flannage. We still listen to Nirvana and this dude? Is sick with the comfy, and has a goatee. He is flanntastic, but I think he is afraid they will be itchy. His cheap wife bought some sketchy flannel bed sheets that SUCKED and itched like a meth-head.

The Count's Shirts: A Wrap-Up
Other than long sleeves, thick fabric, no white buttons,  good patterns, no forbidden colors, he says anything goes. 
______________________________

Happy 5th Wedding Anniversary to my Count, you big, beautiful weirdo! This blog post? Is your anniversary present. DFILY.

p.s. We were married in Vegas 5/10/08 but that is just the day the paperwork made it legal to the government, and really who cares about those jackholes? Anyone who can’t legally be married yet, a piece of paper doesn’t define your love, you do it yourself EVERY DAY.

I prefer to celebrate November when he asked me to share the rest of my life with him or October, when we first started dating. This October will be NINE YEARS together. Neither of us remembers the exact date because we didn’t write it in our Holly Hobby diaries, and that was before we had Facebook accounts so we can’t just look it up, but we think it was October 18th. Ish.

Since I’m too lazy to soak this word stew in my usual marinade of funny, I give you definitions of Clothes from UrbanDictionary.com because I might be lazy, but I am grateful when people stop by to read my brain vomit.

clothes 
Pieces of fabric shaped and stitched so that they may be worn on the body. Are increasingly becoming a symbol of social status.
Many people are being classified based on what kind of clothes they wear. You've probably done it, too.
clothes 
The most effective form of contraception.
Gavin dry-humped Roberta on the bus. Since they both wore clothes, copulation was avoided.
Clothes 
The most useless invention in the history of mankind, in fact we'd all benefit from not wearing clothes.
Man: Yo man clothes are useless! 

Woman: I already took mine off!
2nd FREE Bonus: Roberto from Futurama’s “Ever kill a man with a sock?” Roberto is the bomb dot com. After you watch this video, search "Roberto, practice my stabbing." You are welcome. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gut2Be3sMoY2

Shout out to "It's Why You Like Me" Facebook page for reminding me the only OTHER situation where someone would wear all-white in this day and age. Check out her Facebook page, it's heeeeelarious. THREE BONUSES in this post. Quite a value. 

8 comments:

  1. Heeeeelarious!!! I've never know a man to be, um, persnickity about clothes. But then again, Hubs wears Wranglers and a work issued shirt to work. Blech!! Happy Anniversary!!

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    Replies
    1. Thank you! Yeah, he's REALLY PICKY, but about kind of weird stuff. I mean the color thing? Hilarious.

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    2. P.S. Persnickety is one of my fav-0-rite words!! Noice!

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  2. Awe you rock ... a flannel I'm sure :) But seriously white ... yeah it's a deal breaker fo sho

    ~It's why you like me

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    Replies
    1. I LOVE flannel, but I had to turn too many lesbians down so I stopped wearing them just to save time ;)
      WHITE, I know? WHO wears white other than Kardashians??

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  3. ;) My hubs has green eyes...but blue's his fav...and his shirt hue ranges from most shades of blue to shades of dark green. and white. and I convinced him to get a brown one. plain. no patterns. I feel ya ;)

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    Replies
    1. Really? So there goes my theory on why MY hubs hates blue. Hrrmphf. Yours sounds like he's opening up his range a wee bit, that's some progress. I mean, we ALL have our issues.
      I can't even start a blog post on mine, it would sound so super crazy. Just shoes and pants alone. Sheesh! :)

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  4. Oh dear... Moral of this story? buy your own clothes dude!
    Thanks for hooking up to the Hump Day Hook Up

    ReplyDelete