The Saga of the Pants (part II)

Brought to you Live! from Vickery Towers...that's right folks, still no internet at home, but a friend did send me her old laptop yesterday, so i have a word processor. pretty awesome generous, huh? thanks a million, Annie. i checked on getting it adapted to access the net, but apparently no one supports windows 98 anymore.

Last week's headline news:
~Premature Attackulation in the Persian Gulf Avoided (phew!)
~Presidential Debates Continue (to make few proud to be americans)

and after the break, our lead story...
~Rick Goes Shopping Again


"excuse me, ma'am, i'm looking for some pants for my mom. can you help me?"
"sure, what size does she wear?"
i circle my arms in front of myself, fingertips 8 or 9 inches apart. "Big," i say. "i think she's pregnant."
the sales girl looks at me funny - i'm 56 years old myself - and asks, "have you tried the maternity department?"
"great idea! thanks. where is it?"
"we don't have one."

as patiently as i can muster, "just show me what you've got in size 20 - 24, please."

nearly an hour later i left with the only two pair in the entire store that might possibly fit and went to another store where i wandered around for at least an hour without ever seeing a sales person. the pants there were randomly placed in racks with jackets and shirts all over the place. i felt like a rat in a maze, a fish out of water...choose your own cliché. i imagined i was in a foreign land doomed to roam hopelessly, lost without any way to communicate with the natives (who were apparently invisible) for the rest of my life. at this point i was hoping the rest of my life would be a mercifully short time.

on my way out i passed the underwear department. AHA! maybe i won't have to leave empty handed after all.

30 minutes later i had achieved nothing - other than arrouse the suspicion of the other shoppers. all ladies, of course. i finally got up the nerve to ask one of them where i might find size 20 or so underpants, quickly adding "for my mom."
she was sorting through a rack of really large bras (my favorite) which were clearly too big for her and i was hopeful that she was shopping for her mother, too, and would take pity on me. maybe even offer to be my guide through the jungle of womens' undergarments.

"they don't sell panties that large in a store like this. you'll have to go to a Lane Brant."
"oh. where do i find Elaine?"
"no, Lane Bryant. it's a store that caters to plus size women. there's one in valley view shopping mall."
"thank you ma'am."

i left not only empty handed, but with dread in my gut. Valley View Mall...my worst nightmare - the suburban mall.

to be continued... (probably 2 or 3 installments to go, but it does have a happy ending. well, sort of.)

p.s. you may be wondering why i don't take mom with me to try stuff on. well, i'll tell you why. the last time my daughter, the lovely josephine, and her mom took her shopping it was for shirts. they were mortified when mom came out of the dressing room with no shirt on to look for something else to try on.
and that was 3 years ago! her condition has "progressed" immeasurably since then and besides...i'm talking pants and underpants here, not shirts.
sonny boy ain't goin' there. capiche?