Sunday, June 28, 2009

Demoralization

Today I participated in an annual ritual that is perhaps among the most hated activities in my life: swimsuit shopping. My mother is an excellent seamstress, and yet even she struggles to craft the perfect suit. With this knowledge in mind, I find it peculiar that the modern American fashion industry has chosen to populate the market with what can only be described as village idiots.

My angst has less to do with my physique than it has to do with the impossibility of adequately addressing simple things like torso length. Note to swimsuit designers: it is not beyond the realm of possibility that a women would be both tall and thick. I found a plethora of suits that were wider in the hips & bust - and yet the length of the torso either left my breasts or my bum utterly exposed. I find this unacceptable for family vacations. Additionally - those of us who have surpassed the median American height of 5'5" are not all plagued by eating disorders. I found a number (albeit a lesser number than the thick suits) of long-torso suits, each of which may have nicely covered a thigh, but little more.

I also think it's inconceivably rude that there is precious little variation in age-appropriate swimsuits. The aforementioned idiots must have failed to observe that there are several stages of life, stylistically speaking, between puberty and menopause. Tours through Old Navy, Target, Kohls, Macy's, among other venues failed to reveal any concept of transitional ages. I can only assume that the designers, in their infinite wisdom, have learned that by the end of the shopping experience a woman will be worn into utter haggard, premature aging and thusly identify with the matronly suits that are slight degrees removed from a floral burqa.

Anyway, stay tuned for another post on how I was re-moralized by a fantastic week! Until soon lovely readers...

Thursday, June 25, 2009

Weird World

As I type this, I'm sitting on my parents' couch watching Cathy's sweet dog Sophie cure her insomnia. She was nicely snuggled up beside me, when a pesky bug started buzzing around the room. I'm a little amazed that she woke up at all, but the puppy seemed genuinely agitated at the resonant intrusion into her Land of Nod. So, up she pops and promptly finds the offender on the ground. It's a strange brown bug, about the size of a peanut. She stalked it for a second, sniffing and huffing, curious every time it moved. Well, she darn near messed her doggy drawers when the bug took off in flight, but bravely recouped and attempted to catch it mid-air. This must have caused a mess in the little buggy drawers, because the critter proceeded to fly right into the ceiling fan and get knocked back down into Sophie territory. I'm now sitting here watching the two of them duel unto the death, presumably the insect's. Sophie picks it up and then freaks out at the movement and drops it. She swats it with her paw and apparently gets tickled and lets it go. Now she's figured out that she can literally toss the thing with her mouth which wouldn't bother me if I wasn't afraid it would land on me. Anyway, here's to unexpected entertainment.