And…after that blatant nod to Star Wars, this is probably where my male guests should check their fantasy football stats or something.
I am not a shopper. I procure groceries and other household items, but retail therapy? Eh, unless it’s a shiny piece of tastiness from Apple, I’m pretty meh about the whole thing. Clothes shopping is really at the bottom of my Love To Do list. When you’re as tall as I am, with a wingspan as wide as mine, trying to find clothes that don’t stop short of ankles and wrists is akin to hunting the Abominable Snowman. You catch a glimpse, your hopes raise, but yet again you’re outta luck. And money. And ego.
So that’s a long-winded way of saying I hadn’t taken The Ladies out for new overpriced lacy things in an embarrassingly long time. In fact, I was really only a couple threads from an inadvertent mastectomy. One big sneeze and I would have entertained my new coworkers with gyrations and exclamations the likes of which they’d never before seen. It’s hard enough being known as Tom’s Wife (because there are no fewer than three Jens in my department alone)…oh, yeah, I’m working at Tom’s office…but add in a wardrobe malfunction of that magnitude and it’s talking points for the winter. I would find gifts of gauze and duct tape on my desk for years to come, I’m sure.
But today, I had a few minutes and stopped at a department store on the way home from work. In honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month they were doing free sizings. Hooray! I got to learn just how outta whack the slings have been! And here is where I have to ask: is every single bra sizer on the planet a thickly-accented Russian woman in her sixties? Is it a pre-requisite for the job? Or is it just something people have come to expect, like Chicago hospitals being run by efficient Filipino nurses? ER never did get that right.
So I come with a plea, on behalf of all women in my situation. Manufacturers are making these items bigger and bigger (really, when the boys could use them as water balloon launchers and would love nothing more, they’re just a tad too big) and forgetting about the women who…how to say delicately?…wear sizes closer to super-ball than water balloon. I found exactly two items in my size and preferred design and rack upon rack (pun intended) of C/D/DD. I don’t own enough socks to stuff something that large.
On the bright side, I do now own a couple of new pretty lacy things, and can again put that off for a few years.
Or until I discover the boys launching super-balls at each other.
You could use mine as a hat. 🙂
Here, the fitters are all either Jamaican or Indian. Fewer Russians made it south.
I have the opposite problem. Petite with a large cup size. The manufacturers assume that anyone my size wouldn’t need to have a cup larger than a D. Then there are the bras that are theoritically the right size, but must have been fitted on a blow-up doll or something. Wrong shape, wrong location. Sorry guys, but they don’t literally hit my chin, LOL!
Hmm, I was intimidated by the perky (pun intended) 20 somethings who fitted me post-baby at Victoria’s Secret. They did a good job, but they didn’t seem to grasp the concept of a bra HOLDING THINGS UP in addition to looking pretty. Someone who had experienced both babies and gravity would have been an improvement. But I don’t need to do it again for at least ten years. Right? They’ll last that long? (I hate to shop too, and Eddie Bauer online is the only place I ever bother anymore.)
Oh, thank you for this laugh!!
I don’t shop for bras too often because it’s rare that I don’t have up to three boys with me. (I’m surprised I’m not still wearing nursing bras, and my youngest just turned five.)
I find the whole experience disheartening, too. Somehow, no matter what bra I put on, I’m not magically transformed into a Victoria Secret model. 😛
Yes they are all russian crazy ladies. And my problem is the girls have fluctuated so much with every birth I can hardly keep up. But you may have just inspired me to get out and give it a go today! 🙂
20-somethings at our Victoria’s Secret, too, and no accents in range, but my own. I broke down and bought something with enough padding to proect a hockey player (gah!) just so I could look anything other than lopsided, since E is still nursing at night, and only did that because my nursing bras were in need of some serious medical attention of their own, and buying new nursing bras when your nurser is *three* sounded a trifle ludicrous. Bust buttons on a cute little blouse last week in the new armor though, which was frustrating.
My big fitting coup of the, oh, millenium, was discovering that one can buy pants that are a size smaller in the waist than in the hips, namely the Blakely and Bremerton pants at Eddie Bauer. Dress slacks that fit off the rack were a miracle I *never* thought I’d encounter!