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{ Monday, September 06, 2004 }

Retail Therapy?

 
I have gotten up out of bed a couple times in the last few days... let me tell you what happens when I leave the bed.

It started with trying to get dressed. I decided (probably not unlike my great grandmother did) that the first step back toward sanity was getting dresed. The next step being not climbing immediately back into the bed.

We had some false starts.

I only having one comfortable bra to wear, and it needs to be washed. Probably if I left it unattended long enough, it would walk itself into the washing machine at this point. Given that I am not really a bra-wearing kind of girl, it's probably not a shock. But if you're trying to get dressed to promote good mental health, and you're me, you might decide this should even include wearing the correct foundation garments.

The rest don't fit right or else they've suffered some sort of mechanical problem due to old age. Like rust. Or dry rot. I have one that I swear is disintegrating. Underwires break. Underwires migrate. Clasps bend. Straps break. Fabric stretches. These things happen when you buy cheap bras and ask them to last you six or eight or twelve years.

Yes, twelve years. My "training bra" still fits. Shut up.

I decided to be proactive about this. Not by putting the bra into the washing machine. I decided what I needed to do was aquire at least one other bra I wanted to wear. The first step was getting back into the bed (see how that's better than doing laundry?) and scouring the internet to learn about bra sizes.

So, I learned and I measured. Using a towel that was already in the bed and a ruler that was in the drawer of the nightstand, I took the relevant measurements.

If you're interested... my chest is 30.5 inches around. When all was said and done, the experts told me that my bra size was approximately a 32 C or D. I measured again. Did the math again. Grabbed a mirror and looked at my boobs. One more time with the math. Triple checked those measurements. Cross referenced a couple other pages.

Okay, so 32C or D. I thought I was a 34B. The experts told me those two sizes were the same amount of volume. I even found a page that said that my problem with my bras (they were riding up) was often caused by needing a lower number.

I was so shocked by all this talk of D cups and my boobs that I got up from the bed and drove 3/4 of a mile down the street to my nearest Target location.

For everyone who is not a 34B, I'm sure it will come as no shock to you that I didn't find any bras in those sizes to try on at Target. They had lots of 34Bs, and they looked like they'd fit, but I didn't try any on.

That was Saturday night. I got food and came home and climbed back in the bed with my clothes on.

This afternoon, I got out of my bed and took a shower. Because I smelled BAD. (What also needs to happen? Changing these sheets. I am really trying to convince myself that after I finish this, I am going to get all the debris out of the bed and change the damned sheets.) Then I got back into the bed. At some point, I had to go to the bathroom, and I saw in the mirror that I am having a great hair day.

I had a flicker of motivation. Not one to waste good hair, I put on make-up. And clothes (a halter top, no bra needed). I got back in bed for another hour. I idly looked up the location of the nearest Victoria Secret. They aren't known for their size selection, but I think medium-ishly small is actually the only range they carry.

And then I got into my car and I went to the mall.

I have an ear infection right now. I mean, I always have an ear infection, but right now my stupid left middle ear is pretty bad off. The crowd at the mall was fun to hear... as I walked, the sound would fade in and out of static. By the way, the static hurts. Depending on volume, there's barely uncomfortable right on up to "makes me want to cry and forces me to cover that ear".

I found Express before I found bras. Express is my pants store. Express is not a good store for my ears. Every girl has one store where she knows the pants are going to fit her well. Mine's Express. And Express has a whole line of pants out that I just NEED. Last season, I wasn't crazy about the pants. This season, I am.

They're beautiful and perfect, but seemed too heavy for Arizona. Maybe in the "winter", they will seem more practical? They're also $88/pair. I have time to save up. I really hope that this line, which they really seem to be pushing, takes. I'm a little scared it won't, because they only seemed to have sizes zero to four. Which, fine by me, I'm a zero (short), except I don't think they're going to move a lot of merchandise with that sizing.

I might not ever buy a couch because I spent all my money on pants.

I didn't buy any. I didn't even try them on because I knew once I did, I would HAVE to have them. I can look at them and know they are the pants for me. Plus, the music was making me a little bit dizzy with the way the bass makes the mucus in my ear jump around. It was painful and disorienting.

Right, so, bra shopping. I went on to Victoria's Secret, to learn about my boobs and what size they are, buoyed by the discovery of the great pants that I want to wear everywhere I go for the next ten years. The music there was only slightly better. It hurt me pretty consistently, but it did not make me want to cry.

I asked for help. Because that's what I do in stores. I let the professionals do the shopping. A measuring tape was brought out. They decided I was a 32B. I was given a drawer of bras and sent into the dressing room.

Never in my whole life have I had quad boob. Now I can cross that off my list of Life Experiences. I stood in front of the mirror, and my boobs spilled out of the bra. Amazing. If my cell phone'd had more battery, I would have called someone to tell them about it as it was happening.

I tried a few more on just to see. Same problem. The salesgirl came to check on me. I told her I had the wrong size. She asked what was wrong. I opened the door and showed her.

What? I was in a damned bra store! I was wearing a bra! Just like all the plastic torsos out there, only with less (ill-fitted) cleavage and much better hair. I don't know why she looked so shocked that I just showed her. She measures boobs. She sells bras. I thought it was perfectly acceptable to just show her the problem so she could figure out how best to fix it.

What? When I bought my first bra, that's what we did. The lady measured me, she chatted with my mom and the other saleswoman right there in the middle of the store about my measurements and my first bra and after I put it on (Mom was in the dressing room with me), I walked out there and showed the ladies so they could confirm that it fit right.

I clearly have no couth. That's what I learned from her face. I already knew myself to be lacking in modesty.

She came back with a drawer of 34As and 34Bs. I tried them on. This time I did not show her the results when she came to check on me. Instead I just told her that the problem was now that I didn't completely fill out some of B the cups and the whole mess was riding up (my original complaints with the 34Bs) and the A's were too small.

I'm not sure why she decided that I needed something bigger around, anyway. The problem was clearly not diameter. The problem was volume. I tried to explain this, but she's the professional. She asked me to just try them, so I did.

There was dithering. I guess they don't normally get so many complaints. I realize that this is a store that really mostly sells underwear to men for women. I also understand that many women aren't comfortable talking about their boobs or their underwear. I further understand that many women don't approach shopping the same way I do (which is that I think my job is to try things on and the salespeople's job is the actual finding of things for me to try on).

The dithering bothered me though. I was not being unreasonable. This isn't like I walked into Target and the man in housewares to help me to find me a bra that fit. This place primarily sells underwear to skinny people.

She came back with some other things for me to try on, apparently thinking that my discomfort was not actually related to the bras not fitting, but rather to underwires and padding. I tried those on too. Didn't work out for me.

I got frustrated and left the store.

I cut through the food court on the way out, and somehow the droves of people and the noise and the smells (why is the Body Shop next to the food court? Who thought that was a good idea? Do you know what that's like to a person's nose?) got to me. I threw up. In a trashcan. One of those ones in the box with the flap. It was lovely.

Then I started crying a little bit, because I'd just thrown up in the middle of the food court with my head in a box after that whole experience with the bras. And I was barely emotionally fit to leave the house in the first place. And the puking noises really made my ear hurt a lot.

I grabbed some napkins from a table and cleaned myself off while I busted ass to get back to my bed. Retail therapy is not for me.

About One Year Ago: The vicodin bottle wrote this post for me, I think.

About Two Years Ago: Everyone else's favorite story. The one where I accidentally give the poor old landlord a show.

posted by mary ann 6:18 PM


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