big

Yesterday, I went to a department store and bought some underwear-in-a-package, which, as the moral of the story will show, is not my favorite way to buy underwear, because of the mystery sizing issue, as detailed below.

I needed white underwear because when you wear white scrub bottoms, well, you need white underwear, trust me on this one.

Any way, not sure of the sizes, and unable to tear through the packaging to see, I bought a size 6, which seemed reasonable to me, because it was half way in between size 4 and size 8, and I'm a "middle-of-the-road" kind of person. When I finally got home and opened the package,I realized they didn't just look "a bit big," they looked huge. But I was determined, so I decided to try the old "hot water wash and dry" trick.

So I dumped them in the washer and dryer, and then...

Dammit. They were still too big.

Not so big that I can't wear them, exactly, because I do think they shrunk somewhat, but they still don't fit at all well. If this was a weight loss commercial, I would have just lost about 6 inches off my hips, as evidenced by me, proudly pulling away the elastic waistband said distance from my tummy.

Then I looked at the packaging, and realized that according to their measurements, I should have purchased a size 4, or something. Maybe I should have realized that not being able to fit into size 2 jeans "because they are too big" anymore and having to rebuy all my pants in size zeros last year should have clued me into the fact that size 6 underwear were going to be too big, but how the hell was I supposed to know?! Commercial sizing, I curse thee!

This is so very, deeply annoying. Now I have too-big-underwear that I can't exchange in good conscience, because I've already washed them and dried them and trial worn them. And underpants are not something you can exactly give away, are they? I mean, even supposing you could find someone that would want ugly white underpants, what are you going to say to someone to seal the deal? "Hey, your ass looks fatter than mine, want some new underpants?!"

So, I don't know. I'm hoping if maybe I just keep washing the underwear and drying them on high heat, they'll shrink to more befitting proportions, but I suppose I'm goign to have to shell out another 7 bucks for a size that actually fits.

This kind of thing is why modern life is just ridiculous, and it's times like this when I really think we're all doomed to a life of one absurd situation after another.