Where Have All My Skivvies Gone?

[mrissa]

(Long time passing?)

I am no longer super.

I have had a Critical Underwear Failure. You know that thing that happens with socks and underwear, where one pair wears out, and then another, and pretty soon you get nervous when you open the drawer, because surely it can't be time to do laundry again, the rest of your clothes are still fine. I've thrown out two pairs of panties this week, and the latest casualty was my bright blue superhero drawers.

They were not grown-up Underroos. They had nothing overtly super about them. But they were superhero blue. C'mon, you know the blue. Super. I sold an essay about them and Underroos, about how different it was for girls to grow up with secret superhero identities on our skivvies instead of corsetry or girdles. They more than paid for themselves. They were good. The bra gave out ages ago, going the way of all flesh and also all flesh-supporting undergarments, so really I've only been slightly super for awhile. It just wasn't the same. After the bra went, I never sang myself a little super fanfare while getting dressed. Still, they were mine, and they were superhero blue, and some days you're just not feeling super, and a little help no one else can see is not unwelcome.

(I realize that this sentiment is not at all universal.)

I've ordered reinforcements, but I don't know when the cavalry will arrive or how good it will be, and anyway, none of it is the right blue. I will be content, satisfied, if I can go back to doing laundry at sensible intervals. And I know, objects are just objects, clothes are just clothes.

Still. Sigh. Sic transit etc.

Comments

[ellameena.livejournal.com]

I've decided that underwear and sock shopping is really a monthly expense. I am very hard on my skivvies. Your post made me remember a new bra I bought recently, and wonder why I haven't seen it in a while. Hmmm...

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Question the dog closely.

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

Oh, I mourn favorite pairs of skivvies that passed away lo, decades ago. There was this one stretchy green bra.... *sigh*

[kalmn.livejournal.com]

some days you need your lucky rocketship underpants.

i want to start a business selling lucky rocketship underpants. i think i could sell as a dealer at a convention and make millions.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I would settle for stars, even. Or galaxies.

[pameladean]

Or flowers that BLOODY LOOK LIKE flowers. I want Portmeirion underwear. I am so tired of squinting at their paltry designs, their little dibs and dabs, thinking, is that a tulip? Are those daisies? Did they give a solitary undersized rat's ass when they put those stupid daubs on this piece of clothing?

Portmeirion underwear.

Some galaxies would be good too.

P.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I have a bra with Definitely Daisies on it, but I know what you mean. I had the standard blotchy florals when I was 14 and am over them.

p.s.

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

"sic transit gloria undies?"

Re: p.s.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

*GROAN* I should have thought of that.

[jmeadows.livejournal.com]

I get sad when my undies and socks die, too. I like them! I wouldn't have bought them otherwise.

Of course, all my socks look like socks you'd find on a 9-year-old, but whatever...

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I used to wear 9-year-old-style socks, but mostly I don't now because mostly I wear SmartWool now. It's less stylin' than my cactus socks but also makes my feet very happy.

[buymeaclue.livejournal.com]

SmartWool = love.

[ellameena.livejournal.com]

Oh, I'm very interested in socks. Tell me about Smartwool!

[bradipo.livejournal.com]

SmartWool is a brand name for a very soft, non-scratchy wool. It comes from merino sheep. (You can buy non-SmartWool branded merino fleece or yarn if you want to spin or knit your own fabulously soft and wonderfully warm woolens.)

It's great stuff, and not just for socks.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I will note that non-SmartWool merinos have been much itchier for me than SmartWool itself, though I'm not sure why that is.

[pameladean]

SmartWool isn't just merino. They have an upper limit for the diameter of the fibers they use, alleging that coarser fibers cause itching. They also go on endlessly about some high-tech process or other that makes their wool non-itchy and washable, but their website
is so annoying that I didn't wait around to see if they explained it. They may not.

P.

Fiber geekiness

[lynnal.livejournal.com]

It is less scratchy because it goes through a chemical process to remove the scales from the wool fibers. The main purpose is to prevent the wool from felting. With normal wool, the scales on the fibers open up in warm humid conditions, and close in cold conditions. When this happens in the wash the fibers get locked together = felting.

Merinos have the finest diameter fibers of any sheep breed, which tends to make the wool softer. They have the normal number of scales/fiber. Some breeds have less, so even though the wool diameter is larger ("coarser fibers"), the wool is smoother and less likely to felt.

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

Soft, non-scratchy and machine-washable.

Not cheap however. If you're looking for some, I was just in REI nad they had the whole range, so it's probably also on their website (rei.com).

[stillsostrange.livejournal.com]

I've never had super blue, but I had a bra in a very whimsical shade of violet-blue that I miss. I found it at Hot Topic, of all places. I think it was the only non-scary undergarment I've ever seen there.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

That's part of the problem: when I tried to go underwear shopping in January, it was, well, January. As in "retail period leading up to Valentine's Day." Which meant that 90% of the underwear at Dayton's had feathers on it. Now, if people enjoy having feathered skivvies, that's all great for them, but "feathers" and "easy-care" don't really go well together, you know? There was other scariness, but really it was the feathers that got me: why feathers? Why so overwhelmingly many feathers?

(scary speculation deleted due to excess scariness)

[stillsostrange.livejournal.com]

I haven't seen feathers at VS yet, I don't think. Usually just rhinestones and little keyhole cutouts in the back. I'm of the school of thought that says to throw out underpants when they get holes in them.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I've seen their cutout swimsuits to tan little hearts on your butt. Where by "your" I mean "neither your nor my," since neither of us has that much melanin. And having heart-shaped sunburn-blisters on one's butt is just not that sexy, I shouldn't think.

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

I think I live in a world one foot left from the one where tanned hearts on one's butt are attractive.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yah. Well, me, too. But still more so than sunburn-blister hearts.

I know some people out there must be really, really into tan lines, but they have happily (but not at all mysteriously) never intersected with people who are really, really into me.

[timprov.livejournal.com]

Well, but if you burn really bad, then once it heals you end up with a freckle heart there forever.

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

...

*shudder*

[joelrosenberg.livejournal.com]

Or, conceivably, a heart-shaped melanoma. Not, probably, going to be the hot new thing in designer body modifications outside of a Varley story.

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

When mundanes want to inspire thoughts of flight, they think "bird" rather than "superman." Silly people. And when they want to inspire warm thoughts, they think "down." This is not *generally* insane, for Minnesota January...only for the particular case of bra design.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yah, and I think they should remember that it's down lining that works, or we'd all be wearing feathered parkas!

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

I used to live with a washing machine that ate undies. It didn't eat them the way dryers notoriously eat socks (one at a time, swallowing them whole). It nibbled little half-cm round bites. Sometimes it went for silk shirts, too. Washing stuff in those little nylon bags helped some.

Bergelene has midweight thermal underwear in super blue. Around here, EMS has a few remaining pieces, in whatever sizes happen to be left, for half price. I really need my superpowers in freezing rain.

[dsgood.livejournal.com]

If Dan has aleph-one socks, how many pairs of socks does Dan have?

None -- they don't match.

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

Having read this, I realize that all the problems in my life are due to a lack of superhero underoos. Although I think I need Batman ones and not Superman ones, to stave off the danger of someone dropping kryptonite down one's shirt...

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Reliance upon technology is one advantage to Batman-nature, yes. The question is, what gadgets come built into Batman undies?

Umm. No one should feel obliged to answer that.

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

...

*spluttersnerk*

[sksperry.livejournal.com]

I must admit, this is the most entertaining post on undies that I've ever read. Of course, it's the only post on undies that I've ever read. Now I know what I've been missing. Thanks, Marissa. *g*

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I feel sure I must have been more entertaining about undies elsewhere at some point, but I really don't feel like looking. Thanks, though.