Men don't shop; we buy. We take all the time we could have wasted trying on clothes and comparing things and agonizing over brand labels, and we watch televised sports instead. Today is my triannual cotton undergarment replacement day. Thirty pairs of socks, thirty pairs of bloomers: 15 minutes - max. Actually, since each bag had a bonus pair, I wound up with 35 pair of briefs, instead of 30. See? I didn't "shop", but I saved 16.7% without trying. Had the self-service register taken Susan B. Anthony dollars it would have been the best trip ever.
Yeah, but jeeze-louise Tom, thirty pair of underwear, isn't that a bit, well... No, it's not, and I'll tell you why. On the long list of necessary but mundane things I don't like to think about, underwear ranks pretty near the top, above pencil sharpeners, but below lawn care (don't get me started). So, in an effort to streamline such things and free my mind for deeper and more rewarding pursuits, I adopted Tom's Monthly Laundry System. [Don't abbreviate that or the National Board of Realtors will swoop down and "Cease and Desist" your ears off, just after they try to convince you that their SUVs somehow get better mileage than everyone else's, Big Gold is still in fashion, and that "Perception is Reality"*, especially if you have a corner lot.]
It's all about effeciency and economy of scale. If you have thirty pairs of underwear, you only have to do laundry once a month. If you never turn your socks inside out, you never have to turn them rightside out. If all your socks match, you never have to sort them. Just reach into the drawer and grab two, any two, and you're set. Dress socks in a different drawer and only for dressy occasions please. Plus, if you do you shopping right before laundry day, just toss out the dirty whites, and you save at least one load of laundry every three years. Over the course of my adult life that's a savings of over 20 loads. Less wasted water, less detergent in our water system, and less electricity used. I expect Mother Nature to ring my doorbell any minute and give me a big ol' sloppy kiss. And I thought new socks were good for my self-esteem.
Life's a jungle. If you're going to get through it, you have to have a plan.
*This belief is at the foundation of why Realtors act they way they do. To quote J.R. "Bob" Dobbs, "Pull the Wool Over Your Own Eyes!"
5 comments:
Oh, my god. I just realized that this is nothing more than a pixelated savage monkey! Ahhhhhhhh! I get it. I get it. On another topic....do savage monkeys only drink Black Cherry Koolaid while doing their savage dance to savage music in a savage jungle, or do the savage monkeys gulp down the nectar of life without the peer pressure of group event? I asked Cecil, but he rudely told me to go straight to my dope (of which I have none!)
Ya know Rog (and I'm only saying this because I care), there are plenty of decaffinated brands on the market these days that are just as tasty as the real thing.
Heh!
Ya know, I did try one of the decaffinated brands, and it was extremely painful and the burnt meat smell was disconcerting. Now, I have this enormous circle and letter "R" on my leg. Thanks Tom, but I'm going to stick with caffinated beverages to avoid long-lasting dermitological damage.
Look on the bright side. Who else has a leg that's a registered trademark?
My test subject has the very same brand. Naturally, I was a bit reluctant to try a decaffinated brand, so I found a test subject, and held down their screaming, flailing body while I tried out the brand. I was amazed when the test subject immediately stopped screaming and went to sleep. After waking, I asked the subject, "I wonder if I should try the brand. How was it?" The reply: "Man, it was great! It was simply wonderful, a joyous experience that so overwhelmed me that I passed out!" Little did I know that my test subject was -evil-, and was -lying-. Sigh. It is -so- hard to find good, honest test subjects. It was a hard-learned lesson to discover that decaffinated brands are -bad-.
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