Yeah. Shopping is a snore.
Since I'm always buying clothes from the men's department I'm always using the men's fitting room. Nobody has ever said boo to me about it, or even looked at me funny. This is not because I pass. Maybe it's just the shops I use. Really, I've never had anyone do more than raise a brow about my shopping for clothes in the men's department and using their dressing rooms. Except when I was being fitted for a suit -- "What is this for?" says the sales-girl, appearantly thinking I'm in a play or going to some drag party. "Formal occassions," I replied, "I am a cross-dresser." She was a little stunned. The seamstress who actually measured for the alterations seemed a little hostile. I was indifferent, it's good for them. Fup, by Jim Dodge: "We don't want anything unusual," says the movie-theatre manager to grandpa, in reference to the pet duck sitting on grandpa's head. "Well that just about narrows the s*** out of your life, doesn't it!" grandpa yells back. Being the duck in somebody's movie theatre is my little gift to them. I wish I still felt like giving it.
Your tale of woe concerning your mom and men's sizes reminds me of the recent slipper fiasco wherin my father decided to order me a custom-made pair of slippers from a maker local to him, and asked me what size I took. I told him, and warned him that I was talking about a men's size. This was all too complicated for my dad, so he had me email the slipper company with my size. This created terrible confusion, for although the slippers are all the same design and the women's ones look the same as the men's, the men's sizing chart bottoms out one size above mine. I tried to guess the equivalent women's size, and was of course wrong since I've not worn women's clothing for fourteen years. For some insane reason, the company was able to tell me that the women's size I gave was not equivalent to the men's size I gave, (Error! Error! Does not compute!) but were unable to extrapolate what that size ought to be. After all this exchange of weird information, they sent me a women's size, one number smaller than the men's size number I'd given them. I ended up smearing my feet with paint and stepping on peices of paper and sending those into the company with the returned slippers. The slippers they made from my footprints fit perfectly, and are actually so nice they're worth the hassle. I remain rather mazed that "men's size six and a half" coupled with "for my daughter," can create such a huge communication problem about such a simple thing.
