Prêt-à-Porter

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Current Mood:  tired

My chief fashion consultant took me shopping the other day because I needed a few new work shirts.  By “work shirts,” I mean button down Oxford style shirts, a.k.a. “consultant wear.”  In my consulting days, the rule was always to dress one level more formally than your client.  So I was basically always dressed in these shirts.  Even though I’m in a stable cube farm these days, and could easily get away with jeans every day, I’ve never given up my habit.  It’s become like a uniform to me… I never wear street clothes to work, and I never wear work clothes other than to work.  I think it helps me mentally keep those two worlds and sets of responsibilities separate.  Anyway, because I view them strictly as “work clothes,” I don’t worry too much about them.  Simple solid colors.

You see, I have exactly five of them in my rotation.  The means I have a Monday shirt, and a Tuesday shirt, and so on.  So if you only ever meet with me on Tuesdays, you might think I wear the same shirt all the time.  I realize that even introducing one more, a sixth shirt, would skew that whole cycle so this Monday’s shirt will be next Tuesday’s shirt, and the following Wednesday’s shirt, etc.  But again, this isn’t a fashion show.  It’s just my work clothes.  I don’t care.  And in fact, some of these shirts are 12 years old.  I’m not kidding.  As they’re getting a little frayed, I figured it was finally time to get some more.  The last time I bought shirts was like 2005, and they were around $60 which I thought was expensive.  Do you know that she helped talk me into buying a pair of shirts for $250!  I know there’s been some inflation, but what just happened?  I guess with the amount of use I appear to get out of my work shirts, it’ll average out to like $0.02 per use, but still, that was a hard pill to swallow.  And they’re both purple.  This is the kind of power some people have over me.  It’s mystifying.

I now have six viable shirts in the rotation, which means my five-day cycle is broken.  It’ll be anarchy, but I think I can handle it.  In response, I think I need to finally relent with my consultant wear and just do casual Fridays like a normal person.  The thing is, Converse and tattoos at work?  It seems like a CLM (career limiting move).  Subconsciously, I think the constant consultant wear gives off a vibe of heightened professionalism to my coworkers and management.  Dress the part and all that.  What happens if they see me in cuffed jeans?  The spell could be broken for them, even just subconsciously.  Thoughts?

In other news, I’m almost done with Stephen King’s latest short story comp Just After Sunset.  Notice these pages are flying by, unlike the Mozipedia.  It’s an interesting and I’d almost say more “mature” collection.  Highlights so far include “The Things They Left Behind” which is a really moving story around 9/11, and the profoundly disturbing “N.” which deals with OCD and slipping into madness.  Maybe it just hit too close to home, but I found myself having to put it down a couple of times.  Pretty powerful stuff.

Alright, holy hell, I write about some boring things sometimes.  I’m knocking it off right now.  Goodnight!

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